British Brown Ale The Kings Nutz Imperial Nut Brown Ale

Nice read. You mentioned having trouble with the liquid extract because of thickness... did you soak the can in warm water before opening it? If not...it works great.

Glad you enjoyed it. I probably went into way too much detail, but whatever.

I didn't have too much trouble simply due to the thickness; I had left the can out on the counter long enough for it to get close to room temperature. It was more of an inadvertant spill thing, followed by me not being able to get it all out of the can easily.

Thanks for the hot water tip, though - I will definitely use that in the future.

Also, I did one more substitution than I had mentioned before... when I was ordering my LME, they didn't have "light". I ended up going half and half with amber and extra pale. I expect that my beer will be a little darker because of it, but I doubt that will be an issue.

Thoughts?

homebrewdad said:

Also, I did one more substitution than I had mentioned before... when I was ordering my LME, they didn't have "light". I ended up going half and half with amber and extra pale. I expect that my beer will be a little darker because of it, but I doubt that will be an issue.

Thoughts?

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That shouldn't be a big problem. It is a fairly dark brown ale using LME in the first place.

That's amazing you came out with a 1.100 reading. That thing is going to be a beast. You will be glad you made that starter and threw in some yeast nutrient, it will really help to break down that monster of a beer.

D_Ranged_Eskimo said:

That's amazing you came out with a 1.100 reading. That thing is going to be a beast. You will be glad you made that starter and threw in some yeast nutrient, it will really help to break down that monster of a beer.

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I'm wondering if it's something that I'm somehow doing. My first brew was an extract kit from AHS (Yorkshire Square Brown). Tagert OG on it was 1.051, I came in at 1.075 (took three identical readings). Now this one comes in almost twenty points high!

I have checked my hydrometer in plain water more than once, get a 1.000 every time.

I know that it's possible I added a little too much extract to this recipe, since I was using volume, not weight (kitchen scale is in storage). Still, I couldn't have been off by THAT much, as I only bought a small amount of extra (7 lbs of LME as opposed to the 6.6 for the recipe, 3 lbs of DME, as opposed to 2.25... and I had what appeared to be the correct leftover amounts of both).

I guess time will tell...


Edit: as for it being a beast, my next blog entry will be about the beastly fermentation so far. Does that count?

My guess is that your gravity readings are off. The only reason I say that is because kits are usually right on the money as far as starting gravity. There's nothing you can do to squeeze that much more fermentable sugars out of it. Even if you have steeping grains, there's just no way...

Extract is very precise on how much potential sugar you will get out of it.

Suthrncomfrt1884 said:

My guess is that your gravity readings are off. The only reason I say that is because kits are usually right on the money as far as starting gravity. There's nothing you can do to squeeze that much more fermentable sugars out of it. Even if you have steeping grains, there's just no way...

Extract is very precise on how much potential sugar you will get out of it.

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I've assumed that, myself. That beign said, I measured this recipe twice, and measured my kit recipe three times. Every time, I held the thief at a little different angle, in case I was hitting some sugary pocket or somesuch.

The only time I've ever had an inconsistent reading was when checking FG on the kit brew, I had somehow gained .010 in a day, and knew that couldn't be right; dummy me hadn't taken enough of a sample, and my hydrometer was sitting on the bottom. A new sample lined up with what I was expecting.

I pulled a gravity reading last night, after three weeks in primary. 1.015, so fermentation should be complete. I plan to leave it another week in primary to clean up a bit, then I'll rack it to secondary for clarifying, batch aging, and opening up my primary for the next brew.

I'm going to leave this one for at least two weeks in secondary before I bottle. I wonder if I'd hurt anything by leaving it a full month?

Incidentally, even though my sample did have some hop gunk in it, it was surprisingly tasty! Sweeter than I expected, but not at all cloying, and smoother than I was expecting (no bad alcohol bite at all)... I am really excited to see how this one turns out.

