Heady Topper- Can you clone it?

Adirondack47 said:

I would think that you would want to let the dry hops ride at fermentation temps for at least a few days anyway.



Changing speeds a bit, has anyone done this without the hop shot or found a method for substituting the hopshot? I cant source anything locally and I cant imagine paying $15 to get one shipped to me.

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Order the bulk can from Yakima valley hops. It's so much cheaper and I pretty much use them in all my IPAs for the bittering hop now. They work great and there is so much less hop matter in the kettle.

Bottles this morning I will say next round think I will try the comet recipe for hops more fruity then piney/dank but we will see what it is like in week or two can't wait still one solid brew even if it's not a perfect clone just yet, altho I haven't had the real thing in a while thank god a friend from the local vfw has a case in there fridge and are willing to do a trade and I can do a side by side
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1fast636 said:

I will try the comet recipe for hops more fruity then piney/dank

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US Comet is more dank and citrusy than anything.

I will compare once carbed with this one I did and the real thing but I have a feeling the piny dankness iS just missing alil in my version right now but guess we will wait and see it has been a while since I had heady from the can

bobbrews said:

I believe the mystery hop we are all missing is Comet. There is likely no Amarillo in Heady Topper.



It has also been stated several times that Kimmich does not boil any hops for Heady Topper. He relies on HopShot for nearly, if not 100% of the IBUs in this beer. So, instead of a hefty 8.50 oz. mixed hops at 5 minutes and 0 minutes, it is likely that Kimmich uses slightly more HopShot, and implements a warm hopstand around 165 F for all of the hopstand hops instead. This temp. is below the 167F myrcene boiloff threshold. Myrcene is that hop compound that offers floral/citrusy/pine.

Lastly, I've never seen a commercial clone or brewed an IIPA whereupon the recipe called for more hopstand hops than dryhops. The dryhop regimen always contains the largest amount of total recipe hops by weight. Pliny, Double Jack, Head Hunter, Tricerahops, Kern Citra, and Alpine all go by this idealogy.

For that reason, I think there is likely 6 to 7 oz. dryhops per 5 gallons beer and only 5 to 6 oz. total hopstand hops per 5 gallon batch.

1.074 / 1.011

86.9% Pearl Malt
4.60% Corn Sugar or Turbinado
4.60% White Wheat
3.90% Caramalt

13-14 ml HopShot @ 90 Minutes (shoot for about 155-170 IBUs)
2.50 oz. Simcoe @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
1.00 oz. Centennial @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
0.75 oz. Columbus @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
0.75 oz. Comet @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
1.50 oz. Simcoe @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz. Centennial @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz. Columbus @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz. Comet @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
0.50 oz. Apollo @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop

Conan @ 63 F, then ramp up to 68-70 F after ferm slows down/completes.

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Appreciate the quote.. and damned if it doesnt make some sense.. Comet is dank. It's literally weed and grapefruit juice in a 50 states legal form.

Comet though.. is interesting, as it's not always available for homebrewers, as last year was a terrible year for comet, but it's back this year in enough form for us little guys to enjoy.

Come to think of it.. the 2 brews I've used comet in.. I do get some notes from it that remind me of heady.. old and new heady at that.. I feel it's a bit over the top like Apollo, and questions the addition in heady, but would make total sense for being an off the wall, hard to find, obscure hop that would make cloning the beer harder to get nailed down.

So my buddy and I are looking to brew this on Thursday next week and we would LOVE to have a couple on and to do a side by side comparison when this is ready. Problem is we live near Chicago and can't get it out here. We have some phenomenal local breweries around here too and would love offer up a trade. Of course we have access to 3 floyds zombie dust if that perks anyone's interest. I am also actually sipping on a brew called "Da Fuzz" from Pipeworks Brewing Co. based out of Chicago. This brew is AWESOME IMO. They also have a tone of others that a liquor store down the street from me sells a ton of their variety of bombers. Check them out and let me know if anyone is interested in a trade. PM me PLEASE!!

bobbrews said:

I believe the mystery hop we are all missing is Comet. There is likely no Amarillo in Heady Topper.

