American Pale Ale BBD Brewing Kabe's Secret APA

Kabe's Secret
1st place 10A-American Pale Ale, 2nd place BOS, in the 2009 HBT BJCP Competition


Brew Type: Partial Mash
Style: American Pale Ale Brewer: BBD Brewing
Batch Size: 5.25 gal
Boil Volume: 3.30 gal Boil Time: 60 min
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Taste Rating (50 possible points): 40 (As judged in the HBT BJCP Comp)

Ingredients Amount Item Type % or IBU
4.00 lb Pale Liquid Extract [Boil for 10 min] Extract 40.00%
2.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 20.00 %
2.00 lb Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 20.00 %
1.00 lb Honey Malt (25.0 SRM) Grain 10.00 %
0.50 lb Barley, Flaked (1.7 SRM) Grain 5.00 %
0.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 5.00 %
0.75 oz Amarillo Gold [8.40 %] (60 min)
0.50 oz Cascade [6.30 %] (20 min) Hops
0.50 oz Cascade [6.30 %] (15 min) Hops
0.25 oz Amarillo Gold [8.40 %] (10 min) Hops
0.50 oz Cascade [6.30 %] (5 min) Hops
0.50 oz Cascade [6.30 %] (Dry Hop 18 days) Hops *see note about long dry hop below
1.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.40 %] (Dry Hop 18 days) Hops *see note about long dry hop below

Wyeast 1764 Rogue Pacman Ale Yeast

Mash In Add 7.50 qt of water
Mash at 154.0 F 60 min
Sparge Temperature: 168.0 F
Sparge Water: 2.15 gal


Beer Profile Estimated Original Gravity: 1.058 SG
Measured Original Gravity: 1.052 SG
Estimated Final Gravity: 1.015 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.012 SG
Estimated Color: 11.9 SRM (
Bitterness: 35.0 IBU
Alpha Acid Units: 12.6 AAU
Estimated Alcohol by Volume: 5.60 %
Actual Alcohol by Volume: 5.21 %

All hops were pellet hops.

Racked to tertiary for a few days after dry hopping.

*I'd planned on dry hopping for a week with this, but the pellet hops made such a mess I tried to wait them out, and eventually used the tertiary to get the beer away from the hoppy sludge. On rebrewing, I'll be going with one week, but since this was how it was done in the batch that I entered in the comp, I posted the recipe as is.

Primed with 5oz of corn sugar.

I've always wondered what that much honey malt would do in a APA or even IPA... I guess it wins competitions!

Hey Cat - What temp did you ferment the pacman at? I did some at 60F for a wheat and it was great.

I did the tub of water and frozen bottles method, so it wasn't exact, but I kept it in the mid 60's. Love those pacmans!

ChshreCat said:

I did the tub of water and frozen bottles method, so it wasn't exact, but I kept it in the mid 60's. Love those pacmans!

Click to expand...

Same method I used.

Picobrew said:

Same method I used.

Click to expand...

I'm amazing at how well it works. During a hot spell this summer it was in the 90's and between the ice bath and keeping it in a small bathroom with the door closed and exhaust fan running, I had my beer under 70F. I didn't even use the wet t-shirt and fan method with it.

I'll be brewing this one up sometime in the next couple weeks. I'm making a mirror pond clone first as described on "Can You Brew It?" then it's on to this. I'll be converting to AG but the only other change I'll make is using Denny's Favorite 50 yeast in place of the pacman. Shouldn't make too much difference. I've got a ton of amarillo and cascades just begging to make some APAs. What's the body like on the beer? I'm thinking about fermenting at 152 but may drop it to 150 if you think a thinner mouthfeel would be better.

Not brag or anything but... Mirror Pond was the favorite pale ale of a friend of mine I work with. I gave him a couple bottles of this and he said that he doesn't like Mirror Pond as much now.

ChshreCat said:

Not brag or anything but... Mirror Pond was the favorite pale ale of a friend of mine I work with. I gave him a couple bottles of this and he said that he doesn't like Mirror Pond as much now.

Click to expand...

I'll be sure to let you know my preference when they're both kegged and carbed! This is gonna be my first experience with honey malt. I'm kind of excited!

KingBrianI said:

I'll be sure to let you know my preference when they're both kegged and carbed! This is gonna be my first experience with honey malt. I'm kind of excited!

Click to expand...

I'm gonna hafta brew it again soon. I just looked and I'm down to a 6-pack of regular bottles and three stubbys. It's so sad when you see the end near.

I'm not sure if I'll brew it quite this way next time though. The dry hop schedule ended up kind of convoluted on accident. But... that's the way it was brewed so that's how I posted the recipe, mistakes and all.

ChshreCat said:

I'm gonna hafta brew it again soon. I just looked and I'm down to a 6-pack of regular bottles and three stubbys. It's so sad when you see the end near.

I'm not sure if I'll brew it quite this way next time though. The dry hop schedule ended up kind of convoluted on accident. But... that's the way it was brewed so that's how I posted the recipe, mistakes and all.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I think I might just do 10-14 days dryhop. I'm worried about leaving it for much longer than that.

I'm really not sure what effect my odd schedule had. I'm thinking that the 4 days in tertiary could have mellowed things out after the 18 days on the hops. So a shorter dry hop with no tertiary might end up with a similar finished product.

