Gamma Ray Original

[emerson909]

Very Hazy for Gamma and SO yeast.
Take that back its lupoid

Yes it’s the ‘lupuloid’ recipe above. Was surprised at how hazy it is but guess it’s from the wheat, oats and dry hop

Should move to new thread really!

 

[krispn]

I’m gonna chime in here about the current Gamma Ray original. Grabbed a few cans tonight (just finished up my week of night shift yesterday morning) and it does taste different. The good lady was a big fan since it’s release and I always tasted a ‘nutty’ kinda flavour as in hop nutty not actual nuts - I can’t describe it any other way - but this can just tastes a bit ...generic? It’s not the same beer it was by any stretch!

In other news my clone is kegged and I’ve high hopes!

 

[Braindead]

Im in refuge volta and drinking gamma ray
£6 a pint and its crap

 

[krispn]

You should refuse Volta!

 

[Brew_DD2]

Heineken are just *******s if they have ruined Beavertown.

 

[Newerbrewer]

If I wanted to make a 1gal recipe of this is it just a case of dividing all the ingredients in the original by 5? Is there anything else I'd need to keep in mind scaling down?

 

[Clint]

Maybe the hop addition and the IBU outcome. Easiest is to crunch it through some software..

 

[Northern_Brewer]

I see a lot of people getting hung up on finding Bravo and Calypso. FWIW 70:30 Calypso:Bravo is a well known 'poor mans' approximation to Citra. But in this case it can be cheaper to replace the Bravo and Calypso that need a special order with Citra you already have in stock. Obviously it's slightly different as the Bravo and Calypso aren't added at the same time, but I'd suggest it's a good enough hack if you don't want to mess about with separate hop orders.

 

[phildo79]

Was in a pub last week that had this on draught. Took a chance and ordered one...and then a second one. Really nice, the way it should be. The cans you get in supermarkets are giving this beer a bad rep. I was all set to make a clone brew and then tried a can to remind myself what it was like. Instantly put me off making a batch. But then those two pints last week have got me interested again. Hmmm, decisions decisions.

 

[Mungri]

Was in a pub last week that had this on draught. Took a chance and ordered one...and then a second one. Really nice, the way it should be. The cans you get in supermarkets are giving this beer a bad rep. I was all set to make a clone brew and then tried a can to remind myself what it was like. Instantly put me off making a batch. But then those two pints last week have got me interested again. Hmmm, decisions decisions.

Give it a go. I’ve made this one a couple of times and loved it.

 

[Jimthebrewer]

FWIW, it’s not easy to scale production and still make the same beer. It’s not easy to be consistent in any regard. Sure you can spec same water and time but hops will change batch to batch, year to year. Do you dose that dry hop to Oil content or to weight?

Ok let’s do it to oil, well is the oil content the same at the start of the year and end of the year? No it’s not.

Then the brewer goes from 100hl batches to 250hl batches. Everything changes, all the while you have pressure from customers to keep producing volume, as well as a desire to constantly improve a product.

Sad to say that demand from consumers can sometime drive bad practices at the brewery. Not bad process.

If you want flavour consistency, best stick to a mass produced lager that’s made with extracts and science.

 

[phildo79]

Brewing off-site with different equipment can make a huge difference to the flavour of a beer. And with Heineken owning 49% of the brewery, I'd say that is exactly what is happening.

 

[Jimthebrewer]

Well I can assure you that it’s not. And Heineken have very little to do with the actual brewery on a day to day basis. Logan is 100% hands on at the brewery and neither him nor Nikola would ever want to sacrifice quality. That’s just not what they are about.

 

[An Ankoù]

Im in refuge volta and drinking gamma ray
£6 a pint and its crap View attachment 19052

Just googled Volta out of curiosity. Looks like a Wetherspoons. 6 squids a throw is a bit pricey, I thought.

 

[phildo79]

Well I can assure you that it’s not. And Heineken have very little to do with the actual brewery on a day to day basis. Logan is 100% hands on at the brewery and neither him nor Nikola would ever want to sacrifice quality. That’s just not what they are about.

if you say so. I just find it odd that once small breweries start getting supermarket shelf space, after investment from big beer, the quality takes a hit. Probably just a coincidence...

 

[Jimthebrewer]

I challenge you to make the same beer everyday and make all of the batches taste the same.

 

[Hoppy]

I have to agree with Jimthebrewer here. We have both worked with breweries, flavour matching/profiling is a very important and also challenging for successful, competent brewers.
Along with inevitable variation already mentioned by Jimthebrewer, supply chain is also another factor to supermarket beer, what temp has beer been kept at along it's journey?
These flavoursome 'craft' beers are understandably not as stable as artificially mass produced, stabilised, filtered, pasteurised and light stable beer.

Beavertown have very much autonomy and strive for consistency, constantly.
As to Heineken involvement? Think about it, there are now over 2000 breweries in the UK, the ones growing quickest are the beers that are being emulated here, surely that is the sincerest form of flattery. These breweries cannot just crowd fund a couple of million, to expand a brewery, these are well past that now. Where do they go for finance to expand or indeed get better access to supply chain?

 

[phildo79]

supply chain is also another factor to supermarket beer, what temp has beer been kept at along it's journey?

Aren't beers deliberately kept in harsh conditions before taste testing goes on at the brewery to check the beer is up to standard? I would love to know just how awful this journey from the brewery to the supermarket shelf is.

I get that is not easy to make the same beer time and time again. There will always be variables between batches. But when you are charging £8 for 4 cans, you expect more. I am not one to complain about the price of beer, but when I am paying a premium, I expect something other than bland beer. And, unfortunately, this seems to be the case more and more often when small brewery beer ends up readily available. It has happened far too many times for my liking. It has just put me off buying them anymore.

 

[Jimthebrewer]

You just sound disgruntled.

Firstly, the brewer isn’t charging £8. Secondly there is no cold chain in the UK. So once beer leaves a brewery it’s not put back in a fridge until it hits the consumers. Hop oils are extremely volatile. So flavours change rapidly.

The reason beer became quite uniformed from the 1960’s until let’s say 2000 was because breweries were striving for consistency and stability. That inevitably led to blandness because the things that make beer flavourful are inherently unstable. Fast forward to the “craft beer” revolution and ok yeah we have lots of flavourful beer but it’s inherently unstable.

So as a consumer YOU have the choice. The flavourful beer that you clearly crave can be niche and hard to find, often not travelling far from where it’s made or it can be the “norm” with some (small) sacrifices. But you can’t have both. That’s the long and short of it.

But you’re here and you’re making your own. Don’t worry about what other brewers beer tastes like, you just make yours the best it can be! And don’t sell it to Tesco.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Secondly there is no cold chain in the UK.

There's plenty of cold chain in the UK, it gets used for everything from milk to chicken nuggets. The supermarkets just choose not to use it for beer.

And even for beer you're not quite correct - Jolly Good Beer now have a full cold chain for beer and eg are used by Cloudwater down to London, Yvan blogged about it here : https://jollygoodbeer.co.uk/2019/03/01/on-the-road-to-coldchain/

But cold chain isn't some magic solution, it's far more widespread in the US (because their weather is more extreme) and it doesn't stop them having problems.