Caramel cream ale?

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Bump! Any advise on the high OG and if I should pitch another pack of yeast?

Smells delicious though I keep going into my brew room just to get a sniff! It has to be the best smelling beer that I brewed to date.
 
Srm 775 You're absolutely right! Definitely an infection. I wish I had my camera I would post a picture! Wild yeast??? What ever it is, it is almost lined up uniformly along the sides of the bottle. Definitely going to try this one again!
 
ThatGuyRyan said:
Bump! Any advise on the high OG and if I should pitch another pack of yeast?

Smells delicious though I keep going into my brew room just to get a sniff! It has to be the best smelling beer that I brewed to date.
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Ryan, what's the problem again? Your starting gravity was high? Shouldn't matter that much. The terminal gravity is what matters.

Where about in Elmhurst, I used to live in Elmhurst?

EDIT: Ok, I just saw the original. Yes, 1 extra lb. of DME would bump the gravity up that much.

That's a lot of dark grains for this recipe. That much dark grain, and you'll end up with something very different from a cream ale. Though, it may not be bad.

If it's already fermenting, then I wouldn't worry about it, if not, then pitch another packet. It won't hurt anything either way.
 
srm775 said:
Ryan, what's the problem again? Your starting gravity was high? Shouldn't matter that much. The terminal gravity is what matters.

Where about in Elmhurst, I used to live in Elmhurst?

EDIT: Ok, I just saw the original. Yes, 1 extra lb. of DME would bump the gravity up that much.

That's a lot of dark grains for this recipe. That much dark grain, and you'll end up with something very different from a cream ale. Though, it may not be bad.

If it's already fermenting, then I wouldn't worry about it, if not, then pitch another packet. It won't hurt anything either way.
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Thanks for the reply! I am off of York and North. If you know of Hamburger Heaven my street is behind the big Lutheran Church across the street.

As for the beer it started bubbling away with in hours and is looking good. My only worry is that I haven't had a beer get lower than 1.020 but then again all my beers have had high OG. I must also say that this is the first time I drank the entire gravity tester beaker of wort! I was damn tasty! I do have another smack pack in the fridge that I was going to use for the Boom Boom recipe next but I just realized that I wont have any more primaries for a least a few weeks so I thought I should just pitch it.

I also found some vanilla beans at Jewel the day after brewing this so now I have a few beans soaking in Bourbon and a few in Vodka for priming and the Boom Boom=)


Thanks

Ryan
 
If i wanted to do this as a partial mash should i just replace the Light Extract with a couple of pounds of pale malt or any other suggestions? This recipe seems really intriguing.
 
Brewed up the Boom Boom and yes it is Boom Boom! When I went to check on it yesterday the lid was a dome and the air lock was all crusty and full! When I pulled the air lock beer and foam hit the ceiling! Looks like she was just about to blow the top! Now my brew room smells even better!
 
ThatGuyRyan said:
Brewed up the Boom Boom and yes it is Boom Boom! When I went to check on it yesterday the lid was a dome and the air lock was all crusty and full! When I pulled the air lock beer and foam hit the ceiling! Looks like she was just about to blow the top! Now my brew room smells even better!
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The exact same thing happened to me with my batch of this. VERY violent fermenter, and the krausen was through the roof (needed a blow off almost immediately)

Word of advise though - Let this beer run its full conditioning course. It was okay when green, but it has gotten WAY better now that it has some age on it. Would I make it again? The jury is still out on this one. Definitely an interesting brew!
-Me
 
JoeMama said:
The exact same thing happened to me with my batch of this. VERY violent fermenter, and the krausen was through the roof (needed a blow off almost immediately)

Word of advise though - Let this beer run its full conditioning course. It was okay when green, but it has gotten WAY better now that it has some age on it. Would I make it again? The jury is still out on this one. Definitely an interesting brew!
-Me
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Did you primary and secondary or just primary and bottle condition? And how long for each?

Thanks!

Ryan
 
ThatGuyRyan said:
Did you primary and secondary or just primary and bottle condition? And how long for each?

Thanks!

Ryan
Click to expand...


This was the first beer that I threw into the secondary (just to say I did it - no real reason) I believe it was 2 and 2. I did my final vanilla and lactose addition in the bottling bucket with the priming sugar during bottling time. Somehow when I finally hit the 3 week mark for the bottles, half of them were gone. :cross:

In that period leading up to the '3 week rule' they were just 'okay'. Tasted like ass at 1 week, pretty okay at 2.5 weeks (most of this was the drinking time) and now that they are at the 3 week rule they are almost downright tasty.

If I did this beer again, I would just follow my normal routine of 3-4 weeks in the primary, then straight to the bottle/keg. I would only use the secondary this time if I was racking onto vanilla beans. I just used an organic vanilla extract for this one.

Time definitely made this beer better IMO.
-Me
 
My wife has asked me a great question. She loves those "salted caramels" and wondered how this recipie could be modified for a "Salted Caramel Cream Ale"?

I've never considered salt, but its a mineral that I assume would really goof with water chem?
 
