experimental english brown recipe.. what do ya think?

[Nickme23]

Trying to get something drinkable and smooth with a plum character like Newcastle. Balanced but more towards maltiness with a slight sweetness.

Dominated by these flavors: Biscuity, bready and malty
Secondary flavors: Fruity esters, Plum
smooth, low carbonation, very slight hop presence, slightly sweet but finishes relatively clean and light.

So here's my idea for a recipe, but I've never used some of the adjunct grains in this recipe just read a lot of descriptions and recipes so it'd be a total shot in the dark if I just went with it. Hoping there will be somebody out there who's had more experience brewing with these grains.


10 lbs Maris Otter
1.5 lb Special Roast
.25 lbs Victory
.5 lbs Special B

6 Gal batch post boil, leaving about 5.25 into primary

Mash at 153 for 60 mins

90 min Boil

1 oz EKGoldings 60 mins

Whirlfloc 15 mins

Immersion/whirlpool chiller till pitching temp ~60F

Pitch 1L starter of whatever yeast I decide on using

Gelatin after 2 weeks in primary

Keg after 4 days of gelatin and cold crashing

1099 Whitbread or possibly WLP500 but leaning towards the whitbread But the WLP500 says it promotes a plum flavor. Not a big fan of raisin, but I love the plum flavor in newcastle.


Projected stats

OG 1.053
FG 1.016
ABV 4.8%
Color ~ 16-19L


Other variations I was thinking of using were

9 lbs Maris Otter
.5 lbs Victory
.5 lbs Special Roast
.38 lbs Special B
.12 lbs Crystal 45

OR

10 lbs Maris Otter
1 lb Brown Malt
.5 lbs Special B


Please tear it apart, critique, offer suggestions, changes, or other recipe ideas.

 

[bierhaus15]

That's a lot of "biscuit flavor" type malts there, with the MO, special roast, and victory.

Really, with a base of good quality MO, you don't really need the special roast or victory. If you are intent on keeping some special roast, I'd drop it to a 1/2 pound MAX and drop the victory altogether. If your looking for more complex toasty/roast flavors, I like brown malt for around 10% of the grist. Special B will definitely give you those caramelized fruit like flavors you are looking for. Chocolate malt (or Pale Chocolate) for around 3% will help round out the color and add some very nice toasty notes to the beer.

 

[ghpeel]

Wlp500 won't give you anything near a Newcastle, that's a Belgian strain. I've never noticed "plum" in Newcastle myself anyway.

 

[Nickme23]

I know it's a belgian strain, in the White Labs notes it says it brings out a plum character. That's what I taste in a good example of newcastle and that's what I like in a good newcastle. I don't understand why everybody hates on nc. It's like comparing a 2 yr old example of a Hefe kept in the sun at 80F and saying you hate Hefeweizen.

I was just asking for advice on those strains and the possible recipe from people who've brewed with those ingredients and yeast strains before. Plus, who says you can't get from A to Z using a different path? What if I find a recipe that utilizes a belgian strain and duplicates a beer I like in a fraction of the time. Sounds like a worthy pursuit to me. Plus, think of all the beer I get to drink in the meantime

 

[Yooper]

I know it's a belgian strain, in the White Labs notes it says it brings out a plum character. That's what I taste in a good example of newcastle and that's what I like in a good newcastle. I don't understand why everybody hates on nc. It's like comparing a 2 yr old example of a Hefe kept in the sun at 80F and saying you hate Hefeweizen.

I was just asking for advice on those strains and the possible recipe from people who've brewed with those ingredients and yeast strains before. Plus, who says you can't get from A to Z using a different path? What if I find a recipe that utilizes a belgian strain and duplicates a beer I like in a fraction of the time. Sounds like a worthy pursuit to me. Plus, think of all the beer I get to drink in the meantime

That's cool. No need to jump on people trying to help, though.

I've never tasted plum in Newcastle either.. Newcastle is a thin, relatively flavorless brown, with almost no yeast character. If you want to use a Belgian yeast for interest that's fine. I'd probably go with a London Ale yeast or another British strain to avoid excessive esters although you'll get some with a British strain especially if fermented at 68 degrees or a bit above. Probably not plum, though.

