Recipe Feed Back - Irish Red Ale

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Keyes88

Keyes88

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Recipe Feed Back - Irish Red Ale

Looking for feed back on tweaking this clone recipe. Any Feedback would be welcomed. I was doing some reading on different types of well reviewed Irish Reds from BA and wanted to make a Great Lakes Conway's Irish Ale Clone. Fun part about this is I wont be able to compare my clone till next month when the beer is released but I need to make this now as I have a family event that I am making this for. Again, any information or tweaking would be great! Hopefully keeping this simple will work out well.


Conway Irish Ale

Style: Irish Red Ale
OG: 1.066
Type: All Grain
FG: 1.018
ABV: 6.29 %
Calories: 217
IBU's: 25.16
Efficiency: 75 % (not sure about this, idk where the program got this number from)
Boil Size: 5.83 Gal
Color:***16.6 SRM**
Batch Size: 5.00 Gal
Boil Time: 60 minutes
*
Grains
10.00 lbs Briess 2-Row Brewers Malt
2.00 lbs Crisp Crystal Dark 77L (might need to sub this, any ideas?)
*
Hops
0.50 ozs Northern Brewer @60 mins
0.50 ozs Hallertauer @ 30min
1.00 ozs Fuggles @ 10min

Yeasts
Wyeast Labs 1084
*
Additions
Whirlfloc Tablet @15 mins
 
I love Conway's! Just saw an add from my local grocery store that its now available. Going to pick up as much as I can tomorrow. Let me know how your clone turns out. I want to try brewing it too.
 
I'd love to get a recipe for it too. I know it doesnt say it on the website, but I swear I taste special roast in it. Anyone else?
 
thread revival....

definitely special roast , it's got that biscuity flavor.
I tried a clone last year that was good but not quite toasty enough.
Gonna try again tomorrow - half pound special roast this time

BTW, their house ale yeast is WY-1028
 
I am also working on a conways clone. So far I have...
4 lb 2 row
7 lb Maris otter
.75 crystal 70; 77 if they have it
.5 special B
.33 biscuit malt

Should I be substituting special B or biscuit malt for special roast? I know I am getting my color mostly from special B
 
Special B is totally different, you want to stick w/ "biscuity" malts.
Great Lakes is kind of "tricky" with their ingredient listings on their site now - I think they list some of them but not all.
For Conway, they used to say:
"American Two-row and Special Roast, English Pale and Crystal, and Belgian Biscuit."

I've been using MO as a base, along with Victory, Special Roast and Crystal-80.

I'll let you know in 5-6 weeks how the latest try went....
 
I am working on a recipe for a Conway's clone I want to brew this weekend, so far from what I have read I think DustBow is onto it. I would love to see the recipe you used, and hear your thoughts on how it turned out, what you would change, etc.

So far this is what I have:


Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 7.89 gal
Post Boil Volume: 6.76 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.50 gal
Bottling Volume: 5.50 gal
Estimated OG: 1.060 SG
Estimated Color: 11.5 SRM
Estimated IBU: 17.2 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 82.7 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
8 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3.0 SRM) Grain 1 62.7 %
3 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 2 23.5 %
12.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 3 5.9 %
8.0 oz Special Roast (50.0 SRM) Grain 4 3.9 %
8.0 oz Victory Malt (25.0 SRM) Grain 5 3.9 %
1.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 6 16.1 IBUs
1.00 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 7 -
1.00 oz Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 2.0 min Hop 8 1.1 IBUs
1.0 pkg SafAle English Ale (DCL/Fermentis #S-04) Yeast 9 -


Mash Schedule: Batch Sparge - Medium Body (154), 1.15 qt/lb thickness


Looking for comments and suggestions for the recipe!
 
Your recipe looks close to my current one. Per great lakes website they use Northern Brewer as the main bittering hop and fuggles/hallertauer for flavor and or aroma.
Also, great lake states their ale is at 25 IBU. As far as color goes, I have it at roughly 14 to 15 which matched or nearly matched my pumpkin ale which was at 14 L. Hope this helps..
 
