Pliny the Younger Clone

[bobbrews]

That sounds amazing. Interested to see and read about the final results compared to last time you brewed this beer, as well as any pointers from your experience for a more successful clone.

 

[jaw94087]

Scottland, thank you for your passion and your efforts on cloning PTY. We’re giving your recipe a spin this weekend, and I appreciate your approach around organizing the dry hop schedule. But, a couple of questions come to mind regarding the latest revision. Why did you cut back on the sugar and why the change on the mash temperature? I got the impression 148 degrees and 1.33 lbs of sugar worked pretty well as far as FG. And for clarification, I understand that you cold-crashed after reaching FG, and then dry-hopped at room temperature?

Thanks
Jim

 

[scottland]

Ya, no worries. This is a beer that definitely needs a solid clone recipe floating around. Hopefully we'll get there =)

FYI, for the dry hop schedule, I focused on the total hop amounts (2oz Simcoe, 1.5oz Amarillo, 1oz Centennial, 1oz CTZ, .75oz Warrior, .5oz Chinook). The way I divided those up probably isn't identical to how RRBC divides them up. Personally, I don't feel it will make much difference. I just tried to keep each addition around 1.5-2oz each. I was/am still tempted to flip the Amarillo and Centennial amounts. I don't know...

I was torn on the sugar. Part of me said to use less because Russian River probably uses less. The other part of me was scared this beer wouldn't attenuate as much as I want. I don't know. Lean more towards your experience with your brew system, and how WLP001 attenuates for you at given mash temps. I'm pretty sure I can hit sub-1.008 with this grain bill and mash temp. We'll see in about 10 days. I'm also fermenting very cool (62F) to keep the hot alcohols down; that's probably not helping. hahaha

I'm not going to fully crash the primary, I'm just going to drop it to 50F or so to get most of the yeast to drop out. I'll then flush a keg with CO2, rack into that, and dry hop at room temperature. The keg will come in handy as I can flush it with CO2 after every hop addition. I oxidized a batch of Union Jack a few weeks ago because I wasn't careful with it in the secondary. I won't make that mistake with this beer. From there, I'll rack to a clean keg to serve in.

In 7-9 days we'll know how it attenuated. Updates to follow.

 

[BethelLight]

Very interesting thread! Thank you for sharing your hard work and experiences with us.

I had the younger last week (last day) at the pub and my friends who live there told me that they ran out of the batch that was brewed at the pub and was actually younger from the production brewery. They said that the pub version wasn't as sweet and had a nicer hop character. So evidently there is some variability even at Russian River.

Question? Would it make sense to add the sugar latter in fermentation with a beer this big?

 

[scottland]

Sure, I'm just lazy, so I added it during the boil.

 

[jaw94087]

I've got a question regarding this recipe. What is the theory behind using four separate dry-hop additions rather than one, two, or three?

 

[crazyirishman34]

One thing you have to remember is you are shooting at a moving target. I heard that Vinnie changes the hop bill pretty regularly.

 

[scottland]

Ya, I did some googling. It looks like the dry hop has changed pretty much every year for the past few years. With a beer this big, and a hop aroma this complex, I just need to get in the right ballpark. it'll be pretty hard to distinguish any differences from that point.

 

[crazyirishman34]

Since I am on the east coast I most likely will never taste real younger. So if you get your recipe close that is good enough for me to brew it myself. How consistent are Russian River's beers. From what I know of dogfish head their beers while each batch is similar the beer isn't an exact match to the last one.

 

[skeezerpleezer]

Since I am on the east coast I most likely will never taste real younger. So if you get your recipe close that is good enough for me to brew it myself. How consistent are Russian River's beers. From what I know of dogfish head their beers while each batch is similar the beer isn't an exact match to the last one.

Some places in Philly get it.

 

[crazyirishman34]

I think it would run out between the time I hear about it and the time I can get there. It's a 6 hour drive to Philly for me.

 

[scottland]

Down to 1.020 today. There's still a nice krausen on top, and it seems very active. The sample tasted great. Lots of Simcoe coming through with a punchy clean bitterness. Hopefully the yeast chew off another 12-14 gravity points

 

[crazyirishman34]

do you warm it up at the end of the fermentation?

 

[WDT]

Subscribed.

