Request - Thornbridge AM:PM Session IPA clone (Extract)

[sniak]

Hello all,

I am looking for a clone recipe for Thornbridge's AM : PM Session IPA clone (Extract).
My searches only turned up clone recipes for their Jaipur English IPA.

I know from their label that they use:
Malts - Maris Otter / Munich / Crystal
Hops - Ella / Citra / Nelson Sauvin / Amarillo

Is there any recipe for this beer with extract ?
anything that is really similar ?

I really liked the tropical fruit notes in this one (specifically the strong guava flavor and lightness of it all).

Thanks alot !

 

[sniak]

Okay, so due to my lack of experience, i looked up some standard recipes.
I concocted some kind of recipe which is a variation of Northen Brewer's KamaCitra.

SPECIALTY GRAIN:
- Valencia Grains: - 0.5 lbs Caramel 40
- 0.5 lbs Munich

EXTRACTS:
- 6 lbs Gold Malt Syrup
- 1 lb Gold DME

HOPS:
- 0.5 oz Amarillo(60 min)


- 1 oz Citra (Flame out–20 minute hop stand)
- 1 oz Nelson-Sauvin (Flame out–20 minute hop stand)
- 1 oz Amarillo (Flame out–20 minute hop stand)

DRY HOPS:
1 oz Citra
1 oz Nelson-Sauvin

YEAST:
Safale US-05 Ale Yeast


Does this recipe work ?
Am i okay on my hopping dosage ? did i choose the right hops for the right stage ?
Are this the right Yeast ?

Thanks !

 

[IslandLizard]

I'm not familiar with the beer you're trying to clone.
Maris Otter is a British brewing malt with a rich, bready, fresh biscuit/cracker kind of flavor. Aside from the other 2 malts, it's possible they use it at 100%. Or at 30-70%, with the balance in 2-row, who knows?
There is Maris Otter extract available if you want to try it, but IPAs are really about the hops, not so much the malts.

With most IPAs, the way you brew and handle it makes much more difference than the ingredients alone.
The hop stands/whirlpool hops after flameout (at reduced temps) make sense, that's how many (modern day) IPAs are brewed as is generous dry hopping (2 oz is quite the minimum).

Nelson Sauvin is a hard to obtain hop, often people buy the kits (instead of piecemealing at their local homebrew store), just to get access to the hop.

US-05 is a "West Coast Ale" yeast (Chico strain) and often used in American IPA's (think Sierra Nevada). Most breweries use the same (their house) strain for most of their beers. It's suitable, yes.

What's your brewing level? How many beers have you brewed? Kits only, or recipes compounded from loose ingredients?
Do you brew full volume or partial boil with top up?
How do you chill the wort?
Kegging or bottling?

Not sure about special sales on their extract kits, but many of NB's all grain kits used to go on sale quite frequently, as low as 3 for $20 each, which also gave you free shipping (orders over $59). Those are really good deals if they still do them. Expect to pay a bit more for extract kits, though.

 

[IslandLizard]

OK, looked some things up about that beer.

"AM : PM is a American IPA style beer brewed by Thornbridge Brewery in Bakewell, GB2, United Kingdom."
"Notes: AM : PM is a truly sessionable beer."
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/13029/139490/

It's definitely a "Session" IPA, 4.5% ABV.

 

[sniak]

I'm not familiar with the beer you're trying to clone.
Maris Otter is a British brewing malt with a rich, bready, fresh biscuit/cracker kind of flavor. Aside from the other 2 malts, it's possible they use it at 100%. Or at 30-70%, with the balance in 2-row, who knows?
There is Maris Otter extract available if you want to try it, but IPAs are really about the hops, not so much the malts.

With most IPAs, the way you brew and handle it makes much more difference than the ingredients alone.
The hop stands/whirlpool hops after flameout (at reduced temps) make sense, that's how many (modern day) IPAs are brewed as is generous dry hopping (2 oz is quite the minimum).

Nelson Sauvin is a hard to obtain hop, often people buy the kits (instead of piecemealing at their local homebrew store), just to get access to the hop.

US-05 is a "West Coast Ale" yeast (Chico strain) and often used in American IPA's (think Sierra Nevada). Most breweries use the same (their house) strain for most of their beers. It's suitable, yes.

What's your brewing level? How many beers have you brewed? Kits only, or recipes compounded from loose ingredients?
Do you brew full volume or partial boil with top up?
How do you chill the wort?
Kegging or bottling?

