The Alchemist's Heady Topper clone recipe

[Rebel_B]

I've heard about this ale, but never had it. Anyone here tried to brew up a Heady Topper? This from the new October BYO magazine:

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Heady Topper clone (The Alchemist)

(5. 5 gallons/21 L, all-grain)

OG = 1.076 FG = 1.014 IBU = 100+ SRM = 6 ABV = 8%

Ingredients

15 lbs. (6.8 kg) British Pale Ale Malt

6 oz. (170 g) Caravienne® malt

1 lb. (0.45 kg) turbinado sugar (10 min.)

7 AAU Magnum hops (60 min.) (0. 5 oz./14 g at 14% alpha acids)

13 AAU Simcoe® hops (30 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 13% alpha acids)

5. 75 AAU Cascade hops (knockout) (1 oz./28 g at 5.75% alpha acids)

8.6 AAU Apollo hops (knockout) (0. 5 oz./14 g at 17.2% alpha acids)

13 AAU Simcoe® hops (knockout) (1 oz./28 g at 13% alpha acids)

10.5 AAU Centennial hops (knockout) (1 oz./28 g at 10.5% alpha acids)

7 AAU Columbus hops (knockout) (0. 5 oz./14 g at 14% alpha acids)

1 oz. (28 g) Chinook hops (primary dry hop)

1 oz. (28 g) Apollo hops (primary dry hop) 1 oz. (28 g) Simcoe® hops (primary dry hop)

1.25 oz. (35 g) Centennial hops (secondary dry hop)

1.25 oz. (35 g) Simcoe® hops (secondary dry hop)

1 Tb. Polyclar

Wyeast 1028 (London Ale) or White Labs WLP013 (London Ale) or Lallemand Nottingham yeast

Priming sugar (if bottling)

Step by Step

Achieve a target mash temperature of 153 °F (67 °C). Boil for 60 minutes, adding the hops as instructed. After boil is complete, begin a whirlpool in the kettle and let the knockout hops rest in the hot wort for at least 30 minutes before chilling. Chill the wort rapidly to 68 °F (20 °C). Ferment at 68 °F (20 °C) for one week. After final gravity has been achieved, add a clarifying agent such as Polyclar. Allow three days for clarifying agent to work, then add first set of dry hops to primary fermenter. After seven days, rack the beer off the dry hops and yeast cake either into a keg or secondary fermenter. Purge with carbon dioxide if available. Add the second set of dry hops to the keg or secondary fermenter. After five days prime and bottle, or keg. If bottling, use the priming chart at http://byo.com/ resources/carbonation to determine how much priming sugar you will need.

Heady Topper clone (The Alchemist)

(5. 5 gallons/21 L, extract with grains)

OG = 1.076 FG = 1.014 IBU = 100+ SRM = 6 ABV = 8%

Ingredients

9.9 lbs. (4.5 kg) light liquid malt extract

1 lb. (0.45 kg) extra light dried malt extract

6 oz. (170 g) Caravienne® malt

1 lb. (0.45 kg) turbinado sugar (10 min.)

7 AAU Magnum hops (60 min.) (0. 5 oz./14 g at 14% alpha acids)

13 AAU Simcoe® hops (30 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 13% alpha acids)

5.75 AAU Cascade hops (knockout) (1 oz./28 g at 5.75% alpha acids)

8.6 AAU Apollo hops (knockout) (0. 5 oz./14 g at 17.2% alpha acids)

13 AAU Simcoe® hops (knockout) (1 oz./28 g at 13% alpha acids)

10.5 AAU Centennial hops (knockout) (1 oz./28 g at 10.5% alpha acids)

7 AAU Columbus hops (knockout) (0. 5 oz./14 g at 14% alpha acids)

1 oz. (28 g) Chinook hops (primary dry hop)

1 oz. (28 g) Apollo hops (primary dry hop)

1 oz. (28 g) Simcoe® hops (primary dry hop)

1.25 oz. (35 g) Centennial hops (secondary dry hop)

1.25 oz. (35 g) Simcoe® hops (secondary dry hop)

1 Tb. Polyclar

Wyeast 1028 (London Ale) or White Labs WLP013 (London Ale) or Lallemand Nottingham yeast

