What style should I try next?

I just started brewing. This is my legacy:

Extract stout (flopped)
Extract stout (flopped)
Extract stout (turned out ok)
All-grain Edwort's Pale ale (turned out fantastic)
All-grain Centennial Blonde (looks ok)

So basically I have 3 styles in the fridge. I would like to brew at least one different style so that I can give away 4-pack carriers for Christmas. What's a fairly easy style/recipe that I can have brewed before Christmas, and I won't likely screw up? Are IPA's hard? I've never used liquid yeast or made starters before.

I work in Richardson, live in Wylie. Just fired up a brown ale last night after dropping a couple hundred bucks at HomebrewHQ for gear upgrades and ingredients. Seems to be quite a few of us in this neighborhood.

Once this batch clears out of primary, we're going for porters and holiday ales for the next couple months. Eventually, its going to cool off out here and I'd like to have some fall beer ready for it...

I would go with a brown ale. They seem to be forgiving of noobie mistakes

Just curious what made you move to all grain when your extract beer wasn't turning out good? Seems to me you would wanna master extract brewing before making the leap to AG.

Sorry to sidetrack a little, but: Hows your fermentation control? Typically that is the single aspect of normal brews that has the greatest effect on quality.

If you have proper control (can keep temps in the low 60s), I would suggest a pumpkin ale or brown ale with a clean attenuating yeast (nottingham or US-04, 05).

Also, IPAs are not hard, they just require more hops and malt and are typically higher gravity than blondes, pales and stouts. If you are using dry yeast, you might want to pitch two packs if your OG is going to be higher than 1.060 or so.

I have a good temperature-controlled fermentation chamber. I usually ferment at 20C/68F

I would suggest a pumpkin ale or brown ale with a clean attenuating yeast (nottingham or US-04, 05).

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Do you have a recipe? I'm not sure I know what a brown ale tastes like. Is there a commonly available commercial beer that fits that category (so that I can taste)?

Just curious what made you move to all grain when your extract beer wasn't turning out good?

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Well, my extract beer wasn't turning out good, so why not try all grain? So far I have a better record with all-grain, and I'm skeptical of kits. My extract brews were flopping because of the cheap yeast that came with the kits, though.

I work in Richardson, live in Wylie. Just fired up a brown ale last night after dropping a couple hundred bucks at HomebrewHQ for gear upgrades and ingredients.

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What recipe are you using? I buy everything at homebrewHQ (or craigslist) so far. Their prices seem reasonable.

Hefeweizen would be my choice.

My first Stout flopped (over carbed in the bottle), but I do love stouts, so I went with Austin homebrew's double chocolate stout, doubled the chocolate addition, and it's amazing. So if you like stouts (which it seems like you do), I would suggest that. Looks like your early brews (like mine) may have suffered from process issues (bad,bad,ok,great), so your stout issues probably aren't down to the style, but your early brewing and fermenting process?

I did an IPA at the same time as the double chocolate, as easy as any other beer really, came out lovely. Grab a basic IPA recipe, some extra hops for secondary / hop tea / whatever, and start experimenting.

BetterSense said:

I have a good temperature-controlled fermentation chamber. I usually ferment at 20C/68F



Do you have a recipe? I'm not sure I know what a brown ale tastes like. Is there a commonly available commercial beer that fits that category (so that I can taste)?



Well, my extract beer wasn't turning out good, so why not try all grain? So far I have a better record with all-grain, and I'm skeptical of kits. My extract brews were flopping because of the cheap yeast that came with the kits, though.

What recipe are you using? I buy everything at homebrewHQ (or craigslist) so far. Their prices seem reasonable.

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Try these links, lots of fairly simple recipes here. We brewed the Moose Drool clone, best brown ale I've ever had. There's a beer joint/gas station on 544 heading into Murphy, cant remember the name, stocks a bunch of Big Sky.

http://byo.com/stories/recipeindex

http://byo.com/stories/recipeindex/...-ale/2154-big-sky-moose-drool-brown-ale-clone

You might go to a beer store that lets you make up your own 6 pak and get one bottle of everything they sell ( hey,it's research) taste them and pick the 3 you like most, then google for a recipie (example, google "Hogaarden clone extract recipie") usually you will find a link that leads back to a thread on this forum. Read through and grab the recipie. My first 3 brews were brewers best extract kits, the rest are extract kits I put together. Most newbies start on kits then graduate to making their own kits and eventually (?) AG. The raw ingredients are usually fresher than the ones in the pre packaged kits.

Taypo said:

I work in Richardson, live in Wylie. Just fired up a brown ale last night after dropping a couple hundred bucks at HomebrewHQ for gear upgrades and ingredients. Seems to be quite a few of us in this neighborhood.

Once this batch clears out of primary, we're going for porters and holiday ales for the next couple months. Eventually, its going to cool off out here and I'd like to have some fall beer ready for it...

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Working in Richardson is convenient to HBHQ. They are great people and taught me to brew! Kelly appreciates the money! Let's keep him in business!!

Brown ales are good, Belgian wits seem to go like clockwork and the yeast like higher fermentation temps... My personal favorites are Irish Reds, though. (Well, aside from Marzen / Oktoberfest styles, but those are lagers.)

aerod1 said:

Working in Richardson is convenient to HBHQ. They are great people and taught me to brew! Kelly appreciates the money! Let's keep him in business!!

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The only thing I havent bought from him at this point is the turkey burner, everything else is all HQ. SWMBO went in there to get the stuff for our last batch, they were real cool with her. Gonna need more carboys and bottles, so he's got a little more of my paycheck coming soon!

Dude that's funny, I was in HBHQ a couple weeks ago at like 5-6pm and there was a woman buying stuff basically reading a list off her smart phone and they were helping her figure it out, I figured some homebrewer had sent her to get stuff for a batch. I've taken my wife there a couple times to buy soda stuff; actually now that I think of it HBHQ is closer to my wife's work than mine so maybe I should start sending her, then at least she can't claim I'm hiding hobby expenses from her.

IPAs are great. When I was a new brewer, a guy at my LHBS said that IPAs are especially good for newbies b/c the hoppiness can mask many imperfections that might come up while you're learning the process.

BetterSense said:

Dude that's funny, I was in HBHQ a couple weeks ago at like 5-6pm and there was a woman buying stuff basically reading a list off her smart phone and they were helping her figure it out, I figured some homebrewer had sent her to get stuff for a batch. I've taken my wife there a couple times to buy soda stuff; actually now that I think of it HBHQ is closer to my wife's work than mine so maybe I should start sending her, then at least she can't claim I'm hiding hobby expenses from her.

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That DEFINITELY wasnt my wife - she's just as into it as I am, which helps out a ton when it comes to dropping cash. We're still pretty new, so we're both asking a ton of questions and those guys are always happy to help.