Not sure about special sales on their extract kits, but many of NB's all grain kits used to go on sale quite frequently, as low as 3 for $20 each, which also gave you free shipping (orders over $59). Those are really good deals if they still do them. Expect to pay a bit more for extract kits, though.

Wow ! Thanks for the detailed response and breakdown.

Your questions are spot on.

My brewing level is a beginner, i only did one brew, a porter, which i brewed from loose ingredients, from a local store's recipe.
it was an extract with specialty grains
I brewed a 3 gallon batch, and one week of bottling conditioning is now behind me.
The waiting time is hard so i'm already trying to think what will i brew next.

The next time i will brew though, i will do a full batch, i inherited some equipment from a friend, that 'm about to use:
-10 gallon pot with a built in thermometer and level.
-an immersion wort chiller coil with a heat exchanger to cool the water before they enter the chiller
-two buckets for fermenting/bottling

And i plan to bottle my beers.

Thanks for the tip on the kit sales, but i am not a US citizen and they do not ship globally.

 

[IslandLizard]

As long as your heat source is powerful enough to heat and boil that kettle with 6-6.5 gallons of water/wort in it, you can do full boils.

Now for most extract brews there's not much to be gained doing full volume boils unless you brew very hoppy beers (IPAs, NEIPAs). The partial boils are much easier and faster to heat and chill, especially when adding an equal amount of very cold (32-40F/0-10C) top up water to 120F/50C wort. Keep that in mind.

When doing partial boils it's best to boil only half the extract (or less) and add the balance at flameout. Unless you're brewing Scottish ales or Barleywines where extra caramelization is desired.

When brewing at full volume, your immersion chiller is certainly needed to chill it down at a decent rate. You can run regular tap water through until it chills down to around 30C above the tap water temp, then fill your pre-chiller/heat exchanger with ice to get it down to pitching temps. It's the temp difference that chills, no need to waste ice when the wort is still at high temps. That is, unless ice is cheaper or less precious than water.

With that 10 gallon kettle it's easy to do all grain (or partial mash/mini mash) too. Either do BIAB (plus a spare bucket for sparging) or using a separate mash vessel (e.g., converted cooler).

Read up on brewing IPAs. Hoppier beers need to be protected as much as possible from oxidation due to air ingress at any point after fermentation starts.

Just in case, forget secondaries, they're not needed for most (99.999%) of beer brewed.

Use a recipe calculator (Brewer's Friend is free) to tailor/scale the 6% ABV KamaCitra recipe to one that will make a 4.5% ABV.

You don't have your location listed, but yeah, when you're outside the U.S. NB's sales won't be much use to you. One of my brew friends stocks up on those $20 special sale kits when they're on. Big time!

BTW, nothing wrong with brewing 3 gallon or even smaller batches. It gives you more opportunity to learn and master the processes, while giving you at least twice the variety. Or for tweaking experimental recipes, such as the AM : PM, without getting stuck with 2 cases of beer that aren't quite there yet. Or using different hops or different ratios of hops.

For hoppier beers I really like WY1318 (Boddington, a British, ESB strain). That yeast is awesome in NEIPAs.
Also WY1968 (or WLP002) and WY1272 (or WLP051) are wonderful in IPAs. They're liquid yeasts, so availability may not be the same where you live, and always make good size starters before pitching.

 

[sniak]

As long as your heat source is powerful enough to heat and boil that kettle with 6-6.5 gallons of water/wort in it, you can do full boils.

Now for most extract brews there's not much to be gained doing full volume boils unless you brew very hoppy beers (IPAs, NEIPAs). The partial boils are much easier and faster to heat and chill, especially when adding an equal amount of very cold (32-40F/0-10C) top up water to 120F/50C wort. Keep that in mind.

When doing partial boils it's best to boil only half the extract (or less) and add the balance at flameout. Unless you're brewing Scottish ales or Barleywines where extra caramelization is desired.

When brewing at full volume, your immersion chiller is certainly needed to chill it down at a decent rate. You can run regular tap water through until it chills down to around 30C above the tap water temp, then fill your pre-chiller/heat exchanger with ice to get it down to pitching temps. It's the temp difference that chills, no need to waste ice when the wort is still at high temps. That is, unless ice is cheaper or less precious than water.

With that 10 gallon kettle it's easy to do all grain (or partial mash/mini mash) too. Either do BIAB (plus a spare bucket for sparging) or using a separate mash vessel (e.g., converted cooler).

