First all-grain brew - Pale Ale

[comrade_drkomir]

Hello,

I'm a beginner brewer and I decided to do a first all-grain brew - typical Pale Ale. I wonder if my recipe is ok. What would you guys change in this recipe? I intend to brew 12 liters of beer.

MALT:
-2kg of Pale Ale malt EBC: 7-9,
-500 grams of Vienna malt EBC: 8-10
-100 grams of CARA 20MD EBC: 10-20

Should I use other malt? I wanted to use MUNICH malt, but my local store ran out of it, so I decided for Vienna malt instead.

HOPS:
I intend to use STYRIAN GOLDING T90, EAST KENT GOLDING T90 and maybe CITRA or CASCADE hops for dry hopping. Do you recommend other hops? I also need advice for how many grams should I use and when to add hops.

YEAST:
FERMENTIS SAFALE S-04

So, what do you say guys? What do you recommend?

Thank you very much!

 

[kevin58]

Your recipe looks no better or worse than any other. Your grain percentages look to be very good. Your hops are OK. I have my preferences but you are not going to hurt anything with your choices. Others may nitpick your yeast choice but again, you are not going way out of bounds with S-04.

 

[Gnomebrewer]

Your grain choice looks good.
For hops, I'd suggest cutting down to three. Personally, of the ones you listed, I'd go with EKG and Cascade in the boil and Citra for a dry hop (EKG, Styrian and Citra would also be tasty). Whichever hops you choose, you'll be in the ballpark if you aim for about 2 grams per litre at flameout, 2 grams per litre at 10 to 20 minutes and enough at 60 minutes to get the bitterness you want (typically around 40 IBU). 1 to 1.5 grams per litre Citra dry hop works well for my tastes. Others will suggest bucket loads more hops, but is really moving away from pale ale (which is about balance) to IPA (which is about hops).
For your first Pale Ale, I'd suggest US05 instead of S04. S05 is cleaner, so it helps you work out what flavours are coming from what ingredients. As a new brewer, leave the more estery yeasts (eg. S04) for simpler beer where you can more easily determine it's flavour contribution, then decide if you want it in your pale ale later on.