What on earth have I made?

Ok so I went to my local homebrew supply shop. Found a recipe for what sounded like a good beer to me.

I found a great recipe and started to look for ingredients. I had some trouble so I inquired for help and the very knowledgeable fellow helped me find "substitutions" for the missing ingredents.

I'm going to list ingredients and then later on I will post the "type" of beer the recipe was supposed to make. In the meantime I want you to observe the ingredients and tell me what Kind of beer I AM making.

No grains for steeping.
9 lbs Muntons Light Malt Extract Syrup
2 lbs honey
3 oz Tettnang hops for 2oz bittering (60 min), .5oz flavoring (last 15) .5oz and finishing (last 5)
White Labs California Ale Yeast -

70F fermentation.

Beer is yellowish brown right now and very active still after 1 week.

What Kind of beer is this?

Sounds like beer.

Really, not too much to say. Call it a pale ale if you'd like. The honey will ferment out almost completely and leave only a little bit of flavor; mostly, it'll make the beer a bit dry. German hops, Cal Ale yeast...

It's beer.

I'm going to guess 'honey ale' but they were out of honey malt? Though 2lbs is a lot of honey malt so maybe not. Ok I guess I have no idea.

The biggest problem I see is that your OG is very high compared to your IBUs. The honey should counteract the cloyingness of the LME. It should be beer, but probably on the sweet side...

the_bird said:

Sounds like beer.

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That's as much as I can say about it, too. Pale malt, honey, German hops, and Chico yeast make . . . beer, and 11 lbs of extract fermentables in a five gallon batch make for a BIG beer. If I had to call it anything, maybe a suped-up American Amberish thing, as it will be pretty sweet, but it's far too big of a beer to be a true amber.


TL

ok so now that is looks like I have made BEER. I will explain what I was supposed to make.

"Honey Miabock"

I was suposed to use halleertauer hops for bittering.
and a lager yeast.

I used tettanger hops and California Ale yeast. (I'm not ready for lagering)

so I guess the hops and the Ale yeast are the "substitutions"

so Is it still a Miabock? Steam Miabock?

Not really. A "maibock" needs to be lagered, it's not the same even using a clean ale yeast like Cali Ale. There's nothing terrible bock-ish about regular LME or honey. A maibock is usually built around pilsner malt with some Munich malt for character (you can get both pils and Munich extracts from some of the big online stores). The Munich gives a deep, toasty, melanoidin-rich background to the beer that's just not there with plain 'ol extract.

If I were making a maibock with the restrictions of:

1. Extract only
2. Can't lager

I'm get myself some pils extract, some Munich extract, and some California Common yeast. Cali Common, unlike Cali Ale, is actually a lager yeast that works pretty well at warmer temps (~60&#176. Stick with the German noble hops for bittering only, and drop the honey (ever hear of the Reinheitsgebot? ).

I'm wondering if there are any better names out there than "Suped-up American Amberish thing". That will be hard to design a label for.

Perhaps I can shorten it to "the thing".

"Grandmas Wonder tonic"

"Me Beer, Me love you long time"

It sounds like what you've made is a champ. That beer is going to be strong, and you'll know it by the taste. I can't think of any kind of commercial example, but that's just the sort of beer that I enjoy making. Get a whole lot of fermentables (pretty much only malt in my case), toss in a bunch of hops, and cheers to good times. You may find that the beer you have made doesn't have particularly good head retention, but once you drink a couple you'll see that it gets the job done. I think it will be tasty. Please post and let us know how it comes out!
Cheers and happy homebrewing.

John Sanderson said:

I'm wondering if there are any better names out there than "Suped-up American Amberish thing". That will be hard to design a label for.

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"BEER" sometimes less is more.

Call it a Summer Day Pale Ale. It will likely be a bit dry to taste, and like a good summer day, too much will leave you hurting.

you should call it "Bulletproof" sounds like after a couple of these that is how you will feel....