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...

[Dave W]

That looks really really interesting, I'll be keen to hear how this goes.

Using the Wayermans acidified malt might mean less risk of accidentally infected brews next time you brew I guess?

I've tasted the malt itself but have not (knowingly) tried any beers that use it, so I can't say how much effect it would have?

[Scarrfie]

Damon I have smoked Kahawai with Pohutukawa when there was no Manuka to hand (Rangitoto Island). It is the business mate. In fact it is probably preferable as the flavour isn't so in your face, it should lend a nice subtle flavour to malt. I have toasted Pohutukawa chips and chucked those at ESB in the fermenter for a week. Kelly has a bottle of that now so it will be interesting to see what he thinks. Unfortunately it has a few faults as well. Go for it, I would love to hear how it turns out.

[Kelly Milligan]

Looking forward to trying it :) Been a bit man down sick this week so will wait till I have my smell and taste back at full capacity!

[Damon Colbert]

In case any future readers are curious about the success of this beer, here's my take;

Strong smoke aroma, hiding any hop aroma.  Good colour and clarity for a wheat beer.  Great head retention and lacing.  A bit too thin in body, and as a result somewhat astringent.  More peaty than smoky.  Not quite the spice/earthiness from the hops that I had hoped.

In the end I simply used 2kg NZ Pilsner and 2kg wheat malt, and smoked the whole batch.  Whole grains were soaked in a bucket of water for about half an hour beforehand, while we built up and burnt down the fire using dry Pohutukawa wood.  Spread the grain thinly over some old insect netting, and warm-smoked for approximately 2 hours (I estimate the temperature was never above 60C).  To boost the amount of smoke we periodically threw some green twigs on the fire.  I left the malt for two weeks to let phenolics breathe out, and had the grain crushed as normal.

Mash went well, except I didn't hit the correct saccharification infusion the first time around.  I think the short period at 63C (and possibly forgetting to mash out) is what left the beer a bit thin.

I think next time I will only smoke 1/2 the grain bill, and only with Pohutukawa wood, to avoid some of the phenolics that gave it a peaty/medicinal flavour.  Also I trialled dry-hopping a small amount, using Cascade (just what I had on hand).  I think this added something it lacked, so will definitely do this (with perhaps a more careful selection of hop variety) next time around.

[Scarrfie]

Cool, thanks for the update Damon. Good that you have ideas to refine it :-)

[Dan]

Hi Guys. The Brewhouse seems to have a lot of imported hops at the moment so thought Id try an Epic Lager brew.

Probably bitter to about 35-40 IBU with Southern Cross then use use 20g Liberty @10mins and 30g @0 mins (19L batch OG 1.050). Is that enough Liberty to get the Aroma about right?? Was thinking of maybe dumping all 50g in  at 0mins could be another option( ie skip the 10min addition)

Using 95% Malturop pils, 5% Carapils and Saf 23 yeast

Thoughts??

[Matt Smith]

Hey Dan, good idea for clone, great beer! I'm not sure how close you want to get, or if you just want something similar, but I know there is Santiam in Epic Lager aswell. I have no idea what the ratio is, but Liberty and Santiam are both great flavour and aroma hops, so Id just go with a 50/50 mix. Whilst you'll get a reasonabe amount of hop flavour from a big 0 minute addition, I think a 10 minute addition is also pretty important for beers like this for some nice punchy hop flavour. If it was me id go about 30g @ 10, 30-40g @ 0 and about 30g dry hopped (along with your bittering addition. Just my thoughts, I could be way off though.

[Dan]

Thanks Matt

Yeah I knew about the Santiam but didnt see any at HBS so settled for Southern Cross, which I had in stock (also quite like it as a lager/pils bittering hop). Dont think Ill do the dry hop for a lager but might up the 10 min and 0 min additions as you suggest. I was trying to keep to 50g total of Liberty so I could get 2 brews out of the pack, but Id rather get the good hop flavour for the sake of another $11 !!! cheers

[Scarrfie]

I don't normally worry about the colour of my beers, but if I am going to have a crack at the Alt comp I thought I had better find out what sort of colour I am getting my my home toasted malts. I made up some jars with about the same ration of malt to water as a full batch, then sat them in a pot of water and heated to 72°C. I have attached a picture of the comparison, from the left is dry toasted(1hr@175), caraaroma, wet toasted(soak one hour then into preheated oven@175) and dark crystal.

The wet toast looks bang on the same as dark crystal at 110EBC, but I am not sure about the dry toast. Certainly darker than the caraaroma that is supposed to be 350EBC. Any guesses. Maybe I should do some pale choc as well, but I would have to water it down to get a comparison.

[Tilt]

From the photo those numbers look about right - bet your getting some fresh flavours and a ripper smelling kitchen from that home toasting!  Alt?  Is that the next WBC challenge?

[Scarrfie]

Yeah, Dusseldorf, hence the interest in the darker malts :-) The dry toasted malt is quite(really!) dry and biscuity when you chew on a few grains and I have been using combined with the wet roast since I started all grain. Didn't have a clue about what I was doing, but it tasted good so I have kept doing it. Might be the ticket for colour adjustment without adding 'roast' flavours.

I don't have a sweet tooth so that is possibly the reason I prefer the nuttier flavours over crystal, or at least in balance with them. So I reckon and alt might suit my tastes and If I can get it right, might end up as a house beer.

The wet roast is quite tasty, a little sweet but toasty as well. The closest I have tasted in a commercial malt would be carared, except it would be like carared on steroids.

Oh yeah the kitchen does smell great when toasting, although the last 10-20 minutes gets a little smokey :-)

[Tilt]

I'd imagine the home toasted malts are closer to Amber and Brown than the crystals in their flavour.  If you were looking to calibrate flavours to improve reproducibility (not that it really matters if you like variety) it might be worth a comparison with those.  I'll be interested to know the results if you have.