Pale Ale Recipe Trial

[statseeker]

I kind of want to do a pale ale with a little bit of a rounded off bitterness level and a killer amber color. So I was thinking of maybe doing:

6lb Pale Malt
1lb Black Patent
2lb Crystal Malt

I would use White Labs 001 California Pale Ale Yeast and 2oz. Cascade hops with a half ounce of Saaz or Willamette.

Would this only work with 2 fermentations or could it work in a single?

Thanks guys.

 

[artyboy]

It looks like too much specialty malt and not enough base malt. Is that for a 5 gallon batch? Your specialty malts should only be about 10% or so of your total grain bill when you're doing a pale.

 

[Yooper]

I'm not a huge black patent fan. It's very dry, roasty and acrid, and used mostly for porters/stouts. If you want just color, you could use an ounce or two of it, or some carafa II or III.

2 pounds crystal is too much, but a pound would be ok. You want to use about 7-10% crystal, and if you want a darker color you could do a mix of crystal malts, like 12 ounces of crystal 10L and 4 ounces of crystal 120L. (I used that crystal combo in an APA and got a really nice dark almost-ruby color)

 

[pkeeler]

2 lbs of crystal is typical of Amber Ales. You say you want to make a Pale with amber color, but are you actually trying to make an Amber? It is all a bit of a gray area, but it does effect things.

I get an amber color with 2-3 oz of chocolate malt. 1 lb of patent is going to give you a porter.

If you want to dry hop, and who wouldn't want to dry hop an amber or pale ale, then a secondary is necessary, imo. But if you are not dry hopping, you don't need a secondary.

 

[jlpred55]

Agreed, that is going to taste very cloying and burnt. Try 8lbs of base malt, 1lbs of Crystal 40 and 1 oz of Black Patient or Roasted Barley. It will be a nice amber crimson color and should get you on your way to making a killer pale with a nice reddish color to it.

 

[statseeker]

Wow, Thanks a ton guys. I didnt think the patent would make it taste that way on account of most people I've talked to think that it's mostly for color, not really for taste so I figured it wouldnt have that strong of a flavor. I'll go with the roasted barley in that case. Once again, I will let you all know how it turns out.

 

[Shrewd_Alchemist]

roasted barley will give a similar flavor. If you want to avoid that flavor but still get the color, you just need to use less of it. Maybe 4 ounces at most.

 

[pkeeler]

Wow, Thanks a ton guys. I didnt think the patent would make it taste that way on account of most people I've talked to think that it's mostly for color, not really for taste so I figured it wouldnt have that strong of a flavor. I'll go with the roasted barley in that case. Once again, I will let you all know how it turns out.

1 lb of roasted barley would turn your beer into a stout. It isn't the malt, it is the amount. There are SRM calculators on the web that will give you the approximate color of your beer based on your grain bill.

 

[statseeker]

Alright, real quick here. My final grain bill was 8lbs pale malt, 1lb of crystal 10L and .5lbs of chocolate. It's gonna be a deep amber color, maybe even reddish, but I can deal with that as long as it tastes good.

Now a word about efficiency, I kind of inherited a huge brewing system from a buddy of mine. It comes with mash tun, lauter tun, carboys, hoses, kegging system, bucket, everything. Should I use my lauter tun as my mash tun? From what I've seen a bunch of people do in video, they have the rectangular coolers with PVC strainers. I've got the false bottom lauter tun with the sparge water distributor on top. Should I run the sparge water with the sprinkler over the grain and drain as I go? Or mash it first in the mash tun, get my runnings, transfer to the lauter tun and sparge there? I have an idea of how it would go if I used the lauter tun as my mash tun, but I'm kind of in a gray area here.

 

[944play]

Should I use my lauter tun as my mash tun?

I don't know of any homebrewer that doesn't. It's a PITA to move an entire mash to a different vessel (unless you're a giant brewery with a mash pump).

 

[statseeker]

So what would be the point in having a second vessel without the false bottom? Maybe for a second striking? Adding hops directly after mashing but before boiling? I'm lost on that one.

 

[mullenite]

Maris Ottere or Pale Ale malt will give you a darker color to start with so you don't need to add any roasted malts to get an amber color.

 

[944play]

So what would be the point in having a second vessel without the false bottom?

Hot Liquor Tank?

 

[statseeker]

I figured out what the second vessel was for. Sparge water. The sparge sprinkler connects to the second vessel and allows you to control the flow of the sparge water as it lauters the grain.

I brewed my beer today.

Mash temperature: 165

Left it in the mash tun for almost 2 hours before lautering. Likely a mistake on my part, hoping not though.

Used Saf-ale 05, pitched at 78 degrees on account of it being so hot outside.

It was quite a bit darker than I thought it would be, but hopefully after everything settles out, it will be a nice light reddish brown color. I used hop pellets and they left quite a bit of sediment behind that I can see in the carboy, maybe about an inch or so (probably including grain sediment)? Is this a bad thing? Should I have filtered out as much as I could? Or should I wait and rack it to a second carboy to finish the fermentation and leave that sediment behind?

Beginning specific gravity was 1.050 on the nose. Racked to primary at between 76 and 78 degrees. Hoping that isnt too terribly high. Also hoping everything went okay sanitation-wise since I had to brew outside on account of it being almost 98 degrees today. I couldnt cool the wort to under 76-ish degrees and it probably came up a few degrees during the transfer to the carboy. Some of the wort escaped going into the carboy but I didnt touch the cooled wort or let anything touch the wort going into the carboy. Sanitized the carboy twice. Once with bleach and hot water, and then once a few hours later with star-san. Overkill maybe but it's worth it since the patio isnt exactly the cleanest place around. I did everything I could to stay sanitary through the process. Now all that's left to do is wait and hope that I did the right things.

 

[Indian_villager]

Hey man sounds like an experience. Keep us posted on how it turns out! One more thing, care to post a pic of your rig?

 

[statseeker]

The pic of my rig is in the photo forum.

I was just paroozing through the forum and noticed that for higher temperatures usually Nottingham yeast is used. I pitched at about 78. Did I make a mistake using the safale 05 yeast? Or will I be okay. Fermentation has leveled out thus far. Fermenting nicely. Thick layer of trub on the bottom.

 

[pkeeler]

The fermentation temps listed for yeast are the temps that the majority of fermentation happens at. They are not the pitching temp. So, if your fermentation happens in a room at 68, that is the temp the fermentation will mostly happen at. If the room is 78, try and find someplace cooler as that is ok for pitching but too high for fermentation with any ale yeast.

 

[statseeker]

I think I have a successful beer. I took gravity readings last night and they read 1.018. Adjusted, that is 4% ABV. Read the same last week. It tastes good and light for a pale ale and that is okay by me. I like a bit of a light flavor so that I can drink more of it. Fermentation time was 2 weeks.

Some of the things I'll try to change with the next brew are 1. brew at cooler outdoor temperatures since I cant brew in the house, 2. brew at a lower strike temperature, trust my instinct, 3. ferment at a lower temperature however I can, the bottle ice technique reminds me of the milk jug icing technique I used to use camping, I'll start freezing jugs of water now, 4. maintain my sanitation technique and keep a 5 gallon bucket of starsan solution around as to avoid using too much sanitizer multiple times.

Learning experience for sure but it was fun. I cant wait to brew again sometime soon. I gotta get rid of 5 gallons of beer first.