Read up on brewing IPAs. Hoppier beers need to be protected as much as possible from oxidation due to air ingress at any point after fermentation starts.

Just in case, forget secondaries, they're not needed for most (99.999%) of beer brewed.

Use a recipe calculator (Brewer's Friend is free) to tailor/scale the 6% ABV KamaCitra recipe to one that will make a 4.5% ABV.

You don't have your location listed, but yeah, when you're outside the U.S. NB's sales won't be much use to you. One of my brew friends stocks up on those $20 special sale kits when they're on. Big time!

BTW, nothing wrong with brewing 3 gallon or even smaller batches. It gives you more opportunity to learn and master the processes, while giving you at least twice the variety. Or for tweaking experimental recipes, such as the AM : PM, without getting stuck with 2 cases of beer that aren't quite there yet. Or using different hops or different ratios of hops.

For hoppier beers I really like WY1318 (Boddington, a British, ESB strain). That yeast is awesome in NEIPAs.
Also WY1968 (or WLP002) and WY1272 (or WLP051) are wonderful in IPAs. They're liquid yeasts, so availability may not be the same where you live, and always make good size starters before pitching.

Thanks a lot!
You gave me a lot to think about, really appreciate it.
Right now I think I'll try to figure out a 3 gallon BIAB recipe, and also whether I can use the big pot or maybe it's too big.

I'll be sure to post here when I converge.

 

[IslandLizard]

whether I can use the big pot or maybe it's too big.

For a full boil of 4 gallons wort from an all-grain (BIAB) mash, your 10 gallon kettle is very fine. A little less than half way full at the end of the boil.
The only thing is you may boil off more than a gallon per hour, due to the larger, wider kettle, so test first and adjust your pre-boil wort volume accordingly. Or top up with boiling water during the boil.

In general, a 30 minute boil is sufficient for many worts derived from ale malts (45' for Pilsner derived worts). Although an hour (1.5 for Pilsners) is typically done, there are diminishing returns after 30 minutes (45 for Pilsners). For smaller batches, adding 30-50% more bittering hops to obtain the same IBUs in 30 minutes vs. 60 minutes is usually a small price. The only slight drawback is your immersion chiller may not be entirely submerged. The plus side is you can easily upscale to doing a 5 (5.5) gallon batch in the same system when you want to double your yield.

Yeah, first try it out by bringing water to a boil and time how long it takes. Leave the lid on, or slightly cracked, while heating to a boil, to reduce heat loss.

 

[sniak]

For a full boil of 4 gallons wort from an all-grain (BIAB) mash, your 10 gallon kettle is very fine. A little less than half way full at the end of the boil.

You mean that I should end the Biab process with 4 gallons, then start the boil, which should end at about 3 gallons?

So you recommend I just boil water for 30-60 minutes to see how much my kettle boils off?

general, a 30 minute boil is sufficient for many worts derived from ale malts (45' for Pilsner derived worts). Although an hour (1.5 for Pilsners) is typically done, there are diminishing returns after 30 minutes (45 for Pilsners)

Do you mean that by boiling, I am somehow affecting the sugar content? I didn't quite get what am I losing by doing a full boil?

 

[IslandLizard]

Do you mean that by boiling, I am somehow affecting the sugar content? I didn't quite get what am I losing by doing a full boil?

The sugar content, the amount in the kettle, is always the same, it doesn't change, unless you splash out wort, have boil overs, leave the valve open, or add more sugars.

By boiling you merely evaporate water, thus concentrating the sugars that are are already in there.

By doing a full boil you get better hop utilization, which merely refers to bittering. Perhaps somewhat better overall hop flavor when brewing very hoppy beers (IPAs).
The main reason to do full boils is to concentrate sugars when doing all grain brewing. See below.

For extract brewing there is no real need to do full volume boils. To reduce caramelization, don't add all the extract to the boil, only half (or less) and add the rest at flameout, so it gets pasteurized.

You mean that I should end the Biab process with 4 gallons, then start the boil, which should end at about 3 gallons?

Not just BIAB, it's common for all all-grain brews, even full volume extract brews. You start out with a larger volume and due to evaporation you concentrate the wort during the boil. A gallon an hour boil off on homebrew systems is often used as a guideline.

To optimize mash/lauter and thus brewhouse efficiency in the end, most all grain processes use a mash volume that's smaller than the pre-boil volume needed. The balance is made up by sparging (rinsing) the grain, which extracts more sugars from the mash.

