Please describe Great Lakes Dort Gld

[Bullhog]

Could someone please describe to me what Great Lakes Dortmunder Gold tastes like from a brewers perspective. I’m going to try to brew one but never tasted it. There’s a few clone recipes floating around out there so this will help me make some tweaks. I doubt it will taste like it, but the person who wants it hasn’t tried it for a decade, so they probably won’t know either!

 

[friarsmith]

Lightly bready malt flavor with noticeable caramel malts, more hops forward than malty in balance and bitterness, clean (no ester fruitiness or fermentation byproducts), herbal/pepper/citrus peel hop flavor. Slight lingering bitterness. Like a light colored lower hopped pale ale made w/ lager yeast.

It is a very enjoyable beer, but since you asked, IMO it tastes like a very Americanized Dort/Helles-Export.

Only a passing resemblance to Helles Exports/Dorts I’ve had in Germany. To me it screams 2-Row/Pale and Crystal, body is too big, and the hops are way too prominent. Nice “Golden Lager” definitely. But a “Dortmunder”… not so sure.

 

[Bullhog]

Thank you! This helps.

The way I wrote the recipe, from reading beeradvocate, it has way more dextrin malt than I would think is reasonable (9%), and also a low temp single infusion mash. I was trying to put myself in the shoes of a low-budget brewery and what they might do in the first few years of their brewery. So your comment on the body makes me feel better about this.

I was trying to write it with 2-row, as you mentioned and they also mention on their site, but to get the color down I am going with pilsner, maybe a mistake, but I'm estimating it around 5.8 SRM

I will up the whirlpool hops as well now. I am getting a feeling that it's dry-hopped, but I think I'll just overdo the whirlpool hops a tad to make up for it.

Thanks again!

 

[friarsmith]

I edited my post a bit (probably while you were responding). Yeah, I’d swap out the 2-Row/Pale for Pils and maybe do 3-4% Carapils or Carafoam and 3-4% C-10/C-20 with a single infusion around 150*. Should make a real nice American Golden Lager with the hops they use