thaks for the advice. we have flaked barley, I forgot to mention....
I think I'll try stout.
I wanted to ask you, since you're more experienced, have you tried Ozujsko and Karlovacko in Croatia?
What do you think of these beers? How would you rate them?
I would like to know is there a possibility to make a clone of these beers. I know it's a lager, but I want ale that would at least be similar in flavour to one of these beers....
Yes, of course I've had those beers. But, sorry, I don't think I'd ever clone them. I think they're pretty bad beers, with Ožujsko being the better of the two. Have you had Velebitsko Pivo, from Gospić in Croatia? That's a much, much better beer. When I first moved here I drank a lot of Ožujsko because that's what the cafes had. My nickname here is after that beer. Locally it's called Žuja, so my nickname is Žujo.
If you want to emulate a light lager but with an ale yeast, I'd look at the recipes from here to see the grain bill for those light lagers, use a similar one (though I don't think they have ANY specialty malts at all in the Croatian lagers, just Pils malt) and then use that US 05 you have at a cooler temp close to it's lowest safe number listed on the Fermentis site (don't know what that is, you'd haveta check) so you get a clean ferment. I think those Croatian lagers are all grain with no corn or rice. To me, they have no aroma hops at all but I can't say if that's really the case. They're not too bitter either. Can't put an accurate number on it, as I haven't had either in a while, but I'd guess they're at 20-25 IBUs. I'd just use those Super Styrians to get the IBUs.
Like I said, though, I don't think I can give a really proper advice on those beers as I really don't like them. And I'm not a lager brewer either. Sorry if this is of no use. If you get the chance, try Velebitsko Pivo. I think they likely use the same or similar grain, but they're a bit more bitter and the grain tastes better. It tastes cleaner to me too. Karlavačko is made by Heineken and Ožujsko is made by InBev (same as Jelen Pivo in Serbia), so I think they've brought their crappy, industrial, high gravity brewing techniques into it. Velebitsko Pivo is made by a small, independent brewery. With high gravity brewing, the breweries brew and ferment the beer as a high gravity beer, then water it down. This leads to a far less clean beer, IMHO. Don't KNOW they do that, but I assume it. Those two beers are far from clean.