Flower Power clone

Have you looked at Ithaca's website? Pretty decent information there, and the malt bill is simple enough that you shouldn't have too much trouble approximating it:

ABV 7.5%
IBUs: N/A
Malt: 2-Row Pale, Honey Malt
Hops: Simcoe, Chinook, Citra, Ahtanum, Centennial
Dry-Hop: Simcoe, Amarillo, Centennial

 

Even if you had 300 batches ‘under your belt’ you couldn’t reverse engineer a recipe from the information that Ithaca Brewing provides for Flower Power. The only ‘real’ information they provide is ABV.

From a malt perspective I think it is a reasonable guess that the vast majority of the grain bill is 2-Row with a small percentage of Honey Malt (e.g., 3% maybe).

There is absolutely no way to make a reasonable guess of a hopping schedule. Firstly, they don’t publish the IBUs so you would have to guess at a value. Maybe the IBUs are 75 IBUs or maybe it is some other value. They list five hops for the non-dry hopping portion; how in the world do you deduce how much and which varieties are used over a 60 minute boil (assuming they use a 60 minute boil). They list three hops for dry hoping; are they equally proportioned? Do they conduct a muti-step dry hopping process?

Good Luck!

Cheers!

 

Did they change the hopping in this beer in the past couple of years?

 

Homebrewtalk.com has some clone recipes for it.

 

Yes. I think they've changed it a couple of times. The ingredients listed above have changed on their website. I attempted to clone it on my own recently and though it tasted very good, it didn't really taste like FP. I mashed at 150. I used 3% Honey malt, 3% Carastan, 4% carapils and the rest 2-row. I bittered with Columbus, added a 30 minute charge of Simcoe and did Ahtanum & Cascade at 15 and Ahtanum/Cascade/Centennial at FO. Dryhopped with Simcoe, Chinook & Amarillo. Fermented at 65 with US-05. In hindsight I would have used the Simcoe later in the boil, otherwise no clue.

 

I think the directions Jack suggests are on the money. Ithaca Brewing was featured on a Sunday Session at the Brewing Network (maybe in 2011?). The brewmaster provided percentages for the grist for flower power and while I don't recall it verbatim, Jack's 3% honey malt sounds right to me. I also want to say there was something about acidulated malt, but maybe that was another recipe. In any event, it would only serve to adjust mash pH. He gave some hop info on the show (like maybe timing?) but not all the details. You probably have enough info to make a good beer inspired by the original.

 

Ratebeers got IBUs at 75. That seems to be consensus target. I found one site at 60, one at 50.

The bittering addition confuses me: I assume it has to be the Chinook? I would also guess Ahtanum/Centennial 15 minutes and in, as I get mostly grapefruit from this beer, not a ton of pineapple or tropical fruits.

I would think Chinook at 60, Simcoe/Citra at 30, then Ahtanum at 15 mins, and a lot of Cent 10 mins and down. Then, maybe like 1oz/5gallons each of Simcoe, Amarillo, Cents for dry hop, maybe split into two separate additions.

I love this beer, it is a standby of sorts. I may have to pick some up and contemplate...

 

94% 2-row
3% Gambrinus Honey
3% Acidulated Malt

House Yeast can be harvested and stepped up from a bottle of Cascazilla.

They've definitely changed the Hops. Citra wasn't in there before, but Columbus was. Columbus was both boil an dry hop. I'm assuming they're cranking up the Simcoe in the dry hop to get that dankness.

 

Citra was not in there even a couple of months ago. I know that and I'm positive that chinook was not in the boil either. Chinook was in the dry hop. Now centennial is in the dry hop and chinook is not. I've seen this change at least 3 or 4 times now. Quite frankly, I think they are just screwing with everybody.

 

I just checked the hops from my last attempt a year ago:
Boil hops: Ahtanum, Cascade, Centennial, Simcoe
Dry Hop: Amarillo, Chinook, Simcoe

http://beeradvocate.com/community/threads/looking-for-all-grain-flower-power-recipe.47883/

 

Correct. Those were the the exact hops I used in my attempt. They change it on their website every so often. Probably to mess with people. I find it hard to believe they're constantly changing such a popular recipe.

 

Almost certainly not to mess with people. You can't always get the hops you want, and sometimes the quality of the hop changes, as they are an agricultural crop. You start making a beer and you realize that this year's Ahtanum batch isn't up to snuff, so you make adjustments to the recipe to try to make it taste the way you want it to taste.

 

Chinook AND Citra to replace Cascade in the boil? That's a bit more than a yield change.

 

I have to agree. Saying cascade was not up to snuff or in short supply so you replaced it with chinook and citra makes no sense to me. And why swap the chinook for centennial in the dry hop? It's not like me knowing a clone of FP would cost them any sales because no one can find any FP anyway. I haven't had that beer in almost 2 years because I can never find it.

 

This is business not an episode of Scooby Doo. Ithaca is not some old man in a mask out to pull one over on some meddling kids. Ithaca has to deliver an approximation of their product batch after batch. With ingredients changing in character and availability from year to year it stands to reason it will vary.

 

So you're saying that most beers from most breweries change their recipes regularly? Although god knows that damn, elusive cascade is hard to come by and so much more expensive than citra.