 

[ghpeel]

On kind of an interesting side note, a buddy of mine made a simple English Pale Ale with WLP007, a classic "British" strain. However, he doesn't have temp control and the beer fermented up into the high 70's we think.

The final result came out tasting like a great BELGIAN PALE ALE. It had a great Belgian character, but was nothing like the British beer it was supposed to me.

 

[Nickme23]

I apologize if I was a little short, I didn't intend to "jump" on anybody. I just expected a lot of newcastle bashing with the usual "skunk in a bottle" comments. I personally think that when you get a good example of newcastle that it's a good beer. I know it's a lot thinner than a porter or most big heavy beers but sometimes you want to be able to drink a liter and not feel like you just ate a hippo.

I'm sorry, I really do appreciate the input and I probably won't end up using a belgian strain. I was just trying to think outside the box and see if anybody had tried using a non-traditional strain at a different temp. I thought if that strain brought out a plum flavor and that's what I love about NC then maybe I could use WLP500 at a low temp with a slightly higher pitch of yeast and see if I could reduce the normal belgian ester production but still capture some of that plum character.

I might just brew a 10 Gal batch and split it, try both strains and see which is best. What do ya think?

 

[dcp27]

I might just brew a 10 Gal batch and split it, try both strains and see which is best. What do ya think?

I vote yes. It's amazing how much changes in just using a different yeast strain. Plus, then you dont need to question it when you remake the batch another time.

 

[kanzimonson]

I like most of your recipes, especially the ones with Special B. To really get some plum flavors you might want to stick some caramunich in there. Some lighter colored crystal malts will add a little more to the perception of sweetness that's important with fruity flavors. But I may be misinterpreting what you want.

Also, I'm not sure about this but I suspect NC uses Fuggles as a finishing hop. The only reason I wonder about this is because I recently brewed a Nut Brown Mild or maybe a low alcohol Northern English Brown, and I used 24g of Fuggle at flameout (no other finishing hops). I let the kettle sit there hot, covered, but with the flame off for 15 minutes before I turned on the chiller.

The final beer has this really impressive woody hop character throughout, almost as if I had added multiple small hop additions in the last 20 mins of the boil. The entire beer reminds me of NC, but I don't think it's a clone at all. Much more caramel and roast in my beer.

 

[Nickme23]

I like most of your recipes, especially the ones with Special B. To really get some plum flavors you might want to stick some caramunich in there. Some lighter colored crystal malts will add a little more to the perception of sweetness that's important with fruity flavors. But I may be misinterpreting what you want.

Also, I'm not sure about this but I suspect NC uses Fuggles as a finishing hop. The only reason I wonder about this is because I recently brewed a Nut Brown Mild or maybe a low alcohol Northern English Brown, and I used 24g of Fuggle at flameout (no other finishing hops). I let the kettle sit there hot, covered, but with the flame off for 15 minutes before I turned on the chiller.

The final beer has this really impressive woody hop character throughout, almost as if I had added multiple small hop additions in the last 20 mins of the boil. The entire beer reminds me of NC, but I don't think it's a clone at all. Much more caramel and roast in my beer.

What recipe did you use? I've been looking at Biermuncher's newcastle thread and I came up with a different recipe, wanted to compare with yours.


This is what I came up with

7 lbs Maris Otter
1 lb Corn (flaked)
.5 lb Carafoam
.5 lb Crystal 20
.25 lb Crystal 60
.25 lb Crystal 80
.25 lb Special B
.25 lb Light Chocolate (200L)
.05 lb Carafa Special II (400L)

Mash 154
1 oz EKG 60 Mins 4.5%
.25 oz Fuggles 15 mins 5%

WY 1099 Whitbread Ale


Never used caramunich before, how much and what would you suggest?

 

[kanzimonson]

Here's the thread where I discussed it - just scroll to the bottom for the final recipe

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/nut-brown-mild-critique-208989/