Dogfish Head Craft Brewery’s Burton Baton clone
Mark Sarfarik, Dogfish Head’s Brewmaster, provided us with all the juicy details about this beer. “Burton Baton is a 10% ABV imperial IPA that is a blend of 90 Minute IPA with an English old ale that is aged in our 10,000-gallon (380-hL) oak foeders. Since most people don’t have the ability to wood-age beers at home, this recipe is more of a composite of the two threads.”
(5 gallons/19 L, all-grain) OG = 1.088 FG = 1.016 IBU = 65 SRM = 11 ABV = 9.5%
Ingredients
15 lbs. (6.8 kg) pale ale malt
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) crystal malt (60 °L)
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) honey malt
0.2 lb. (90 g) amber malt
1 lb. (0.45 kg) corn sugar (10 min.)
15.2 AAU Warrior® hops (60–30 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 15.2% alpha acids)
9.5 AAU Simcoe® hops (30–15 min.) (0.75 oz./21 g at 12.6% alpha acids)
4.1 AAU Palisade® hops (15–0 min.) (0.5 oz./14 g at 8.2% alpha acids)
14.4 AAU Palisade® hops (0 min.) (1.75 oz./50 g at 8.2% alpha acids)
2.1 oz. (60 g) Simcoe® hops (dry hop)
2.9 oz. (80 g) Amarillo® hops (dry hop)
1.4 oz. (40 g) Palisade® hops (dry hop)
1.1 oz. (30 g) American medium-toast oak chips (optional)
Wyeast 1098 (British Ale) or White Labs WLP007 (Dry English Ale) or Lallemand Nottingham yeast
3⁄4 cup corn sugar (if priming)
Step by Step
Mill the grains, then mix with 5.1 gallons (19.2 L) of hot strike water to achieve a single infusion rest temperature of 155 °F (68 °C). Adjust mash pH to 5.3–5.4 using lactic acid, if needed. Hold at this temperature for 60 minutes. Mashout to 170 °F (77 °C) if desired.
Vorlauf until your runnings are clear before directing them to your boil kettle. Batch or fly sparge the mash and run-off to obtain 6.5 gallons (25 L) of wort. Boil for 60 minutes. Add the Warrior® incrementally from 60–30 minutes, then add the Simcoe® incrementally from 30–15 minutes, and finally, add Palisade® incrementally from 15 minutes to the end of the boil. Also, at 15 minutes left in boil, you may want to add either Irish moss or Whirlfloc as fining agents. At 10 minutes left, add the corn sugar.
After the boil, add the flameout hops indicated and whirlpool for 10 minutes before rapidly chilling the wort to 63 °F (17 °C). Oxygenate with pure oxygen and pitch a healthy count of yeast. Allow the beer to free-rise to 68 °F (20 °C).
Once primary fermentation is complete, dry hop with all three varieties. After 3 days, drop the temperature to 55 °F (13 °C) and after 24 hours, rack the beer to secondary. If oaking, add it now (1.1 oz./30 g of medium-toast American oak) and age for 14 days. Bottle or keg the beer and carbonate to approximately 2.5 volumes.
Dogfish Head Craft Brewery’s Burton Baton clone
(5 gallons/19 L, extract with grains) OG = 1.088 FG = 1.016 IBU = 65 SRM = 11 ABV = 9.5%
Ingredients
8.25 lbs (3.74 kg) extra light dried malt extract
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) crystal malt (60 °L)
0.5 lb. (0.23 kg) honey malt
0.2 lb. (90 g) amber malt
1 lb. (0.45 kg) corn sugar (10 min.)
15.2 AAU Warrior® hops (60–30 min.) (1 oz./28 g at 15.2% alpha acids)
9.5 AAU Simcoe® hops (30–15 min.) (0.75 oz./21 g at 12.6% alpha acids)
4.1 AAU Palisade® hops (15–0 min.) (0.5 oz./14 g at 8.2% alpha acids)
14.4 AAU Palisade® hops (0 min.) (1.75 oz./50 g at 8.2% alpha acids)
2.1 oz. (60 g) Simcoe® hops (dry hop)
2.9 oz. (80 g) Amarillo® hops (dry hop)
1.4 oz. (40 g) Palisade® hops (dry hop)
1.1 oz. (30 g) American medium-toast oak chips (optional)
Wyeast 1098 (British Ale) or White Labs WLP007 (Dry English Ale) or Lallemand Nottingham yeast
3⁄4 cup corn sugar (if priming)
Step by Step
Bring 6.5 gallons (25 L) of water to roughly 150 °F (66 °C). Steep all the specialty malts 15 minutes before removing and draining. Add the extract, with stirring, before heating to a boil. Boil for 60 minutes following the all-grain recipe for hopping and fermentation directions.
Tips for Success:
Mark Sarfarik, Dogfish Head’s Brewmaster, provided us with all the juicy details about this beer. “Burton Baton is a 10% ABV imperial IPA that is a blend of 90 Minute IPA with an English old ale that is aged in our 10,000-gallon (380-hL) oak foeders. Since most people don’t have the ability to wood-age beers at home, this recipe is more of a composite of the two threads.” In addition, Mark conferred several additional tips for the beer. First off, the dry-hop timeline for the beer should be no more than 3–4 days as extended aging can result in harsh, tannic-type flavors. With the majority of dry hopping protocols, most of the magic is really accomplished in the first 72 hours. Secondly, DFH’s oak foeders are fairly neutral so they’re more interested in the oxidative character that oak aging brings. To this end, Mark suggested the addition of the honey malt to drive a bit of that toffee sweetness. Finally, the water profile at the brewery is fairly soft with only 20 ppm calcium. Through additions, they arrive at ~70 ppm of calcium and during the mash you should be striving for a pH between 5.3 and 5.4. Mark adds, “this is a very high-gravity fermentation, so oxygen rather than air is recommended for wort aeration. Pitching double the normal amount of yeast is highly recommended.” If you have trouble finding Palisade®, Willamette is a good substitute, or if Warrior® isn’t available, any high alpha-acid bittering hop should suffice. Another unique technique DFH uses is called continually hopping. It means that small charges of hops are added roughly every minute or so. “This can be emulated at home by dividing each variety up into manageable, small quantities and spreading the addition out over the times indicated in the hopping schedule.”
