English Ales - What's your favorite recipe?

[crusader1612]

are you adding caramel to a brown ale?
or you just want a sweeter brown ale?

 

[Barbarossa]

are you adding caramel to a brown ale?
or you just want a sweeter brown ale?

I want to play with flavors. I need to optimize the grain bill, calibrate the mash temp and boil time to get a sweet caramel brown beer.

I'm actually done with the first batch and will adjust on the next one.

I just did:
7# Vienna
2# 75lvb
1# 35 lvb
1# 10 lvb
1# red wheat
6
70 minutes @156F
120 minutes gentle boil
Wyeast 1099 whitbread


Taste like caramel and toffee.

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

Anybody got an opinion on the grain bill of my coming brown ale?
Maris otter as base
7% crystal 240(ebc)
5% brown malt
2% pale chocolate
Aiming on 1.048 OG and 20 ibu, a small part of the hop addition ~0.8g/L will be First Gold at 15 min
Aiming for a lighter, kinda dry northern style brown.

 

[tracer bullet]

I'm sorting out a recipe as well, it'll be either my next brew or the one after. I'm planning on adding a little Victory, 5%-ish or so, and some crystal as well. I'm thinking about 60L but may drop it down. I recently had a 4-pack of Samuel Smiths and though I'm not necessarily trying to duplicate it I was trying to pay attention to what may have been in it.

British II (Wyeast 1335) or maybe Yorkshire (1469). Aiming for around 5% and 35IBU.

 

[kmarkstevens]

@tracer bullet I adore the W Yorkie yeast. Suregork pairs it as equivalent to WLP022 Essex Ale.

 

[crusader1612]

@tracer bullet I adore the W Yorkie yeast. Suregork pairs it as equivalent to WLP022 Essex Ale.

Such a good yeast.

Hot Tip for E-IPA people.
Add 10g (0.35oz) of chinook to the dryhop, so a really subtle pine finish and another layer.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Emptier's ESB
-------------------
Crisp MO : 77.25%
Briess 60L Caramel : 4.25%
Briess 80L Caramel : 4.25%
Demerara Sugar : 13.4%
Briess 350L Chocolate : 0.85%

Magnum : 60 min boil: 16.2 IBU's
Challenger : 20 min boil: 15.0 IBU's
Fuggle : 10 min boil: 3.8 IBU's
Total IBU's = 35

~OG = 1.062
~FG = 1.017
London ESB Yeast
~6.15 ABV

Color : ~15 SRM (~29.6 EBC)

 

[kmarkstevens]

Anyone have a gluten free English Ale recipe? I am preparing to go gluten free for a few weeks, and then reintroduce gluten to see if I notice any changes. While I'm willing to do a gluten free lifestyle experience, I'm not willing to do a beer free lifestyle experiment.

One option is Sorghum malt extract + invert. Longer term if I'm really going to go gluten free can start investigating brewing with gluten free grains, and these folks in Oregon do a selection of specialty malts from gluten free grains. Anyhow, I ordered 10# of Sorghum extract in preparation. Any recommendations are welcome!

 

[ba-brewer]

I was looking at beer clarifiers and see that these can reduce gluten.
White Labs Clarity Ferm - 10 mL | MoreBeer
CellarScience® Clearzyme - Beer Clarifier | MoreBeer

 

[DuncB]

I have been using the Clarity ferm, you can buy it in brewery quantities ( I get 100ml per order) and concentration and need to use 3 ml for 5 gallon batch. Said to reduce the gluten a lot and help stability and chill haze.
Beer has been good with this, cleared well but can't comment on the gluten reducing effects as no sensitive beer drinkers to test my beer on.

 

[kmarkstevens]

Thanks. I meant to mention clarity ferm. Seems like it works for a lot of gluten intolerant people. I ordered the homebrew 10ml tester.

Honestly, not sure if I'm gluten intolerant (though my brother is). That said, thought I'd test it out and will probably help me lose a few pounds as well. And got me intrigued about brewing gluten free.

