My first brew was an extract caramel amber ale kit, almost certainly based off this, but with brown sugar in place of the candi syrup and without the late Chinook (I believe), and S-04 instead of US-05. I was told to ferment it at 24C (75F) for the esters. After a few beginners' mistakes, I pitched around 30C (86F). I got super-fast fermentation - 4-5 bubbles/second in the three-piece - that left some bad flavors. It was an alright beer if you ignored the aftertaste brought on by the high fermentation temps, but nowhere near as good as it was when I drank the same beer, properly made, at the home of the guy who sold me the kit.
I decided to come full-circle and try again now, after seven months and about a dozen BIAB batches.
My adjusted recipe (based on my ingredients and efficiency):
3.9kg 2-row
.7kg C60 (a mediocre batch, unfortunately)
.52kg homemade
Candi Syrup (290F x2) - meant to add .6kg, ended up with a bit less than intended. I was surprised how little color it added compared to Beersmith calcs - apparently I estimated way too high on the SRM.
.08kg "old red sugar" - very dark brown sugar ("old red sugar" is directly translated from the Chinese), used to make up for coming up short on the Candi Syrup.
22g Chinook 60m
29g Chinook 0m
29g Willamette 0m
1 packet S-04, rehydrated
Overshot my OG and volume by a bit (still adjusting some Beersmith profiles): 14p (1.057) vs. 12.3p (1.051 - replacement hydro only had Plato) and ~6 gal vs. 5.5 gal. Color seems about right.
Cooled down to about 26C with my IC (maybe 45 minutes), pitched about four hours later after cooling to ~19C in my ferm chamber. Chilled down to 17C by the morning, adjusted the temp controller to 18C, got bubbles 8 hours later, left town for a day and a half, came back and bumped to 19C, then 19.5C the next morning, 20C last night. I'm planning on reaching 24C (the temperature recommendation from that first kit) at 1C a day, then letting it sit for a week, dropping down as close to 12C as I can for a few days (chamber's lower limit - it's a wine fridge), then bottling around the 3 week mark to free up the chamber for my tea beer experiment.