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]

Haha im just hassling mate :oP

[Mike Neilson]

Making a plum fruit beer 60wheat/40adm split with 2kg of Omega Plums just want to know if Skin On or Skin Off when adding to secondry?

[Reviled]

My dad used to make plum wine and never de-skinned them... Id say put them in secondary and rack the beer of all the bitty crap afterwards.. Good idea tho :o)

[Mike Neilson]

Yeah I reacon in a wine it might be allright as the tannins under the skin are more accepted. But in beer I wounder if it would give you that toungue drying bodyless feal to the beer?

[Reviled]

I guess it depends on the amount of unfermentables in the plums?? If it has enough sweetness to back it up it should be fine yeah?? Plums are fairly sweet..

Maybe do 2 small batches in a demijohn or something and try both ways?

[Reviled]

Working on a recipe for something not horrendously bitter, but still hoppy.. Any thoughts?? My figures give me 1046 and 30 IBU's

3.5kg NZ Pils
600g Munich
220g Crystal 80L
60 : 8g US Cascade 5.8%, 8g Southern Cross 13.2%
15 : 12g Cascade, 12g Southern Cross
FO : 12g Cascade, 12g Southern Cross

Then maybe dry hop 15g of each? Not sure, and yeast wise either S-05 or Wlp-001???

[JoKing]

Thats a lot of crystal to go with that Munich? Maybe you'd struggle to notice the hops? I like the Munich though. I reckon if you want it to be hoppy but not bitter, you'll need to give it a pretty thorough dry hopping - perhaps 50g total? Depends on what you want - for example Y M had 100g dry hop... so maybe half would be good. Also... YM had 200g of light caramel as the only additional malt - with the idea being less emphasis on malt flavour so perception of hoppiness is increased.

US 05 is the best yeast for hop accentuated beers as it costs less than 1056 or 001, and results are fully comparable.

[Reviled]

So maybe cut the crystal back to 150-200gms? And up the dry hopping? I can do that..

[JoKing]

150g is heaps - should give a nice colour without sweetening it up too much. Even 60g in dry hop isn't too much... 30g of each? You wont be disappointed! Dry hopping at room temp for 10 days will make a massive impact on the flavour too. I've done it at a range of temps over the years - and that method definately seems the best.

[Reviled]

Ever dry hopped with Southern Cross? I dont want too much 'lemon' I guess, im a bit scared to throw in 30g of them?? Cascade doesnt worry me tho..

[JoKing]

I haven't even used it before, but if you want it in there - it cant hurt. If you're worrid about it, dont use it - there are plenty of other varieties out there. It says that there is a good dose of pine fraction in the oil profile - which definately wouldn't hurt the profile of the beer!

[jt]

Hm, 5% crystal isn't over the top depending on what you want from it - do you want a reasonable crystal character in the beer ? If you do, throw it in !

Personally, I'd go 2.5% crystal and the same of wheat