Anyhoo, I've ordered enough sorghum syrup for 2 batches, will try a hopped cyser as well, and that should tide me over for a couple of weeks of being gluten free. Then can introduce a clarity ferm brew to see if I notice anything. Finally, then introduce barley and other grains to see if there is any effect..

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Anyone have a gluten free English Ale recipe?

Pretty much any golden ale. You have to remember that brewers want to get rid of gluten even for "normal" beers, as it's the main protein in chill haze, so a lot of commercial brewers have found that their standard processes take gluten to below the 20ppm level used to define "gluten-free". Much easier with pale beers than with dark ones though. So there's a lot of commercial golden ales and lagers out there that are below 20ppm, it's just that the brewers can't be bothered to go through the onerous process of being certified as gluten-free. It gets more complicated, as historically some of the tests weren't particularly accurate (in particular old ones would miss gluten fragments created by enzymes, although that's not been true for a couple of years now in the UK), and proper coeliacs can be sensitive to gluten at a fraction of that 20ppm level.

There was a bit of a thing for brewing with non-barley grists 3-4 years ago. I tried most of the commercial examples and every single one had a noticeable taste; it's perhaps no coincidence that pretty much everybody now just uses ClarityFerm-type enzymes on barley grists, rather than sorghum and the like. They're widely available here these days.

 

[DuncB]

I'm not sure where I got this water profile from, but it's the one I've been using for quite some time now for Bitters

View attachment 725843

Have had this reply from the Five points brewery re the water.

Regarding the water profile for Best, I have this from the head brewer: "Hi mate, if you could pass to on aim for ~190 ppm calcium, 200 ppm chloride and 330 ppm sulphate."

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

So I am tinkering a bit with my recipe for what is supposed to become my house porter, done it a few times with some small changes between each time and coming near what I'm looking for.
Last time I did MO as base, 8% UK crystal 240(ebc), 9% Brown malt and 3% black malt. Looking for something in the lines of London porter but a bit more beefy and a little "harder" rostyness and it got a little bit too hard and dry this time, otherwise really good.
So I am thinking about upping the crystal and brown to 10% each, and switching the black malt to 2% chocolate.
Will keep the the same at 1.054 and probably get AA around mid 70's, does this sound like a good change to get it nice and roasty but not too harsh?

 

[monkeymath]

So I am tinkering a bit with my recipe for what is supposed to become my house porter, done it a few times with some small changes between each time and coming near what I'm looking for.
Last time I did MO as base, 8% UK crystal 240(ebc), 9% Brown malt and 3% black malt. Looking for something in the lines of London porter but a bit more beefy and a little "harder" rostyness and it got a little bit too hard and dry this time, otherwise really good.
So I am thinking about upping the crystal and brown to 10% each, and switching the black malt to 2% chocolate.
Will keep the the same at 1.054 and probably get AA around mid 70's, does this sound like a good change to get it nice and roasty but not too harsh?

I honestly haven't brewed a whole lot of porters myself, but it might be worth considering ramping up the base instead of the crystal: e.g. replace a pound of MO by munich and/or rye malt. 3% black malt does not sound too roasty to me, but you could also try going 2% black malt + 2% carafa spezial instead.
Last but not least, there's yeast. For your "house porter" you may be determined to use one particular strain, but I think the same grain bill could make a harsh beer with one yeast and a soft beer with another. But I fathom that most British yeasts would fall into the "soft" category.

 

[z-bob]

My "house porter" is 90% pale ale malt, 5% 20°L to 40°L crystal, and 5% black patent malt. I have no idea how authentic that is, but it's good beer. I change up the hops and the yeast. The time I brewed it with Willamette hops (which is kinda English-ish) and yeast cultured from a bottle of Bell's Oberon was one of my best beers ever. I haven't tried it yet with Goldings hops and/or a British yeast, but I have some Goldings in the freezer...

