Extremely low gravity beers - anyone has experience brewing them ?

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jfr1111

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I'm mainly talking about sub 1.030 brews that are still "beery": not Kvaas or other alcoholic beverage not made from hops, barley and water, altough I'm sure they can be delicious. I was reading the Shut up about Barclay Perkins blog and stumbled on the figures for Mild during WWI and was astonished to see the low gravities (sometimes as low as 1.023!) that the 4d beer were sporting.

I like me some low-gravity session ales and was wondering if such "thin" offerings still had the mouthfeel and taste of beer. I like the challenge of brewing something that is very low in alcohol that is still delicious: Bob's Mild at around 1.035 felt like a much bigger beer. Anybody has experience/tips about brewing such a "reverse monster" ?
 
I made a beer from some second runnings that was 1.034, I wanted to go all Columbus as I was obsessed with them at the time and wanted to taste what they would be like, I bittered it to about 33-34 IBUs right with the gravity so an even BU/OG scale, finished at 1.004 and was a fantastic beer one I would probably make on it's own actually.

Tasted like a really light session IPA which is what I was shooting for actually.


Here are the numbers

Amount Item Type % or IBU
4.47 lb Great Western American Pale (3.0 SRM) Grain 60.53 %
1.69 lb Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 22.86 %
0.80 lb Rye, Flaked (2.0 SRM) Grain 10.90 %
0.21 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 2.86 %
0.21 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 2.86 %
0.35 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.00 %] (60 min) Hops 17.1 IBU
0.50 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.00 %] (20 min) Hops 14.8 IBU
0.50 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.00 %] (0 min) Hops -
1 Pkgs California Ale (White Labs #WLP001) [StartYeast-Ale
 
I've never gone quite that low! I've brewed a 1.039 oatmeal stout (finished at 1.016), for a 3.12% ABV that was was great.

I made a "session IPA" that was at 1.043 and ended up at 3.99% ABV. It was really good, too, as a session IPA.

I've never had great success with anything else (besides a mild) in a very low OG beer.
 
I've done a few berliner weiss that clocked in at 1.032, but nothing sub-1.030. Sounds like a fun project.
 
I like me some low-gravity session ales and was wondering if such "thin" offerings still had the mouthfeel and taste of beer. I like the challenge of brewing something that is very low in alcohol that is still delicious

I brew a lot of milds and session bitters and even the occasional 'baby' IPA, with most of these are around 1032-40. For me, the key for small beers is keeping them all malt for a fuller flavor and using a healthy amount of crystal or other malt that adds some body. I know a lot of historical recipes call for adjuncts in their low gravity beers, but I tend to leave them out as they can lend a pretty thin mouthfeel and flavor. One of my favorite low gravity beer's I make is an IPA with a starting gravity of 1.040, hopped to hell with amarillo and simcoe. It's only 3.8% but tastes like a miniature IIPA.
 
I've never had great success with anything else (besides a mild) in a very low OG beer.

Milds in general, at least the home brewed ones, do tend to have a high proportion of speciality malts along with an all malt grist. I'm guessing that upping the crystal/roasted malts percentages, along with an increase in mash temperature would be beneficial flavour and colour wise in such a low gravity beer. Keeping the final gravity in check would be critical: dry beers do tend to be perceived as being lower bodied. Mouthfeel increasing ingredients (oats, flaked barley, carapils) would also be beneficial, I think.

The only drawback (but it's a big one) is that such low alcohol offerings also tend to be low in hopping rates, as to not end with an overly bitter beer, wich in turn makes the beer less stable and more prone to spoilage. Ie. drink it fast.

What about carbonation levels ? Do you guys (and gals) think that it would play a role in the perception of the final product ? I know that Milds tend to be very low in carbonation.
 
Sounds like some really good "lawn mowing beers" when you need to cut the lawn trim the hedges, and edge the whole yard, weed & mulch the flower bed... all that turns into a 6 pack job!

