Kronenbourg 1664 Clone

I’m trying to clone this for a neighbor, but have not found much online.  Here is what I’ve come up with.  Any advice would be much appreciated.

7#  Floor Malted BoPils
1#  Flaked Rice
.5# Light Munich Malt
3oz Acidulated Malt

2oz Strisselspalt 2.3% at 60 mins
2oz at 30 mins
2oz at 10 mins

1lb Honey at 10 mins

Mash at 150 for 60 minutes

Wyeast 2308 Munich Lager

Thoughts?

Dave

I would use Belgian Pils, way less aroma hops (maybe 1 oz at 30 and a half oz at 10), magnum or hop extract at 90 for most of the IBUs, 100% pils (with a little acid or acid malt), and the more-common Bohemian Lager yeast. If you’re sure there’s rice in it, add that, too.

Not trying to be a jerk or anything, but living in France, l’origine de Kro, for the Love Of God Why???

“Seize” (pronounced ‘says’) as it’s called here is without a doubt the. worst. beer. I. have. ever. tasted.

To be constructive, if you really want to clone it, you’re going to need to amp up the acetylaldehyde and make sure it’s got either skunk (sold in green bottles) or a strong chemical bite. I am not 100% sure but I believe Kro does the ‘fermented under pressure’ thing to speed up fermentation from what would normally take ~2 weeks to less than three days.

The recipe you’ve got there looks like it would make a tasty beer, but if you really want to clone 1664, you might as well try to clone Olde English.

If what your neighbor wants is a drinkable light lager, brew a cream ale or CAP, which will have much more ‘interest’ to it. That’s my opinion anyway.

OOOH LA LA!

Apparently he spent a summer there when in college and that is what they drank.  I bought a case the other weekend and thought it was decent for a light lager.  I could really make out the honey and Strisselspalt hops.  Maybe they keep the crap for the locals to make them stick to wine?  ;D

I like the looks of the recipe too except for the late hop additions as Skylar pointed out.  I do have some 2124 that a BoPils is sitting on.  It’s fermented out and ready to be kegged, so I may just use it.  I just bought a bag of the FM BoPils so I’m just going with that for the grain bill.

Funny you just call it “16”.  What French beer would you recommend to clone/drink yourself?

Or is that why you homebrew!!  ;D

Dave

That sounds about right.

You laugh, but sometimes I wonder if it’s not the case!

Hrm. Well, Craig Allen, a scottish-married-to-french-lady brewer friend of mine, brews a beer called Cuvée d’Oscar - http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/cuvee-doscar/146593 It’s basically a Nelson Sauvin dry-hopped dunkelweizen.

One thing to keep in mind is that ‘french’ saisons are actually not French, but rather from French Flanders (in Belgium, where theoman lives).

I’m afraid that as far as mass-produced beer there’s not much home-grown that’s interesting… Yet. :slight_smile:

LOL!  Thanks for the link and best of luck educating our French friends on good beer!

Dave

With plans to open the first canning brewery in France, I’ll need it.

Flanders is the Dutch-speaking (or Flemish, if you will) region of Belgium. Wallonia (or Walloon) is the French-speaking region. French Flanders, oddly, is the northernmost region of France, which borders Belgium. The capitol is Lille, and Lille has some great breweries, including Fantome, which makes some great saisons.

We can say thank you to 600 years of wars for all this confusing territory. And thanks to you for the clarification!

We went with the recipe as is except I subbed in the 2124 for the 2308.  It’s bubbling away with a nice thick Krausen at 50F.  Phil, I’ll try to remember to post whether it came out like Kro or the much better Clonenbourg.  I have some high hopes for this beer.  The Strisselspalt smelled great in the boil!

Dave

Clonenbourg! I love it.

You’re almost right. There are some very good French Flanders breweries, but Fantome isn’t one of them. Fantome is in Belgium and nowhere near Lille.

Dave, good luck on the beer. Here’s hoping it’s nothing like 1664 (I agree entirely with Phil)!

I agree that Kronenbourg in the bottle is awful, but a bar (in Montana!) had this on tap a while ago and I thought it was quite nice.  I could really pick out the Strisselspalt.

It blows my mind that Kro is available in Montana.

I stand corrected. I wonder why I thought that brewery was in Lille?

:o Hi davidgzach  how did that 1664 clone turn out please?
btw I think 1664 is an excellent beer and frequently have one when dinning out