Did you use the hop extract vials from northern brewer, you have like 40ml? That would be like 8 of them.

 

[scottland]

Ya, currently at 68F.

I use hop extract, but not from Northern Brewer. Yup, it would be 8 hop shots. This isn't a cheap beer.

 

[WDT]

I use hop extract, but not from Northern Brewer. Yup, it would be 8 hop shots. This isn't a cheap beer.

Nice, I'm really looking forward to your tasting notes.

I think Amarillo is a pretty dramatic hop. I get huge passionfruit and tropical flavors with only modest amounts of dry hops. Don't want to try and make you second guess yourself but every time I use more than an ounce that's all I can taste.

I'm using Williams brewing hops btw.

 

[crazyirishman34]

You can get 10 ml ones here http://www.yakimavalleyhops.com/category_s/1851.htm

 

[PseudoChef]

Do you know the volumetric equivalent of the can of extract on that yakimavalleyhops page?

 

[fifthcircle]

Hey Scottland, great blog. Thanks for sharing your knowledge through all the hard work, trial and error!!

 

[scottland]

Do you know the volumetric equivalent of the can of extract on that yakimavalleyhops page?

It varies slightly. They sell the cans by weight of alpha acids. So there's 100g if Alpha in that can.

It equates to roughly 190-200ml of extract. You won't get every drop in a syringe., so figure 140-160ml. That's what I got. That's about 30 hop shot syringes, which would cost $60.

PS, when I checked the beer this morning, fermentation has slowed way down. There's still a small krausen on top, but it's close to done. We'll know the FG in about 2 days.

 

[PseudoChef]

Awesome, thanks for the info.

 

[crazyirishman34]

How long will it keep after you open the can?

 

[scottland]

I bought some cheap plastic syringes on ebay, and made my own hopshots. Extract is extremely shelf stable if un-opened. I would think it would oxidize rather quick once opened.

Btw, I think fermentation stopped a little higher than hoped for. There was no airlock activity this morning. I'm guessing I stalled at 1.011-1.012 or so. I don't think it'll be a massive difference. We'll see.

 

[scottland]

Alright, 1.010, and not budging. That's not quite as low as I wanted, but not a big deal (we're only talking 2 points). If anyone is taking a stab at this, use more dextrose. Or US05. US05 does attenuate a little better.

I tossed the first batch of dry hops straight in the primary. I know Vinnie doesn't do that, but eh....Those will sit for 4 days before I rack to secondary (keg)

 

[bobbrews]

What yeast did you end up using this go-around?

Perhaps slightly less carapils and crystal 40 will help in addition to raising the corn sugar by 1-2%. You're already at 5% corn sugar as it is. I don't think it's much higher than that.

 

[scottland]

WLP001.

Last time around it was more C40, more dextrose, same amount of Carapils, higher mash temp, and better attenuation. US05 has always attenuated a little better than 001/1056 for me. As such, it's not as flocculent.

I think just moving back to 1.33lbs of Dextrose would get the job done, but hey, every fermentation is a snowflake.

 

[Hopper5000]

subscribed

 

[bobbrews]

WLP001.

Last time around it was more C40, more dextrose, same amount of Carapils, higher mash temp, and better attenuation. US05 has always attenuated a little better than 001/1056 for me. As such, it's not as flocculent.

I think just moving back to 1.33lbs of Dextrose would get the job done, but hey, every fermentation is a snowflake.

You notice drastic differences in better attenuation with US-05 vs. WLP001? That's odd. Perhaps it's because you pitched more cells of US-05... or added more nutrient for the prior batch... or like you said, you used more sugar. I've always had much better attenuation with a healthy pitch of liquid starter vs. any equivalent dry packet of yeast.

 

[scottland]

Specifically speaking about US05 and 001, yes, I've found 05 attenuates better. Same amount of cells, nutrients, O2, etc. US05 is slightly different than 001. I've consistently found it to attenuate a little more, and flocculate less.

Lately (for me at least), the flocculation has gotten really poor, and I like clear beer, so I've switched to 001.

 

[crazyirishman34]

Have you tried using gelatin to fine your beers? I use US-05 exclusively for my APAs and american IPAs. With gelatin fining and cold crashing I get perfectly bright beer