I recently brewed a batch that was 93% GP, 5% pale crystal and 2% carahell, it was quite sweet but not exactly 'caramely'.
I'd be tempted to bump it up to about 7% pale crystal, and then go 2% medium crystal if you want a richer caramel flavour or 2% caramalt if you want a sweeter caramel flavour.
can you dry hop with pellets or does it have to be cones? if pellets are ok then is there a limit to the length of time they should be left in the beer? cheers
I have been dry hopping with pellets, and leaving in for up to 7 days on occasion. (Don't know if this is a bad thing to do, but the beer tasted ok to me.)
I don't recommend dry hopping cold, I've done it a couple times and picked up little hop aroma/flavour but a lot of tannic/polyphenol/vegetal type thing.
Five to ten days is the norm. Usually over ten days you'll start picking up tannin/vegetal type flavours.
I was going to brew a stout for the competition, but realised that I do not have any chocolate, rye, or suitable yeast. (By suitable, I mean something like Irish yeast.) However, I do have the following on hand..any advice on something interesting that I can brew with any of this?
Golden Promise over 5kg
Malturop over 5kg
Pale Crystal about 500gm
Medium Crystal (150ebc) about 500gm
Oat Malt 500gm
CZ saaz hops
cascade US hops
cascade NZ hops
perle US hops
motueka hops
Wilamette hops
Pacifica hops