Russian River R2H65 clone

I'll start by saying I haven't even tasted this beer let alone tried to brew it, but I'll be up at Russian River in a few days time (currently in LA, flying to SF tomorrow) and the recipe looks great and Crusader Rob [I think] has had some good results from it. Anyway, it's on my 'must brew' list when I get back!

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/russian-river-row-2-hill-56-clone-3...

copied direct from HBT;

Recipe Type: All Grain
Yeast: California Ale Yeast
Yeast Starter: Yes
Additional Yeast or Yeast Starter: 1.25L
Batch Size (Gallons): 6
Original Gravity: 1.055
Final Gravity: 1.010
IBU: 40
Boiling Time (Minutes): 90
Color: 5.1 SRM
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 10 @ 68F
Tasting Notes: Firm Hop Bitterness, Crisp Malt Backbone with biscuity notes, citrus & pine.

After quaffing large quantities of Russian River R2H56 at the brewery I set out to make a homebrew clone. Vinnie Cilurzo was a huge help and is incredibly generous with information!

This is an awesome APA, bright yellow/gold in color with firm hop bitterness, white head and lacing and massive signature Simcoe aroma - Citrus, grapefruit, pine, resin and cat piss.

After 5 revisions, I've finally settled on what I believe is the closest clone I'm going to get. In side by side tastings

Batch Information:
Batch Size (fermenter): 6.00 gal
Bottling Volume: 5.50 gal
Estimated OG: 1.055 SG
Estimated Color: 5.1 SRM
Estimated IBU: 40.4 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
7 lbs 4.3 oz Pilsner (2 Row) Bel (1.5 SRM) Grain 1 60.5 %
3 lbs 14.4 oz Pale Malt, Maris Otter (2.5 SRM) Grain 2 32.4 %
13.6 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 3 7.1 %
0.55 oz Simcoe [12.20 %] - Boil 90.0 min Hop 4 23.5 IBUs
0.55 oz Simcoe [12.20 %] - Boil 30.0 min Hop 5 16.9 IBUs
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins) Fining 6 -
1.0 oz Simcoe [12.20 %] - Boil 0.0 min Hop 7 0.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg California Ale (White Labs #WLP001) [35. Yeast 8 -
2.00 oz Simcoe [12.20 %] - Dry Hop 10.0 Days Hop 9 0.0 IBUs

Mash:
60 min at 154F

Fermentation:
10 days at 68F. I've hit FG in as little as 4 days, but seem to average 6. I like to do a gravity check at 7 days and again at 10 and assuming I'm at 1.010 on both I keg.

Dry Hop:
I dry hop in the keg and have tried dry hop additions between 1.25oz - 3oz. For my personal tastes 1.75 - 2oz is the sweet spot and seemed closest to the draft R2H56 when it was hitting it's stride. For scaling the batch size up or down, note that the dry hop ratio is 0.3 - 0.5oz per gallon.

If dry hopping in primary/secondary, I'd dry hop for no longer than 7-10 days. I personally would bump the amount of dry hops by 15% and cut it down to 5 days dry hopping to try and avoid the vegetal flavor you can get when doing longer dry hop at warmer temps.

Notes:
The above recipe is designed to exactly hit the numbers Russian River delivers and what I use in my batches.

This should finish at 2.5 Plato (1.010) so I tend to use a 1.25L (if using a fresh vial) starter to overpitch just slightly as I find if I pitch the appropriate # of cells or underpitch I tend to under attenuate and only get to about 1.012. I try and pitch approximately 240-250B cells, with required being 230B (figures taken from Yeastcalc). You can also mash slight lower if you are having problems reaching FG.