I've gone as high as 6% black malt and it wasn't too harsh, but 5% was better. HTH

 

[BarkingSpider]

I have a brown porter that I'm still in the process of tweaking, but it is settling in on these numbers and I'm pretty happy with it!
75% Golden Promise, 10% Brown malt, 10% UK C80, 4% UK Pale Chocolate, 1% Chocolate Wheat . 20 IBU's of EKG @ 30 minutes. Mash around 154-156 for some extra body. Wyeast 1469 is my go to yeast (it seems to attenuate more than I would expect so I mash with the higher numbers to compensate). I drop French oak cubes in the primary and let it set for 4 weeks (.5 ounce per gallon). Ferment @ 68F. This beer should come in around 25 SRM.

I'm brewing this and a pale this weekend with 1099 so we'll see how that goes...

 

[DuncB]

I find the 1098 and Windsor seem to ferment on and on.

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

That seems more in line with what I'm after. The other no doubt produce good beer, but more of american dry porter.
I'm after a sweetish caramelly backbone, backed up by coffee and chocolate roast notes, wich probably will be too dominating if done the american way with loads of black malt.
Yours and mine recipe seem pretty similair, I'll try my changes and see what I'll end up with. @BarkingSpider

 

[BarkingSpider]

That seems more in line with what I'm after. The other no doubt produce good beer, but more of american dry porter.
I'm after a sweetish caramelly backbone, backed up by coffee and chocolate roast notes, wich probably will be too dominating if done the american way with loads of black malt.
Yours and mine recipe seem pretty similair, I'll try my changes and see what I'll end up with. @BarkingSpider

Not too far off! I'm tempted to streamline the recipe some more and just go with 5% chocolate, but I like the softer flavor of the pale chocolate/chocolate wheat combo. I'm a big fan of Fullers London Porter and Samuel Smiths Taddy Porter so this a bit of both.

 

[DBhomebrew]

Weyermann chocolate rye is also very good for dark chocolate flavors without the fear of bitter or too much roast. Like the carafa special, no husk.

 

[schmurf]

+1 on chocolate rye

 

[kpsalerno]

Not too far off! I'm tempted to streamline the recipe some more and just go with 5% chocolate, but I like the softer flavor of the pale chocolate/chocolate wheat combo. I'm a big fan of Fullers London Porter and Samuel Smiths Taddy Porter so this a bit of both.

Since you say you like Fullers London Porter, I would actually recommed you lower the chocolate malt to 2%, add 12% brown malt, and forgo all crystal malt in favor of 12% dark invert sugar, the rest pale malt.

 

[tracer bullet]

Weyermann chocolate rye is also very good for dark chocolate flavors without the fear of bitter or too much roast. Like the carafa special, no husk.

+1 on chocolate rye

I've always been curious about the chocolate rye but never tried it. I steer my porters towards dry and roasty / coffee, but my stouts towards sweeter and more chocolate flavored. I have considered the chocolate rye a few times for the stout, trying to get chocolate flavors without actually using chocolate, but been nervous it would be "rye" flavored. Is it?

I love rye whiskey, but I hate "rye beer". Never had one I liked, ever. Didn't want to ruin a batch with rye flavors if the chocolate rye tastes at all like the typical rye malt. Rye malt has a unique flavor that doesn't agree with me whatsoever.

 

[DBhomebrew]

I've always been curious about the chocolate rye but never tried it. I steer my porters towards dry and roasty / coffee, but my stouts towards sweeter and more chocolate flavored. I have considered the chocolate rye a few times for the stout, trying to get chocolate flavors without actually using chocolate, but been nervous it would be "rye" flavored. Is it?

I love rye whiskey, but I hate "rye beer". Never had one I liked, ever. Didn't want to ruin a batch with rye flavors if the chocolate rye tastes at all like the typical rye malt. Rye malt has a unique flavor that doesn't agree with me whatsoever.

I don't find that chocolate rye comes across as 'rye' per se. To me, it tastes like a good dark chocolate should. Maybe just a touch of unspecified spice.

