Critique my first extract recipes!! Brown Ale and ESB

[bcmeyer]

So a year ago yesterday I brewed my first beer. Pretty exciting! But since then, the hobby has taken hold of me. I've brewed 11 extract batches, and learned so much about the process. From cleaning and sanitizing, to fermentation and yeast starters, to kegging and carbonation. I've read books. I've followed these forums. Pretty much a majority of my spare time has been focused on brewing beer.

Now I'm a teacher and summer break is coming up, so I'm planning a pretty big brew week for my first week off of summer. I'm planning on brewing three beers. One fruit beer recipe off this forum so I can experience making a fruit beer. The other two are my first two recipes. I think after this I will slowly start moving into all grain brewing once equipment and space allows. But anyways, I wanted to post my recipes here and see what you guys think. This was my first time working with BeerSmith 2. It was very easy to put a recipe together, and I'll definitely be checking out the other features soon.

Brown Ale
This one was a request from a friend, but I do enjoy a good brown ale as well! I stayed with in the style guidelines for both these brews. With this one let me know what you think about the specialty grains and hops (and hop timings). Also I didn't know if I should use amber extracts or just stick with light extracts.

Style: Northern English Brown Ale
TYPE: Extract
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.00 gal
Estimated OG: 1.048 SG
Estimated Color: 20.8 SRM
Estimated IBU: 22.6 IBUs
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
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Amt Name Type %/IBU
3.3 lbs Amber Liquid Extract (1 Extract 41.0 %
2.5 lbs Amber Dry Extract (12.5 Dry Extract 31.1 %
1 lbs Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 12.4 %
8.0 oz Biscuit Malt (23.0 SRM) Grain 6.2 %
8.0 oz Special Roast (50.0 SRM) Grain 6.2 %
4.0 oz Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 3.1 %

1.00 oz Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 11.3 IBUs
0.50 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00 %] - Boil 30.0 Hop 4.8 IBUs
0.25 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00 %] - Boil 5.0 Hop 0.6 IBUs

1.0 pkg Whitbread Ale (Wyeast Labs #1099) [124.2 Yeast

ESB
Again, I stayed within the style guidelines (I'm not sure if that's what most people do when they make a recipe). Kinda the same thing, any comments on the specialty grains, hops used, and hop timing is welcome!

Style: Extra Special/Strong Bitter (English Pale Ale)
TYPE: Extract
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.00 gal
Estimated OG: 1.054 SG
Estimated Color: 13.0 SRM
Estimated IBU: 39.3 IBUs

Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
6 lbs Light Dry Extract (8.0 SRM) Dry Extract 4 75.0 %
1 lbs Victory Malt (25.0 SRM) Grain 1 12.5 %
8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 2 6.3 %
8.0 oz Special Roast (50.0 SRM) Grain 3 6.3 %


3.00 oz Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 5 27.7 IBUs
1.00 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00 %] - Boil 30.0 Hop 6 7.9 IBUs
0.75 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00 %] - Boil 15.0 Hop 7 3.8 IBUs
0.50 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00 %] - Aroma Ste Hop 8 0.0 IBUs

1.0 pkg London ESB Ale (Wyeast Labs #1968) [124. Yeast 9 -


I'm still very new and learning a lot. I tried to keep the hops the same for ease of purchase as well as a chance to learn more about them. But i wasn't too sure about the timing or the amount. Same goes with the specialty grains. It's my first time using some of them, but I read up on them before I threw them in my recipe. Any who, have at it and let me know what you think!

 

[Yooper]

For the brown ale, the first thing I'd do is switch out the amber extract for light/pale. The reason is that amber extract has other stuff in it- like crystal malt- but you don't know how much so you may be doubling up on the crystal malt. I like the specialty grains and the hops, so aside from switching to light extract, I'd leave it.

As far as the ESB, it's a good start. I like crystal malt in mine, but not a ton- say .5 pound crystal 15L or 20L and then about 4 ounces of 120L. That gives a "layered" depth to the malt bill and enough sweetness to balance the hops, but not too much. The special roast is nice, but I don't think I'd like victory malt in there. Or at least, not so much. Victory malt is great and toasty, but with too much it's very dry tasting like dry toast. I've never used it in an ESB, and I'm not sure that I've ever had one with victory malt in it. A little would be nice and toasty, but I think a pound is about three times more than I'd like.

I like the hopping on the ESB.

 

[bcmeyer]

For the brown ale, the first thing I'd do is switch out the amber extract for light/pale. The reason is that amber extract has other stuff in it- like crystal malt- but you don't know how much so you may be doubling up on the crystal malt. I like the specialty grains and the hops, so aside from switching to light extract, I'd leave it.

As far as the ESB, it's a good start. I like crystal malt in mine, but not a ton- say .5 pound crystal 15L or 20L and then about 4 ounces of 120L. That gives a "layered" depth to the malt bill and enough sweetness to balance the hops, but not too much. The special roast is nice, but I don't think I'd like victory malt in there. Or at least, not so much. Victory malt is great and toasty, but with too much it's very dry tasting like dry toast. I've never used it in an ESB, and I'm not sure that I've ever had one with victory malt in it. A little would be nice and toasty, but I think a pound is about three times more than I'd like.

I like the hopping on the ESB.

Awesome! Thank you! Definitely did not know that about the amber extract and will change that. Looks like when i change it, it takes away from my IBUs, so I'll just make additions to the amount of hops. I just bumped everything up. 1.5 oz fuggles at 60 min, 1 oz goldings at 30 min, and .5 oz goldings at 5 min.

I will also make changes to the specialty grains in the ESB. I'm going to take out the victory malt, and adjust/add crystal malt. Maybe the next time I brew the ESB I'll try it with the victory malt.