1.074 / 1.011

86.9% Pearl Malt
4.60% Corn Sugar or Turbinado
4.60% White Wheat
3.90% Caramalt

13-14 ml HopShot @ 90 Minutes (shoot for about 155-170 IBUs)
2.50 oz. Simcoe @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
1.00 oz. Centennial @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
0.75 oz. Columbus @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
0.75 oz. Comet @ 160 F, 45 Minute Hopstand
1.50 oz. Simcoe @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz. Centennial @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz. Columbus @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz. Comet @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
0.50 oz. Apollo @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop

Conan @ 63 F, then ramp up to 68-70 F after ferm slows down/completes.

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Can anyone lend insight to this recipe with the Comet additions? My gut is saying to stick with the OP to get a baseline before swaying off of the line. We've ordered a pound of Comet for testing in whatever, just aren't sure if we're doing it in this batch or not, yet.

That being said, I can't see when the original recipe (first post) was last updated. I see quite a few of other's takes on it throughout the thread; is the recipe within the first post still the 'current' thinking?

rustedbucket said:

Can anyone lend insight to this recipe with the Comet additions? My gut is saying to stick with the OP to get a baseline before swaying off of the line. We've ordered a pound of Comet for testing in whatever, just aren't sure if we're doing it in this batch or not, yet.

That being said, I can't see when the original recipe (first post) was last updated. I see quite a few of other's takes on it throughout the thread; is the recipe within the first post still the 'current' thinking?

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I helped theveganbrewer (OP) a lot with the recipe on the first page. We traded a lot of PMs and we have both made about 5 attempts each. It seems that he has since retired from homebrewing. While the 1st page recipe produces a very fine IIPA, it is not a clone for Heady Topper. More tweaking is required. I brewed my revised version last month and it is pretty darn close. It has more of that marijuana dankness that is so obvious in the real thing.

The recipe also needed more bitterness to combat the juicy hops, which is why I upped the HopShot and slightly reduced the Caramalt. Perhaps you can add 1/2 oz Apollo to the hopstand, but the rest of the 5/0/Aroma Steep additions can really be consolidated. You also don't need a whole 8.5 oz. for that time frame. There are also zero boil hops in the real thing so the 5 minute additions are definitely not accurate. The dryhop should contain the most recipe hops by weight, as this patten is very apparent in the large majority of top-rated American IIPAs.

bobbrews said:

I helped theveganbrewer (OP) a lot with the recipe on the first page. We traded a lot of PMs and we have both made about 5 attempts each. It seems that he has since retired from homebrewing. While the 1st page recipe produces a very fine IIPA, it is not a clone for Heady Topper. More tweaking is required. I brewed my revised version last month and it is pretty darn close. It has more of that marijuana dankness that is so obvious in the real thing.



The recipe also needed more bitterness to combat the juicy hops, which is why I upped the HopShot and slightly reduced the Caramalt. Perhaps you can keep the 1/2 oz Apollo in the hopstand, but the rest of the 5/0/Aroma Steep additions can really be consolidated. You also don't need a whole 8.5 oz. for that time frame. There are also zero boil hops in the real thing so the 5 minute additions are definitely not accurate. The dryhop should contain the most recipe hops by weight, as this patten is very apparent in the large majority of top-rated American IIPAs.

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Any chance you could share your most recent attempt? Just asking since it's an expensive recipe to not be a close heady but good iipa... Thanks!

Any way you could post your recent attempt at the recipe?

bobbrews said:

I helped theveganbrewer (OP) a lot with the recipe on the first page. We traded a lot of PMs and we have both made about 5 attempts each. It seems that he has since retired from homebrewing. While the 1st page recipe produces a very fine IIPA, it is not a clone for Heady Topper. More tweaking is required. I brewed my revised version last month and it is pretty darn close. It has more of that marijuana dankness that is so obvious in the real thing.

The recipe also needed more bitterness to combat the juicy hops, which is why I upped the HopShot and slightly reduced the Caramalt. Perhaps you can keep the 1/2 oz Apollo in the hopstand, but the rest of the 5/0/Aroma Steep additions can really be consolidated. You also don't need a whole 8.5 oz. for that time frame. There are also zero boil hops in the real thing so the 5 minute additions are definitely not accurate. The dryhop should contain the most recipe hops by weight, as this patten is very apparent in the large majority of top-rated American IIPAs.

