Recipe Advice Thread

[denimglen]

Thought it might be handy to have a thread for some of the more advanced brewers to give some advice on recipes.

Let's see how it goes eh...

[Reviled]

Ive added water post fermentation before and it didnt taste watery...

1011 is pretty low, where do your beers normally finish? Cos if youre used to drinking beers that have a higher FG you would notice the difference... When i was having under-attenuation problems I got used to drinking beers that were between 1020 and 1030, and when I sorted the problem, everything tasted watery for a while, but ive adjusted again!

[JoKing]

Did you add 10.5 Liters of water to 8.5 Liters of wort though mate?

[Reviled]

lol, no I didnt see that part, that could be the culprit! Most ive done is 4 litres to 18 litres...

[Nolen Smith]

Yea, but I do seriously concentrated boils... always. And rechecking my notes, I ended up with 10 liters *after* boil so added 9ltrs. Seriously, with most of my beers you would struggle to know they're 'from concentrate'. But this one.. whew. Worst thing about it is that I have to use more hops to get the same level of AA extraction than if I was doing a full boil.

Reviled, I was thinking 1.011 was pretty low and surprised it got this low (probably why it seems so dry as well). My pale ales usually finished around 1.013/14 and sometimes upwards of 15/16. (I like 'em a bit sweet).

I SERIOUSLY need a bigger kettle!

[Richee]

I regularly add boiled and cooled water to my brews as they tend to always be over the target gravity after the boil. I just add the required water to get the desired OG. Seems to not affect the beer judging on my NHC results. Oddly enough the reverse happened to me on the weekend coming up short of my 1098 target OG, maybe I should have boiled for another half hour!

[Tony]

I try and target my OG, but if it goes over (which it more often does), that's life. I hear you Nolan, I sparge what I need plus add for boil off. So what I get at the end of the boil. is what I put in the fermenter. I did a partial mash for the first time in ages, yesterday. I used some Weyermann extract, in the boil to give me some flavours. As my recipe stated, I was aiming for 1.075, I got 1.085! And I decreased the amount of extract I put in there. The baby is bubbling away nicely next to me as I type. I fear that if I had to add water, I would dilute it too much and you can't take it out. Look on trade me, for one of those SS 30-40L pots, that's what I got, works wonders. Still haven't put a tap on it though. I have the Ray Daniel's- designing great beers. Which is a mine of information, but I found it just gets a little too technical, I really don't want to work that hard and prefer to go by feel and instinct. So I live with what I get.

[Soren]

Bairds Dark Caramalt 90 EBC.

Have anyone used this?
How does it compare to the light caramalt 30 EBC?
Or is it more like light crystal?
What is the difference?
What is the average speed of an unladen swallow? :-)

[JoKing]

I've got some Global Dark Cara 110 EBC... I should imagine that the flavours would be similar. The flavour is a lot like Caramunich II.

Its got some real fruity characters going on in it - but in the end the Caramel Flavour is what it's all about. I should imagine that the Bairds stuff would have all of what the 30EBC has - but more intense.

I wouldn't consider it a Crystal malt, because it doesn't taste like it.

117 KpH

[Soren]

that sounds pretty tasty, do you like the stuff? I was gonna use it in a brown ale instead of light crystal as the last one got a bit too sweet, the other option I had in mind was excactly caramunich II.

117 KpH sounds like a lot, must have some good tailwind going on there...

[JoKing]

I love Caramel malt - but at the end of the day, it's all about personal preference. I hardly ever use crystal anymore... not that there is anything wrong with it.

If they made Caramel in all the colour ranges as crystal (240EBC) that's all I'd use!

[jt]

I've brewed with Bairds caramalt for a month or two now, but I'm going to try the pale crystal for awhile and check out the differences in the same recipes.
I've grown to like the subtlty of the lighter specialties, just using a bit of choccy or pale choccy if I want some colour, leaves more room for the hops to shine through

cheers, jt

[JackoNZ]

Hi guy's, been a while since I brewed, moved house and too much going on but have got a grain order in and hope to brew this weekend. Decided to go with Jamil's West Coast amber ale but have instead taken Glen's recipe as my base as don't have my classic recipes book at work. Now I don't have any American Hops so I'm going with what I do have. Originally had planned plenty of nz cascade but got told to expect a lot of grapefruit so have toned it down with the Pacific hallertau?

Anyway here it is, just wondering what people's thoughts are on the hop types being used. If it helps I also have Motueka, hallertau aroma, nz fuggles and nz goldings if they are better suited

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
5.00 kg Pale Malt (2 Row) UK (3.0 SRM) Grain 80.39 %
0.40 kg Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 6.43 %
0.40 kg Munich Malt - 10L (10.0 SRM) Grain 6.43 %
0.20 kg Caraamber (30.0 SRM) Grain 3.22 %
0.20 kg Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L (120.0 SRM) Grain 3.22 %
0.02 kg Chocolate Malt (275.0 SRM) Grain 0.32 %
15.00 gm Cascade, NZ [7.40 %] (60 min) Hops 13.1 IBU
25.00 gm Williamette, NZ [6.30 %] (60 min) Hops 18.5 IBU
40.00 gm Williamette, NZ [6.30 %] (10 min) Hops 10.8 IBU
30.00 gm Pacifica [5.00 %] (10 min) Hops 6.4 IBU
25.00 gm Cascade, NZ [7.40 %] (10 min) Hops 7.9 IBU
25.00 gm Cascade, NZ [7.40 %] (2 min) Hops 1.8 IBU
25.00 gm Pacifica [5.00 %] (2 min) Hops 1.2 IBU
20.00 gm Williamette, NZ [6.30 %] (2 min) Hops 1.3 IBU
0.01 gm Koppafloc (Boil 15.0 min) Misc
2 Pkgs SafAle American Ale (DCL Yeast #US-05) Yeast-Ale