I swapped out the hops, and also added some more base grain to get it up to the 6.5% ABV with 68% brewhouse efficiency and using a Medium body mash @ 154 F. Here is my revised recipe:


Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 7.89 gal
Post Boil Volume: 6.76 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.50 gal
Bottling Volume: 5.50 gal
Estimated OG: 1.067 SG
Estimated Color: 11.8 SRM
Estimated IBU: 26.1 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 68.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 80.4 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
9 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3.0 SRM) Grain 1 61.0 %
4 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 2 27.1 %
12.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 3 5.1 %
8.0 oz Special Roast (50.0 SRM) Grain 4 3.4 %
8.0 oz Victory Malt (25.0 SRM) Grain 5 3.4 %
1.00 oz Northern Brewer [8.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 6 23.5 IBUs
1.00 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 7 -
0.50 oz Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 8 1.2 IBUs
0.50 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 9 1.3 IBUs
1.0 pkg SafAle English Ale (DCL/Fermentis #S-04) Yeast 10 -


Mash Schedule: Batch Sparge - Medium Body (154), 1.15 qt/lb thickness
 
Ive been on the search for info on this beer as well. I'm brewing on Saturday and this is my recipe. I would like some feedback to see what you guys think. Cheers.

10# pale malt (2-row)
1# crystal 80•L
8oz victory
4oz special roast
4oz Belgian biscuit

1oz northern brewer (60min)
.5oz Fuggle (10min)
1T Irish moss(10min)
.5oz hallertaur (2min)

2.4L starter of 1084.
 
hopcop said:
Ive been on the search for info on this beer as well. I'm brewing on Saturday and this is my recipe. I would like some feedback to see what you guys think. Cheers.

10# pale malt (2-row)
1# crystal 80•L
8oz victory
4oz special roast
4oz Belgian biscuit

1oz northern brewer (60min)
.5oz Fuggle (10min)
1T Irish moss(10min)
.5oz hallertaur (2min)

2.4L starter of 1084.
Click to expand...

Unless your system is getting amazing efficiency, You might not have enough base grain to get to the OG you want, Conways comes out to 6.5% ABV. The recipe I came up with assuming 68% efficiency has 14.75 lbs. total grain. Also if you can get your hands on some MO, it would probably get you closer to the real deal.
 
todda00 said:
Unless your system is getting amazing efficiency, You might not have enough base grain to get to the OG you want, Conways comes out to 6.5% ABV. The recipe I came up with assuming 68% efficiency has 14.75 lbs. total grain. Also if you can get your hands on some MO, it would probably get you closer to the real deal.
Click to expand...

I have a 50# sack of 2 row that's why I was using that. I plugged my numbers into hopville calculator and had a 6.3%ABV assuming I had 70% efficiency. I usually get around 80-85% efficiency with my set up. I've read around here to use victory with the 2row to get close to MO. I've never used MO before so I was going to see how it comes out the first. I was going to sample side by side to compare then make some adjustments.
 
I'll be kegging my latest Conway attempt in the next couple days, so should have some early reports on the flavor in the next week or so.
I'll have to check the recipe at home, but I'm pretty it looked like this:
11# MO
1# Victory
12oz C-80
8oz Special Roast

I used either Northern Brewer or Goldings with some Fuggles for hops but I don't think it really matters for a Conway clone - it's all about the malt with just enough hops to provide a balance, not hop flavor.
 
