jacobelong

Recipes 

Hey everybody,

I've been using Home Brew Talk as a great resource since I started brewing this summer, but am just now officially joining the community Thanks to everyone who has unknowingly helped me out in the past!

Anyway, I have a question about Northern Brewer's Rye Malt Syrup and how I might go about entering it into BeerSmith or iBrewMaster (or any other software for that matter.) I searched all over these forums and the greater Interwebz but came up empty. iBrewMaster, for instance, has all of NB's other malt syrups in its database out of the box, but the rye syrup isn't there just yet. I'm trying my hand at crafting my first recipe (an attempt at an extract "clone" of Founders Red's Rye), and would love the input from those who know way more about this than I as I try to figure all this out!

According to NB, their rye malt syrup is a combination of 70% 2-row, 20% rye, and 10% caramel-40. As my recipe exists currently in iBrewMaster, I just calculated out the respective weights of each 2-row, rye, and caramel-40 from the amount of syrup that's going into the batch, grabbed the grain equivalents that already existed in the software, and changed their profile to "extract" for the recipe.

So, for specifics, I have this:

9.15 lbs NB Rye Malt Syrup is equivalent to 6.4 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US, 1.80 lbs Briess Rye Malt, and 0.9 lbs Briess Caramel 40L (all entered as type "liquid malt extract" in the software.) The calculations for gravity, SRM, and the like appear to be lining up correctly, but I worry I might be missing something important that's going to screw up the recipe.

So any input on this would be very helpful! Thanks again. Here's my whole recipe for reference / critique.

-Jake

djbradle

Recipes 

I would love to know how this turns out as an extract as I've been wanting to do a good red rye. I do believe you can sub the carapils, aromatic, crystal 80, and crystal 40 equally as your steeping grains as per the all grain clone recipe. So the 4% grain bill of the crystal 40 is taken care of in the NB rye extract? If it is would you wanna add the aromatic weight/weight to your steeping bag?

Don't know for sure as I haven't even bottled my first homebrew

jacobelong

Recipes 

Definitely! From the get-go this was meant to be a multiple-revision recipe - just trying to get a decent starting point before adding more of the aromatic grains and such to dial it in to a true clone. I didn't want to jump straight into the deep end on my first recipe Plus it just means I get to drink more beer! But you can be assured that, assuming this batch turns out ok, I'll be brewing it again soon and adding some of those aromatic grains!

I actually just went ahead and brewed it Tuesday night since I'd already scheduled the brew day with a buddy of mine and I was filled with the wisdom of Charlie Papazian - "Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew." So we rolled with it.

This was by far the sloppiest brew day I've had yet (though that's not saying too much considering this is only my third batch), but it's probably going to be far from a pseudo-clone and more of just a hoppy Rye IPA

I missed the O.G. by about .07 (1.061 instead of 1.068) thanks to adding too much water to the carboy after an initial reading was way too high (1.081) - I think the problem was that I didn't mix it up after topping it up to the 5 gallon mark in the first place, so the reading was off to begin with. So that was a bit disappointing.

Also, fermentation started way too hot (like...72+ degrees for the first 12 hours or so), but I caught it hopefully quickly enough that it won't alter the beer too much (it's happily and feverishly fermenting at 64 degrees now.) I had to use a blowoff tube thanks to the combination of the yeast starter and heat - fermentation took off like a rocket and hasn't looked back since. It doesn't show any signs of slowing down just yet, so I'm taking that as a good sign. Also, it smells pretty dang amazing. The dry hop will make this beer sing!

I'll let you know how it ultimately turns out!

jacobelong

Recipes 

My brew buddy and I bottled my Red's Rye "clone" this evening, and I have a couple updates on the beer, which you can read here http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/founders-reds-rye-extract-clone-288986/#post3757928

Honestly I think the malt character is rather weak (at least nothing in particular really jumped out at me when I tasted a partial fill other than a very nice hop aroma and flavor), but I'll wait to pass final judgement until I have a chilled, fully-conditioned bottle to sample.

I'll post my thoughts on the finished product hopefully early next week!