Sinebrychoff Porter Tasting - 2-year, 3-year, 1.5-year clone with recipe

I’ve promised a tasting of the rye 70/-, and it’ll make its merry way here soon enough.  Beating it to the punch, though, are tasting notes about a year in the making.  Sinebrychoff Porter, a vinous Baltic beast out of Finland, was an early introduction for me into the worlds of both porter and craft beer, and has always been a favourite.  Many a night late in undergrad was wiled away at Bukowski’s over a bottle or two of Koff with a good friend and/or roommate; at the time it was offered both regular and aged 3 years, which was also my introduction to vertical tasting.

When we moved back to Chicago in 2008, I found a couple bottles on sale, which I quickly snatched up to squirrel away for a while.  In late 2009, at a hang with friends Joe, Ted, and Michael (and respective girlfriends), we did a vertical tasting of a “fresh” bottle and one of the bottles from the previous year.  The results were pretty stunning; while the fresh bottle was excellent, the smoothness of the aged bottle went above and beyond.

The other 2008 bottle, along with one from 2009, have been hanging out in my reserve collection ever since, along with a bottle of a clone I made in early 2010.  We meant to do another tasting that winter, but it never worked out; we did do a great vertical tasting of 4 years’ worth of Bourbon County Stout in the late summer before the move west, though.  We’re past due on this, though.  DeAunn loves dark beers and has never said no to a bottle of the real thing or my clone.  Her palate is also much better than mine, and I feel woefully inadequate evaluating beer on my own at this point (the vast majority of my beer would all have the descriptors “bready, crackery, tasty”).  So earlier this week together we did the deed; here are our notes.

Koff (clone, bottled 1.5 years ago)

Appearance - Opaque black with red around the edges when held to the light.  Tight head of fine espresso-coloured bubbles that dissipates after a few minutes.

Aroma - Caramel, sweet, alcohol.

Taste - Mellow, warm roastiness; burnt sugar with a muted bitterness in an aftertaste that really lasts; alcohol is present without being oppressive; very round overall; “yummy”.

Mouthfeel - Light-medium carbonation, medium body.  Fits the mellow flavour well.

Overall - Incredibly satisfying, this has aged very well.  It has a warm mellowness that goes perfectly with the cooling weather.

Sinebrychoff (2-year)

Appearance - Same opaque black, but with less red at the edges.  Head is lighter, more of a dark tan; bubbles are coarse.

Aroma - Winey, grape juice, cola.

Taste - Hop bitterness, sharp alcohol and sweet cola up front, with light roast at the end; kind of a reverse of the clone.  Doesn’t linger.  Definitely complex.

Mouthfeel - Medium carbonation, resulting in a medium-light body.

Overall - Excellent, though very different from the clone.  The extra effervescence works with the sweet cola flavour.

Sinebrychoff (3-year)

Aroma - Same colour as the 2-year.  Low carbonation evident in small, quickly dissipating head.

Appearance - A whole lot of cola, very winey, grapey.

Taste - Exceptionally round, very sweet and malty; lots of dark fruit (plums, prunes); syrupy, but with a firm bitterness in the middle; longer aftertaste than the 2-year.

Mouthfeel - Low carbonation, medium body.

Overall - An easy sipper, definitely an improvement over the 2-year; complex, with lots to savor.

Koff (Sinebrychoff Porter clone)

Batch size: 5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.086
Projected SRM: 54.8
Projected IBU: 27.0
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 77%

Grains
65.1% - 10.25 lb Munich
19.0% - 3 lb Vienna
9.5% - 1.5 lb Carafa III
6.4% - 1 lb Caramunich III

Hops
.5 oz Tradition (4.6%) (60 min)
.5 oz Brewer’s Gold (9.7%) (60 min)
.5 oz Saaz (3.5%) (30 min)

Yeast
WY2124 Bohemian Lager - cake

Water additions (mash)
1 1/8 tsp    Baking soda
½ tsp        Salt

Brewday: 3 March 2010
Mash in: 154F for 60 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 6.75 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 15̊P (1.061)

Pitched onto yeast cake at around 40̊F

6 March 2010
Happily fermenting away in the swamp cooler; ambient temp kept 45-50̊F

15 March 2010
Fermentation slowed, brought upstairs for d-rest

Secondary/lagering: 28 March 2010
FG: 1.022
8.25% ABV

Bottled: 9 May 2010
Bottled with 3.5 oz table sugar