Found this Calculator for Volumes of Co2:
http://www.tastybrew.com/calculators/priming.html

Bottling I usually got more carbed than I would have preferred on low gravity beers. Now that I found this and I'm kegging two out of 3 batches (have the handy dandy pressure to temp chart) I may actually bottle a few of the low gravity beers again. I love milds but I wasn't pleased with the bottled ones I've done just bc they were too fizzy!
 
I have two brews on my schedule. Maybe I should switch one of them to a Low Gravity session beer. I've been wanting to do a mild for a while. And now I have the capability to lager. Maybe I just need to brew about 4 batches!
 
Do brew a mild, they are awesome. I'll post my sub 1.030 recipe pretty soon for people to look over before I brew it in the first week of January. I also have an ESB planned for that weekend with maybe another batch of dry stout, altough I already have two cases of porter in bottles.
 
Here's the recipe, aptly called "Recession Mild":

OG: 1.028 (yes!)
SRM: 20
IBU: 17
Est. Alc. 2,64

4,00 lb Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3,0 SRM) Grain 72,73 %
0,75 lb Extra Dark Crystal 135 (135,0 SRM) Grain 13,64 %
0,50 lb Pale Chocolate Malt (250,0 SRM) Grain 9,09 %
0,25 lb Oats, Flaked (1,0 SRM) Grain 4,55 %
0,75 oz Willamette [5,50 %] (60 min) Hops 16,3 IBU
1 Pkgs SafAle English Ale (DCL Yeast #S-04) Yeast-Ale

Mash @ 160
Ferment at the med to high range of yeast to produce some esters

I went by Jamil's suggestion to use a high proportion of spciality malt in very low gravity beers to keep the mouthfeel from becoming too watery/thin (he basically advocates keeping the amounts the same when dropping gravity). I might sub the small amount of oats for cooked pearl barley (I don't have flaked on hand).

Not so sure about the yeast yet. I might just use London Ale III since I'm mianly looking to produce a cake for my Barleywine and its the use I've finally chosen for it.
 
28? holy man.

smallest beer i've made was a 1.033 bitter. it was solid.

also, recession mild turned into barleywine made me laugh.
 
I tend to either like sessionable offerings (4% and less) or big, ridiculous beers like barleywines and RIS as a treat. No in between :) 1.028 was probably the lowest gravity I saw for a 4d while looking through the Shut up about Barclay Perkins! blog. I went all malt, instead of choosing to reproduce the adjunct laden beers of that period, so it probably will have a lot more mouthfeel and flavour than that 4d ale for the same gravity though.

The only thing I'm worried is tannin extraction due to the very, very low starting gravity and the high volume of sparge water. I might just mash very thin to alleviate that. Not sure.
 
I converted the all-grain tafelbier recipe into an extract version and made it on my stove top a while back. I think it clocked in at 1.026 OG and ended up around 3% on the ABV. It was maybe a touch thin, I would add maltodextrin to it if I did it again or try it as a partial or full grain recipe. However, despite being a little thin, it was still pretty drinkable, the belgian yeast and black pepper in the recipe both came through and I found it quite nice during the summer to be able to fill up a one liter mug and go out to the garage and tinker on stuff without coming back to the house half lit.
 
Do you have a recipe for the tafelbier ? Is it in the database ?

This is it, I just converted the pilsner to pilsner extract and did it on my stove top as a partial boil. If I remember correctly I boiled half the extract in about 2.5-3 gallons of water and did all my hopping there and I boiled the other half of the extract at the same time in about a gallon of water in a second pot to see if I could get it to caramelize a little bit, not really sure if it did anything.

http://www.jackofallbrews.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=886
 
Cool recipe. Makes me confident. I'm in a phase where I'm not digging anything Belgian, but if I weren't, I'd give the tafelbier a shot too.

I will be brewing this probably Friday. I really hope it will turn out since my father-in-law is on a big NA beer kick for some reason and I'm getting a bit tired of packing bottles every time I go there to play cards (because I'm not drinking President's Choice NA beer). I could just gift him a case, plus, it would help me decrease my waistline without cutting too much on beer consumption.
 
Cool recipe. Makes me confident. I'm in a phase where I'm not digging anything Belgian, but if I weren't, I'd give the tafelbier a shot too.

