Gluten Free Amber

I am thinking about making an amber using just whole leaf East Kent Goldings, and then only for flavor and aroma. I want a hoppy beer without the residual bitterness. If anyone has any opinions on my ingredients or hop schedule please reply as this will be my 9th brew and I am still figuring stuff out.

Type: Extract
Batch Size: 2.50 gal
Boil Size: 2.94 gal
Boil Time: 25 min
Equipment: Brew Pot (5 Gallon/2.5 Gallon batch)

Ingredients

Amount Item Type % or IBU
2.00 lb Brown Rice Syrup (2.0 SRM) Extract 50.00 %
1.50 lb Sorghum Liquid Extract - Briess (1.5 SRM) Extract 37.50 %
0.50 lb Candi Sugar, Dark (160.0 SRM) Sugar 12.50 %
0.10 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.70 %] (25 min) Hops 2.7 IBU
0.20 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.70 %] (20 min) Hops 4.2 IBU
0.30 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.70 %] (15 min) Hops 5.2 IBU
0.40 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.70 %] (10 min) Hops 5.1 IBU
0.50 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.70 %] (5 min) Hops 3.5 IBU
0.50 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.70 %] (Dry Hop 7 days) Hops -
1 items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 min) Misc
3.50 oz Malto-Dextrine (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
0.25 tsp Yeast Nutrient Misc
1 Pkgs SafAle English Ale (DCL Yeast #S-04) Yeast-Ale

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.056 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.014 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 5.36 %
Bitterness: 20.6 IBU
Est Color: 16.9 SRM

*Measured OG: 1.056 SG

This looks good, I'd expect the colour to be exactly what you're shooting for. Please update as it progresses.

I brewed this today and had to adjust the hops schedule as the EKG hops they had at my LHBS was lower than I anticipated. It was an easy brew day and I can't wait to see how this one turns out. I also hit my OG right on target. :rockin:

No_Party said:

I brewed this today and had to adjust the hops schedule as the EKG hops they had at my LHBS was lower than I anticipated. It was an easy brew day and I can't wait to see how this one turns out. I also hit my OG right on target. :rockin:

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Couple quick questions, what did you use for candi sugar (home made, stuff form a brew supply, syrup/hard). And how dark was the wort?

The recipe sounds good!

dorklord said:

Couple quick questions, what did you use for candi sugar (home made, stuff form a brew supply, syrup/hard). And how dark was the wort?

The recipe sounds good!

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I used the following, and it was a perfect amber color. I will take a picture of the carboy tonight and post it. I was very pleased with how it looks. I hope I will be pleased with how it tastes. Oh, and I forgot that I added some maltodextrin so I will update the recipe again.

No_Party said:

I used the following, and it was a perfect amber color. I will take a picture of the carboy tonight and post it. I was very pleased with how it looks. I hope I will be pleased with how it tastes. Oh, and I forgot that I added some maltodextrin so I will update the recipe again.

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Cool. I think that my home-made candi syrup wasn't as dark as that stuff must be.

Probably not. I was stoked when my LHBS started carrying it. I have a couple pounds stockpiled now as it works very well. It is a bit pricey though.

I have yet to try to make my own candi syrup. I have thought about it a couple times, but I'm trying to get my grain roasting mastered before I take on another experiment.

I think I'm going to buy some of the candi syrup when I get a chance, and with it as a guide hopefully make some of my own.

dorklord said:

I think I'm going to buy some of the candi syrup when I get a chance, and with it as a guide hopefully make some of my own.

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Sweet. You have to let me know if are able to replicate it. I would love to know that process.

No_Party said:

Sweet. You have to let me know if are able to replicate it. I would love to know that process.

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The process itself is quite simple, the main difficulty is time. My last batch, I started cooking my syrup on the stove as soon as I got home, and I added the resulting syrup to the wort at flameout...probably 2 hours, and I didn't get the syrup as dark as I wanted to/should have. Now I know that I'll need to make the syrup up ahead of time.

will you be dry hopping right away? i've been thinking about brewing another GF IPA, but leaving it in the secondary carboy for a few months BEFORE dry hopping. my idea is to give the sorghum some time to lose some of the tanginess that i've noticed seems to dissipate after a few months in the bottle.

what do you all think?

jman said:

will you be dry hopping right away? i've been thinking about brewing another GF IPA, but leaving it in the secondary carboy for a few months BEFORE dry hopping. my idea is to give the sorghum some time to lose some of the tanginess that i've noticed seems to dissipate after a few months in the bottle.

what do you all think?

