Hogs Back TEA and Summer Ale

[Eskimo Spy]

Greetings! I have a colleague at work who is from the Tongham, Surrey area, and was quite excited about the idea that I might be able to make a clone of Hogs Back Traditional English Ale (TEA) or Summer Ale.

Does anyone have a recipe for either of these? This would make this guy's year, as he loves these beers, so please help!

I have the TEA clone in the primary, based on the recipe below, but since you can't get either beer here in the states, I was hoping to get some feedback. Please check my recipe for TEA and let me know if I'm in the right neighborhood or not, and please give me some direction on their Summer Ale, thanks!

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Extract recipe (Hogs Back TEA):

Hogsback Traditional English Ale-Best Bitter
5.0 gallons

5 lbs. Golden Light DME
0.75 lbs. Paul's Crystal 60ºL (Steeped for 30 minutes at 155º)
2 oz Kent Goldings AA 4.5% @ 60 mins
0.5 oz Kent Goldings AA 4.1% whole leaf @ 10

1 Smack Pack Wyeast 1968 London ESB Ale

(Sorry everything is in lbs and oz!)

[sills]

There is a recipe for TEA (one of my favourites and next in line to be brewed) in "Norm's Real Ale Almanac Recipes" section of this forum. I've not made it myself so I don’t know how close it is to the original but I am looking forward to finding out.

[Eskimo Spy]

The recipe above was adapted from Norm's recipe. Has anyone made this recipe? Is it close to the original?

Thanks.

[Madbrewer]

The recipe above was adapted from Norm's recipe. Has anyone made this recipe? Is it close to the original?

Thanks.

The recipe wasn't bad but it was not exactly a clone either. Andy and I have both attempted it and decided it didn't quite have enough of a 'toffee' taste of all things (IIRC) - then tried a higher temperature mash

Here's the latest improvement though still not perfect
it's Malt and Hop Bill I used last time

O.G. 1.044

Pale Malt 4500g
Crystal Malt 350g

Goldings 5.17 26g 90 mins
Fuggles 4.95 28g 90 mins
Goldings 5.17 15g 0

Although I am lucky enough to br able to get the actual yeast for this I used Nottingham as the Hook Norton strain that HBB use doesn't always behave in a home brew environment.

[RabMaxwell]

If it's not got enough of a toffee taste take some of the first runnings from the mash boil separately with gas reducing by more than half will give toffee notes.

[booldawg]

If it's not got enough of a toffee taste take some of the first runnings from the mash boil separately with gas reducing by more than half will give toffee notes.

I found 2L of wort will reduce down to 1L after 35 mins of boiling on the gas hob.

[sills]

As I said this will be my next brew, Rab and booldawg can you please explain what you mean. Do I boil up some of the wort seperatly and then add it back to the fv? If so how much? Might give this ago at the week end.

[timmydog]

If it's not got enough of a toffee taste take some of the first runnings from the mash boil separately with gas reducing by more than half will give toffee notes.

I've heard of this effect before here, but it was mentioned regarding decoction mashing.

My wife tried a beer in the East Sussex Camra beer festival that had a toffee flavour to it and she loved it. I've been trying to find out how to recreate it (in a half-hearted way, admittedly - she tends to prefer wine to beer) and was going to try some of the different cara malts. I'm putting a brew on tomorrow, so I might give this a go and see what happens.

Tim

[Toast]

Although I am lucky enough to br able to get the actual yeast for this I used Nottingham as the Hook Norton strain that HBB use doesn't always behave in a home brew environment.

I too live near the brewery, and used their yeast (handed over in a dodgy plastic bag) in my first brew. No idea why I didn't get an infection!
Asked them if they had any yeast the next week (intending to take a sterilised box) and they had a yeast infection and were not able to give me any (or brew themselves). This is what can happen when you crop your yeast I guess.
Minor infection or no, there beers are good and they are happy to sell raw materials.[/quote]

[Eadweard]

TEA is all fuggles.

[Andy]

Hi Eadweard,

Do you have insider info on that ? The Real Ale Almanac lists fuggles and goldings ( viewtopic.php?p=2556#2556 ).

[Madbrewer]

Am near the end of my corny now on this one. I had a cracking pint of it from my corny last night though. The above recipe did yield good results. They weren't a perfect emulation of the brew that you could do a 'pepsi challenge' with but I would defintely say 'if you liked that, you'll like this!'

Being critical of my own results, I am not sure if the Nottingham yeast didn't over ferment this brew? Had I indeed gone for the Hook Norton Strain or used Safale I may have rated it closer as a clone.

I am of mixed opinion on the merits of using the exact yeast. I am not sure if it's Graham I am paraphrasing or where else I may have read it but just because the yeast works well in the conditions imposed by the brewery doesn't necessarily mean it will work well in your 5 Gallon fermenter. Other brewers happily tell me it (yeast) is more important to the flavour than I give credit for.

I would suggest Using either Norms posted recipe, the one above, or indeed formulate one in between and let us know how you get on?

[booldawg]

As I said this will be my next brew, Rab and booldawg can you please explain what you mean. Do I boil up some of the wort seperatly and then add it back to the fv? If so how much? Might give this ago at the week end.

Yep, I usually boil it down whilst sparging. Just add it to the wort in the boiler when its ready.

[timmydog]

Yep, I usually boil it down whilst sparging. Just add it to the wort in the boiler when its ready.

I gave this a go with my on Thursday (21/08/08 ) but think I might have boiled it for too long - it had gone very thick and gloopy. I added a bit of cold water to stop it from getting any worse and tasted a bit; it didn't taste very toffee like, but didn't taste burnt either, so I chucked it into my fermenting bucket anyway. It's currently in my new better-bottle secondary fermenter, looking far more cloudy than I'd like, but I'm looking forward to trying it anyway...

[sills]

Mine just went into a barrel to mature for a few weeks before going into a cornie. Made madbrewers version, hope it tastes as good as it smelt whilst fermenting under the stairs. Only problem was I found a small dead fly floating on the top legs up. Hope there's no harm done did'nt look like it had drunk to much