Summer Ale Style, GF

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Pitbull-brewer

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I am looking to surprise my Father-in-law and his wife, who is glutton intolerant , with a GF beer. I am very new to home brewing and dont want to screw this up. So i am looking for a the best combo of, good tasting, simple recipe, and a summer style ale. New to homebrewtalk but it is awesome thus far.
 
It's surprisingly difficult to screw up too badly. (Sure there's still screwups but it's usually still drinkable.) The most important thing is sanitation, cause that can trigger a beer dump. Any recipe oops tends to be drinkable (so long as you don't mix up sugar and salt).

Also, gluten free beer tends to be... difficult... flavorwise. We know it's hard to get decent beer. There's 3 that can be found regularly in the stores so we're limited there. We know that sorghum beers usually have a metallic, phenoic twang and that rice beers are kind of thin and flavorless (even with maltodextrin). (this is usually why we combine the two when we do extracts, except when we phase out sorghum completely). Usually, gluten free people will be happy with what they're given regardless (assuming that we're sure it's gluten free).

Any simple recipe beer will probably be those using a combination of those two extracts.

So the remaining question is what constitutes a summer style ale to you?
 
How new to homebrewing are you? Are you generally satisfied with the "regular" beers you've made? Personally, it took me several batches to realize the importance of basic brewing techniques, like full-wort boils, filtering post-boil instead of putting everything in little bags in the boil, quick chilling, pitching a large amount of healthy yeast at the proper temperature, keeping my carboys covered to avoid exposure to light, etc. If you nail the basics like this, then you can easily make a tasty GF beer with very simple ingredients. Tell us more about what you mean by "summer ale" and we'll help you figure out a recipe.

One other question: have you tried the gluten-free beers available in the store? You should definitely try as many as you can get your hands on just to get a sense of how gluten-free beer differs from regular beer.
 
I am pretty new to brewing. I bottled my first batch, an Irish Red, and it turned out well. I have more experience moonshining than I do brewing. I don't know if summer ale is a standard term. Something like Samuel Adams Summer Ale would be ideal. But the main thing i am looking for is a lighter beer that I can mix with an orange flavor. Not a big fan of Blue Moon but the people i am making it for tend to like that as well.
 
My first brew was extract plus steeping grains so I think that wont be two hard. I am just worried because it seems from what I have been reading on the forums that GF beers can be a little tricky to get a crisp taste.
Thanks for the article, I have always loved seasonal beer the trick is finding it. That is that hard part about living in BF Egypt, North Carolina.
 
After some looking, I'd say give a shot at the recipe mentioned in this thread:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f78/gluten-free-wicked-messenger-wit-172452/

Ingredients:
------------

7 lbs Sorghum Syrup (30 min)
1 oz Hallertauer, pellet 3.8% (60 min)
.50 oz Hallertauer, pellet 3.8% (5 min)
.25 oz corriander seed, cracked (flameout)
.25 oz bitter orange peel (20 min)
.5 oz sweet orange peel (20 min)
1 tsp yeast nutrient (20 min)
8 oz maltodextrine (5 min)
1 pkg SafBrew Specialty Ale (T-58)

Carbed with 3.8 oz corn sugar

Personally, I'd do 50/50 rice syrup solids/sorghum instead of all sorghum, or maybe 3 lbs sorghum, 3 lbs rice solids, and 1 lb light honey (at flame-out), and possibly steep a couple pounds of home-toasted quinoa prior to the boil for 30-60 minutes. I also wouldn't add the sorghum until flame-out, that seems to be helpful in minimizing the "twang".

Good luck!
 
My brew store recommends an orange coriander as well, of the ones I've given them, they said it was one of the least sorghum offensive beers they had since the orange citrus pairs well with the twang.
 
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