I think I made near beer

I have been trying my hand at all grain no-sarge (BIAB) ales and recently made one using;
2.5 gallon batch
3# Cara Pils
2# 2 Row Malt
.5# Vienna
.5# Corm Meal @ last 15 min of mash
mashed @ 150F for 90 min
mashed out @ 170F for 10 min
boiled for 60 min with
.5 oz Cascade @ 60 min
.25 oz Cascade @ 10 min
dry American ale yeast
bottled 8/19/2012

I was going for a sort of Yuengling so I added some corn meal at the last 15 minutes of a basic recipe (should have been mashed the entire 90 min). The beer tastes good and refreshing but I can drink a quart + some (probably 2 qts.) and not feel any effects at all other than being full. My hydrometer was broken during this brew so I didn't measure it and played it by ear. I guess that didn't work out so well. I used a paint strainer bag to steep in, squeezed out the grains and rinsed then with another gallon or so of hot water and added that to my brew pot. Does anyone have any comments?

You probably want to use maybe .25-.35 lbs of carapils and then make up the difference with more base malt. You might not have gotten much out of that carapils.

I didn't think Cara Pils was normally used as a base malt? Isn't it normally added in small quantities for mouthfeel and head retention?

The .5# of corn meal didn't add anything to your alcohol, since it wasn't converted to fermentable sugars. I don't know how fermentable Cara Pils is, but I suspect not very.

Well this was my first attempt a making my own recipe, I guess it didn't work out so well. Needless to say I went back to following recipes and made an all grain dark chocolate stout which came out good and just bottled an extract Bass Ale clone today which also looks good. The Bass Ale i measured and it had a starting gravity of 1.051 and final gravity today of 1.010, so I know I got something maybe not as much as I wanted but something.

fischfam said:

The Bass Ale i measured and it had a starting gravity of 1.051 and final gravity today of 1.010, so I know I got something maybe not as much as I wanted but something.

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I believe that's about 5.3% ABV

JonM said:

You might not have gotten much out of that carapils.

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I'm gonna go out on a limb and say you didn't get much out of that much carapils other than a bunch of dextrins. If you're hydrometer had been working I'm sure your FG is sky high.

But, this got me thinking about near beer. How do they make it? I think it is real beer with the alcohol evaporated out??? Correct? I asked some guy at the Schell's Brewery tour because he said during prohibition they made near beer but also bootleg alcohol but had no idea how but this seems to make since.

inhousebrew said:

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say you didn't get much out of that much carapils other than a bunch of dextrins. If you're hydrometer had been working I'm sure your FG is sky high.

But, this got me thinking about near beer. How do they make it? I think it is real beer with the alcohol evaporated out??? Correct? I asked some guy at the Schell's Brewery tour because he said during prohibition they made near beer but also bootleg alcohol but had no idea how but this seems to make since.

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Well I can tell you how I made "Neer Beer'. I entered the wrong data in and my sparge water was waaaayyy to high; after mixing the grains in, I believe it was around the mid 180°F for close to 5 minutes (This was my first BIAB). I cooled it to 156° as fast as I could (took about 5 minutes or so) and ended up with a 2.6% ABV Golden Pisser ale. It resembled "Foster's Australian for Beer" in taste but drinking an oil can of this would leave you with nothing but a full and bloated belly. I drink this beer when I am on-call and this batch has been the only batch I've made to last longer than 3 months.

Ignoring the carapils, you have 3 lbs of grain in 2.5 gallons. That will give you a ~3% beer. With so much carapils, it should have very good mouthfeel.

david_42 said:

Ignoring the carapils, you have 3 lbs of grain in 2.5 gallons. That will give you a ~3% beer. With so much carapils, it should have very good mouthfeel.

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Oh yes, it tastes very good and is very clear. Although I made it all in 1 liter bottles and dumped all but two last night. I guess you gotta admit when it went wrong and since space and bottles are at a premium I figured I would make way for my next batch. Back to following recipes and adding 30-50% more grain if I BIAB.

Yeah. That is a LOT of carapils. Typically, you want the base malts (2-row and Vienna in this case) to make up at least 80% of the grain bill. Also, you can usually eliminate carapils completely if you go all-grain. I've done plenty of brews with just 100% 2-row and have never had any problems with head retention or mouthfeel.

gr8shandini said:

Yeah. That is a LOT of carapils. Typically, you want the base malts (2-row and Vienna in this case) to make up at least 80% of the grain bill. Also, you can usually eliminate carapils completely if you go all-grain. I've done plenty of brews with just 100% 2-row and have never had any problems with head retention or mouthfeel.

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I don't exactly remember what made me use so much cara but I think this is just what I had crushed and left over and just wanted to get rid of it before it went bad. Should have just dumped it which i am doing to the beer now. It would have taken less time. Oh well.

You can freeze leftover crushed grains and they'll be good for months.

Actually, this sounds really interesting. I'd love to make a good homebrew "near beer" for friends who don't drink. Was your beer overly sweet?