I had worried a bit that I had scorched the LME; I knew that I had perhaps come close, and my original taste on brew day was fairly bitter, even smoky. That's all gone now.

homebrewdad said:

I pulled a gravity reading last night, after three weeks in primary. 1.015, so fermentation should be complete. I plan to leave it another week in primary to clean up a bit, then I'll rack it to secondary for clarifying, batch aging, and opening up my primary for the next brew.

I'm going to leave this one for at least two weeks in secondary before I bottle. I wonder if I'd hurt anything by leaving it a full month?

Incidentally, even though my sample did have some hop gunk in it, it was surprisingly tasty! Sweeter than I expected, but not at all cloying, and smoother than I was expecting (no bad alcohol bite at all)... I am really excited to see how this one turns out.

I had worried a bit that I had scorched the LME; I knew that I had perhaps come close, and my original taste on brew day was fairly bitter, even smoky. That's all gone now.

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That's good to hear it turned out well. Were you able to control your fermentation tempuratures? That seems like it would really helps keep a lot of the esters and strong alcohol tastes down.

I left mine in a secondary for 2 months before bottling it. A month won't hurt, and batch aging will really help the flavors of this big beer come together.

D_Ranged_Eskimo said:

That's good to hear it turned out well. Were you able to control your fermentation tempuratures? That seems like it would really helps keep a lot of the esters and strong alcohol tastes down.

I left mine in a secondary for 2 months before bottling it. A month won't hurt, and batch aging will really help the flavors of this big beer come together.

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I had started this one at 68 degrees ambient, but the original fermentation was vigorous and pretty hot. I moved it to the basement and 62 degrees ambient, which kept it from getting above 70 degrees.

I'm not getting the same alcohol warmth from this one that I get from my Yorkshire square brown (first batch), even though that beer is a lower ABV. I'm guessing that the temp was the big factor, here?

Thanks for the advice on secondary. I had been leaning towards a month... I may leave it longer. I understand that bulk aging may be better for bigger beers? If so, there's no rush to bottle it.

Thought I would check in on this one. I spent some time reading about big beers and long conditioning times, and decided that the evidence pointed towards people being a bit happier with those that bulk aged... so I decided to do nothing for a while.

Tongiht, I will finally bottle this monster, after right at four months in secondary. If appearance and aroma are any indicator, this will be an amazing beer.

I have about four ounces of the maple syrup left over that I bought for brewing this beer, and I have decided to use it for priming in the hopes that it imparts a little more maple flavor to the batch. I'm expecting that what I have right now will be a very light maple flavor, as I was unable to obtain grade B syrup, and had to go with dark grade A for brewing... so hopefully, I'll get a slight bit more this way ( have read some encouraging results about using maple syrup to prime).

Unfortunately, four ounces has me about 20% short of the amount I need to properly prime, so I'll be doing some frankensugar - I'll throw a little less than an ounce of normal sugar in there, too, which should get me to about 2.4 volumes of CO2 (the 2.1 volumes called for by the style is just a little flat for my taste).

After bottling (and labelling) these, I'll put them in the back of my closet and forget them until the fall. By then, the beer will haver been in process for seven or eight months; surely that will be long enough to at least try one?

I'll let you all know how it eventually turns out.

Can someone who has brewed this tell me if it is on the sweeter or roast-ier side of the brown ale spectrum? I'm looking to add a spirit treatment to it and want to know the base's flavor before I pick out a spirit.

Thanks!

Would I still need a starter for a 2.5 gallon batch?

janitorjerm said:

Would I still need a starter for a 2.5 gallon batch?

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Use a calculator like mrmalty to come up with how many cells you need.

I just put a bottle of this in my fridge (I brewed the batch back in mid January). This is +/- eight months from brew date, and 3-4 months in bottles (I did an extended secondary).

I figure that I'll crack it open this weekend. Judging from the OP's early posts, it should be quite good, though perhaps not as good as it will become.

For the record, this batch finished at 8.66% ABV.

