Please comment on this recipe

American Brown Ale

% LB OZ MALT OR FERMENTABLE PPG °L

40% 3 5 Munton's Dark LME 34 22

24% 2 0 Muntons Plain Dark DME 44 60

14% 1 2 Briess Crystal 80L 33 80

12% 1 0 Pale Chocolate Malt 34 165

6% 0 8 Malto-Dextrin 43 6

3% 0 4 Light Dry Malt Extract 45 8

Batch size: 5.0 gallons edit
Original Gravity
1.057 / 14.0° Plato
(1.051 to 1.060)
Final Gravity
1.016 / 4.1° Plato
(1.013 to 1.017)
Color
33° SRM / 65° EBC
(Black)
Mash Efficiency ?
75% edit
Late Boil Additions
Show | Hide
hops
USE TIME OZ VARIETY FORM AA

boil 60 mins 1.0 First Gold pellet 7.3

boil 30 mins 0.75 East Kent Goldings leaf 6.3

boil 15 mins 0.75 Willamette leaf 5.7

boil 5 mins 0.25 East Kent Goldings leaf 6.3

boil 5 mins 0.25 Willamette leaf 5.7

Boil: 3.0 avg gallons for 60 minutes edit
Bitterness
33.1 IBU / 7 HBU
ƒ: Tinseth edit
BU:GU
0.58
yeast

Munton's Dry Yeast
ale yeast in dry form with high flocculation and 73% attenuation edit

Alcohol
5.5% ABV / 4% ABW
Calories
189 per 12 oz.
misc
USE TIME AMOUNT INGREDIENT

boil 15 min 1 tsp Irish Moss

secondary 7 days 2 ounces Cacao Nibs

 

I would consider backing off on the pale chocolate malt. I only used .5 pounds in my last brown that I brewed on 11/19/11. I bottled on 12/11/11 and it is just now losing the sort of burnt/overly roasted taste from the pale chocolate. It is becoming a good beer now, but I didn't think it would take this long to mellow out.

 

Yea mix up your high Lovibond grains instead of a full # of Chocolate -- it'll be more complex and it won't be so one-dimensional.

I suggest Brown Malt (~70°L, biscuit), Carafa III (~525°L, dark aroma/flavor), Special B (180°L, Dark caramel), or any dark crystal malts or other specialty grains. I think you'll be happier with 1-2 pounds of mixed specialty grains over the 1# of just chocolate.

 

Thanks guys!



i brewed it last night...I used 1 pound of pale chocolate and one pound of crystal malt.

it is definitely VERY roasty/chocolatey/molassesy/coffee-ish on the initial taste before putting it in the fermenter.. Its backed by the spicyness of the hops.

My wife tried it and said "ooooh, thats gonna be tasty"

we'll see! Its my 3rd batch. the base was a "brown ale" kit i got for christmas, but i wanted to jazz it up a bit, so i added the steeping grains and the extra hops.

 

We'll see how it turns out!