Recipe Feedback - Widmer Citra Blonde Clone Attempt

I'm trying to clone Widmer's Citra Blonde Summer Ale for the SWMBO. This will be my first attempt at creating my own clone recipe and I used beersmith to help me. I went to Widmers website and it says they use 2-row and Caramel 10L for the grist and Alchemy hops (which from what i read is a mix of Millenium and Warrior) and Citra. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated as we are planning on brewing this tomorrow.

10 Gallon Batch

OG 1.044
FG 1.011
IBUs 20.8
4.2 SRM

Grains:

15lb US 2-Row (88.2%)
2lb Caramel/Crystal 10L (11.8%)

Hops:

.4 oz Millenium @ 60 minutes
.4 oz Warrior @ 60 minutes
1.0 oz Citra Dry Hop (5 days)

2 Packets of Safale 05

Thanks everyone and happy brewing! :beard:

Well, I brewed this up on Friday, April 25th, and will report back on how it tastes in 4 to 6 weeks. Hopefully I got somewhat close!

I am going to make my own clone next week. I have pretty much what you have, but the Widmer site says pale malt and 10L, so I'll be using that. I also will be using some citra as a flavor and an aroma at 15 and 5 (or flameout), in addition to the dry hop. Haven't worked out all the numbers for the hops yet, but my grain is:

US pale: 8 lb 8 oz
10L: 8 oz

I think it's going to be:

.2 of millennium and .2 of warrior at 25 min
.25 citra @ 15
.25 citra @ 1

This gets me to about 22.5 IBU (slightly over Widmer's 20 IBUs)

What do you think?

Just to let you know millhouse, the Alchemy blend of hops Widmer uses are equal volumes of Warrior, Magnum and Horizon, all pretty high alpha hops. For example for bittering you might use this for the 60 minute hop addition for a 5 gallon batch for a pale ale and maybe less for a blonde.

0.25 oz Warrior [15.00%]
0.25 oz Magnum [14.00%]
0.25 oz Horizon [12.00%]

Hope that helps you zone in on this clone in future batches!

I used 2 row pale malt and ended using 15l because that's all my lhbs had.

Thank you for pointing out the blend with the alchemy hops...I thought I read that it was a mix of millennium and warrior...guess not.

I kegged this yesterday and will report back with results.


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Their marketing department says that the alchemy blend changes from time to time as they perfect the best combination of bittering hops. I'm sure their accounting department would say it differently.


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I force carbed this yesterday and I think I got pretty close! It still needs to condition a bit more, but we'll see here in a couple weeks.

Also, I only kegged 5 gallons of it...the other 5 are still in a carboy and have not been dry hopped yet. I'm considering trying a different dry hop for the 2nd 5 gallons, but after tasting this yesterday when it was cold and carbed...probably just stick with the citra.


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How did it end up turning out after conditioning? I am hoping to brew this is next weekend for the 4th

This beer turned out great! I did a side-by-side comparison and I'd venture to say I got pretty close, but I think mine had a bit more hoppy flavor. So I may have used too much Citra for the dry hop, but that will subside with time. I've shared this beer with quite a few people and everyone loves it so far! I say go for it!

Subbed. Had this last night at a restaurant while on a business trip and was pleasantly surprised by it.

Deacon

Well, I polished off the keg last night! It didn't last long...granted I had some help along the way from some friends. Went ahead and kegged the other 5 gallons.

Please post on this thread if you decide to brew this and tell me how it turned out. Cheers!

I brewed on Sunday, everything went well. When I keg I will post the results

JWBC - Did you use the same recipe? How many gallons did you brew? I'm excited that you brewed this up! Can't wait to hear about your results.

Yep I followed your recipe. I'm excited to see how it come out. I like the widmer Citra and so does the SWMBO, but she is pregnant so I guess it just leaves more for me. My plan is to have it ready for the fourth.

I'm currently cold crashing something similar to this. It was basically Biermuncher's centennial blonde malt bill but with with pale ale malt rather than 2-row. The hops are 0.4 oz magnum and 0.5 oz citra each at 10 min, 0 min and dry hop. We'll see....

millhouse9 said:

JWBC - Did you use the same recipe? How many gallons did you brew? I'm excited that you brewed this up! Can't wait to hear about your results.

Click to expand...

Sorry didnt see the question about how much. I only did a 5.5g batch, I scaled it down in beersmith. I will still dry hop it with the oz as originally posted, I don't think that I will change that, and I will probably dry hop in the keg. I'll let you know the final results and will post my version once I am finished.

Mine is on the left. I brewed it before seeing this thread but once I did I decided to pick up a 6-pack out of curiosity. Some subtle differences, but it's pretty close. Mine is clearer which makes it look a little darker in the photo. Against a white background, they're pretty much identical. Someone dry hopped with 1 oz. I did 0.5 oz and that's not quite enough. I also used 0.5 lbs of crystal 10L. I would probably increase it to 0.75 or 1.0 lbs if I really wanted to clone this.

That looks great jwalker! My 2nd keg is currently conditioning. Next time I think I'll go with pale malt instead of 2-row...for some reason when I read pale malt on the Widmer website I was thinking they meant 2-row pale malt! Oh well, still turned out to be a great beer! Cheers!

Thanks! It was surprisingly close but I could tell a bit of a difference, at least side-by-side. I like the original just a tad better so I'm going to tweak my recipe to see if I can get closer.

