Great Homebrew Recipes: Pliny The Elder

Occasionally, I will try to document a recipe that appears to be popular amongst the Internet brewing community. As well as serving as a reminder of a potential future brew, it also gives me the opportunity to relate interesting points about contemporary brewers and their brewing practices.

This is, of course, the recipe that Mike McDole’s winning entry in the 2007 Samuel Adams® American Homebrew Contest is based on.

Vinnie Cilurzo is credited with developing the first commercial Imperial IPA at Blind Pig Brewery in Temecula, CA. In 1997 he became head brewer at Korbel Champagne Cellars’ Russian River Brewery in Santa Rosa, CA. He worked there for seven years before purchasing the brewery. At the American Homebrewers Association 2004 National Homebrew Competition in Las Vegas, NV, and again at the 2005 National Homebrew Competition in Baltimore, MD, Vinnie passed out a handout containing a homebrew scale recipe of Pliny the Elder which, in turn, got posted at ratebeer.com. Later, he worked with Brew Your Own magazine, to publish the recipe. The differences in the grain bill between the two may be due to different volume assumptions.

The small amount of caramel malt and the moderate dextrine malt are consistent with Vinnie’s tips on making better hoppy beers. Supposedly, Vinnie started introducing Dextrose due to mash tun volume limitations at Blind Pig. He found that his customers preferred the dry finish it provided. Also, they apparently no longer use mash hopping. The cows that eat their spent grains supposedly do not like it. Some say that they have switched to hop extract.

At 1:44:30 into the 06-26-05 episode of The Sunday Session, there is a lecture that Vinnie gave at the 2005 NHC called “Dry Hopping: Quantity, Time, Temperature, and Mixing,” including a discussion of this beer and how it came about and the dry hopping schedule at Russian River.

This is from the product page at Russian River Brewing:

Pliny the Elder was a Roman naturalist, scholar, historian, traveler, officer, and writer. Although not considered his most important work, Pliny and his contemporaries created the botanical name for hops, Lupus salictarius, meaning wolf among scrubs. Hops at that time grew wild among willows, much like a wolf in the forest. Later the current botanical name, Humulus lupulus, was adopted. Pliny died in 79 AD while observing the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. He was immortalized by his nephew, Pliny the Younger, who continued his uncle’s legacy by documenting much of what he observed during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius.

8.0% ABV, 1.071 OG

• Gold Medal, 2006 World Beer Cup (Double IPA Category)
• Gold Medal, 2005 GABF (Double IPA Category)
• Bronze Medal, 2004 GABF (Double IPA Category)

I have formulated this recipe to produce 5 gallons (19 L) of beer for packaging. I assume a loss due to trub of 0.5 gallons in the fermenter and another 0.5 gallons in the boil kettle. That leaves six gallons (22.7 L) at the end of the boil. I assume a boil-off rate of about 1 gallon per hour, which means I need 7.5 gallons (28.4 L) at the start of the boil for a 90-minute full-volume boil. I have adjusted the ingredient amounts accordingly to achieve the desired gravities, bitterness, and pitching rates. I assume the use of bagged pellet hops for all hop additions. I use the Rager formula for calculating bitterness and the Morey model for calculating beer color.

Recipe: Vinnie Cilurzo’s Pliny the Elder

OG: 1.075 (18.2 °P)

FG: 1.013 (3.3 °P)

ADF: 81.8%

IBU: 261.3

Color: 5.9 SRM (14.3 EBC)

Alcohol: 8.4% ABV (6.6% ABW)

Boil: 90 minutes

Pre-Boil Volume: 7.5 gallons (28.4 L)

Pre-Boil Gravity: 1.054 (13.3 °P)

Extracts	Weight	Percent
Light DME (2.2 °L)	10.0 lbs. (4.5 kg)	80.9
Dextrose (0 °L)	1.1 lbs. (500 g)	8.9
Steeping Grains
Carapils Malt (2 °L)	0.94 lbs. (425 g)	7.6
Crystal (40 °L)	0.32 lb. (145 g)	2.6
Hops		IBU
Warrior 15.6% AA, 90 min.	2.75 oz. (78 g)	167.9
Chinook 12.2% AA, 90 min.	0.5 oz. (14 g)	23.9
Simcoe 12% AA, 45 min.	1.0 oz. (28 g)	39.6
Columbus 14.3% AA, 30 min.	1.0 oz. (28 g)	30.0
Centennial 9.1% AA, 0 min.	2.25 oz. (64 g)	0.0
Simcoe 12% AA, 0 min.	1.0 oz. (28 g)	0.0
Columbus 14.3% AA, dry hop.	3.25 oz. (92 g)	0.0
Centennial 9.1% AA, dry hop.	1.75 oz. (50 g)	0.0
Simcoe 12% AA, dry hop.	1.75 oz. (50 g)	0.0
Yeast
White Labs California Ale WLP001, Wyeast American Ale 1056, or Fermentis Safale US-05

Fermentation and Conditioning

Use 16 grams of properly rehydrated dry yeast, 3 liquid yeast packages, or make an appropriate starter. Ferment at 68 °F (20 °C). When finished, carbonate the beer to approximately 2 to 2.5 volumes.

All-Grain Option

Replace the light extract with 13.3 lbs. (6.0 kg) American two-row malt. Mash at 150–152 °F (66–67 °C). Add 1.5 ounces of 13% AA Chinook hops during the mash.¹

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1. To quote Denny Conn, “The difference, to me, is that [first wort hopping] adds hops flavor and smooth bitterness and mash hopping basically does nothing but waste hops.” ↩