tips for a low gravity clone of a high gravity brew

Nope

 

When you just proportionally scale down a big beer, you can end up with a distinct lack of body and flavor. A way to mitigate this is to aim for a less fermentable wort (through less fermentable grains, mash temps, shorter mash times) or use a yeast strain with less attenuation. If there's any simple sugar in the original recipe, consider reducing/deleting it, and consider going a little heavier (proportionally) with the specialty grains. There's no magic formula though. Designing really good low gravity beers is an art.

 

Trial and error. I would potentially up the crystal malt % for some increased body in a smaller brew and potentially a bit more of the flavor. Luckily with that particular beer most of the flavor profile is the yeast and complemented by the hops so you can certainly get plenty of flavor from those without much to worry about.

 

We brew pretty much exclusively beers around 1.045 for almost all styles. Vikeman hit on a few things we've realized we need to do to get a good tasting, full-bodied beer.

Mash high, like 160*F, don't oxygenate (just give your fermenter a good shake), ferment on the low end temperature-wise, don't be afraid of specialty malts (substitute some base malt with cara-pils).

Oh, and watch your IBU:OG ratio. Too much bitterness can make a low-gravity beer very unpleasant. Work backwards when calculating your IBU's, meaning if you're aiming for, say, 1.25 IBU:OG ratio, determine your late hops (flavor/aroma) and their IBU contribution. Adjust your bittering charge from there.

 

The trick to brewing a clone of Raging Bitch (regardless of OG) would be obtaining the proper yeast: the El Diablo strain which is produced by BSI in Colorado.

I am not aware that BSI sells yeast to homebrewers.

Cheers!

 

All good advice...might I suggest a name? ..."Raging Princess"

 

hopefully naugled will respond here because he brewed a pretty amazing RB clone. Have you brewed a BIPA before?

 

It may be possible that El Diablo is 'classified' as a wit yeast strain, but the Belgiany character (esters and phenols) in Raging Bitch are much greater than what I obtain in my wit beers using 3944 and 3463.

Hopefully @Naugled will come to the rescue!

Cheers!

 

i've only done one (sort of two but second one was really just a hoppy pale ale fermented w/duvel strain). Other people may have different opinions, but in my limited experience find it's a balancing act getting a good mix of hoppy characteristics to belgian characteristics. I opted to keep the belgian yeast characteristics more on the muted side with a lower range ferm temp helped because the phenols & esters can dominate when ferm temps gets ramped up if using a strain like westmalle or duvel.

 

Great advice in this thread so far. I made an "Alchemy Minute" APA clone of Great Lakes Alchemy Hour/Chillwave DIPA, and while it was very tasty, it would have benefited greatly from several if not all of the suggestions in this thread.

 

i was at a local establishment yesterday and was talking to the brewer about their session ale (2.5%). he told me it was trial and error for them to get a full-body and full-flavour session beer.

he said that they mash high (not sure if i'd go up to 160 F...would probably peak at 156 F). they use the same malt bill as a regular gravity ale, but they cut their sparge well short. they don't want any tannins in their wort, so they won't do a full-volume sparge and will just top up their brew kettle with water to get to volume.

and yeah, i wouldn't be using Chico as your yeast strain. use something a bit less aggressive.

 

Jack, thanks for tagging me on this post, I missed the RB reference.

Mugs, here is an RB clone recipe from the Flying Dog kit. The kit includes two vials of yeast.

2-row 95%
C60 5%

Mash at 150-152F

Warrior 25g @ 90 min, 57 IBU
Amarillo/CTZ 13g @ 15min, 8 IBU
Amarillo/CTZ 36g, FO
Amarillo 70g, DH

Target OG 1.072
Target FG 1.009

Ferment at 68F
Cool to 50F after complete and DH with Amarillo

This came out dead on. I've gotten close with the grain and hop bills in past but the yeast was the missing link to to getting the right flavor profile. The yeast was the key to obtaining the correct flavor. I probably made 4 or 5 attempts at it with different wit yeasts before I finally got my hands on the right stuff.

I see you're in Maryland. I believe the will be offering this kit again in May. I'd swing by and pick one up, just for the yeast. Check out their website, I believe the post a schedule.

If I were to 'sessionize' this beer I'd follow much of the advice given from the others.
Lower the OG to maybe 1.050, target the same FG, but mash a bit higher, maybe 154-156F.
Adjust the bittering hop IBUs and the FO/DH amounts to maintain the original IBU:OG ratio. They didn't reveal the Amarillo/CTZ proportions, but I've used a 50:50 split on following recipes and it seems to be correct.

So Raging Princess would look like this to me...

2-row 95%
C60 5%

Mash at 154-156F (I'd stay closer to the lower end on my system)

Warrior @ 90 min, 40 IBU (you might be able to go to 60min for the boil)
Amarillo @ 15min, 5 IBU
Amarillo/CTZ 32g, FO
Amarillo 63g, DH

Target OG 1.050 (I randomly picked this number)
Target FG 1.009 (this will give you about a 5.4% beer)

Ferment at 68F
Cool to 50F after complete and DH with Amarillo

Let me know if you brew it. I'd like to hear the results. I may even try a little bitch myself.

 

Brew it on the moon. Gravity is lower there.

 

Out of curiosity, do you recall which Wit yeasts you have tried?

Thanks!