There are different ways to sparge. Larger systems all use fly sparging. Smaller batches, e.g., 5-15 gallons could be fly sparged, but batch sparging is very popular too, requiring less dedicated equipment and tends to be easier and faster.

BIAB mashes are often non-sparge. This means using full volume mashes without sparging. Many brewers let the bag drip out or squeeze it.

However, many do sparge by simply pouring a gallon or so of water over the bag or dunk it in a large bucket or spare kettle with a few gallons of water in it. The resulting sparged volume, containing more precious sugars, is added to the kettle. Voila!

So you recommend I just boil water for 30-60 minutes to see how much my kettle boils off?

You could but don't have to. You may as well brew a batch and use the estimate of a gallon boil off per hour (or 1/2 gallon if you boil 30 minutes) and add a little more at the end if needed. Next time add that extra bit of to the beginning volume. After a few brews you get it all dialed in. Some calculators use a "boil off percentage," but there's a fallacy as boil off tends to be more or less the same amount, and occasionally even less at higher volumes.

Recommended reading:

• HowtoBrew.com (it's an older, web version, but covers brewing basics very well).
• Or the more modern book version of it (4th edition right now).
• HomeBrewTalk

 

[sniak]

The sugar content, the amount in the kettle, is always the same, it doesn't change, unless you splash out wort, have boil overs, leave the valve open, or add more sugars.

By boiling you merely evaporate water, thus concentrating the sugars that are are already in there.

By doing a full boil you get better hop utilization, which merely refers to bittering. Perhaps somewhat better overall hop flavor when brewing very hoppy beers (IPAs).
The main reason to do full boils is to concentrate sugars when doing all grain brewing. See below.

For extract brewing there is no real need to do full volume boils. To reduce caramelization, don't add all the extract to the boil, only half (or less) and add the rest at flameout, so it gets pasteurized.

Not just BIAB, it's common for all all-grain brews, even full volume extract brews. You start out with a larger volume and due to evaporation you concentrate the wort during the boil. A gallon an hour boil off on homebrew systems is often used as a guideline.

To optimize mash/lauter and thus brewhouse efficiency in the end, most all grain processes use a mash volume that's smaller than the pre-boil volume needed. The balance is made up by sparging (rinsing) the grain, which extracts more sugars from the mash.

There are different ways to sparge. Larger systems all use fly sparging. Smaller batches, e.g., 5-15 gallons could be fly sparged, but batch sparging is very popular too, requiring less dedicated equipment and tends to be easier and faster.

BIAB mashes are often non-sparge. This means using full volume mashes without sparging. Many brewers let the bag drip out or squeeze it.

However, many do sparge by simply pouring a gallon or so of water over the bag or dunk it in a large bucket or spare kettle with a few gallons of water in it. The resulting sparged volume, containing more precious sugars, is added to the kettle. Voila!

You could but don't have to. You may as well brew a batch and use the estimate of a gallon boil off per hour (or 1/2 gallon if you boil 30 minutes) and add a little more at the end if needed. Next time add that extra bit of to the beginning volume. After a few brews you get it all dialed in. Some calculators use a "boil off percentage," but there's a fallacy as boil off tends to be more or less the same amount, and occasionally even less at higher volumes.

Recommended reading:

• HowtoBrew.com (it's an older, web version, but covers brewing basics very well).
• Or the more modern book version of it (4th edition right now).
• HomeBrewTalk

Thanks again !
Okay so i did some reading.
Got to a recipe i'm comfortable with, the recipe is loosely based on the recipe HERE, which is described as a Tropical Session White IPA.
Made some changes so it's a hybrid that fits more the malt and hop profile i imagined the AM : PM has, and my local store material availability:

Mashables:
White Wheat Malt - 0.9 kg
Pale Malt (2 Row) - 0.7 kg
Pale Malt - Maris Otter - 0.5 kg

Hops:
Warrior - 5 gram - 60 min

20 min flameout of
- Amarillo - 5 gram
- Citra - 10 gram
- Nelson Sauvin (or Hallertau Blanc) - 10 gram

and another 10 gram of each for 7 days of dry hopping:
Citra & Nelson Sauvin (or Hallertau Blanc)

Yeast:
SafAle - #S-04


I'm planning on doing a one vessel BIAB 11Liter batch (fermentation volume), and i assume an efficiency of 75%, targeting an OG of 1.046.

Does this make any sense ?
Is the efficiency probable ?