Yeah, I'll be using all whole leaf hops too so there shouldn't be a problem with the mess. It's pretty easy to rack off of whole leaf hops without sucking up a bunch of hop matter. Any little bits that do make it to the keg get sucked out in the first pint or two anyway.

I'm glad you're kegging this. I'm really anxious to hear how it comes out for someone else.

Brewing this guy up tomorrow. Getting everything ready for it now so i can get an early start. I'll update tomorrow with how it went and observations.

Schweet! You're the first one to make this as far as I know.

I'm excited! Not only is this an award winning recipe, but it will be my first experience with honey malt. I gave it a taste before crushing and it had a very unique sweet/sour flavor, not unlike honey. Should be great in a beer. My hops are whole leaf and higher AA% than yours so I think I'll adjust the bittering addition so that I can keep the late additions the same mass-wise and still get the same IBUs.

At 85% efficiency, my AG grain bill is as follows:

5.2 lbs crisp maris otter
2 lb. weyermann vienna
1 lb. gambrinus honey malt
0.5 lb. british crystal 75
0.5 lb. flaked barley

Denny's favorite 50 yeast in place of the pacman.

My cascade whole leaf is 7.6%AA and my whole leaf amarillo is 9.5% AA so I'll have to adjust the 60 min amarillo addition down a bit to get the same IBU while maintaining the size of the later additions.

Well, you usually get a bit more out of pellets than whole leaf, so they might translate directly as they are.

I loves the honey malt. I used it after trying Mighty Arrow and finding out they use it in there.

It's in the carboy with yeast pitched. Pretty uneventful brewday. Everything went exactly as planned. I was aiming for your reported actual OG and hit it right on the numbers. I'm trying to do this exactly like you did when you won the comp. Well, except maybe I'll dry hop a bit less time! I boiled 90 min to really clean it up but I think it might have darkened a bit more than estimated. Looks beautiful though. I'll report back with tasting notes in about 2 months.

Comin' up on dry hoppin' time, Brian!

Yep, I was thinking the same thing last night. Only problem is all my carboys are in use. I've gotta get my 10.10.10 bottled then I can rack my mirror pond to that carboy for dry hopping and the Kabe's Secret to the carboy the mirror pond is in to dry hop. I took a gravity reading last night and tasted it anyway though. Gravity was down to 1.010 and flavor was great, the honey malt really gave it a nice sweetness that I think really needs some dry hopping to balance. Should end up great. Oh, I've also gotta kick some kegs for these or they might be dry hopping for as long as you did it!

KingBrianI said:

Oh, I've also gotta kick some kegs for these or they might be dry hopping for as long as you did it!

Click to expand...

Have to empty some kegs, huh? It's a tough job but somebody's gotta do it!

Going to try this recipe on Sunday. First time not using a kit. Bag of grains smells soo good. Dont have the pac man but will use Saf05 or some WL001 slurry. Looking forward to it - :rockin: Will let you know how it goes..

Sweet! Looking forward to hearing about how it comes out.

How's it comin' Brian?

ChshreCat said:

How's it comin' Brian?

Click to expand...

Racked to secondary on top of dry hops yesterday actually. I used 3/4 oz cascade since that was the rest of the bag and didn't want to leave just a quarter ounce in there and an ounce of amarillo. The smell is great coming out of secondary. Most of the damn hops are floating out of the beer though. It'll be a few days before the bottom ones get soaked enough to sink a little and let the ones on top get their turn at a soak. I think I'll let it go for 2 weeks then keg it.

Keg that yet?

This looks absolutely delicious!! I will probably give it a go myself when I'm done with my current crop of lagers. My fridge is full of lagering beer but I can ferment this one in the spare room with the heating off

I'll most likely use dry Nottingham and dry hop right in the primary just to keep things simple and easy. Now to track down some honey malt..

EDIT: Think using all amarillo or all cascade would make a big difference to flavour? I'd need to buy a 4-ounce pack of each otherwise. Hmm, already thinking of cutting corners, I should know better...

Balls! Seems Honey Malt is not available in the UK. Is there any substitution that would actually get me there or is it a lost cause? Don't think importing a pound of malt is really an option :-/

ChshreCat said:

Keg that yet?

Click to expand...

The plan is to do it tonight. It's been dry-hopping for almost as long as you did yours! All the hops finallysunk down enough for the ones that were rafting on top to get wet.

I got a 1lb of honey malt randomly on my last order figuring I would use it eventually. I think this may be the recipe. I have everything for this in my inventory too, it must be a sign

humann_brewing said:

I got a 1lb of honey malt randomly on my last order figuring I would use it eventually. I think this may be the recipe. I have everything for this in my inventory too, it must be a sign

Click to expand...

The beer gods have spoken!

dunno of a sub for honry malt. there must be SOME where you can find it?

Gonna be brewing this again in a few weeks to have it fresh and ready for NHC!

Got this mashing as we speak.

ChshreCat said:

Got this mashing as we speak.

Click to expand...

And I'm drinking one as we speak! It's really coming around now.

Hey, I just realized I didn't put the mash temp in the recipe so I added that in now. What temp did you mash yours at?

And it's in the bukkit!

I think it was 150. I'm too lazy to run upstairs to look at the computer with beersmith.