Balter XPA clone assistance.

[xpostmanx]

I am trying to put together a grain bill for this beer. However my palette is not refined enough to do so from the 1 can I thoroughly enjoyed.

I plan on using citra, centennial and Amarillo to bitter to 30IBU and a dry hop of equal quantities of each. (I brew 1 gallon batches and was thinking 12gram of each dry hopped.

I was thinking a very simple grain bill of 95 percent pale Malt, 5 percent light crystal.

Anyone care to throw in their 2 cents?

 

[AJS2154]

Hi mate,

I have had that beer both from a can and on tap (at Coogee Bay Hotel). I really like it also, although 2-3 is my limit. It seems too sweet to me after those. Some other blokes I was with, in their early 50s like me, said it was way too sweet and only had one.

I am pretty sure that when I had the can they listed the hops in the product, which is a good start. I definitely remember the citra.

Just use a simple pale ale recipe and fiddle with the hops. In the meantime, hang on, the cavalry will be here soon to let you know the best hops and what proportion. Sorry mate, I can't be of more help than that.

See you, Anthony

 

[xpostmanx]

Hello All,

I have come up with this recipe:

Batch Size: 4.5l
.85kg Pale Malt (81%)
.2kg Wheat, Flaked (19%)
5g Centennial @ 15mins
5g Centennial @ 5 mins
5g Citra @ 5 mins
5g Amaraillo @ 5mins
4g Centennial Dry Hop 4days
4g Citra Dry Hop 4 days
4g Amarillo Dry Hop 4 days.
US05

According to my software, this gives 28.7IBU & 4.8%abv. to the 30IBU & 5% on the original.

Any suggestions before I put an order in for the grain bill?

 

[Dan Pratt]

To get the correct colour you will require 3-5% light crystal malt with your gran bill.

http://www.freethehops.com.au/single-post/2015/09/23/Balter-New-Brewery-on-the-Block

 

[xpostmanx]

To get the correct colour you will require 3-5% light crystal malt with your gran bill.

http://www.freethehops.com.au/single-post/2015/09/23/Balter-New-Brewery-on-the-Block

Cheers, 50 grams of 30L Crystal brings the ABV to 5.0%

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

I would swear there is Galaxy in that beer. Particularly considering Head Balter brewer came from S&W.

 

[xpostmanx]

I would swear there is Galaxy in that beer. Particularly considering Head Balter brewer came from S&W.

That was my guess, but they replied to me on untappd and said not a galaxy in sight. Citra, Amarillo and Centential form the backbone.

 

[Bax]

Anybody want to have a whirl at turning this into an extract recipe?

 

[xpostmanx]

I didn't dry hop this, quite a nice beer, but a clone it is not. I have a couple of balter cans in the fridge, I'll try them and my beer back to back and see where it sits. Suspect the hop profile is off, but will report back next week.

 

[dirtynidge]

Just to chime in on this, I have a beer with a very close hop profile to Balter. I wasn't intending to replicate it, just stumbled across it.

I did a 'side by side' with mine and XPA the other week and despite the additional bitterness of my 60min hop additions, the flavour was very close despite having no Citra anywhere near it.

Removing the my 60min addition gives 35 IBU which is pretty close.
See below 21L ferment with a 10L boil:

14g Columbus @30min
14g Simcoe @30min
28g Centennial @Flameout
56g Simcoe @Flameout
28g Amarillo @Flameout
28g Centennial @Dry hop
28g Columbus @Dry hop
28g Amarillo @Dry hop

Being an extract brewer am going to pair this hop bill with a Dr Smurto's inspired grist (67.5% DME, 25% wheat extract, 7.5% caramalt), which I reckon will get me close.

 

[fungrel]

Just to chime in on this, I have a beer with a very close hop profile to Balter. I wasn't intending to replicate it, just stumbled across it.

I did a 'side by side' with mine and XPA the other week and despite the additional bitterness of my 60min hop additions, the flavour was very close despite having no Citra anywhere near it.

Removing the my 60min addition gives 35 IBU which is pretty close.
See below 21L ferment with a 10L boil:

14g Columbus @30min
14g Simcoe @30min
28g Centennial @Flameout
56g Simcoe @Flameout
28g Amarillo @Flameout
28g Centennial @Dry hop
28g Columbus @Dry hop
28g Amarillo @Dry hop

Being an extract brewer am going to pair this hop bill with a Dr Smurto's inspired grist (67.5% DME, 25% wheat extract, 7.5% caramalt), which I reckon will get me close.

Any reason you went for Columbus at 30min? I don't get any dank or resin from the original and thought that Simcoe would be a better fit.