Priming sugar (if bottling)

Step by Step

Steep the crushed grains in 2 qts. (1. 9 L) for 20 minutes at 155 °F (68 °C). Rinse the grain with hot water and add water to achieve 6.5 gallons (25 L) in your kettle. Turn off the heat, add the malt extract to your kettle and stir until fully dissolved. Boil for 60 minutes, adding the hops as instructed. After the boil is complete, begin a whirlpool in the kettle and let the knockout hops rest in the hot wort for at least 30 minutes before chilling. Chill the wort rapidly to 68 °F (20 °C). Ferment at 68 °F (20 °C) for one week. After final gravity has been achieved, add a clarifying agent such as Polyclar. Allow three days for clarifying agent to work, then add the first set of dry hops to the primary fermenter. After seven days, rack beer off the dry hops and yeast cake either into a keg or secondary fermenter. Try to purge with carbon dioxide if it is available. Add the second set of dry hops to the keg or secondary fermenter. After five days prime and bottle, or keg. If bottling, use the priming chart at http://byo.com/resources/carbonation.

Tips for Success:

The goal is to get at least 5.5 gallons (21 L) into your fermenter to compensate for the loss of wort which will occur during dry hopping. Make sure your primary fermenter has enough headspace to accommodate that much wort plus a large kräusen. John Kimmich’s biggest piece of advice for trying to clone this beer: “Technique and water treatment.” For more information about brewing water treatments, visit http://byo.com/story1547. To tweak your brewing water, download BYO’s brewing water spreadsheet, written by Vermont Pub & Brewery’s Greg Noonan: http://byo.com/resources/brewwater

If you have access to a can of Heady Topper, try culturing the yeast from the can to get as close to the original as possible. Read about the culturing process here: http://byo.com/ story1661

For extract brewers who use concentrated boils (usually around 3 gallons/ 11 L), try adding most of the extract near the end of the boil. This will keep the gravity low, which may help alpha acids convert into iso-alpha acids.

[mashani]

More hops then you can shake a stick at!

[swenocha]

That recipe is fine and dandy, except you'll never get Heady Topper taste without the Conan yeast.

[Beer-lord]

Read alot about this and have collected a few recipes myself (got the same one you imaged). Of course, it's not available here. And, the reason I've never done it is just because of what swenocha says....the yeast. I've read tons of posts on forums where people harvested the yeast from a HT and was still not pleased with the final result.

[swenocha]

Conan yeast starter (slurry shared by Derrick from CSB's Conan the Brewbarian) ready for action

[Beer-lord]

Nice!
By the way, there's an old and still going thread on HBT about this is anyone is interested.
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/heady-t ... ne-390082/

[Kealia]

For me, this is like Pliny to others: I've heard a lot about this beer but never had one.

I just downloaded my October issue of BYO to my tablet and haven't gone through it yet. Saving it for my next plane trip in two weeks.

[haerbob3]

Read alot about this and have collected a few recipes myself (got the same one you imaged). Of course, it's not available here. And, the reason I've never done it is just because of what swenocha says....the yeast. I've read tons of posts on forums where people harvested the yeast from a HT and was still not pleased with the final result.

We need to remember that a lot of beers are filtered (to remove a priority yeast strain) and bottle conditioned with a different yeast. If this is done with this beer you would not net the same yeast.

[swenocha]

There are tons of threads about harvesting and using the Heady yeast. I don't think that that is a concern here.

[haerbob3]

So tell us Swen how do you get all cool yeasties and hops?

[philm00x]

He could tell us, but then he'd have to kill Swen us!

[Inkleg]

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[swenocha]

So tell us Swen how do you get all cool yeasties and hops?

Just have to make friends with the right brewmasters...

The Heady yeast is mucho active...

[haerbob3]

Guess I am screwed then

[philm00x]

Came across this recipe on BYO's website while searching on Google. I want to brew this really badly because I really do love Heady Topper's flavor, more so than Pliny. Yeast Bay sells Vermont Ale yeast which is the Conan strain that Alchemist uses in Heady, but it costs as much to ship the yeast as the yeast itself costs. And then there's the nearly one whole pound of hops that goes into the beer at various stages of brewing. That is a lot of hops, which costs a lot of money.