Going from mead to beer

[henryakirk]

going to brew my first beer, I've done 4 meads and want to try something new and exciting. Im torn between two recipes any thoughts?

Ingredients:
1 can Cooper's Bock malt extract
2 lbs dextrose
1lb milled chocolate malt
1 cup dextrose for bottling
Additional Instructions
Primary Ferment: 1 week
Secondary Ferment: 2 or 3 weeks

Beer Profile
Original Gravity: 1.062
Final Gravity: 1.002
Alcohol by Vol: 7.86%
Recipe Type: partial mash
Yield: 5.00 Gallons
Procedure:
boil 2 gallons water and add the extract syrup and the dextrose. bag your Chocolate malt and mash it for 45 min to an hour. Add to 3 gallons cold water and pitch the yeast. Every pro homebrewer tells you that it has to be a within 10 degrees of 90 to pitch the yeast...beer is a centuries old libation, and there were no candy thermometers or otherwise when beer was first made. take your chances and pitch the yeast. Put the lid on your tub and the airlock and let 'er rip!

Put it in the secondary after a week, let it clear up...thats all. It may take 1 week, it may take 3. Remember that the longer your beer is in contact with trub, the more off flavors your beer takes on.

Bottle it when you're ready. Carbonate for 5-8 days, chill, open and enjoy!

If I do this I'll add between 1 and 2 quarts of tart cherry juice (to taste) and a pound of crushed local cherries in the wort for a chocolate cherry bock.



Or



Ingredients:
9 lbs. plain amber malt extract syrup. (Boil for 60 min).
1/2 lbs. Crsip Chocolate Malt (steep (150 to 160 F) for 30 min. in 2 gallons of water prior to adding the malt).
1 oz. Tettnang Hops (Boiling hops 60 min).
1 oz. Saaz Hops (Boil last Twenty minutes for flavor).
White Labs German Bock Yeast. (Pitched at 70 F. until fermentation starts then dropped to 55 F. to 60 F. for the duration of the fermentation).
3/4 c. corn sugar for bottling.
Additional Instructions
Primary Ferment: 7 days
Secondary Ferment: 14 days

Beer Profile
Original Gravity: 1.084
Final Gravity: 1.066
Alcohol by Vol: 2.35%
Recipe Type: partial mash
Yield: 5.00 Gallons
Procedure:
See Ingredients for boiling and yeast pitching times.I performed a secondary fermentation to lager this beer. Transerfer wort to secondary carboy, set airlock and drop temperature below 44 F. Place carboy in an area of total darkness for an additonal 14 days. Bottle beer and let it age in the bottle for 18 days. Open and enjoy

I'll likely do the same cherry treatment to this one too depending on the hop flavor and aroma.

 

[justenoughforme]

go with the first one, just because it's less waiting for it to be ready : )

 

[Kent88]

I'd go with the second one just because the first calls for a lot of sugar in the boil and you don't usually want that in a beer. That one looks weird too, though, as the final gravity only goes down to 1.066? Even with strong bocks it should still get down to at least 1.02ish.

The advice with that first recipe that you could pitch within 10F of 90F doesn't sound good to me. I have made some decent lagers only chilling the wort down to 75F to pitch, but I really wouldn't want it at 100F. Do you have a means of controlling the temp after you add the yeast?

I'd keep anything with those kinds of OGs in primary for 10 days, maybe 12. I would then keep them below 42F in secondary for at least a month.

 

[henryakirk]

I have a chest freezer that I'm going to install a regulator on before I start the brew. Temp regulation should be a snap so now Im saving extra money for the regulator, bottles, caps and Ingredients I just need to decide on ingredients and procedures is all.