Apple Honey Old Ale

[StrangeBrews]

Hello,

I've made two batches of beer now. The first a tried and true recipe from my local brew shop, and a second which is a Honey Porter recipe I found online. It seems to be good so far but I'm making my own recipe for the first time. It's intended to be an old ale with an apple honey twist. I'm just wondering what you might think. It has a lot more malts in it than anything I have done before but also alot stronger. I think it will be a good summer beer though. Thanks for your thoughts.


1.5 lb 2-Row Caramel Malt 60L
1.5lb 2-Row Carmamel Malt 40L
1.5lb Amber Malt
1.5lb Honey Malt
7lb Light Malt Extract
1.5lb Honey
0.5 oz. Chinook - boiling (60 minutes)
0.5 oz. Brambling - boiling (30 minutes)
0.50 Hallertau Traditional - finishing (5 minutes)
WYeast 1272 American Ale II
Apples (Sliced) - Added after boiling

 

[Oldsock]

It is hard to say. You have a lot of unfermentables (4.5 lbs of cara/cystal/honey malt), but you also have the highly fermentable honey. Amber malt really needs to be mashed, steeped with those other grains you won't get much besides starch out of it. I'd probably go down to ~2 lbs of the cara/crystal/honey malt, add some pale malt for the rest and do a mini-mash with the amber.

I'd probably go with good apple cider over slices of apple, apple is a pretty subtle flavor and it would take quite a bit to get a noticeable impact. If you want to taste the honey use a bold variety and add it after the boil (or better yet after primary fermentation).

Hope that helps, good luck.

 

[StrangeBrews]

Thanks for the feedback. I think I will nix the 1.5lb 2-Row Carmamel Malt 40L and the 1.5lb Amber Malt. This will give it a lighter color that I was looking for. I'm thinking about 1qt. of apple juice.