 

[monkeymath]

I find chocolate rye, when tasted by itself, quite ashy and burnt, but without the bitterness most roasted malts have. It is also considerably lighter in color (at least the one I had).
Can't say exactly how its flavour in the finished beer compares to that of other roasted malts, as I have always used it in conjunction with other specialty malts.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Since you say you like Fullers London Porter, I would actually recommed you lower the chocolate malt to 2%, add 12% brown malt, and forgo all crystal malt in favor of 12% dark invert sugar, the rest pale malt.

Per Fuller's, their Porter is ~14% crystal.

As for the other suggestions on this thread - brown malt is pretty much the defining ingredient of London porter. You can make perfectly tasty beers without it, but it's no longer a London porter. And ditto with using English yeasts.

 

[BarkingSpider]

I agree with Northern Brewer on this. My take on this style is not Fullers, but it is an inspiration for sure! I actually cut the crystal a bit in this one (it was originally around the 13% mark). A few of the english beers I've brewed (dark mild is one of my other favorites) use a heftier amount of crystal (upwards of 15%). I generally use piloncillo sugar cubes over invert out of convenience if I need to beef something up a bit. Less expensive/hassle and still adds those darker flavors.

 

[ba-brewer]

This is the porter I have on tap at the moment;
70% Maris Otter
18% Brown Malt
6% Crystal 70/80
6% Pale Chocolate
30IBU of Fuggle at 60min
WLP033 Klassic Ale
Was shooting for about 1050 but got 1045 and then low attenuation so a easy drinking 3.7%ABV .

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

View attachment 727945
This is the porter I have on tap at the moment;
70% Maris Otter
18% Brown Malt
6% Crystal 70/80
6% Pale Chocolate
30IBU of Fuggle at 60min
WLP033 Klassic Ale
Was shooting for about 1050 but got 1045 and then low attenuation so a easy drinking 3.7%ABV .

That’s a whole lotta roast.

 

[ba-brewer]

That’s a whole lotta roast.

Maybe on paper, but does not seem that way in the glass. Could be the low attenuation and the drying of the roasted grains balance each other out. For sure roasty in aroma with some fruitiness, chocolate in flavor with an almost balanced bitterness.

edit: The amount of brown malt was partially determined by wanting to use what I had left. Also the beer has been conditioning for about 2 months which might help take the sharpness off the roast malt flavor.

 

[Shenanigans]

One of the best beers I every brewed was the CYBI clone of Meantime London Porter.
Only changes I made were I used WLP007 instead of Notti and a single step mash at 68oC for 60 mins.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/can-you-brew-it-recipe-for-meantime-porter.239374/
I was really surprised that it was very drinkable after only 2 weeks in the bottle.
It was all gone after about 6 weeks and had improved a little by that time but I can't imagine that it would have improved much more for my tastes as I couldn't get enough of the stuff.
Next time I think I'm going to brew 10 gallons

 

[duncan_disorderly]

Anybody got an opinion on the grain bill of my coming brown ale?
Maris otter as base
7% crystal 240(ebc)
5% brown malt
2% pale chocolate
Aiming on 1.048 OG and 20 ibu, a small part of the hop addition ~0.8g/L will be First Gold at 15 min
Aiming for a lighter, kinda dry northern style brown.

Late response sorry but I'd say it is a bit light on chocolate, and that brown malt is not common or usual in brown ales. I like brown malt but I keep it to stouts and porters. No rules though.

 

[tracer bullet]

That’s a whole lotta roast.

I've made this recipe a few times, I'll link it below, it's from here. I have made small tweaks (for my liking I add a dash of dark crystal and some Franco-Belges coffee malt) but otherwise left it alone.

It's got a really high % of roasted malt in it and I agree with @ba-brewer that it's not too much at all. Well he / she was talking about a different recipe of course but I guess I'm agreeing that, perhaps it's the brown malt specifically, a lot can be used and it's not too much in the glass at all. You'd guess you'd be drinking an acrid, char flavored mess, but it turns out that it's nowhere near it.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/honeymoon-porter-2x-gold-medals-2nd-place-bos.683809/

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

Late response sorry but I'd say it is a bit light on chocolate, and that brown malt is not common or usual in brown ales. I like brown malt but I keep it to stouts and porters. No rules though.