Going to do this recipe in all grain. Should I just mash at 154, and sparge at 168-170???
Also, want to make sure the nutty flavor is distinct, was thinking about adding some victory. Any thoughts on that would be appreciated. Thanks !

I going to try this beer soon. Did anyone use a secondary? If so, how long? Are you guys bottling then aging or just letting it sit in a secondary for 3+ months?

I did primary for about four weeks, I believe, then secondary for close to four months. I bottle conditioned for 3-4 months before I cracked the first one a couple of weeks ago (~8 months total from brew date to drinking the first one).

Really, really good beer. Great grainy character, just a little sweet nuttiness to it. I fully expect it to get evenbetter with some more age.

Just tasted one after ~14 months since brew day. Its amazing. This was the second beer I ever made and I did the extract version. It was good for the first few months, a bit sweet for my taste and it was sort of a one note beer with just a single dimension cloying/alcohol/maltiness to it.

Now its a completely different beer. The sweetness has mellowed a lot and the nuttiness has come to the front in an amazing way. I don't remember tasting the nuttiness at all in the first four months after bottling, but the has become a much more complex and well rounded beer. I think I'm going to rebrew this as an all grain soon and see how it compares.

Seriously though, any ideas on how to make this beer as good as it is without the one year+ of aging? There must be something we can do to tweak the recipe, no?

I brewed this on New Years Eve. I'm really looking forward to it and I hope it turns out well. I am concerned though...my smack pack didn't inflate well, and being NYE, I forgot to make a starter. So, 2 days later, I'm still not bubbling. I also made a slight mistake and added the maple syrup in at 15 mins with the LME, so I added more at the end. I messed up when ordering too...I ordered extra dark dry extract...so mine will probably be a lot darker than it is supposed to. Hopefully it will turn out ok...if my fermentation will start.

1. Should I add some yeast nutrient (I usually only do this for wine)?
2. Should I add another pack of yeast?
2a. Another smackpack of the same?
3. Fermentation temp is about 64*...it's cold in my basement - will the yeast just eventually start going making my fermentation a little longer than 21 days?
4. Should I just RDWHAHB?

Well, I brewed this back on 12/15... this is only the 4th beer I've brewed, and my first Brown Ale. It's also the first time I've made up a starter as opposed to just rehydrating dry yeast an hour or so before pitching.

I had some pure maple syrup left over from my last camp trip, stuff I had bought from Costco actually, so that's what I used.

The thing was a monster during fermentation... we brewed and fermented at my buddy's house in a corner of his study. The temp in there was ~70.

Within the first few hours the airlock sounded like a typewriter, and a day and a half in it had "volcano'd", blowing the airlock across the room and covering a portion of his wall in foam. There was dried foam on his ceiling as well as on his computer across the room on his desk. Needless to say, I was proud.


The eruption


Ceiling casualty

Although I did secondary fermentations on my previous two batches of beer, I didn't on this one. After a week, I kegged it. Having just restarted brewing as a hobby, I had an empty keg that I needed to fill!

The taste at the time was nice and nutty, if a little sweet. I gassed it up, and even after just another week in the keg (refrigerated), there's already been a nice mellowing of the brew, and he sweetness has been significantly reduced.

It has a nice head at pour and good body and mouth feel. The maple just comes thru, and compliments the nutty/grains character nicely. I served it to a number of people on New year's eve, including my buddy I brew with, and everybody loved it.



Unfortunately I was not able to get a gravity reading, but it feels like it's probably in the 8.5-9% ball park.

This is a great recipe that I'll definitely try again.. perhaps soon so I can let the next batch sit in a secondary for a few months...

-sc

Just brewed this with the extract recipe. dropped it onto a Yorkshire yeast cake from an all grain English IPA I did with a friend 3 weeks ago. Hit all the temps, the OG came in at 1.084. Will give it 3 weeks around 65, then rack to secondary and forget about it.

I have a blow off tube in this - and it still blew the bung out! Cleaned up, got the cork back in and it sounds like I'm on vacation at Yellowstone.