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I'm going to leave in the primary for 14 days then I will move to the secondary for 7 days and dry hop it then. I think letting it sit in the secondary for a few months is excessive, but it will probably make a good beer.

hmmmm, interesting. its been my experience with the 5 other GF brews i've made that the sorghum taste definitely mellows over time. the ginger IPA i made 5 months ago has very little detectable sorghum taste, which wasnt the case when it was 4,5, even 6 weeks old. the problem i can see is a degradation of hop flavors and aromas. this is why i was thinking about waiting a few months before dry hopping. i figure if i transfer to secondary to remove some of the trub, i could potentially leave it to age and mellow for a while to lesson some of the sorghum tang. then, just before bottling, i would hit it with a week or so of dry hopping.

I haven't had the patience to allow a beer to age that long yet. I think that you are on the money about the sorghum flavor dropping over time, and the late dry hop would be a great idea to bring the hops back in to the fold.

How long are we talking? Because i seriously cannot stand the taste of sorghum.

well, sounds like its experiement time. i'm thinking a week of primary, maybe 8-10 weeks in secondary, then a week or so of dry hopping. i'll def report back my findings.

jman said:

well, sounds like its experiement time. i'm thinking a week of primary, maybe 8-10 weeks in secondary, then a week or so of dry hopping. i'll def report back my findings.

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There's some anecdotal evidence that using gelatin and cold-crashing can speed this process up. Also, I think that letting the beer cold-condition in the bottles helps (it seems that the longer I leave my beers in the fridge, the better they become).

Also, I think leaving the beer in primary for longer than 1 week is helpful. I'd do something like 2-3 weeks primary, then add gelatin, then cold-crash as cool and long as you can...if you could basically lager the beer for a couple weeks, I think that would be great...

this reminds me i have a keg of pumpkin spice ipa thats been sitting since october. ill pull a glass and see how it is tonight. i have my last final today.

dorklord said:

Also, I think that letting the beer cold-condition in the bottles helps (it seems that the longer I leave my beers in the fridge, the better they become).

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I will try this simple method of leaving my beer in the fridge after a couple weeks carbing up in my cabinet. I don't know why I haven't already been doing this, but if it helps diminish the sorghum taste then I'm for it.

I've been doing 3 week primary, 1 week cold crash, gelatin, and then conditioning in the keg since February without noticing any difference in the sorghum taste.

DirtbagHB said:

this reminds me i have a keg of pumpkin spice ipa thats been sitting since october. ill pull a glass and see how it is tonight. i have my last final today.

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Is this a GF beer? If it is I would love the recipe.

And good luck on the final. SWMBO has her last final of nursing school tomorrow. I can't wait for that to be over.

I brewed this again about 6 weeks ago and kegged it for the Music City Brewer's Festival here in Nashville last weekend. I got a lot of positive responses on it. I was pleasantly surprised at how many people asked for it specifically. I still think I can improve on it by incorporating some malted grain in a partial mash. This is definitely going to be a staple in our house.

This was the thread I was looking for, I modified your recipe for the ESS/ESB I am making.

Added Fuggles and less Sorghum trying to make an english ale more than a Amber

That's hilarious because your post is what reminded me to update mine

No_Party said:

I brewed this again about 6 weeks ago and kegged it for the Music City Brewer's Festival here in Nashville last weekend. I got a lot of positive responses on it. I was pleasantly surprised at how many people asked for it specifically. I still think I can improve on it by incorporating some malted grain in a partial mash. This is definitely going to be a staple in our house.

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Just came across this, diagnosed gluten intolerant 2 days ago. Struggling.

One of the many thing I was told not to have is malt. I saw your note above on malted grain. My understanding(very little) is malted barley is a big no no?

You'll want to read some of the other threads Grym, including/especially the threads about malting grain. to malt, is the process of sprouting, drying and kilning grain. It's just that the only grain people have done this with for years upon years was barley and wheat. So because barley was the main grain to be malted, it was easier to just call it malt, instead of malted barley.

What we talk about is malting our own grain. Not barley/wheat/rye, but something gluten free and sprouted, dried, kilned and perhaps roasted.

Grymhammer said:

Just came across this, diagnosed gluten intolerant 2 days ago. Struggling.

One of the many thing I was told not to have is malt. I saw your note above on malted grain. My understanding(very little) is malted barley is a big no no?

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Sorry to hear about the diagnosis, but with that knowledge you should be on the road to feeling better.

When I mentioned malting grain, I was speaking about various gluten-free grains. Some examples would be buckwheat, millet, quinoa, amaranth, etc.
I have experimented with these, but not malted.

If you read the various posts on this board regarding gluten-free brewing you should be able to pick up a bunch of different ideas on how to brew and what to brew with.