This was my brew in the picture above (5 gal):
OG 1.040, FG 1.008, Est ABV 4.1% IBUs 21.8, SRM 4.2, 78% efficiency
5.25 lbs Pale Ale Malt (Great Western)
0.75 lbs Carapils
0.50 lbs Crystal 10L
0.50 lbs Vienna
0.15 oz Magnum (12.1%) @ 60 min
0.50 oz Citra (14.2%) @ each 10 min, 1 min and dry hop
Wyeast 1056

Compared to the original, this was too bitter, not enough hop aroma and not enough crystal/malty flavor. So this is my tentative plan for the rebrew:

OG 1.043, FG 1.010 Est ABV 4.3%, IBUs 18.7 SRM 4.5
6.25 lbs 2-row Malt (Great Western)
1.25 lbs Crystal 10L (maybe only 1.0 lbs?)
0.10 oz Magnum (12.1%) @ 60 min
0.50 oz Citra (14.2%) @ each 10 min, 1 min
0.75 oz Citra (14.2%) @ dry hop (maybe 1.0 oz?)
Wyeast 1056

I think I'm going to switch to 2-row because Pale Ale Malt would push my SRM up to 5.1 and I think that would be noticeably darker. Not sure about this one....

Jwalker,

Trying to work this in with what I have in hand....

5 gal

Grain:
6.5 lbs 2-row
0.5 lbs crystal 15

Hops:
0.5 oz crystal - 60 min. ( figured total as was close for the bittering)
0.5 oz citra - 10 min. & 1 min.

I don't have any extra citra for dry hop but do have the extra crystal I could throw in.

Thoughts????

Deacon

I would definitely throw in some extra crystal. 1 lb total would probably be a good start. I think the dry hop character is pretty important with this beer, probably more important that what you get from the 10 min. addition. If you only have 1 oz total, I'd consider switching to 0.5 oz each at 0 min. and at dry hop. Or maybe even 0.25 oz at 0 min and 0.75 oz at dry hop.

It may seem odd to to drop the 10 min. addition but I've brewed the Can You Brew It clone of Nebraska Brewing's Cardinal Pale Ale a few times and it calls for 60 min, 0 min and dry hopping. It's an awesome beer with a wonderful hop flavor/aroma balance.

Good luck!

Maybe .05 oz crystal at 10 and use the extra citra for dry hop???

0.5 oz I mean.

Yeah, that sounds like a good idea too, but I would try hard to not go over 20 IBUs. For me, the nice citra aroma is a key feature of this beer so moving what you have to the flame out and dry hop additions should help.

Currently brewing my first clone attempt. Grain bill is pretty much what millhouse9 came up with originally and the hop schedule is a slight tweak from the last citra blonde I brewed.

OG: 1.043
FG: 1.010
IBU: 18.5
SRM: 4.3

6.5 lbs 2-row
1.0 lbs Crystal 10L
0.10 oz Magnum @ 60 min.
0.40 oz Citra @ 10 min.
0.60 oz Citra @ 0 min.
0.75 oz Citra @ dry hop

I'll post back in a few weeks after it's kegged and carbed.

Well I think that this one will definitely be in the summertime rotation. I will have to do a side by side taste test but I enjoy the taste. Nice job!!

millhouse9 said:

This beer turned out great! I did a side-by-side comparison and I'd venture to say I got pretty close, but I think mine had a bit more hoppy flavor. So I may have used too much Citra for the dry hop, but that will subside with time. I've shared this beer with quite a few people and everyone loves it so far! I say go for it!

Click to expand...

I actually like the more hopped up flavor in your recipe, I normally am not a big in your face hop beer drinker but I do like the taste of citra hops. I can see this being a big hit on summertime days, it is 105 here and it was good to take a drink on the way back into the house from the garage.

Brewed a version of this last night with what I had. I did add in Rice to make up for the grain I didn't have. Don't have a LHBS here so getting grain is a bit of a hassle.

10 Gal Batch (Full Volume BIAB)

Mashed Long!!!
Mash In @150 for 180 min (Had Errands to run and got held up ) it was @ 140 when I got home.
Mash Out @170 for 10 min

12# - 2-Row
1# - Crystal 15L
3.5# - Minute Rice

2 oz - Crystal (60 min)
2 oz - Citra (2 min)

Washed WLP090 made w a 1 Gal starter.

I ended up with an OG of 1.46 & IBU around 18.5.

It was bubbling away this AM when I came to work. I plan to bottle in 2 weeks.

It will probably be paler and dryer than the original, but SWMBO likes those kinds of brews....

Deacon.

Nothing like coming home to a good krausen!

Gonna hook up some blowoffs after dinner since I didn't have time last night.

So I just tapped mine last night. I brought a glass of this and a glass of the original in for my wife and her response was "so these really aren't the same beer?"

The color and hops are probably as close as I can expect to get but I still think mine has a little less malt character. Bumping the 10L up to 1.5 lbs probably would be closer, as much as the idea of adding that much crystal in a light beer like this kind of freaks me out.

Also, even though the hop aroma is pretty much identical today, I'm comparing my fresh example against a commercial example that's probably a month or so old (my bottles have been in my fridge for over 2 weeks). Something to consider.

Bottled one of the carboys today. Sample tastes great. Great grapefruit aroma and taste from the citra. Can't wait for it to get carved up.

Gonna bottle the other carboy next weekend and see if there is any taste difference.

Deacon.