Conway CloneConway Clone

conway

My last brew session was a Conway’s Irish Ale clone of the Great Lakes Brewery beer. I chose this one at my wife’s behest and the thought that my dad would enjoy this one as well.

The clone is not precise for a few reasons, the first being that I don’t have a whole lot of money to throw around right now and I had a backlog of ingredients on hand. As I pursued a clone recipe for Conway I learned that Great Lakes uses Harrington 2-row as the base for most of its brews. This is good to know, as I have a desire to try a few clones: for instance, my Christmas ale this year used a Nosferatu clone as the base–again, however, I didn’t know about the Harrington 2-row. I learned about the base characteristics of Great Lakes brews from a nice post on The Beerists blog site.

In looking around, the only places I’ve seen that carry Harrington are Midwest Supplies and Northern Brewer.

Additionally, Great Lakes uses quite a bit of Cascade.

Regardless, here is the clone that I used:

  • 11 lb Maris Otter
  • .75 lb Crystal 80
  • .10 lb Crystal 40
  • 1 oz Northern Brewer (30 min)
  • 1 oz Hallertauer (10 min)
  • .75 oz Fuggle (5 min)
  • WLP002 British Ale yeast

We’ll see how this compares, although I expect significant differences. In the future, I aim to try this again with a more precise version that uses Harrington 2-row, Cascade, and Wyeast London Ale 1028.

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Brews a’Bubblin’Brews a’Bubblin’

An assortment of things…

Rodenbach

Follow-up on the Brew day

Had some people ask about the Arrogant Bastard clone so I thought I just throw an update out. The brew day went off so surpassingly smoothly that I sort of floated through it.

I modified the recipe some, as I didn’t have all the grain that I thought I did, so the final recipe looks a bit more like this: 

  • 15.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM)
  • 1.00 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L (120.0
    SRM)
  • 1.00 lb Munich Malt – 10L (10.0 SRM)
  • 0.50 lb Aromatic Malt (26.0 SRM)
  • 0.50 lb Caramunich Malt (56.0 SRM)
  • 0.25 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM)
  • 0.25 lb Carafa II (412.0 SRM)

I also went with the 5.72 gallon boil volume recommended which was a mistake given a 90-minute boil time. In retrospect I should have boosted the volume to around 6.5 gallons. Regardless, I had prepared the yeast starter a week or so back and the airlock was bubbling within 12 hours or so.

Next Brews

On another note, I just went to the grape and granary site and picked up ingredients for a Founder’s Breakfast Stout clone and a Flanders Red, which I’m real intrigued about. My wife enjoys Rodenbach so I thought I’d take a stab at it. Little did I know that it involves nearly 2 years and a pitch pack named, enticingly, “The Roeselare Blend” which apparently contains “Belgian style ale strain, a sherry strain, two Brettanomyces strains, a Lactobacillus culture, and a Pediococcus culture” which results in a 1.5″ cake of pellicle on the fermenting beer.

Mr. Beer Kit

As well, I won a Mr. Beer kit on eBay ($25) which I’m going to play with just for kicks and see what I can make out of it. If nothing else there was a post on homebrew talk that mentioned the fake barrel being useful for real ales. Regardless, I can load up that barrel and the party pig and avoid the problems I had with the Keg Charger at the Oktoberfest.

Get your beer on!Get your beer on!

Cleveland Beer Week is upon us, with dozens of great breweries descending upon Cleveland in a host of locations throughout the city. Jammin’ brews will be available from East to West in our fair City of Cle, from XYZ Tavern to the Cedar Lee–and from North to South.

Love Stone Brewing Co? Great Lakes? Hoppin Frog? Fat Heads? They’re here. 21st Amendment? Dogfish Head? Smuttynose? Sierra Nevada? They’re here. Beer will be flowing and locations will be hoppin–literally in a whole slush of senses.

If you love beer, this coming week is a GREAT week to be in Cleveland. I’m definitely going to find a way to get away from the children, out of the house, and hit a few locations for some frosty pints!

For more information including events, breweries, and locations check out http://www.clevelandbeerweek.org/