Can someone put up some numbers about how they determined proper carb for this beer especially if you primed for bottling with maple syrup? I've got a huge "waterless" imperial maple brown going and I want to make sure it finishes right. Thank you all!

50SuperDeluxe said:

Can someone put up some numbers about how they determined proper carb for this beer especially if you primed for bottling with maple syrup? I've got a huge "waterless" imperial maple brown going and I want to make sure it finishes right. Thank you all!

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Well... I'm not sure if this is bang on target for you, but I used 6 weight ounces of maple syrup in the boil, and then pasteurized 4 weight ounces of maple syrup and 2.5 weight ounces of dextrose in 2 cups water to carb. I *believe* maple syrup is 60% solids by weight, and virtually all of them are fermentable... do go ahead and double check that figure though. Using this method I had one bottle-bomb in the whole batch, and I believe that was from a cracked bottle, not over-pressure.

By the way, Super, send me a PM when you're done with your maple brown . When I made this batch it turned out a tetch sweet, and I am curious if that comes from carbing with maple syrup, or if I just under-attenuated through some other way.

Cheers and good luck!

P.S.; "Waterless beer?" I am picturing a hoppy maple-malt candy sheet that looks like brown window glass...

VicariousCynic said:

I have a blow off tube in this - and it still blew the bung out! Cleaned up, got the cork back in and it sounds like I'm on vacation at Yellowstone.

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My airlock whistled for three days when I made this recipe... this was genuinely fun ferment.

I realized how much I took from his recipe when I re-read all these posts. I used a Scottish ale yeast and it has gone nutz bout 26 hours from pitching Until this morning when I has dropped significantly in intensity. I'll be watching this fern carefully. I've added a little fermaid and may put in more.

Thanks for the input on the priming. I think I'll be in the same area. I know that when I'm going into secondary I'll be tasting for maple and for a need to dry hop for that exact sweetness you mention.

Waterless refers to my base. I got 5 gallons of maple sap from Wisconsin and used that for my partial mash and boil of 4.5 gallons and topping off with the cooled half gallon. All sap was boiled to pasteurize before use.

Cheers!

Don't mention it. I've heard excellent things about brewing with maple sap, so I'm very curious how yours turns out. The effect I get from this beer is a roasty-sweet, hoppy, bitter treat- not something to take with dinner, but certainly a good drink on its own. It's amazing as a base for a float too.

Has anyone had this beer dry out or is it supposed to be on the sweetish end?

Fermentation finished about 5 days ago. Ive been busy and this is gonna need more aging than that. O.G. Came in at 1.115 after I added .5 lbs by weight of maple syrup at peak of fermentation. I finished at 1.017. According to the Rooftop brew calc. That's 13.1% ABV. In drinking the devils cut from the vial, I'm inclined to believe that. As far as maple goes, there is very little maple but I am getting a nice brown ale once past the alcohol bite at this point, mild in the hops by choice, nutty and I'm comparing to the Moose drool tap I just had at a rock club in Minneapolis (apparently mine is spiked with Vodka). Pretty stoked. Now to let it sit and bulk age for a bit (I'll take suggestions on how long) before I bottle with more maple syrup for that final kick of maple.

Hey strangegreenman, I think 1.017 is fairly dry for this. Rock on!

Wow, sounds more like a brown barleywine at that point! Maybe age it for a year or so, though I am no expert on big beers. I think I under-attenuated mine, since my FG (as recorded in the notes I took 8 months ago) was 1.025-1.030 (kinda... syrupy).

...call me nuts (nutz?) but what would happen if you aged this (or your big brown monster) on oak chips?

Looking into it. I have time....

Well it's all finished out and bottled. I ventured a bottle a day or two ago. Carbing up nicely. Pours like a stout with a thick creamy head, mild carbonation at this point a month after bottling. Tastes like a semi sweet brown with a hint of maple and I can tell the oak soak is there. Still a bit boozy but its also >13%abv. Should be great after sitting another few months.

