Two Hearted - Tie your flies

Centennial, Centennial and more Centennial. There's no real secret to this clone. The only formula to making this a good clone is to not drink so much of the clone's inspiration on brew day and don't make the rookie mistakes that I did.



My neighbor and I were going to brew up a Fall IPA for giggles. Mostly because this last summer he really helped me out, with reducing my bottle shortage and by emptying out any number of said bottles with me when I was brewing or busting out the smoker. 


I handed off the summer Northern Brewer catalog for his review, just to give him an idea of what options we as homebrewers have. Catalogs are nice for that. I prefer ordering online, but there's something nice about being able to thumb through a glossy collection of eye candy don't you think?


Once I heard back on his choice I had to laugh a bit. Not that the choice was bad by any means, but he wanted Surly Furious. I suppose if you're going to choose an IPA in a kit, that's the one. Unfortunately NB was out of the necessary ingredients for the kit (I expect it was the Simcoe).


Not to be deterred, the best thing is a Bell's Two-Hearted Ale as far as I'm concerned. there are lots of recipes out there for this, including the one from BYO. I guess I could have done a Pliny clone, but then again, everybody does a Pliny clone. Also, I would have had a hard time getting the hops.

Brew Date 10/16

5 Gallon batch

Mashed at 152 @60 min

OG 1.060

FG 1.010

82% measured attenuation

Grains

Briess 2-Row Brewer's Malt                                                                 11 lbs, 0 oz
Briess 2 Row Caramel 40                                                                     1 lbs, 0 oz

Hops

Centennial 10.6 AA  .75 oz @60

Centennial 10.6 AA   1 oz   @20

Centennial 10.6 AA   2 oz   @5

Centennial 9.9 AA     1 oz   Dry hop for 10 days. 

Pitched at 64F with 1 packet Safale US-05 for 10 days in the primary then racked to secondary for 10 day dry hop before bottling. There was some blow-off in primary which I believe led me to lose some potential hop flavor.

I also accidentally opened the wrong hop packet for my 20 min addition. This was of course due to the namesake's consumption. Later I had to go to the LHBS for an ounce of Centennial before the dry hop. I do believe that they were oxidized which lead to some off flavors at bottling.  

Appearance

SRM is calculated to be about 7.5. There is plenty of lacing and good head retention. I doubt you could visually differentiate between this and the commercial version. 

Aroma

Centennial. There is however a slightly oxidized cheesiness to the aroma which was pointed out by a fellow in the brew club. Not a terrible beer, but it serves as a definite reminder to use the freshest hops possible. This would take a few points off in competition for sure. It's not completely unpleasant though. 

Taste

Solid hop bitterness that is backed by a fairly strong malt backbone. This one finished a bit drier than I expected. 

Mouthfeel

Medium mouth feel with moderate carbonation. Fairly smooth on the tongue. I would like to to be a bit more prickly. 

This is a beer I'm equally happy to drink or to give away. It wasn't my best attempt but in my defense it was my first run in with dry-hopping and first IPA.

Next time I dry-hop I'll use a mesh bag and try to get whole hops. I feel that I lost too much to trub with 5 oz of pellets in the beer. I'd like a better way to strain them out for sure. Lesson learned and secrets revealed for sure.