Help to convert Coopers Sparkling Ale clone to BIAB recipe

Hi Folks,

A kind soul kindly allowed me to copy the following Coopers Sparkling Ale clone recipe from one of her books. When I see her again I will list title and author, the pages I took pics of don't have those details.

The main recipe is for a partial brew method, but it also details adaptions for a mini mash method and all grain method. I have a 50L (40cm x 40cm pot) BIAB setup with gas burner and have previously given the all grain method listed below a go and fluked a drinkable result. Have now downloaded BIABacus and ready to give it another go … my goal is to consistently brew drinkable beer that I can adjust/improve, and drink/share lot's of

Below I have listed what the book details for the three methods, and I would really appreciate some feedback/hints on how to convert the All-Grain Method to a BIAB recipe using the BIABacus.

I can't work out what the original VAW is?
Have put the cane sugar under the Grain Bill?
I do intend to use secondary fermentation.
Will bottle in 750mL king browns.
Happy to consider other types of yeast.
BIABacus FG comes in at 1.014 compared to 1.011 for original
BIABacus SRM is 16.3 EBC compared to 35.5 for original (The EBC figures below are my estimates from a website)

So here goes, and thanks in advance for any feedback! Please let me know if this is the wrong forum to post this sort of request.

The original recipe calls for :

OG: 1.056
IBU: 47
SRM: 18
ABV: 5.8%
Yield: 18.9L
FG: 1.011

Partial Brew Method

Steep: Crush and steep in 3.8L at 50ºC for 30 minutes the following; 227g 120ºL crystal malt (161.8 EBC?), 227g Belgian aromatic malt (33.1 EBC)

Strain & Sparge: Strain the grain water into your beer pot. Sparge the grains with 1.9L water at 65.5ºC. Add water to the brew pot for 5.7L total volume. Bring the water to a boil, remove the pot from the stove and add: 1.5kg Coopers light malt syrup, 1 kg Muntons light DME, 600g cane sugar, 28g Pride of Ringwood @ 10% AA (10 HBU) (bittering hop)

Boil: Add water until total volume in the brew pot is 9.5L. Boil for 45 minutes and then add: 28g Pride of Ringwood (flavour hop)

Boil: Boil for 12 minutes then add: 14g Pride of Ringwood (flavour hop)

Cool & Pitch: Boil for 3 minutes, remove pot from the stove, and cool for 15 minutes. Strain the cooled wort into the primary fermenter and add cold water to obtain 19.5L. When the wort is temperature is under 21ºC pitch your yeast: 1st Choice Wyeast 1098 British Ale yeast (ferment at 19-24ºC), 2nd Choice Wyeast 1028 London Ale yeast (ferment at 19-24ºC).

Ferment & Bottle: Ferment in the primary fermenter 7 days, or until fermentation slows, then siphon into the secondary fermenter. Bottle when fermentation is complete with: ¾ cup (180mL) corn sugar boiled in 2 cups (473mL) water.

Mini-Mash Method

Mash 1.2kg British 2-row pale malt with the specialty grains at 65ºC for 90 minutes. Then follow the extract recipe, omitting 0.9kg DME at the beginning of the boil.

All-Grain Method

Mash 3.3kg British 2-row pale malt (4.4 EBC) with the specialty grains at 65ºC for 90 minutes. Add 7 HBU (30% less than the extract recipe) of the bittering hops and the cane sugar for 90 minutes of the boil. Add the flavour hops for the last 15 minutes of the boil and the aroma hops for the last 3 minutes.

Thanks again!

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Hello blu,

I can help with some of your questions, but the file has the wrong file extension, ".ods"

Can you save it as a ".xls"? and post your questions and file over on this thread?
http://biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=286#p1747



MS

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Mad_Scientist wrote:I can help with some of your questions...

Promises, promises . Where did you run away to MS? .

Short on time here blu so I'll say a quick welcome and then plough into it .

The first thing I better mention is that a lot of brewing forums, facebook sites etc give brief, fast answers on brewing questions but they are almost always wrong. Quality answers often take time so always have a beer and read the answers you find here in a thoughtful frame of mind rather than a racy one. The former ends up being faster if that makes sense .

For example, the Hints recommendation of using 1.3T above was missed and that means I can't give you as good an answer as I would like. Regardless, here we go...

Okay, hold on, I reckon this might be a "Clone Brew Recipe." Am I right on that?

..

Yep, I am. Can you leave this with me blu? I'll get to it again within 48 hours but I'll need you to get this into 1.3T for me as it will take at least an hour to write an answer to you.

I know, I know, it is inconvenient but that is why this is a pre-release BIABacus. The upside is that you get the right answers .


PP

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PistolPatch wrote:

Mad_Scientist wrote:I can help with some of your questions...

Promises, promises . Where did you run away to MS? .

Short on time here blu so I'll say a quick welcome and then plough into it .