I will be brewing this probably Friday. I really hope it will turn out since my father-in-law is on a big NA beer kick for some reason and I'm getting a bit tired of packing bottles every time I go there to play cards (because I'm not drinking President's Choice NA beer). I could just gift him a case, plus, it would help me decrease my waistline without cutting too much on beer consumption.

Good luck! :mug:

I'd also like to tinker with the tafelbier recipe and find a good mild to keep on hand when I want a beer that doesn't kick my butt after a couple of rounds.
 
I made this: http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/2010/11/lets-brew-wednesday-1804-barclay.html (coincidentally from the Shut up about Barclay Perkins). It came out at 1.024.

I don't see your boil time in the recipe; I would suggest a longer boil. It tends to give me better carmalization and a thicker wort without sacrificing efficiency. One thing I've noticed on the old beers on that blog, they boiled them for a looonnngg time.

I did this one at 90 the first time and 120 the second. The second brew seemed to be 'thicker' to me. HTH
 
The problem I can see with a longer boil is that you need a bigger starting volume and my setup's boil rate hovers around 13-15%. A bigger starting volume can mean a lesser gravity starting wort or bigger final efficiency. In normal/big beers, that's not a problem, since you're not likely to be extracting tannins by sparging a gallon or two more. But with something that FINISHES at 1.028 after the boil, I'd be worried that the final runnings might dip very, very low.

I might just brew this as a no sparge and shoot for 7.00 in the kettle and boil part of it way down on the stove. Probably not an accurate technique for a mild, but what the hell.
 
Here's the recipe, aptly called "Recession Mild":

OG: 1.028 (yes!)
SRM: 20
IBU: 17
Est. Alc. 2,64

4,00 lb Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3,0 SRM) Grain 72,73 %
0,75 lb Extra Dark Crystal 135 (135,0 SRM) Grain 13,64 %
0,50 lb Pale Chocolate Malt (250,0 SRM) Grain 9,09 %
0,25 lb Oats, Flaked (1,0 SRM) Grain 4,55 %
0,75 oz Willamette [5,50 %] (60 min) Hops 16,3 IBU
1 Pkgs SafAle English Ale (DCL Yeast #S-04) Yeast-Ale

Mash @ 160
Ferment at the med to high range of yeast to produce some esters

I went by Jamil's suggestion to use a high proportion of spciality malt in very low gravity beers to keep the mouthfeel from becoming too watery/thin (he basically advocates keeping the amounts the same when dropping gravity). I might sub the small amount of oats for cooked pearl barley (I don't have flaked on hand).

Not so sure about the yeast yet. I might just use London Ale III since I'm mianly looking to produce a cake for my Barleywine and its the use I've finally chosen for it.

I'm really happy for you, and Imma let you finish...

but Orfy has one of the best mild recipes of all time!! of all time!!!!
 
I tend to either like sessionable offerings (4% and less) or big, ridiculous beers like barleywines and RIS as a treat.

i like session beers as well, but i tend to live at 1.050.

that being said, the last two beers I made have been 1.040 and 1.037...the beer before that was a RIS....

I converted the all-grain tafelbier recipe into an extract version and made it on my stove top a while back.

have you had goose island's pepe nero?
 
I'm really happy for you, and Imma let you finish...

but Orfy has one of the best mild recipes of all time!! of all time!!!!

I've seen that one floating around. Hmm, might need to give it a try.

have you had goose island's pepe nero?

