American Pale Ale - critique

About to start brewing again after 4 MONTHS!! I want to get to know some ingedients better. I want to learn cascade. I see it mentioned so often and I don't recall ever using it. I figure an american pale ale would do. I also have some brewer's gold on hand and I read somewhere it can be used for bittering in a wide range of beers. So here are the following ingredients I have set in mind to learn about on this brew:

vienna - what to expect from flavor and body
carapils - what to expect as far as body and head retention
brewer's gold - what to expect from bittering use
and cascade - what to expect from flavor and aroma

Any thoughts on my expectations or critiques on the recipe are more than welcome

Here is my recipe:

SG: 1.051
IBU: 42.5
EST SRM: 4.2

8lbs of Pale 2-row American
.5lbs of Carapils
1lbs of Vienna

1oz Brewer's Gold 60min
.5oz Cascade 30 minutes
.25oz Cascade 10 minues
.25oz Cascade 5 minutes

WLP 001

Looks spot on for a simple pale ale. Mash schedule?

The carapils will definitely help the head...but it causes some haze problems sometimes.
The cascade will make it a very "American" tasting beer - you'll recognize the flavor right away.

Add 0.5oz Cascade dry hop for 2 weeks to get that great aroma. I've done it on my IPA & APA and was glad I did. Your recipe sounds great.

I made an all Cascade APA a few months back. Turned out well. I used the same basic recipe but with Munich. Cascade has a very distinctive taste/aroma that I now appreciate and can pick out in beers. Very much a grapefruit flavor. I dry hopped with 1 oz of pellets and it had fantastic aroma that has started to die in the later bottles.

I mashed at 152 and I think it turned out well.

I say add a little color and some sweetness with some Crystal 10L or 20L.
Also, if you have access, replace the Cascade with Amarillo. It has the same flavor and aroma but finishes a lot cleaner. My new favorite american style hops based on side by side comparisons.

I also agree, dry hop that baby......

Cheers

Well, I picked up a pound of cascade for 11 bucks, so I believe I'll be using it quite a bit. What other beer styles is it good with? I know IPA.

ALso, I hear ya on the crystal. But is it really necessary? I figure the vienna will add the sweetness I need, am I making a big mistake? I don't want the flavor to get too complex, because I really want to learn what vienna adds to a beer. I'm afraid crystal might mask it. But, I want it to be a good beer, so if it needs crystal I'll add some.

Will irish moss help with the haze issue? I had a pale ale at my LHBS that the owner had made and it was quite hazy. He's the one that recommended the carapils.

You can really control the sweetness by changing the mash temp. So if you have that down you can probably do without the crystal. I think 8oz of 10 or 20L crystal will add very little sweetness, some body, and very little color. Again, I think you can do with out the carapils if you can hit the mash temp you want. If you want it to have a big body without too much sweetness use the carapils, if you want big body and sweetness up the crystal (no carapils).

You can use cascade in all sorts of stuff, APA, IPA, Amber Ale, Brown Ale. If I had a lot of cascade I might make this; http://beerdujour.com/Recipes/Jamil/American_Brown_Ale_-_2004_AHA_Gold_Medal_.html

Beerrific said:

You can really control the sweetness by changing the mash temp. So if you have that down you can probably do without the crystal. I think 8oz of 10 or 20L crystal will add very little sweetness, some body, and very little color. Again, I think you can do with out the carapils if you can hit the mash temp you want. If you want it to have a big body without too much sweetness use the carapils, if you want big body and sweetness up the crystal (no carapils).

You can use cascade in all sorts of stuff, APA, IPA, Amber Ale, Brown Ale. If I had a lot of cascade I might make this; http://beerdujour.com/Recipes/Jamil/American_Brown_Ale_-_2004_AHA_Gold_Medal_.html

Click to expand...

Hmmmm... I have all of those ingredients too. Except the centinnial. I'll pick some up on my next order.

Carapils will help with head retention. It is my general rule to add .5 lbs to every batch regardless. Every APA that I've had is a subtle golden-orange color and semi-sweet. Achieve that by mashing at around 152 and add the Crystal malt. The vienna will probably be a nice touch as well in adding some malt taste.

My personal suggestion for specialty grains for my favorite style (APA)
.5lbs vienna
.5lbs carapils
1lb Crystal 20L

Mash at 152°

Best of luck....I'm sure it will be good regardless.