The first thing I better mention is that a lot of brewing forums, facebook sites etc give brief, fast answers on brewing questions but they are almost always wrong. Quality answers often take time so always have a beer and read the answers you find here in a thoughtful frame of mind rather than a racy one. The former ends up being faster if that makes sense .

For example, the Hints recommendation of using 1.3T above was missed and that means I can't give you as good an answer as I would like. Regardless, here we go...

Okay, hold on, I reckon this might be a "Clone Brew Recipe." Am I right on that?

..

Yep, I am. Can you leave this with me blu? I'll get to it again within 48 hours but I'll need you to get this into 1.3T for me as it will take at least an hour to write an answer to you.

I know, I know, it is inconvenient but that is why this is a pre-release BIABacus. The upside is that you get the right answers .


PP

Thanks PistolPatch, I confused Mad_Scientist link with Hints Appreciate your comments, and have attached xls version 1.3T.

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Sorry you had to go to the hassle of entering three times . It's one massive limitation of the spreadsheet form with no macros :(. And it looks like you have become an Enthusiast. That is very good of you .

I have this book of Clone Recipes on Kindle and have meant to have taken a proper look for ages now so great questions for me. Also answering this post is not going to take as long as I thought [EDIT: Strike that - lol] because you have done an excellent job on your file. I've changed a few things...

1. Changed a few of the EBC numbers for colour in B.
2. Removed your extract potential for the 2 Row malt as unless you know the specs for sure, the BIABAcus default works very well. (Also note that this should go in the top section of Y.
3. Changed your sugar extract potential in Y to an FGAI of 100%.
4. You had some 3.8 L numbers typed into Section W. I have removed those as you do not need any 'Full Volume Variations' - there is no advantage to them when your kettle is large enough and yours is
5. Typed 'B' for method of Cane Sugar in C.

Now we get to a few tricky bits. Firstly we have the usual problem of not knowing the VAW as you mentioned. The closest info we get on this is the extract instruction... " Strain the cooled wort into the primary fermenter and add cold water to obtain 19.5L." That's the 'Volume into Fermentor' not the VAW but as a matter of interest, I typed that into Section D and you'll see in the attached file that the IBU's on the left equaled about 45 (close to 47) but the colour on the left hand side of Section C was only 12.7 SRM instead of the desired 18 SRM. The only way to get that colour higher would be to type in a number far less than 19.5 litres which would not make sense.

So straight away we have a problem but...

All books I know of either start with an extract recipe and convert it to all-grain or vice versa using computer software, none of which can handle such conversions properly. With this in mind, I assumed the author may have started with an extract recipe first so I thought I would type the extract version from the book into BeerSmith and see if I could make more sense of colour and IBU's. BS came up with 6.5 SRM (half the above) for the extract recipe and IBU's of 29.7 (Garetz, 57.7 Rager) and 46.9 (Tinseth).

So, we are really getting nowhere here.

The best we can do in this situation is get more info from the author otherwise we need to leave the file as attached here.

BIABacus PR1.3T - Coopers Sparkling Ale Clone_20140802 - PP.xls

Here's what I would do...

The above recipe worried me straight up for the high IBU's. 47 IBU's no matter what formula used (Garetz, Rager or Tinseth) is too high for that beer. Also as I was typing the recipe into BeerSmith, I noticed that one of the sample recipes there along with those this site contributed is from Andrew Clark and is a clone of Coopers Pale Ale. I know Andrew Clark and have tasted his beers first-hand and he is very skilled on lager, pilsners and this sort of pale ale. He also made the following note

This is as close as I can get, pretty much identical to CPA, taste and color are spot on.
Specs for the beer are direct from Coopers.

Let's put his recipe into the BIABacus...

BIABacus PR1.3T - Coopers Sparkling Ale Clone - Andrew Clark-PP.xls

As I typed this in, I recalled communicating with Andrew on why he had the multi-step mash and the reason was to get the attenuation as high as possible (a lower final gravity), to get a dry, crisp beer.

Another way to get the crispness is to use the cane sugar so here is third file for you...

BIABacus PR1.3T - Coopers Sparkling Ale Clone - Andrew Clark-PP Adjusted.xls

One Important Thing...

Don't be scared to try any of the above three or eventually even brew all three. These recipes will all give you a beer somewhat along the lines yo are looking for - you won't end up with an American Pale Ale or a Stout brewing the above .

Cloning is a very dodgy/hard area as breweries constantly change their recipes not only over time but sometimes over regions. For example, Guinness brewed here is not brewed the same way as it is in Ireland. Also, many imported beers are not handle well during export and can taste completely different to the original brew once they are sold.

Lol, that took an hour and a half so I better go . A bit later though when I get more time, I'd like to see if your friend wants to put out another edition. If so, we might be able to make a few enhancements.