Nope, I've had the Matilda and Sofie, both available at BevMo. How is it?
 
i brewed a 1.062 stout, and did a second runnings for fun. it turned out 1.030. i was tempted to throw it out, as i like bigger brews, but i didn't. i called it a light dry irish stout, and served it at a party, and the keg was gone as soon as i told them what it was ;)
 
i brewed a 1.062 stout, and did a second runnings for fun. it turned out 1.030. i was tempted to throw it out, as i like bigger brews, but i didn't. i called it a light dry irish stout, and served it at a party, and the keg was gone as soon as i told them what it was ;)

nice easy drinker! gotta love em. did a lemon balm cream ale w/ lemon balm from the garden last summer. Argentina Cascades (big lemon flavor/aroma) about a 1lb of flaked corn.... 1035 og 1001 fg WOW party beer and a half! 4 guys fishing, and camp cooking killed a 5 gal corny! Damn! that was a weekend! cooked a bunch of fish used some beer in a sauce! fun as hell. was still able to catch some shark at sunrise!... breakfast beers in a growler for the pros on the beach! gotta love fishin & home brew!
 
i like session beers as well, but i tend to live at 1.050.

that being said, the last two beers I made have been 1.040 and 1.037...the beer before that was a RIS....



have you had goose island's pepe nero?

Since I live in Quebec, offerings from US breweries are REALLY limited. We get a lot of (crappy) imports from Europe, but not much from our neighbours to the south.

1.050 is not very sessionable to me since I bottle in bombers, so I essentially have to drink almost two beers everytime I crack one. Not very practical, unless I know I won't have to drive for the whole evening. Plus, this is an experiment and a way to create a cake for my small batch of barleywine more than anything else, wich explains why I'm not sticking to an established recipe (Orfy's), altough mine took its inspiration from Jamil's Dark Mild.
 
Nope, I've had the Matilda and Sofie, both available at BevMo. How is it?

it's certainly not a session beer at 6%. uses saison yeast but brewed with some roast malt and black peppercorns.

i haven't had it yet, but I'd really like to.. i'm going to the brewpub at the end of the month, maybe they'll have it there.
 
Here is my English style Tafelbier. I drink this instead of soda.

Upright Ale

OG 1.020
FG 1.005
ABV ~2%
IBU 11.7

2# Maris Otter
1# Victory
1# Crystal 90L
1/2oz Fuggle @ 60m
1/4oz Fuggle @ 10m
1/4 oz Fuggle @ 5m
1 Packet S-04

I recommend that you mash on the high side to encourage body.
 
I just did this too. I BIAB/stovetop/no sparge 2 LBs of 2 row. I was planning on just using it as a starter but when I took the gravity and realized how well I did(2.5 gallons of 1.025)I just hopped it and boiled for 60 mins. I wasn't prepared with the proper grain bill but the turnaround on this (grain to glass) should be only 10-14 days and I have 2.5 gallons. I figure at a minimum I'll have a nice starting point to tweak and I'll still get my yeast cake for the barleywine. I'll update some tasting notes in about a week.
 
I just did this too. I BIAB/stovetop/no sparge 2 LBs of 2 row. I was planning on just using it as a starter but when I took the gravity and realized how well I did(2.5 gallons of 1.025)I just hopped it and boiled for 60 mins. I wasn't prepared with the proper grain bill but the turnaround on this (grain to glass) should be only 10-14 days and I have 2.5 gallons. I figure at a minimum I'll have a nice starting point to tweak and I'll still get my yeast cake for the barleywine. I'll update some tasting notes in about a week.

What hops did you use ? 1.025 all coming from 2-row probably will feel very thin in the mouth, but it'll make for a cool experiment ! Feel free to update in this thread: we need more ultra low gravity beer talk !
 
I used Cascade. I'm not overly hopeful or anything. Plus I haven't had anything light in awhile, i figured this'll be done in 10 days and it'll still prolly be better then BMC, which I refuse to buy for the house.
 
I call this one HopSession, it's an awesome hoppy session beer. I mashed at 158 and it finished at 1.014 for an ABV of 2.6%. Next time I may actually up the munich and carapils a bit to give it a bit more maltiness and body.