The Champion beer of Britain in 2005 and 2006 was a brew called Crouch Vale's Brewer's Gold. It's a golden ale that uses a mix of lager and pale malt, and tons of brewer's gold. It's also dryhopped with BG.

monk

Devil's advocate - I say skip the Crystal and keep the Carapils+Vienna. The recipe you have is just complex enough to add some character, but the finish should be fairly crisp - perhaps slightly dry. Sounds like a winner with a Cascade-heavy brew.

Yea, gonna skip the crystal. I think the beer will still be good, but i really want to learn what flavor I get from vienna. I've used enough crystal in my beers to know what to expect from it.

FYI the original recipe will not even achieve the minimum SRM for the style. 3.5 vs. 5. Most APA's are at least 10-15 SRM.

I'm sure it will taste fine for a vienna experiment but will not be a true APA by style. I just opened a Schlafly Dry Hopped APA (www.schlafly.com) and it had a nice orange-golden color that had to contain Crystal. Schlafly makes the best brew in St. Louis area (brew city) awesome brew...... OK so I've had a few tonight too...........

Cheers

Hmm, good call, I want to hit the style for sure, maybe upping the vienna would hit 10. I'll screw around in promash and see.

Vienna only has a color of about 4L. Not much. I believe it is still a type of Crystal that does not undergo much caramalization...same with carapils. Both are non-fermantables and will require more than 20% to achieve much color...not highly recommended and will reduce the ABV and FG.

Look up any APA recipe and I am sure you will find 90% will have crystal.....

How about EdWart's famous recipe... I bet it has it....

Cheers.

I just looked it up... Bee Cave Brew House Pale Ale

.5 Lb Crystal 10
2lb veinna

Mash at 152°

Check out the pic....beautiful color. right on EdWort.

McTarnamins said:

I just looked it up... Bee Cave Brew House Pale Ale

.5 Lb Crystal 10
2lb veinna

Mash at 152°

Check out the pic....beautiful color. right on EdWort.

Click to expand...

I feel you on the crystal man, and I agree, it's probably close to standard for the style, but I reallllly just want to learn from this brew, I'm sure the next time I'll make it I'll put crystal in.

According to promash, SRM minimum is 5 for the style. So, I upped the carapils to .75 and the vienna to 2.5. I'll be brewing this tommorow if everything goes well. Final recipe is:

SG 1.061
IBU 40.5
SRM 5

8lb Pale Malt
2.5lb Vienna
.75lb Carapils

Brewer's Gold 1oz 60
cascade .5oz 25
Cascade .25 10
Cascade.25 5

WLP001

You could get a higher srm using a different kind of pale malt, too. Maris Otter, for instance, gets you above 5 SRM by itself, unless you use the "light" version of it. The regular gives you about 10 SRM with no crystal addition. Just a thought.

Monk

Awesome thought for sure, except I have a 10lb bag of pale malt sitting next to me

No worries.... APA's put more emphasis on the hops. I do not know much about Brewers Gold hops (I believe they are British), so I cannot comment on them as a bittering hop. However, I have seen many APA recipe's that use strictly Cascade as both the bittering and aroma hop. If you really wanted to learn about Cascade use them as both.

The last APA I brewed had this schedule....

Cascade 1oz. 60
Cascade 1oz. 15
Cascade 1oz. Flame out
Cascade 1/2. oz. dry

It turned out spectacular and won my friend's independent APA blind taste competition with 12 other homebrew entries.

Cheers

I made a Cascade PA two weeks ago and this is my recipe. This is a recipe I tweaked using Beersmith.

7.5 Lbs Pale malt (US 2 row)
3.0 lbs Victory malt
1.0 lb Honey malt
1.0 lb Vienna malt

2 oz Cascade at 60 min
0.5 oz Cascade at 20 min
.33 tsp Irish moss at 10 min

I fermented using Nottingham Yeast and it churned very well. I racked to secondary after leaving it in the primary for two weeks. Added 0.5 oz of Cascade to secondary and will leave it there a week or two then bottle it. The only thing I don't like about it so far is the Nottingham has made it really dry for my taste. Just from racking to secondary it tastes good and has a nice aroma. But IMHO it's a little too dry for me. I might use Windsor next time to ferment. Only because from what I read it will impart a more fruity flavor.

Batch Sparging right now... god, I missed brewing!