Suggestions on this recipe please

[born3z]

Please take a look at this recipe and offer any feed back that you feel would improve it at all as I'm new to writing recipes and am open to any suggestions. It's pretty straight forward but any advise is greatly appreciated.

Style: American Amber Ale
Type: Extract
Boil size: 2.5g
Batch size: 5g
OG:1.048
FG1.012
IBU:28
SRM:15
ABV:4.6%

Fermentables

6lbs amber DME
1lbs Crystal 60L
.50lbs Amercan Victory

Hops

1oz Willamette 60mins
10z Cascade flameout

 

[Phunhog]

Sounds good but I would put some Cascades in there at 10 min. Maybe .5-1 oz

 

[storunner13]

With Amber DME, which is likely to have a lot of unfermentables, I would avoid using that much crystal...it might finish a little sweet. Use Pale/Light DME instead

6 lbs Light DME
.5 lbs Crystal 40
.5 lbs Crystal 120
.5 lbs Victory

You could maybe even throw in a pound of Munich if you want a little more color/depth in flavor. Just steep it at 155˚ for 30 minutes, and you'll even convert some sugars from it!

Also, since you're doing a partial boil, think about adding about 80% of your DME near the end of the boil 10-15 minutes. You'll have to change some of your hop additions to compensate, but you'll end up with wort that will be more fermentable. How many AAs do your hops have? If you just want aroma, with little hop flavor, then go with a 5 minute or flameout addition, like you listed. If you want flavor and aroma, you'll want to split that up at 5 and 15 or so.

 

[RedGuitar]

I would definitely not use the Amber extract and the Crystal malt. I made that mistake with the first batch I made and absolutely hated it- way too much of that caramelly flavor. (This is almost the exact same recipe I used, too.) I think you would be better off using light or pale extract.

 

[born3z]

That's a good point about the Amber extract and the Crystal malt. So I'll change that to Light extract. I had thought of using Munich but it needs to be mashed to get sugars from it, right? Will I still be able to get flavor but can't calculate it into my OG? The hops I played with quite a bit and got the IBUs up. So, for hops additions I have:

1oz Willamette 5.5AA 60mins
.5oz Cascade 6.6AA 30mins
.5oz Centennial 10.5AA 5mins
.5oz Centennial flameout
.5oz Cascade flameout

What do you think of the times and combinations of hops? Also, If I were to add most of my DME toward the end of the boil, how do I adjust the hops to compensate?

 

[storunner13]

Yes, Munich needs to be mashed, but you're already steeping grains...mashing them is a piece of cake. Check out this thread. You could even throw in some pale malt to convert the extra sugars in the caramel malts too.

So, going with 6 lbs. DME, .5 lbs each of 40L, 120L, and Victory..you'll get a OG of around 1.053, SRM of 13. Steep the grain for 30 minutes, then boil an average of 2.5 gallons with 2 lbs. of the DME. If you change your Cascade addition to 15 minutes (you'll get very little flavor out of a 30 minute addition), and add the remaining DME at 15 minutes, you'll get IBUs around 29, maybe a little less.

Another idea is to boil the other 2.5 "top off" gallons of water with the 4 lbs. of DME for 15 minutes, and then cool. Then your 60 minute boil will have fewer sugars in it, caramelize less, extract more IBUs, and be simpler. You'll get about 34 IBUs that way. Finally, if you boil all ingredients for 60 minutes, without the Late Extract Edition, you'll get 18.8 IBUs.

I use hopville.com, and various brewer's friend calculators to figure things out. I think you'll do fine however you do it. Just remember to keep your fermentation temperatures under control and it will turn out great!

 

[bigteachey]

your updated hop schedule looks pretty solid. im guessing thats around 40ish IBUs? Which is probably on the average to elevated side of the style beer you are making.

this is something I do that may not actually be correct, but i'll throw it out there. If you are going for an amber ale, its gonna show any suspended solids. To cut down, you can do your flameout hops in a nylon hop bag. Its gonna cut WAYYYYY down on the sludge that goes into your primary, but you also have to decide whether or not to put that bag in the primary (I wouldnt) and how thats gonna cut down on hop aroma. Also, there will be a slight wot volume loss if you take the bag out. Just puttin that out there.

 

[born3z]

Yes, Munich needs to be mashed, but you're already steeping grains...mashing them is a piece of cake. Check out this thread. You could even throw in some pale malt to convert the extra sugars in the caramel malts too.

So, going with 6 lbs. DME, .5 lbs each of 40L, 120L, and Victory..you'll get a OG of around 1.053, SRM of 13. Steep the grain for 30 minutes, then boil an average of 2.5 gallons with 2 lbs. of the DME. If you change your Cascade addition to 15 minutes (you'll get very little flavor out of a 30 minute addition), and add the remaining DME at 15 minutes, you'll get IBUs around 29, maybe a little less.

