Suggestions for Innis and Gunn clone

[MSK_Chess]

Great ones, a thousand salutations! May your beers flow as readily as rain upon the Scottish mountains!

Having read not a little about various attempts to clone the fabled 'Innis and Gunn original oak aged', there are certain realities and problems which present themselves. Let me begin by stating that according to Innis and Gunn the beer contains Pale malt, caramel malt and raw wheat. They also use Super Styrian hops (Aurora). The beer is also aged in oak bourbon barrels and has an ABV of 6.7% Sooooo what to say?

I have seen many recipes that use roasted barley and chocolate malt??? I suspect in an attempt to get the darkish colouring. I doubt very much if Innis and Gunn use roasted barley. The colouring is probably a direct consequence of caramel malt and extracting some of the wort and boiling it down to attempt to get some kind of caramelization. This in itself presents some problems. How are we meant to account for removing a gallon or so of pre boiled wort and reducing it to about a litre or a quart? This affects everything from original gravity to our hop schedule.

Lets talk a little about the malts. Innis and Gunn use Optic malt which is a Spring grown UK pale malt. It is reputed to add a slight biscuit flavour and I suspect that any pale malt would do though. Caramel malt in the UK comes in three varieties, light, medium and dark. I suspect that its probably medium which corresponds to US crystal 60 maybe? Raw wheat I am not even sure what that is? I suspect that its unmalted wheat? and corresponds to what we call Torrefied wheat which is an unmalted adjunct thats been squashed to give the malt enzymes access to the proteins and starches. That being the case perhaps a little protein rest may be beneficial in the mash profile?

Innis and gunn is matured in American bourbon oak barrels for a stated 77 days. They also have their own kind of oak chip percolator. Anyone who has tasted it knows that this imparts very pleasant oak and vanilla flavours. Personally I have never used oak chips or oak blocks although I used vanilla and bourbon in a rather delectable Vanilla bourbon stout. I cannot say to what extent oak chips soaked in bourbon will infuse vanilla flavours to a 5 gallon batch of homebrew but I have serious reservations that it will be as much as is present in a commercial bottle of Innis and Gunn oak aged original. We probably need to add some vanilla pods soaked in bourbon as well. Last time I used some old Kentucky bourbon and its was fine if a little rough

Lastly the hops, they use Super Styrian (Aurora) which is a hybrid between Northern brewer (Germany) and an unknown wild hop. Its has an AA content on average of about 10%. I suspect an IBU of somewhere in the region of 20'ish might be appropriate for the clone? emphasis on malt.

If anyone can help to account for drawing off about a gallon of pre-boiled wort and reducing this to about a litre/quart in terms of OG and hop schedule this would be really helpful. Also any ideas on ratios of pale, caramel, torrefied wheat or any suggestions on the use of bourbon soaked oak chips also most helpful - regards Robbie

 

[DrFuggles]

My suggestion with Innis & Gunn? Pour it down the sink and run away.

I don't know how anyone can drink thus stuff. It tastes like the dictionary definition of diacetyl. I've had it twice (bought by a friend) and it got poured away both times. Hands down the worst beer I ever tasted.

Ymmv

 

[MSK_Chess]

My suggestion with Innis & Gunn? Pour it down the sink and run away.

I don't know how anyone can drink thus stuff. It tastes like the dictionary definition of diacetyl. I've had it twice (bought by a friend) and it got poured away both times. Hands down the worst beer I ever tasted.

Ymmv

Perhaps foregoing a diacetyl rest to give it that authentic cooked corn flavour overpowering the subtle hints of vanilla and oak might do the trick so beloved by its many aficionados.

Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[RevKev]

To elaborate on the very helpful post above, I can't help with the clone as I have not had the beer but hopefully some others on HBT can, also find that post slightly snobbish and not what HBT is about

If you use oak chips nailing down a time period for a result that can be reproduced will be hard. The surface area (SA) varies so wildly that you will have to do a lot of tasting as to not over oak your beer, with the lower ABV it may not age out as you wish, and will impart with time more harsh tannins.

Oak cubes have the benefit of being uniform and having the same SA and imparting the oak more gently one can say. That being said it is also a drawback as it takes time to get a good oak flavour that imparts all the subtleness of the vanillins, tannins and other main compounds. But that is the key.. time. To get those elaborate flavours from oak cubes it won't be 77 days. I'd highly recommend adding vanilla beans soaked in bourbon for sanitization to get a big vanilla flavour, subtlety is what you'd get from oak IMO. But you also would likely need to lock down what toast of the wood you would want.

Fresh oak is high in lactones, which are sort of that typical woody aroma you would smell after cutting a piece of oak trim. With medium toasts these decrease and you will get some caramel and vanilla compounds that increase with toast until they don't and with dark roasted oaks these deplete. I would say stay away from heavy toasts for this beer,

The only oak I have used is on big beers (13%) with much bolder flavours and honestly haven't even had the I&G. I wish you luck

With any oak you can boil the chips or cubes in hot water to get out some of the harshness, tossing the waste water then soak the cubes for as little as a week to as long as you want in spirit. Add the oak to secondary and keep the spirit and wood tincture and add to taste at bottling.

 

[MSK_Chess]

To elaborate on the very helpful post above, I can't help with the clone as I have not had the beer but hopefully some others on HBT can, also find that post slightly snobbish and not what HBT is about

If you use oak chips nailing down a time period for a result that can be reproduced will be hard. The surface area (SA) varies so wildly that you will have to do a lot of tasting as to not over oak your beer, with the lower ABV it may not age out as you wish, and will impart with time more harsh tannins.

Oak cubes have the benefit of being uniform and having the same SA and imparting the oak more gently one can say. That being said it is also a drawback as it takes time to get a good oak flavour that imparts all the subtleness of the vanillins, tannins and other main compounds. But that is the key.. time. To get those elaborate flavours from oak cubes it won't be 77 days. I'd highly recommend adding vanilla beans soaked in bourbon for sanitization to get a big vanilla flavour, subtlety is what you'd get from oak IMO. But you also would likely need to lock down what toast of the wood you would want.

Fresh oak is high in lactones, which are sort of that typical woody aroma you would smell after cutting a piece of oak trim. With medium toasts these decrease and you will get some caramel and vanilla compounds that increase with toast until they don't and with dark roasted oaks these deplete. I would say stay away from heavy toasts for this beer,

The only oak I have used is on big beers (13%) with much bolder flavours and honestly haven't even had the I&G. I wish you luck

With any oak you can boil the chips or cubes in hot water to get out some of the harshness, tossing the waste water then soak the cubes for as little as a week to as long as you want in spirit. Add the oak to secondary and keep the spirit and wood tincture and add to taste at bottling.

Thanks so much and as I suspected. Vanilla pods are a must. Do we really get Vanilla from oak aged bourbon casks? Amazing!

I have read that people boil or steam the oak chips to remove some of the harsher flavours, others state that its not a problem that these fade with time. It seems to be that we should aim for an overt oak flavour and then let it mellow with time. I have found that there is a widely varying degree of consensus about how long to put chips/cubes in our beers, some stating that the flavours are gone within a few days others that it takes weeks to infuse all the subtleties. Naturally there will be difference because of density between oak chips and oak cubes as you state. Perhaps use chips if we are in a hurry and cubes if we do not mind the wait.

Hmm toast of wood, hadn't thought about that. What do they come in, like slightly toasted, medium and charred? Possibly go medium to see what it imparts.