Holy crap i can't believe i actually just read all 65 pages of this thread......but i did. ;)

I am so intrigued by this recipe that i am going to run out tomorrow morning and round up the ingredients and brew it up tomorrow afternoon..........and i wasn't even planning on brewing this weekend.
 
well, i finally placed an order with northernbrewer today including the ingredients to make this. I'll be using vanilla beans in as well as pure mexican vanilla. I'll prob also use 1056
 
I now have a version of this in the bottle (has been for 2 weeks). I used cheese's basic recipe but made it a brown ale. For my taste I used darker malts and cut the vanilla/ lactose because I didn't want too much vanilla or non-malt sweetness. I stuck with the German ale yeast and was glad I did. I like hops so I bumped the flavoring up to an ounce. It is still early but I regret doing that now. Maybe in a couple weeks it will balance out better.
I will make this again for sure.
Thanks cheese :mug:.

Mike
 
Should I keg the Caramel Cream Ale to the beer gas/stout faucet or to the CO2/regular faucet?
 
This recipe has a really creamy mouth feel already with the wheat, carmel malt and large amount of lactose so it doesn't need beer gas. That said I would love to try this beer on beer gas!
 
This grain recipe seems like it would be pretty tasty on it's own. Has anyone ever brewed this without the vanilla or lactose?
 
Cheesefood said:
EDIT 2/20/07: Please do not PM me with questions on this recipe. Post them to this thread. I get way too many questions that are already answered within this long thread, so consider reading the entire thing (or using the Search function) prior to posting.


Here's the final recipe that I'm brewing RIGHT NOW.

Malts
3 pounds extra light DME
3 pounds light wheat DME
1 pound Caramel 60L (steeped for 45 minutes at 150'-165')

Hops
1oz Cascade for bittering (60 minutes)
.5oz Saaz for flavor (20 minutes)
.5 oz Tettnang for aroma (end of boil)

Yeast
Wyeast German Ale

Extras
1 tsp Irish Moss (10 minutes)
4oz Lactose @ 15 minutes
2 oz real vanilla extract

Priming
>1cup Lactose
4oz vanilla (Be careful! This may be too much vanilla for some people.)
1.5 cups light DME

I'm adding the Lactose in the last 15 minutes of the boil. I'll add the vanilla in the primary, because I don't want to risk losing any that bonds to the trub. So far, it smells fantastic but I'm still at the bittering hops boil. I think this should end up with a nice caramel flavor and a good hint (perhaps a suggestion size amount) of vanilla. I've had vanillas with way too much flavor and they tasted too much like candy. This should have a decent balance.

Notes: 11/4/05

So good. Can't even explain it - you simply must make this beer. I let it prime for almost 2 weeks before fridging it, then cracked one tonight after only about 30 hours. Great head, good lace, nice color, good body and nose. Pictures won't do it justice, but here's one anyways

cv.jpg
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that looks awesome i'm going to have to brew this
 
I wanted to brew this today but the ingredients at the local shop were almost twice the cost of ordering on the internet.

Order is in hopefully I'll brew it weds.
 
McKBrew said:
Some people love this beer. It is a dessert beer. It's pretty sweet and not what you would expect. I personally did not care for it much.
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I hated it. I think some people love it (my best friend liked it quite a bit) but it's only for people with a sweet tooth. Or like McKBrew said, a dessert beer.

Maybe if you use the lactose sparingly, and add only enough to your taste, along with the vanilla it might be ok. I think it tastes like vanilla cream soda with a splash of beer added in this recipe, though. I made it in about late 2006 or so, I believe.
 
I made this beer once. It took me about a year to drink two cases of this. It wasn't bad. If I wanted just one beer after a late dinner I liked having one. Its a good beer to stock for the ladies who generally don't like beer. I will say it got better with age.

I'm drinking Hobgoblin II right now and its totally different than it was two months ago. Its about a year old too. The English hop character has faded and now the nice malt taste is showing up.
 
Lactose is an unfermentable sugar. It adds sweetness without upping the alcohol %. You can get it at any home brew shop or online home brew vendor.
 
I just opened a 5-day-old bottle of the AG version of this, and being a girl, I love it! :D It's young, for sure, and the vanilla is way too strong at this point, but I can see this being one of my favorites in a month or so. Definitely going to brew this again!
 
I mistakenly added the extra 1 cup of lactose into the primary. When I go to bottling should I add more due to potentially not having as much dissolved lactose in the solution?
 
no the lactose is for sweetening it not for priming. Lactose is nonfermentable so it just sweetens the beer. you are fine:mug: Cheesefood added it then because he wasn't happy with the flavor so he added it later on.
 
Brewed the recipe and everyone including the beer supply guys think its great. It's not to sweet and the vanilla does not dominate everything else. A very good drinkable special beer that I shall make again. Thanks cheesefood for the recipe!!
 
This was a very tasty (interesting) brew that I pulled out of the hat for one of my earlier batches. I *might* consider revisiting this one just for old times sake. It was definitely a crowd pleaser - and not your run of the mill brew either!
-Me
 
Well FlyingHorse that would make sense, but my family wants me to try it for them and since it's my second batch ever I figured I would just do it big or not at all....I guess I better get to boiling water! Thanks!

-Cameron
 
Just made this and it turned out very well, frothy head, great creamy feel and smooth finish. I followed the recipe pretty much exactly except I only added four tablespoons of vanilla, all of it at bottling.
 

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