Worried beer will not be balanced

I'm brewing a NB Abbey Ale clone and I'm not sure the beer will be balanced per style. I'm using Brew target software and after putting in all my information it says the beer will be Extra Malty. All the numbers are what the clone recipe calls for so is this something I should worry about or throw caution to the wind and brew it as recipe says?

Recipe is:

Pale Malt 4lb
Pils Malt 4lb
Munich 1.5
Cara Pils 1lb
Cara 80 8oz
Choc Malt 4 oz
Candi sugar 2lb

Target .5 oz 60min
Will .5 oz 10min
Lib .5 oz 5min

I see nothing in this recipe that would lend an "extra malty" characteristic. Potential dial back on the Munich malt, but other than that it looks solid.

Did you set the style in Brewtarget? It will make it's judgement based on style, I believe.

*EDIT* - Nevermind, I just checked it and it does not make judgement according to style...

abbey ales are to the malty end (though ideally dry, not sweet) on the scale of malty to hoppy.


its just a binary scale limitation. (low bu:gu ratio is typical for style)

Did you put that Candi Sugar into Brew Target? That alone will dry the beer out and balance out the residual maltiness that the rest of the grain bill will contribute.

The implicit reason the Candi Sugar is added is to dry out a beer and offset some of the maltiness to create that Belgian/abbey style.

I agree it looks fine as-is. The biggest contributor to any residual maltiness is the Munich, so if you are worried, just bump that down to 1.0 lbs insted of 1.5 lbs.

For the style I inputed it as a Dubbel. I did input the candy sugar into brewtarget as well. Mind you if I remove it, it changes how malty it is, from extra malty to slightly malty. I'll go as the recipe is printed and see how it goes. Thanks for all the replies.

So the problem is really that Brew Target is treating that Candi Sugar addition like it does every other malt addition, and doesn't really take into account that it is a simple sugar. Just note that for future brews that might call for candi sugar or brown sugar or honey, etc. You have to additionally take into account that any simple sugar will dry the body of the beer.

The thing to look at is the BU:GU ratio. That gives a better picture.

The avg, BU:GU ratio for a dubbel is .292.