Sorry for the late post guys, I went out on Sunday and got some Feral Hop Hogs for a side-by-side comparison and here's how I went. I took lot of notes but bear in mind this is my first time doing a comparison...
Bottled Feral Hop Hog on the left, home brewed Hop Hogger on the right.
Appearance: Feral HH is paler in colour and a bit cloudy. I guess the malt used in there's is lighter than the liquid Light ME & Wheat ME I used. Also I might trade the Crystal 20 back to Crystal 10 or even drop it completely for more Carapils. Despite having drank it before I didn't realize the Feral HH was bottle conditioned so in the pic it seems a bit cloudier than my own. I could have corrected this by pouring carefully as I do with my own creation. Do we know if Feral brewery primes with the primary yeast? I'd be interested in harvesting it if that is the case...
Smell: The Feral HH has floral/resin nose leaning more towards the resin in my opinion, where-as my HH has more of a floral nose with little resin or citrus. If I didn't know better I'd be thinking there was a hint of simcoe dry hopped in the original somewhere and if I were to try again I might try adding 10g of simcoe to the dry-hop to capture this scent.
Taste (aka the import part): Ferals HH has a strong floral citrus taste with a background of passion-fruit. The galaxy is definitely there in the aftertaste but the base of the flavor has pronounced elements that I can see might come from the cascade and citra. The flavour is complex and I had a hard time trying to sort it out. It also has a strong malt presence giving it a sweetness to compliment the punchy hoppiness that my own doesn't have, but I made mine to a higher volume and so a lower abv, which accounts for this difference.
My own HH has a more resinous than floral taste than the Feral HH though a very similar citrus presence, the fruit aftertaste is there but a bit rougher. A few more weeks in the bottle may smooth that out (I figure it's the galaxy). It lacks the malty backbone of the Feral HH (as mentioned above) which brings the strong hop elements to the forefront and I'm going to give it at least another 2 - 3 weeks to mature before trying it again.
Mouthfeel: Surprisingly similar, the Feral HH is higher in alcohol than my own (5.8% vs 4.4%) and with my addition of the carapils I think I might have leveled that playing field a little. So a small victory on this front IMHO.
In summery; it's close but no cigar. My Hop Hogger does taste good, very good in fact and I look forward to drinking more of it. It'll probably be one of my favorite extract brews once it mellows out a little but it's not quite the real thing. I know we limit ourselves a little using kits and extracts but this just goes to show you can get pretty damn close anyway.
Next time I'll use the same malt to a lower volume (thus upping the maltiness & abv), add 10g simcoe to the dry hop in place of the citra, and sub out the crystal 20 for carapils to fix the colour a little.
So... does anyone know anything about that bottling yeast?
