Brand new brewer, recipe critique?

[cmoe25027]

Hi everyone! Quick intro- My name is Collin and whilst drinking some beers with a buddy, started talking about brewing my own beer. Just so happens that my friends wife bought him a Mr. Beer kit a couple years ago that he never used so he gave it to me. Promptly went home and started fermenting the standard West Coast Pale Ale recipe. Then I started with the research, and now, quite a few dollars later with my west coast pale ale still in the fermentor, I have the equipment, ingredients, and knowledge to get myself into a little trouble! I still have a couple cans of hopped malt extract that I want to use so while purchasing equipment I just bought some more ingredients that I am hopingv will complement each other and turn into an undefineable yet tasty brew! I have read most of How to Brew by John Palmer and trolled through this forum and a couple others like it and have decided to go with the following recipe, please feel free to make suggestions or comments, and thank you in advance for any help you can provide.

1lb Crystal Malt 60L
1lb Honey Malt

2lb Briess Amber DME
3.3lb Briess Golden LME
1.23lb Mr Beer Pale Ale HME
1.23lb Mr Beer Whispering Wheat HME

1oz Fuggles Pellets

White Labs American Ale liquid Yeast 1 vial

Plan is to steep the honey and crystal for 30 minutes, then boil the DME till after the hot break, then add the LME and Both HME's, bring back to a boil and throw in the fuggles for 15 minutes, then cool wort, pitch yeast, aerate, and ferment. Also plan to make a yeast starter but haven't decided exactly how yet, but I did order an erlenmeyer flask with stopper and airlock.

Sorry for the mega long post but I wanted to include as much info as possible!

Cheers,
Collin

 

[joel4482]

Sounds like you are on the right track, I think that recipe will turn out well. It looks like you have the creative part down. The only advice I have is to keep a recipe book with comments so you can keep track of everything. If you didn't like something about that recipe you can leave it out next time. I can't remember how much hop bitterness the HME contributed, but the Fuggles for 15 min is a good idea for some more aroma. If you can make a starter it will help getting it going faster, but if the yeast is fresh(look at date) it is not 100% necessary. A little history on me is -I started brewing on a Mr. Beer system back in 2003 and now I am the head brewer at Rogue Ales behind John Maier. Not saying this will happen to you, but you have to start somewhere and MR. Beer is a great way to start.
Prost

Joel

 

[cmoe25027]

Hi Joel, thanks much for the reply! How cool is that to end up as a head brewer at an awesome brewery! Congrats! From everything i've read, a starter can't hurt but could make the difference between good and great. My flask is only 1 liter so I was thinking of doing a 500ml starter with 1/4 cup of the amber DME that I already have, starting it 2 days before brew day. I still have around a week until all of my stuff arrives, I am hoping brew day will be on Saturday but we will see. At least I can bottle up the Mr Beer stuff on Wednesday, that will help ease the waiting a little bit lol. Thanks again for the input!

Cheers,
Collin

 

[Yooper]

In my opinion, that's quite a bit of honey malt and crystal. Combined with amber extract, that could be very sweet tasting. I'd cut the crystal and honey malt in half.

I'd also consider adding the bulk of any liquid extract at the end of the boil instead of the beginning. That will keep the extract from darkening and getting syrupy.

Otherwise, you've got it down pretty well!

 

[cmoe25027]

Thanks for the advice! I will kick around the idea of lowering the quantity of the crystal and honey. The plan is to only boil the LME and HME for the 15 minutes that I have the fuggles in for, is that still too long of a boil? Thanks again for the help, can't wait till brewday!

Cheers,
Collin

 

[PT Ray]

Personally I would just use the wort from the steeping grains to boil the hops and add all the extract at flame out. For sanitation purposes anything above 180 degrees for 5 minutes will do. For one, if you boil the hopped extract you're going to drive off the hop flavor in the extract. Second, extract has already gone through a hot break during the manufacturing process.

 

[cmoe25027]

Ok, so here is what I did. I brewed today and ended up with this recipe.

1.2lb of Mr Beer pale ale HME
1.2lb of Mr Beer whispering wheat HME
3.3lb Briess golden LME
2lb Sparkling amber dme
1lb crystal. 60, and 1lb honey grain
.5oz galena pellets 60 minutes
.25oz centennial pellets 30 minutes
1oz fuggles pellets 15 minutes
1 tsp Irish moss 15minutes

Steeped the grains for 30 minutes in 1gallon of water and then added that to brewpot for a 3.5 gallon wort. Added all the extracts when I reached a boil. This is going to be a darker beer so I wasn't worried about the LME darkening. As far as boiling the hoppiness out of the mr beer stuff, I am fine with that. The software I ran this recipe by says that this will be pretty well balanced(that counts the mr beer stuff as unhopped LME) so I will not be upset if it turns out a little malty or hoppy. Oh yeah, changed the white labs to safale 05 for temperature reasons. It's still on the stove so I don't have any gravity readings yet but will update as things progress. Thanks for listening!

Cheers,
Collin

 

[Rogue14]

Good luck!

 

[cmoe25027]

So I've been drinking this for a few weeks and it turned out really good, looks and tastes a bit like Newcastle but with a slight bubble gum aroma that reminds me of some Belgians or Belgium inspired blondes and trippels. Thanks for the tips everyone!

Cheers,
Collin

 

[onipar]

So I've been drinking this for a few weeks and it turned out really good, looks and tastes a bit like Newcastle but with a slight bubble gum aroma that reminds me of some Belgians or Belgium inspired blondes and trippels. Thanks for the tips everyone!

Cheers,
Collin

Glad it came out good!

I'm curious, did you find the 1 lb of honey malt to be overpowering? I've read that too much of that can provide an overwhelming honey flavor, and that small amounts do the trick.

 

[cmoe25027]

Glad it came out good!

I'm curious, did you find the 1 lb of honey malt to be overpowering? I've read that too much of that can provide an overwhelming honey flavor, and that small amounts do the trick.

I was advised to cut the honey malt down but I didn't. I haven't noticed it to be too out of balance or having a cloying or sticky characteristic either. That being said, I do not have an experienced palette and would not presume to know better than some of the experienced folks on the forum who were kind enough to share their tips with me. All I can say is that if you are in the se Michigan area I would be happy to let you sample a couple!

Cheers,
Collin