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Hi Bob, thank you for your reply on this one. I'm rustedbucket's brew buddy on this one and we're doing this up on Thursday. We had a couple additional questions on this in response to your reply.

1. We are planning on getting rid of Apollo completely and spreading that .5oz that Apollo was evenly by 4 and making those other additions 1.625 oz's as opposed to 1.5oz's. Did you/have you done that or would you recommend that?

2. What do you mean by "consolidate"? Do you mean reducing some/all of the additions or swapping them?

3. Are your percentages of the grain bill based on a total 13.25lb's of grain?

The recipe is listed on the previous page. The only changes I would make to it is adding an additional 0.50 oz. of Apollo to the hopstand hops.

I'm on my phone now so I don't have Beersmith available, but I definitely used between 8-10 oz. each white wheat, turbinado, and caramalt at 74% efficiency. The OP used between 8-12 oz. each, so it isn't that different. The main point is that you want to use less caramalt than 5.7%. I feel this is slightly too much. About 4-5% Caramalt is more likely. Turbinado and White Wheat should be identical amounts. Total grist weight was 13.50 lbs. including sugar and about 6.5 SRM.

bobbrews said:

The recipe is listed on the previous page. The only changes I would make to it is adding an additional 0.50 oz. of Apollo to the hopstand hops.

Let me pull the exact amount of grain used... brb

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So ADD .5 more Apollo? Don't get rid of it? Sorry, we interpreted "perhaps you can keep the 1/2 oz Apollo in the hopstand" as you got rid of it.

Well fully carbed but not heady I don't think, it's been since christmas I had a can but I will say mine is in chill have right now but if I let this sit in the fridge for a week or two I have a feeling I'll have a clear beer it's really weird cause I never seen a clear heady. This is a solid base to grow on tho I used the farmhouse brewing kit time to tweak and see what I can do comet batch coming up next

One thing I am at odds with regarding my recent attempt is whether to have:

Upped the HopShot to 20 ml (which would give 40AAU) then combine this with a ton of 165F hopstand hops (no further isomerization and maximum aroma).

or...

Keep the HopShot around 13-15 ml at the bittering slot, then add a ton of whirlpool hops at flameout so some isomerization is still occuring (smoother bitterness, less aroma, but using a ton of late hops like we do here would offset that loss). The additional 10AAU or so would be gained from the whirlpool additions.



The path I went with was 14 ml HopShot and then no hops added until the wort was around 165F. While this attempt was my best yet, I feel that it still needs slightly more bitterness to offset all of those juicy, sweet-perceived. late hops. I would recommend the 2nd option referenced above. I feel that you need some IBU contributions post-boil. Despite the hot temps. boiling off some of the delicate oils, Flavor/Aroma shouldn't be a problem with the massive hop additions added at flameout/whirlpool for this beer.

Then perhaps we'll do that. We'll up the Hopshot to 16 and leave the hopstand/steep alone. While we won't be able to compare, it is something to base our first attempt on.

Anyone use this grain bill for any other recipes. I was thinking of using this grain bill minus the sugar for an all citra pale ale.

Got 5 jars of the good stuff ready for storage or to pitch! Got a nice amount of yeast over a week or two stepping up some Conan from a can of Heady. Pitched that into a 5% ale, saved the slurry and just harvested 5 jars of yeast.

Looking forward to brewing some nice ales and a couple clones of Heady this year

olotti said:

Anyone use this grain bill for any other recipes. I was thinking of using this grain bill minus the sugar for an all citra pale ale.

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I've haven't yet, but I just built a 1.25 gal recipe around this grain bill for a mosaic IPA. I'm going to use hop extract for bittering, but all mosaic hops for all other additions. And I'm going to use Conan yeast too. The small batch will allow me to build enough yeast for a 5 gal batch of this HT clone recipe.

I made a 10g batch yesterday. Used 20ml of extract. Did all the late additions according to the recipe. I let BeerSmith mess me up on the calculated losses. I sparged and collected 14g, evidently my boil on my new setup wasn't aggressive enough, since I transferred 13g to fermenter at 1.055 instead of 1.072...... Good thing is I have a 3 g Cornie. Bad thing is it's 6% vs 8% abv. Oh well, might make a more session able beer.

