BrewDog 5am Saint - Kit Clone

[Paddy Bubbles]

Hey folks.

I'm looking at the best way of producing a reasonable copy of BrewDog's 5am Saint using a kit. 5am Saint is described as an "iconoclastic amber ale". Would love to hear what people think of my "recipe". Luckily, the BrewDog people publish on their website the malt and hops used in their beers, so that gives me a starting point.

http://www.brewdog.com/5am_saint.php

BrewDog 5am Saint "Kit Clone"

• 1.7kg Coopers Real Ale
  1.5 Coopers Amber Liquid Malt Extract (or 1kg Medium spraymalt)
  200g dextrose
  1 oz. Nelson Sauvin (steeped in boiled water for 10 mins)
  1 oz. Cascade (dry-hop)

I don't know if this will work, but I'd love to produce something even remotely like 5am Saint. If anyone has any suggestions on alternative kits/malts/hops, please let me know. Would a light LME/spraymalt be better, for instance? (Would prefer to use a Coopers kit btw.)

Many thanks.

[richc]

I've been playing around with an extract 5am Saint 'inspired' recipe which I suspect will be my next brew


http://hopville.com/recipe/411553/ameri ... ified-dawn

I'd suspect your recipe may end up with more of a british hop character and not as bitter as the original.

[Paddy Bubbles]

Thanks for the response. I like the look of your recipe.

I suppose I've kept the hops quite low, as I know the extract will be hopped with plenty of bitterness. I'm happy enough to leave the bitterness to the kit, but I want to get plenty of flavour and aroma by using extra hops.

Anyone used the Coopers Real ale kit? How suitable as a "base" is it for this style of beer?

[deLaCuerva]

yo man, let us know how does it taste when it'll be ready

[Paddy Bubbles]

I had a bottle last weekend and it wasn't bad but it needs a lot more conditioning. Made to recipe, the Coopers SA is a pretty high gravity brew so we need 3 months in the bottle I reckon. We're getting there though. Plenty of NS hops coming through, but the sweet/malty flavours need to round out more to let the hop flavour come through. Don't think it's much like 5am Saint, but it'll still be a nice drop.

I've since learned that Simcoe is a very dominant flavour in 5am. I also should have (at least) doubled the amount of dry hops. Will keep you posted.

[deLaCuerva]

nice one!
keep us informed!

[Paddy Bubbles]

This has gone through almost 3 months of bottle conditioning and it's tasting really good. Needs another few weeks though. There's very little of the hop flavour and aroma coming through to be honest. So while it's a fine drop, as a clumsy attempt to reproduce the flavour of 5am Saint, it's been less successful.

Next time I'm going to make an amber ale, something like this:
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=40459

Steep some dark crystal. I'm then going to hop it to hell with Simcoe, Centennial and Nelson Sauvin. I'll get there eventually!

[Paddy Bubbles]

Thought I'd post an update on my little "5am Saint" project. Decided to be big, brave and brazen with the hops on this one, and with Mysterio's assistance I did the following:

Coopers Pale Ale, 1.5kg amber LME, steeped 250g 60L Crystal, US-05 yeast
Made to 21 litres
Hops @ 15 mins - 25g Nelson Sauvin, 25g Amarillo (50g)
Dry Hop - 30g Simcoe, 25g Centennial, 20g Ahtanum (75g)

It's bottled now and I'm going to leave for 3 months to condition. The sample I tasted was more bitter than I was expecting but hopefully this will dissipate with bottle age. Strong, but not overpowering level of hops. At least not for my tastes. Fingers crossed!

The "downside" is that I now have lots of unused hops, which means I'm going to have to do more brews to use them up!!

[Paddy Bubbles]

Did a sneaky taste after 4 weeks in the bottle. Initial mouthful was hugely disappointing, that familiar green, fruity smell I’ve come to realise is an immature beer. As I got further down the glass, I started to notice a lot of potential. I think the malt/caramel flavours are very similar to 5am but the hops are a little off, though these will develop further. There’s a nice background bitterness too. However, at the moment, all I can taste is Nelson Sauvin. I’m a little undecided about this hop as it does seem to dominate the other hops. I’m not getting any of the piney Simcoe flavours which is disappointing. Going to leave another 6 weeks and open another bottle. Zero head and very cloudy still too - though this might be attributable to the warm weather, not much cold conditioning out in my shed.