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 5.50 gal
Boil Size: 7.65 gal
Estimated OG: 1.034 SG
Estimated Color: 7.3 SRM
Estimated IBU: 43.2 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 74.00 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
3.00 lb Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 42.86 %
3.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 42.86 %
0.50 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 7.14 %
0.25 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 3.57 %
0.25 lb Honey Malt (25.0 SRM) Grain 3.57 %
1.00 oz Simcoe [13.00 %] (Dry Hop 7 days) Hops -
1.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] (Dry Hop 7 days) Hops -
1.00 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.40 %] (Dry Hop 7 Hops -
0.50 oz Pearle [9.20 %] (60 min) Hops 18.7 IBU
0.50 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.40 %] (30 min) Hops 14.9 IBU
0.33 oz Simcoe [13.00 %] (10 min) Hops 3.5 IBU
0.33 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.00 %] (10 min) Hops 3.8 IBU
0.33 oz Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] (10 min) Hops 2.3 IBU
1.00 oz Simcoe [13.00 %] (0 min) Hops -
1.00 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.00 %] (0 min) Hops -
1.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] (0 min) Hops -
 
That's practically a barleywine compared to some of the recipes posted here :) Looks like a cool recipe. I'm no hophead, but it looks interesting. I'm actually thinking about brewing a bitter or two with American hops, just for the sake of it.
 
UPDATE: I finally used a pouch of Notty I had lying around from one of the "good" batches. I rehydrated per the instructions and pitched at 75F. Signs of fermentation after 8 hours (by then the wort was at 62F). Took a gravity reading to confirm that the Notty was performing okay and it is at 1.016, so it's not finished yet. The taste was reminescent of feces and cheap coffee, but we're only a few days in.
 
Tasted the beer tonite. Its highly carbed, aroma, not much, flavor...its really light beer. The first sip is not good. It has an aftertaste reminiscent of MGD 64, maybe kinda soury, but definitely stays(back of the tongue but not bitterness). My palatte becomes immune to it the more I drink. I only had about 4 ounces. Something makes me think it'd be good if I could get a little lemon flavor in there...dunno why...maybe cause its .002 better then water.

Improvements will be a LB of malty/heavy flavor grain like melanoidin, victory, biscuit, aromatic? Prolly .5 LB crytal too. My OG came in @1.025 and I added .25LBS of table sugar just to get the alcohol up, came in at 1.030 per Beer Tools Pro. Next time I'll start with 1LB Maris Otter and then 1.5 LBS of the specialty grains I mentioned.(2.5 gallon batch)

I'll try dryhopping this just to see if I can get it a bit more enjoyable and not just shower beer.
 
Tasted the beer tonite. Its highly carbed, aroma, not much, flavor...its really light beer. The first sip is not good. It has an aftertaste reminiscent of MGD 64, maybe kinda soury, but definitely stays(back of the tongue but not bitterness). My palatte becomes immune to it the more I drink. I only had about 4 ounces. Something makes me think it'd be good if I could get a little lemon flavor in there...dunno why...maybe cause its .002 better then water.

Improvements will be a LB of malty/heavy flavor grain like melanoidin, victory, biscuit, aromatic? Prolly .5 LB crytal too. My OG came in @1.025 and I added .25LBS of table sugar just to get the alcohol up, came in at 1.030 per Beer Tools Pro. Next time I'll start with 1LB Maris Otter and then 1.5 LBS of the specialty grains I mentioned.(2.5 gallon batch)

I'll try dryhopping this just to see if I can get it a bit more enjoyable and not just shower beer.

Do you have access to argentine cascades?
http://ebrew.com/hops/cascade_argentine_hops.htm
they have a pronounced lemon grass thing going. I used them in a Lemon balm cream ale this summer. added the herb lemon balm from my garden to the last few minutes of the boil in combination with the argentine cascades and there was a nice lemonish thing happening through the finish on that beer. very nice will be doing it again this summer when my lemon balm comes back!
 
I brew a lot of milds and session bitters and even the occasional 'baby' IPA, with most of these are around 1032-40. For me, the key for small beers is keeping them all malt for a fuller flavor and using a healthy amount of crystal or other malt that adds some body. I know a lot of historical recipes call for adjuncts in their low gravity beers, but I tend to leave them out as they can lend a pretty thin mouthfeel and flavor. One of my favorite low gravity beer's I make is an IPA with a starting gravity of 1.040, hopped to hell with amarillo and simcoe. It's only 3.8% but tastes like a miniature IIPA.

Got a recipe for the Mini IIPA?
 
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