I monitored runoff gravity with the MFM and started at 1.060 and stopped at 1.010. Guess my new rig is way more efficient than I thought!
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Oh and the Conan started in about 6 hours! It was a 3rd gen cake from a brown ale I did 2 weeks ago.

Today was brew day; here's what we did, how we did it, and where it landed us.

Instead of using the original recipe on the first page of the thread, we went with Bobbrews recipe and then followed one of his suggestions in post number 2956. Our goal was a 5g recipe and we achieved just over that with the following numbers using a no-sparge, BIAB process:

9g of Strike (total water volume)
11 lb. 11.7 oz.: Pearl (86.9%)
9.9 oz.: White Wheat Malt (4.6%)
8.5 oz.: Caramalt (3.9%)
17 mL: HopShot @ 75min
9.9 oz.: Turbinado Sugar @ Flame-out (4.6%)
2.5 oz.: Simcoe @ Whirlpool/Steep - 40min
1 oz.: Centennial @ Whirlpool/Steep - 40min
0.75 oz.: Columbus @ Whirlpool/Steep - 40min
0.75 oz.: Comet @ Whirlpool/Steep - 40min
1.5 packs: GigaYeast Vermont Ale IPA
1.50 oz.: Simcoe @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz.: Centennial @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz.: Columbus @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz.: Comet @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
0.50 oz.: Apollo @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop

We brought our strike temp to 155° and were able to achieve ~151° at mash for 60 minutes. We then upped our temp to ~169° where we mashed-out for ten minutes. Upon pulling the bag an initiating our squeeze, we collected approx. 8.1g of wort.

After hot break dissipated, we injected the 17mL of HopShot and let it boil for 75 minutes (based on a seemingly increased boil-off rate, we were forced to cut short of the full 90 due to perceived volume in the boil kettle (GREAT decision on our part!)). Per Bobbrew's post, we elected to go the HopShot increase route to increase the bittering.

We dropped the chiller and brought the wort down to 170° to begin the whirlpool/steep and used the burner to create a balance between 162° and 170° (averaging at ~165°) for a 40 minute period. Each hop addition was placed into separate mesh bags and removed at the conclusion of the steep. I'd like to note that we tasted a small sample during this phase and will say that it was INCREDIBLY bitter!

Upon completing the cooling, we pitched into 1.5 packs of GigaYeast GY054. Due to calculated viability, we were at 181 billion cells in one pack (dated March 11th, 2015). Two packs would have dropped twice that (362 billion cells) so we dropped one pack straight and, using a 1-cup, Pyrex measure, measured slightly over half of the second pouch and added it in. This incredibly unscientific method 'should' equate to approximately 280 to 290 billion cells towards our calculcated target of 253.8 billion. Long story short, one pack wasn't going to be enough and two would have been too much. We opted out of creating a starter due to the small, starter volume we would have created and didn't want to add starter volume into what was likely going to be a tight fermenter as it was.

In the end, we collected just over 5 gallons of beer (approx 5.1 gallons) at an OG of 1.074 or 1.075 (depending on who was looking through the refractometer).

We're on the fence about fermentation times, however. We're reading mixed suggestions about letting it primary for four short days and then secondary-ing for ten. Traditionally, we've primary-ed for a week and then secondary-ed for another; any suggestions?

Our dry-hop routine will include the above listing, however we are considering increasing the Simcoe, Centennial, Columbus, and Comet additions by 0.125 oz. (1.625 oz. respectively). We've got a few days to decide on that, again, feedback on this idea would be helpful.

Well, that's about it.... If you hung in this long, thanks! We'd welcome any feedback if you've got any to offer, otherwise, we'll post back in once we get to the next step of the process. Thanks for all the help those of you in the thread have provided!

Intruged to hear how the comet turns out...my biggest struggle in brewing is figuring out what hops work together and also the times and techniques used with various hops. I am really trying to understand how to balance fruit and dank pine with minimal floral, I dislike anything more than a little bit of floral....to me that's the best profile in a good IPA, dank pine and fruit bomb.

Did I miss a few pages? When did consensus jump from 6ml of hopshot (page 1 vegan brewer original recipe) to now (bobbrews post 2956)?

droder1 said:

Did I miss a few pages? When did consensus jump from 6ml of hopshot (page 1 vegan brewer original recipe) to now (bobbrews post 2956)?