Another idea is to boil the other 2.5 "top off" gallons of water with the 4 lbs. of DME for 15 minutes, and then cool. Then your 60 minute boil will have fewer sugars in it, caramelize less, extract more IBUs, and be simpler. You'll get about 34 IBUs that way. Finally, if you boil all ingredients for 60 minutes, without the Late Extract Edition, you'll get 18.8 IBUs.

I use hopville.com, and various brewer's friend calculators to figure things out. I think you'll do fine however you do it. Just remember to keep your fermentation temperatures under control and it will turn out great!

Yeah I might have to try a partial mash when I get another kettle as I start to upgrade my equipment for all grain. Looks like fun. I made this recipe using tastybrew.com and it came out with 34 IBUs. So I'm kind of confused why it would be the same IBUs that you calculated. With less sugars you'd get better hop utilization so my calculation should have less IBUs? Is tastybrew off? If it isn't I'm thinking I will probably just boil all the extract for the full 60 mins then.

 

[storunner13]

tastybrew.com might be using the Rager formula. I'm using Tinseth. They're two different formulas for calculating IBUs. Did you account for 2.5 gallon boil which results in 1.106 gravity in the boil?

At some point, I usually just throw caution to the wind and do it to it.

 

[PT Ray]

Both Munich and Victory ideally need to be mashed. Briess reports using Munich and crystal in their amber extract so you may be able to take advantage of it. But as previously stated, amber doesn't ferment out as well and you'll need to adjust your crystal.

 

[born3z]

tastybrew.com might be using the Rager formula. I'm using Tinseth. They're two different formulas for calculating IBUs. Did you account for 2.5 gallon boil which results in 1.106 gravity in the boil?

At some point, I usually just throw caution to the wind and do it to it.

Yeah I calculated it with a 2.5gal boil. Like you said I'm not too worried about it, I'll probably just run with it. I just would like to know if the stats are accurate or not. Either way, I'm sure it'll be delicious.

 

[born3z]

I appreciate all the suggestions! I went to the lhbs today and picked up the ingredients for this brew. I accidentally got Vienna instead of Victory so I guess I'm using that...

So here's what I have:

OG 1.057
FG 1.014
IBU 38
SRM 11
ABV 5.5

Fermentables

6lbs Light DME
.5lbs Crystal 40L
.5lbs Crystal 120L
.5lbs Vienna

Hops

1oz Willamette 60mins
.5oz Cascade 30mins
.5oz Centennial 5mins
.5oz Cascade flameout
.5oz Centennial flameout

I won't be brewing until Probably Sunday so if there are any suggestions to improve this recipe at all, I'm all ears. Once again, I appreciate all the help! Cheers!

 

[storunner13]

I've already made your brew day complicated enough, but I feel inclined to reiterate that the 30 minute addition will only add bitterness, no flavor/aroma, and you might want to change it to 20 minutes. In general (perhaps for future reference) the higher AA hops (Centennial) are used for bittering, and the lower AA hops are used for aroma. It's mostly because you get more IBUs with fewer hops.

Also, remember to steep the grains for at least 30 minutes at 155˚, hopefully you'll get enough conversion from the Vienna. You might think about adding .5lbs of 6 row to make sure.

Otherwise, I'll think things will go fine. Keep your fermentation temps low!

 

[born3z]

You haven't complicated it, I asked for opinions and suggestions and that's what I got! I'm still learning the hops and grains and what needs to be mashed and what doesn't... There's a lot to take in! Any way, I messed with the hop schedule again taking your advice into consideration and I now have it at:

.5oz Centennial 60mins
.5oz Centennial 20mins
1oz Willamette 5mins
1oz Cascade flame out.

Whaddya think?

Thanks again for the help! I'll have to let you know how it turns out.

 

[storunner13]

That looks good. Double check the IBUs. And keep me posted!

 

[HopSong]

The one I'm about to do is:
8# Light Malt Extract.. (liquid)
1# Crystal 60L
1 oz Magnum
1 oz Willamette
1 oz Willamette

clarifier

4 oz Corn Sugar..

Est OG 1.051
Est IBU 48-52
Est ABV 5%
Sug Ferm Temp 68*

Wadda ya think?

 

[born3z]

I entered my recipe in a couple different calculators and they both list the IBUs at 31 so, I probably won't be using the tastybrew calculator anymore. I'll be sure to let you know how it turns out! Thanks for all the help!

 

[born3z]

So, I've had this one bottled for two weeks and just cracked the first one. To my surprise, it's carbed pretty well and tastes delicious. I simplified the hops schedule a little bit and it did turn out a little hoppy. I'm going to rebrew this and go for a more balance flavor with more of the malt character coming through. It is a very good beer, though. Now I have a starting point for improvements. Thanks everyone for the suggestions!