PP

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It's always been good here and was one of the main reason the forum was started. In the early days, any person who lowered the tone, and there were only three or four, soon found (or were shown) the door . The only crappy thing here is that the site structure is taking so long. Until that site structure gets written and finished, most of the info here is very hard to find for users. It's getting there though.

One thing I noticed yesterday was your great checklist and I forgot to answer a question you had in it re pouring versus syphoning from kettle to fermentor. Go for the syphon. This will enable you to leave the kettle trub behind which is best practice.

As for your other questions, if you are finding the info hard to find, just ask away.


PP

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Thanks blu,

On that recipe, it does mean that but that is unnecessarily dangerous territory to be covering when you are starting out and a lot of work. You might then think, "I'll just use one of the liquid yeasts recommended in "Clone Brews" but I think that is also unnecessary and expensive for many styles.

Dry yeasts that might suit this brew could include Nottingham, Windsor of Safale S-04 in no particular order as I am not experienced enough in those yeasts.

What I am saying though is that dried yeast is widely used and is very consistent. You doing a bottle culture or using a liquid yeast or even a smack pack, introduces a huge range of variables in how that yeast gets treated. For me, dried yeast is very under-rated and we re very lucky these days to have many available.

So, explore that I reckon ,
PP

[TS25]

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Much appreciated PP, sort of glad that was your response

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Thanks for fixing that Nuff and answering it properly and sorry I buggered up my answer blu. I had this thread (and you) totally mixed up with another one . It could have also been partly due to having a flu coming on and trying to kill it up front with beer. Doesn't work .

If you need more detail than Nuff has given above, let us know. I am going to try and ease off on answering questions though until I finish the main BIABacus help as I wanted that out the door a few weeks ago and am getting impatient at myself. (I've been stuck on Section P for nearly a week!)

Looking forward to seeing what you decide to do on this one and how it turns out.


PP

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No worries Nuff and PP, will post results as brew comes along
Let me know if you need any Excel help
blu_

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Thanks blu! I just worked out one reason how I had you mixed up with someone else despite the blue hair, lol. It is the colour of Enthusiasts. I have a new screen and the dark green of Enthusiasts now appears as light green. Very glad I have now worked that out - thought I was going mad/der!!!!

As for your BIABacus Excel help offer, I think we are okay on the Excel side. The BIABacus, in spreadsheet form is finalised, all I'm trying to do now is finish the first stage help and I don't think anyone can help there.

So relax blu on that but thanks very much for the offer. Brewers like you, especially ones so willing to donate as soon as they join, are a rare event. One thing I do know is that Enthusiasts and Donors will be put in a new group shortly that will give them a first glimpse of the final BIABacus spreadsheet and help etc.


PP

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Had a great day on Saturday with mates around to witness first use of BIABacus in anger. It's a testament to your efforts with BIABacus PP that they reckon I knew what I was doing. It was great to use the software in realtime, having the space for notes on the right hand side was excellent. Next time I will pre-load these as steps and milestones so I don't miss anything (like the SG into the Boil) and then just fill in times. The brew itself came out with a FG [MODNOTE: I think that should read OG] of 1.034 a bit lower than the target 1.043, I also ended up with 22L into the fermentor as opposed to target 19.8L, so I'm thinking I may have added too much water at start? Regardless the colour looks OK and has nice aroma, so all in all it was a great day shared with friends and family, with a little help from BIABacus !
Can't wait until the final version comes out, nice work PP
blu_

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Read your post before I went to work this morning blu and really enjoyed it.

I wrote a fair bit here and suddenly realised I had made an error and mally has as well which is rare.

(Note: On the terminology, you wrote FG but I know mally and I both knew you meant OG so don't worry about that. A mod will pick that one up eventually.)

What mally and I missed is that you mention VIF not the critical number VAW.

Your target volume of a brew is always VAW, (that is Volume into Fermentor plus Kettle to Fermentor Loss). I'm worried about this gravity reading blu as is mally. Can you post your file?

I'm a bit worried that you may have boiled with the lid on or something.

...

Regardless, of whether errors did occur, I bet this beer will taste great ,
PP

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bugger PP & Mally, i did boil with the lid on!
thanks for the feedback, and as you pointed out, hopefully will taste spot on
looking forward to next brew, thinking I might try a Roggenbier,
cheers
blu_

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.... quick update FG 1.015, tastes OK, so into the bottle she goes. Thanks for the help along the way

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Hey blu, just reading through your progress here, sounds like you had a decent brew day, congrats! Just wondering here if you have measured that FG over a couple days to be sure it is done fermenting? If I am reading correctly it looks like you just brewed it saturday, and 5 days is a fairly short time in the fermentor. If you have measured that FG and it hasn't changed in the last 3 days then maybe you are OK but if not you might want to give it another couple days. If you bottle and it is still fermenting this can cause over-carbonation and even bottle bombs.

Wouldn't want your batch to go sideways now that you've got it this far...

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