Oh, hey, check it out! I missed these replies. e.e
Glad the "oak soak" worked out for you, 50! I am drinking a 1-year-old Kings Nutz on its bottling birthday. It's still sweet, but not as much as I remember. Not even a touch of boozy smell... the nose is maple, bananas [I brewed this last summer and it very warm for scottish yeast) and chocolate malt. I can corroborate the OP's claim that after a year it is wonderful stuff. It's a good beer to squirrel away and let mature. What a recipe!

Do keep us posted with how your brown monster ages, too, 50super, it sounds great.

I delivered half to ny maple supplier a weekn or so ago with instructions not to drink untilbat least Halloween. Resisted temptation last night. Had a 10 month old Braggtt instead. When I deliverd we also bottked the maple wine which is shaping up into a very smooth sherry thing. Willbpost back around halloween!

I've read this entire thread, glad to see such positive feedback from many brewers. I am very anxious to give this one a try, and have good reason to occupy an empty fermenter for 8-12 months....

I haven't gone back to find exactly where the discrepancy lies, forgive me if this is an error, pretty tired, but....

I believe the original recipe calls for Liquid Extract as a late addition, however a later post by the original brewer calls for a late addition of DME. Can you, or any one who has brewed this with success, set the record straight here?.. Is the late addition liquid or dry?

Thanks! Besides being patient and aware of fermentation temps, (and all other feedback already mentioned), and advice here would be great. Been brewing for 4 years, a few all-grains, but nothing ever this big. Let me know!

Cheers.

I didn't read this thread but I was under the impression that they are the same, one is just in liquid form, the other dried?

Though it may be easier to do a late addition of liquid so it doesn't clump up on you like dme would with steaming wort under it.

Use a yeast starter or make sure you buy enough yeast vials or packs. Dont underpitch. I was told another pack per .015 of gravity over 1.060. Please correct me and educate me if that's in error.

Greetings,

I read this full thread back in October (almost 6 months from the time of writing), and followed everything to a T. Primary, then secondary in a Corney Key (which has been working well, as a new fermentation technique).

Bottled 6 weeks ago. Fully intend on letting it sit for another 6 months or so. Did open a few small bottles which were intentionally used as tasters as time went on.

Tasted EXCELLENT, I second everyone's feedback so far….


…. However, minimal carbonation at best. I've been doing this a while, my techniques are pretty thorough, however, am getting a little concerned about the lack of carbonation. I don't expect a final product yet, and as mentioned, am intending on lettings this sit for 6 months or so (until next fall).

Considering what to do here. I could open them and combine them all in a keg and naturally carbonate, let them sit, or am considering making another (very minimal) yeast starter and priming sugar solution, and very carefully opening all bottles, and injecting some life in these…

Any thoughts?

In all honesty, I won't do anything for another month or so, but am thinking about injecting some more carb-goodies, and hope it carbs up. Currently researching options here, but if anyone has any thoughts tailored to a high ABV brew of this style, please, I am all ears.

So far, this really is the Gods' nectar, and spent lots of time and $$$ making this happen. Can't even consider the possibility of ending up with a DELICIOUS flat nectar.

Please brainstorm.

Prost.

How much bottling sugar did you use? How warm have the bottles been? You will probably oxidize your beer if you do anything to it now... and one batch of low-carb nectar is better than five gallons of fizzy wet dog.

I drank all mine. Too early to age out. But my Maple sap/ syrup supplier is SO ready to give this another go this year. I will definitely be doing a starter with this. Too big not to. If you are going to give this a go, its not hard to do, and so beneficial. I just did a huge Imperial Porter and it finished in three days! So fast I was scared I was stuck,but apparently on gravity reading, the sugar said, "F It, we'll just turn to booze instead of fighting it!" This is big, ya need it. The Oak soak really rounded this out and I will do that again, for sure, but Halloween will not be the "deadline." May take this up to 10 gallons because my sap supplier doesn't want to spend the $ on propane to boil all his harvest to syrup. This recipe is such a win, take your time and have more patience than me.