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Not sure if you missed anything. Vegan hasn't been active since the end of 2014 and the OR is dated back to 2013 without any visible 'last updated' mentions. Because of this, I looked towards more recent attempts from active members to take our spin.

But, just because two people (or was it three) made the jump to increase HopShot levels doesn't make it a consensus. Like I stated before, I've never had the original and am only basing this attempt off of what other people have said. As Bob's recipe was the latest, it got the first attempt; we'll scale backwards, or forwards, as needed.

rustedbucket said:

Our dry-hop routine will include the above listing, however we are considering increasing the Simcoe, Centennial, Columbus, and Comet additions by 0.125 oz. (1.625 oz. respectively). We've got a few days to decide on that, again, feedback on this idea would be helpful.

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You're already over 1 oz. dryhops per gallon of beer as it is. And when you rack the 5.1 gallons you collected to secondary, some of that will be lost to trub.

droder1 said:

Did I miss a few pages? When did consensus jump from 6ml of hopshot

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HBT Heady Topper clone attempts are continuing to evolve. While the page 1 recipe will create a fine beer, it is not a perfect clone for Heady Topper. It is lacking the appropriate bitterness and/or contains too much caramalt, and the hop profile is not completely nailed. No actual hops are boiled in the real Heady Topper either. Additionally, I'm in favor of a 148-149 F, 90 minute mash and substituting about 4-5% turbinado for base malt to aid dryness. The water profile is also extremely important.

If I were to clone again, I would advise gaining some IBUs during the whirlpool instead of relying on 100% of the isomerization at boil start. Again, no actual hops should be boiled:

1.073/1.074 OG
1.010/1.011 FG
7.5 gallon boil
5.5 gallon batch, collected in primary

12lbs, 84.2% Thomas Fawcett Pearl Malt
12oz, 5.30% Turbinado Sugar
12oz, 5.30% Thomas Fawcett Wheat
12oz, 5.30% Thomas Fawcett Caramalt

14 ml HopShot @ 90 Minutes
2.50 oz. Simcoe pellets @ 180 F Whirlpool
1.00 oz. Centennial pellets @ 180 F Whirlpool
0.75 oz. Columbus pellets @ 180 F Whirlpool
0.75 oz. Comet pellets @ 180 F Whirlpool
0.75 oz. Apollo pellets @ 180 F Whirlpool
1.50 oz. Simcoe pellets @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.50 oz. Centennial pellets @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.00 oz. Columbus pellets @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
1.00 oz. Comet pellets @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop
0.75 oz. Apollo pellets @ 8 day, Two-Stage Dry Hop

Conan @ 63 F, then after ferm slows down drastically or completes, rack to secondary and ramp up to 68-70 F. Be wary of ambient temperatures. You don't want the wort in the primary going over say 64 F for the first week.



^The majority of these hops are very piney, dank(marijuana), and full of pungent grapefruit. Centennial is really the only somewhat fruity hop. I am open to minor tweaks if you guys attempt this beer and are familiar with what these hops bring to the table.

bobbrews said:

Conan @ 63 F, then after ferm slows down drastically or completes, rack to secondary and ramp up to 68-70 F. Be wary of ambient temperatures. You don't want the wort in the primary going over say 64 F for the first week.







You're already over 1 oz. dryhops per gallon of beer as it is. And when you rack the 5.1 gallons you collected to secondary, some of that will be lost to trub.







HBT Heady Topper clone attempts are continuing to evolve. While the page 1 recipe will create a fine beer, it is not a perfect clone for Heady Topper. It is lacking the appropriate bitterness, contains too much caramalt, and the hop profile is not completely nailed.

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We have it set at 68 right now. And it's bubbling like crazy and blowing through the blow off tube. 64 I thought was a very low end number for this yeast so we just went middle of the road with 68. Once it's done we will let it clean up at the same temp.

We have it set at 68 right now. And it's bubbling like crazy and blowing through the blow off tube. 64 I thought was a very low end number for this yeast so we just went middle of the road with 68. Once it's done we will let it clean up at the same temp.

I've used Conan for IIPAs multiple times at different temps. I can tell you that 62-64 F is best for primary fermentation. If fermented 5-8 degrees higher, you begin to taste spicy phenolic and solvent flavors.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/conan-yeast-experiences-397947/