I'm excited to hear how the different variations of the recipe turn out. I had to change my recipe I am brewing this weekend because my LHBS was out of some things unfortunately. I was going to get a 50# bag of MO, but they didn't have any, so I opted to just use the 2-row I already had, they don't carry crystal 80, only 60 and 90, so I went with 90. My color was a bit low anyways so I'm not too worried about that. And they didn't have fuggles, so I am doing all Hallertauer for the taste/aroma hops. Next time I brew this, I will try to get closer to what I originally planned. Here is my final recipe I will be brewing:


Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 7.89 gal
Post Boil Volume: 6.76 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.50 gal
Bottling Volume: 5.50 gal
Estimated OG: 1.067 SG
Estimated Color: 12.1 SRM
Estimated IBU: 26.4 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 69.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 81.5 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
12 lbs 12.0 oz Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 86.4 %
12.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 90L (90.0 SRM) Grain 2 5.1 %
12.0 oz Victory Malt (25.0 SRM) Grain 3 5.1 %
8.0 oz Special Roast (50.0 SRM) Grain 4 3.4 %
1.00 oz Northern Brewer [8.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 5 23.7 IBUs
1.00 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 6 -
1.00 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 7 2.7 IBUs
1.0 pkg SafAle English Ale (DCL/Fermentis #S-04) Yeast 8 -


Mash Schedule: Batch Sparge - Medium Body (154), 1.15 qt/lb thickness
 
I also had to modify my recipe due to lack of supplies. Here is my take:

10# Briess 2 Row 83%
1# Crystal 80L 8%
8oz Victory 4%
4oz Special Roast 2%
4oz Belgian Biscuit 2%

1oz Northern Brewer 8.6% AA (30min)
1oz Hallertau 4.1%AA (10min)
1T. Irish Moss (10min)
.75oz Fuggles 4.4%AA (5min)

Wyeast 1028 1.6L starter

I will post some pics along the way.
Cheers

image-2472657916.jpg
 
I had a successful brew day yesterday. I mashed at 153*F for 60mins. Batch Sparged. Finished with 5.5gallons with a OG:1.062. Pitched yeast at 60*F and sitting comfortably at 64*F. It already has a small krausen developing. I think I'm pretty close to the actual Conway in terms of flavor. We were sipping on them while brewing. Only time will tell. I will report back when they are ready.
Cheers
 
Sorry to have gone MIA on this thread guys!

So long story short I brewed what I first posted, even though I had a note to myself to include a small amount of roasted barley. It came out very interesting, VERY sweet and almost banana like in smell but lacked that dry ending flavor or any balance. It was interesting none the less.

As for where I stand now:
8 lbs Maris Otter
3 lbs 2 Row
8 oz cara 80L
4 oz Roasted Barley
4 oz special roast
1 oz chocolate

.5 Nugget @ 60
.5 Hallertauer @ 10
.5 Fuggles @ 10

18 SRM
28 IBUs
5.25 ABV

60 min @ 154
2 packets of S-04

I'll let you know how this comes out soon...
 
After a week it's smells and tastes pretty close to the real deal. The color needs to be more red I think but close enough for the first try. I will wait another week before I consider bottling.

Cheers.

image-2512041027.jpg
 
As per the GLBC website, the following is what goes into the Conway's...
2-Row
Crystal 77
Northern Brewer
Mt. Hood
Willamette (U.S. version of English Fuggle - substitute if needed?)

The beer is 6.5% ABV, 25 IBU.
Best I could figure

11# 2-Row
1# Crystal 77
1oz @60 min Northern Brewer
1oz @30 min Mt. Hood
1 oz @ 10 minWillamette

You might need to tweak out the hops a bit based on AA%.
Hope this helps!
 
See my post #10, they don't give as much info as they used to......this beer is all about Special Roast/biscuit
 
Has anyone tried one of these recipes recently? What has been your closest clone?

One thing I'm wondering about is where the sour taste comes from. I would even consider toning down the sour just a bit, even though it's already in the background. I wouldn't want to completely remove that because I think it helps keep a balance, but just a touch lower would be perfect for my taste. Anyone have experience playing with this aspect of the recipe?
 
I see this is an old thread, but just curious if anyone is still playing with CIA clones and if so what you guys have come up with.
 

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