It was a bit of an experiment, I used brown malt and a little pale chocolate to get a light, hopefully nutty roast.
Also a little first gold at 15 minutes left, might go well with the light roasty notes. Brew went well, hit 1.047 as opposed to estimated 48 so that is definitely acceptable accuracy and tried out that domestically produced yeast.

 

[duncan_disorderly]

It was a bit of an experiment, I used brown malt and a little pale chocolate to get a light, hopefully nutty roast.
Also a little first gold at 15 minutes left, might go well with the light roasty notes. Brew went well, hit 1.047 as opposed to estimated 48 so that is definitely acceptable accuracy and tried out that domestically produced yeast.

Lets us know how the beer turns out.

 

[kmarkstevens]

@Erik the Anglophile What yeast are you using? One of the purported Fullers (Pub is my favorite)?

I've done a lot of SMASHY yeast offs' of different English yeasts. That was interesting, but even more interesting was when I did a few yeast offs' against the London Porter recipe below. I was shocked to figure out that the yeasts I preferred in a simple SMASH were quite different in a Porter. WLP085* (WLP002 + WLP007) completely stripped out the chocolate taste. S-04 was the hands down winner in that match up. Suggest you might try a split batch to see what tickles your palate, and what that might mean for your recipe tweaking.

Digression alert: Whilst it seems that brown ale defines London Porters, brown ale isn't for my palate. That same brown ale taste comes through in Samuel Smiths porter and a few other imports I've tried.

Here's a BYO article on 5 British Ale Clones. Whilst this is written by American Chris Colby and does not contain brown ale, I really like his Fuller's London Porter Clone. Nicely balanced with layer flavor. Here's the grain bill:
9 lb. 12 oz. (4.4 kg) British 2-row pale ale malt
14 oz. (0.40 kg) crystal malt (60 °L)
7.0 oz. (0.20 kg) chocolate malt
7.0 oz. (0.20 kg) black patent malt
4.0 oz. (0.11 kg) roasted barley (500 °L)

*WLP085. White Labs won't admit to anything beyond WLP002 and another British yeast. Most wags are for either WLP006 or WLP007. On the plane yesterday back from LA (after a visit to the WL tasting room on Friday), I noticed this nugget in the White Labs Guide to blending yeast strains: Low Attenuation Yeast ◦ WLP002 English Ale Yeast and WLP007 Dry English Ale Yeast together to get the esters and higher attenuation that you want.

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

@kmarkstevens It’s a yeast made by a Swedish yeast manufacturer who mainly make bakers yeast, but also beer and wine yeast on contract for commercial breweries.
They now seem to have in collab with a domestic HBS, released a few strains for the public consumer market. I thought to make a lighter brown ale to try it out in something that don’t have too much else going on to get a feel of what the yeast contributes.
It is likely a whitbread derivative, from what I gather similair to s04 but a little more of the good ester profile and none of the funky tartness. Also cheaper than imported alternatives and locally produced.
If I’m satisfied it will likely be my new general purpose house strain

 

[Miraculix]

@kmarkstevens It’s a yeast made by a Swedish yeast manufacturer who mainly make bakers yeast, but also beer and wine yeast on contract for commercial breweries.
They now seem to have in collab with a domestic HBS, released a few strains for the public consumer market. I thought to make a lighter brown ale to try it out in something that don’t have too much else going on to get a feel of what the yeast contributes.
It is likely a whitbread derivative, from what I gather similair to s04 but a little more of the good ester profile and none of the funky tartness. Also cheaper than imported alternatives and locally produced.
If I’m satisfied it will likely be my new general purpose house strain

What's the name of the yeast and of the manufacturer?

 

[Erik the Anglophile]

Brewly English Ale made by a company Called Jästbolaget.

https://www.thehomebrewery.co.uk/brewly-english-ale-yeast
https://www.jastbolaget.se/en/@Miraculix