Brew-off beer

I recently signed up to brew and pour beer for a local competition they are putting together here in town. The said they are going to have 20ish homebrewers and they want people to brew a 5gallon batch and serve 4 ounce pours to the attendees. Its scheduled to go down on 10/28 so I need to get something brewed but I'm not sure what that's going to be yet. They are going to have people vote for their favorite beer, favorite name of beer and then us brewers are going to get to vote for a brewers choice beer. I'm not sure if I wanna go for crowd pleaser or something unique and exciting.

I've been thinking of dooing a blond, american wheat or maybe like a saison? Or maybe I should do something darker since its fall. Why are there so many choices!?

Do a brown ale.

*Edit* Might be a lot of those at the show considering the fall season.

That's not a lot of time. I would go with a nice dark mild. It's a definite crowd pleaser and will be ready in time.

I'm a big fan of brown ales myself. However, since you'd be cutting it super close to get a brown in prime condition before the end of October, I'd go with the wheat you suggested as they're ready to drink quick. You could go unique and appropriately seasonal with a pumpkin wheat. I had my first one of those a week ago and I was pleasantly surprised!

You almost have to go with a smaller "crowd pleaser"-type beer. Most beer-geek brews are going to be bigger and need some more time to age. You might be able to get something like a maple porter to be seasonal (thinking of doing one of those myself), as long as you didn't shoot too big.

EDIT: Pumpkin wheat sounds kind of interesting, too. Don't even really need the pumpkin, do an American Wheat beer and spice it with a little pumpkin-pie spice (when people think of "pumpkin beer," they're thinking of the spices a lot more than the pumpkin flavor itself).

Hmmm well I do have a pumpkin ale and a CDA in fermenters right now so I can always fall back to those if need be. Dark Mild might be nice, I don't really have much experience (drinking or otherwise) with the style what would you all reccomend for a recipe? I've seen Orfry's recipe pop up quite a bit and thought about brewing it a few times. Also Jamil's recipe seems pretty good too, hmmm...

Or you could do a pumpkin mild?

azscoob came up with this Mild recipe and its a great beer.

Recipe Type: All Grain
Yeast: Nottingham
Yeast Starter: nope
Additional Yeast or Yeast Starter: nope
Batch Size (Gallons): 5.5
Original Gravity: 1.035
Final Gravity: 1.012
IBU: 20.4
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
Color: 19.1
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 10 days at 65 degrees
Tasting Notes: Catagory 11 winner in 2011 HBT comp. 42/50 in round one, 40/50 in final round

Here is my posting of Orfy's Mild Mannered Ale that took 1st place, category 11 in the 2011 HBT homebrew competition, and was a part of the "Orfy's mild mini-comp".

5 lb 8 oz Maris Otter (Crisp, UK)
1 lb 8 oz Crystal 60L (Crisp, UK)
6 oz Chocolate malt (Crisp, UK)

1 oz UK Fuggle 4.30% at 45 minutes
1 oz UK Fuggle 4.30% at 15 minutes

Brewhouse efficiency for this recipe is set to 75%

Mash at 158 degrees for 60 minutes at 1.25:1 ratio, mashout with 1 gallon of boiling water and Vorlauf till first runnings are clear. Double batch sparge with 170 degree water to get to pre-boil volume.

Pitch yeast at the starting fermentation temp of 65 degrees and ramp up to 68 degrees after 3 days at initial fermentation temp.

After 10 days of primary fermentation rack to a keg or bottling bucket and carb to 1.8 volumes.


A few notes about this beer:

If you have never tried a Northern English Mild, you are missing out on a great full flavored session beer that is both an inexpensive beer to brew and it is a quick beer to go from grain to glass, it can be ready to drink in a couple weeks if you push it.


I always have a great time brewing this beer, if I don't have Maris Otter, I use 4.5 lbs of 2-row and a pound of victory malt to approximate the MO, don't have victory? Just toast a pound of your 2-row at 350 degrees for 16 minutes and let it sit in a bag for a week prior to brewing. It also lends itself well to other English hops, and if Notty is not your thing, use S-04 or WLP002.

Yeah the more I read about it, the more this sounds like what I'm going to do. My wife is kinda pushing for like an american wheat or something that is generally a crowd pleaser but I'm thinking it might be nice to do something a lil more season appropriate. I'm going to my LHBS today for a CO2 refill so maybe I'll get inspired. Maybe they will magically have british crystal malts so I'll have to make a mild!