Two-Hearted Ale for the first time

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heywolfie1015

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I am in Michigan visiting my in-laws. My father-in-law is a big fan of hoppy beers, but doesn't know much about different breweries. So, the last time he was out to visit us, I told him he might like Two-Hearted, based on comments from this board.

Cut to half a year later and he has a six pack waiting for me when we came in yesterday. I'm not even a big IPA guy, but this beer is fantastic. Perfect hop flavor and bitterness, and a great balance. People in Bell's distribution range are extremely lucky.
 
Two Hearted Ale was one of the beers that inspired me to start learning about home brewing. :mug:
 
I brewed a Two Hearted Ale clone recipe from the last edition of Zymurgy and it came out fantastic. They only thing I would do different is to transfer to secondary and cold crash before bottling or kegging. Maybe I wasn't that careful with the auto-siphon but I have a lot of hop floaties from dry hopping in the primary.

bells.jpg
 
It's one of my favorite beers. Beers in the style seem to get more and more hop heavy / unbalanced, Two Hearted has plenty of bitterness, flavor and aroma and the body balances it out very well.
 
I brewed up eschatz's clone of it last night (in the Recipes section), and I hit way higher efficiency than I'm used to. No idea where that extra 5% came from, but I'm just going to end up with a maltier version I guess. I would rather have closer to the original, but oh well.
 
Ranger9913 said:
I brewed a Two Hearted Ale clone recipe from the last edition of Zymurgy and it came out fantastic. They only thing I would do different is to transfer to secondary and cold crash before bottling or kegging. Maybe I wasn't that careful with the auto-siphon but I have a lot of hop floaties from dry hopping in the primary.
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Thanks for posting this. My version of the Two Hearted recipe was quite a bit different than the one you posted. Now I need to brew the Zymurgy recipe to see if it's any better than the one I've been making.
 
Ive been making it for a year or two now. It is hands down my favorite IPA. If you havent tried, harvest yeast out of a 6er of it, and make a starter. The difference between the wyeast 1056 or white labs 001 is night and day when you actually use their yeast.
 
I just had this beer while on vacation on the Outer Banks. I drank close to a case of this over the week I was there. I kept wanting to try some other beers, but this was so good, kept coming back to it. I will be brewing a clone as soon as I can.
 
KayaBrew said:
I've been brewing this recipe for about a year now: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f69/bells-two-hearted-ale-clone-close-they-come-91488/

It's one of the best IPA recipes out there.
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Has anyone brewed both the recipe from Zymurgy posted earlier in this thread and the recipe linked above and compared them?

I absolutely love two hearted, but can't get any Bell's out here. I've never tried brewing a clone of this, but I think it is going to be my next beer.

In particular I was surprised by the lack of late hop additions in the Zymurgy recipe - although there is a lot of dry hopping so maybe that makes up for it. It seems like the big difference in these two recipes is the late hop additions and the size of the dry hop.

Any thoughts on which recipe to go with? Thanks

JG
 
I brewed the one on this forum and it was very good. I didn't compare side-by-side to the real thing, but it was close. The one in the magazine was by some guys who work at the Bells LHBS. Granted, they probably have access to better information, but I don't know if they are listing a recipe any truer than what some other have done.

I would say either one would be close. Based on the color and flavor, I'd guess that the 40L is at least correct. And I know they use 100% Centennial hops.

A clean American ale yeast is a must, but for true accuracy, you can easily harvest Bells yeast from the bottle.
 
Two Hearted is my back up beer at most restaurants around here. But to those they don't distribute to do not despair as bell's is constructing a larger brewery so they can ramp up production. Hopefully that doesn't make it worse for me though.
 
Food for thought - I made a Vienna / Centennial SMASH a while back and I had no less than 4 different people comment on close it was to 2 Hearted. I didn't know at the time that Centennial was the hop in this beer so it wasn't intentional but I'll take a compliment like that anytime.
 
I only had 2 Hearted once and I was extremely disappointed. I'm going to have to try it again to see if the one I had was just a dud. I'm a fan of IPAs but just wasn't feeling this one. Feel like I'm left out of the party because I'd much rather drink Racer 5. Maybe from everything I heard my expectations were set too high.
 
Acoma said:
I only had 2 Hearted once and I was extremely disappointed. I'm going to have to try it again to see if the one I had was just a dud. I'm a fan of IPAs but just wasn't feeling this one. Feel like I'm left out of the party because I'd much rather drink Racer 5. Maybe from everything I heard my expectations were set too high.
Click to expand...

Maybe try it again. I have never heard anyone who likes IPAs at all dislike this beer.
 
I've had a couple of sixes that must have been out of date, but fresh, especially on draft, it is exceptional-and I've had Racer 5 on draft at Bear Republic

Sent from my iPod touch using HB Talk
 
pointerDixie214 said:
Maybe try it again. I have never heard anyone who likes IPAs at all dislike this beer.
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I’m a big fan of IPA’s but I do think two hearted taste a little soapy…I also like racer 5 but if you ever get to Ohio you got to try Columbus Brewing companys IPA. It is a little small for the style but it is one of the best I ever had.
 
It's definitely best fresh on tap, but fresh at any rate is important for a good IPA.

Soapy is not a term I would use to describe 2H.

I like it because it's not as dry as some others, and the hops are not too harsh, yet full flavored
 
Homercidal said:
It's definitely best fresh on tap, but fresh at any rate is important for a good IPA.

Soapy is not a term I would use to describe 2H.

I like it because it's not as dry as some others, and the hops are not too harsh, yet full flavored
Click to expand...

Yes, soapy is the term most used...see the second post in each of these and google the rest.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/centennial-hops-smell-sooo-good-47276/

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f14/soapy-flavor-my-ipa-178215/index2.html
 
I just had 2 Hearted for the first time this weekend while in Chicago, picked up a 6 and managed to save 2 to bring home with me. After seeing the clone recipes for it I am surprised at how balanced it is.
 
Homercidal said:
To each their own, I guess. We used to have a Chinese restaurant in town that served a vegetable mix that smelled like Cat Urine to me.

I don't equate Centennial with soap.
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I LOVE centennial hops and don't notice any soapy flavor, but this may be a genetic thing. Some people (including my wife) say the same about cilantro. It's basically been proven that there's a gene that makes cilantro taste like soap. I know it's not the same gene for centennial though, because I can't keep my wife from drinking my Two Hearted clone.
 
Homercidal said:
To each their own, I guess. We used to have a Chinese restaurant in town that served a vegetable mix that smelled like Cat Urine to me.

I don't equate Centennial with soap.
Click to expand...

Cat Urine
Click to expand...

That would be Simcoe...lol

I guess the question is, Do others think the vegetable soup taste like cat piss or is it just you? Soapy is a term often used to discribe centennial as noted in the links above.
 
vtron said:
I LOVE centennial hops and don't notice any soapy flavor, but this may be a genetic thing. Some people (including my wife) say the same about cilantro. It's basically been proven that there's a gene that makes cilantro taste like soap. I know it's not the same gene for centennial though, because I can't keep my wife from drinking my Two Hearted clone.
Click to expand...

I have used centennial lightly in a blonde and it not be soapy and very good. I think its when mixed with certian crystal malts or something...
 
I brewed an extract version gave to me by my LHBS and did a side by side taste test and it was pretty close. To this day it is still my best beer that I brewed. It may even become a staple brew in my house :mug:
 
Recipe looks interesting, but 65% efficiency???

I'd like to see the extract version not cut off :)
 

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