 

[dirtynidge]

As I mentioned, I wasn't trying to clone Balter, I was just experimenting and it came close.
Funnily enough I was planning on putting Simcoe in dry hop but it was raining too hard for me to be bothered going back to house to get it.

It does have a pretty huge amount of Simcoe at flameout thought

 

[dirtynidge]

Sorry, I misread question and thought you were referring to Columbus in dry hop, not at 30min.

I have just rebrewed this again, starting instead with Centennial and Simcoe at 15min, everything else as per my post above. I will let you know in a few weeks if it is any good.

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

How did this turn out?

 

[Elixir]

Hi there. According to an article in "Froth" newsletter from Feb 2017 Scott says there is no crystal malt in the XPA. I also love this beer and might try a clone.

 

[bassmfb]

Hey Guys,

Using the information from the OP, I brewed the following and was quite happy with how it turned out. Very similar, except probably has a little more malt back bone - which is not a bad thing. Maybe as Elixir states, the Crystal removed might be the difference.

4.44 kg Gladfield American Ale Malt (5.0 EBC) Grain 1 86.7 %
0.38 kg Crystal, Medium (Simpsons) (137.9 EBC) Grain 2 7.4 %
0.30 kg Caraamber (Weyermann) (70.9 EBC) Grain 3 5.9 %
17.00 g Pilot [7.00 %] - Boil 30.0 min Hop 4 12.9 IBUs
15.00 g Columbus (Tomahawk) [15.70 %] - Boil 30.0 min Hop 5 25.4 IBUs
28.00 g Amarillo [9.20 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 5.0 min Hop 6 3.6 IBUs
28.00 g Centennial [8.70 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 5.0 min Hop 7 3.4 IBUs
28.00 g Amarillo [9.20 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days Hop 9 0.0 IBUs
28.00 g Centennial [10.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days Hop 10 0.0 IBUs
56.00 g Simcoe [13.00 %] - Dry Hop 0.0 Days Hop 12 0.0 IBUs
28.00 g Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.00 %] - Keg Hops 7.0 Days Hop 11 0.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05) [50.28 ml] Yeast

 

[Bob_Loblaw]

Interestingly I recently tried to do a Stone & Wood Pacific Ale clone with Citra instead of Galaxy as my local shop was out. I ended up dry-hopping 77g of Citra in 20L and the result was VERY close to Balter XPA.

I used the normal Pacific Ale grain bill 60:40 Pale and Wheat and used about 20g of Citra in the cube and the rest in dry. The keg was on for about 2 weeks and kicked last night but the Citra aroma lasted very strongly until the very last drop.

I would suggest the dry-hop amounts for XPA are in the same region as Pacific Ale. ie a lot.

 

[dirtynidge]

Sorry for delay. Mine didn't turn out great due to some phelnolc flavours (damn chloromides).
They have disappeared enough now for me to tell that I was definitely in the right track but the batch isn't great.
Will try to brew it again with a Campden tablet soon.

 

[fletcher]

Hey Guys,

Using the information from the OP, I brewed the following and was quite happy with how it turned out. Very similar, except probably has a little more malt back bone - which is not a bad thing. Maybe as Elixir states, the Crystal removed might be the difference.

egads, yes, it would be the difference. 13% crystal is like sweet city.

 

[scotthbutler]

Hey Guys,

Using the information from the OP, I brewed the following and was quite happy with how it turned out. Very similar, except probably has a little more malt back bone - which is not a bad thing. Maybe as Elixir states, the Crystal removed might be the difference.

4.44 kg Gladfield American Ale Malt (5.0 EBC) Grain 1 86.7 %
0.38 kg Crystal, Medium (Simpsons) (137.9 EBC) Grain 2 7.4 %
0.30 kg Caraamber (Weyermann) (70.9 EBC) Grain 3 5.9 %
17.00 g Pilot [7.00 %] - Boil 30.0 min Hop 4 12.9 IBUs
15.00 g Columbus (Tomahawk) [15.70 %] - Boil 30.0 min Hop 5 25.4 IBUs
28.00 g Amarillo [9.20 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 5.0 min Hop 6 3.6 IBUs
28.00 g Centennial [8.70 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 5.0 min Hop 7 3.4 IBUs
28.00 g Amarillo [9.20 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days Hop 9 0.0 IBUs
28.00 g Centennial [10.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days Hop 10 0.0 IBUs
56.00 g Simcoe [13.00 %] - Dry Hop 0.0 Days Hop 12 0.0 IBUs
28.00 g Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.00 %] - Keg Hops 7.0 Days Hop 11 0.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05) [50.28 ml] Yeast

How big was your batch size for this brew? See in the original post the batch was 1 Gal, thats roughly 3.8L! should it be 10Gal?

cheers