First recipe suggestions

[ernestmyname]

I am putting together my recipe for my first non-kit brew day. All I know for sure is that it will be bottled and it will be a 10 gallon batch. I basically started off by doubling all the ingredients the 5 gallon sierra madre clone from Northern Brewer. Just by doubling the ingredients I got close to what I was looking for - Higher ABV, darker color, and more bitter than the clone.

But, I don't care for the sweet taste of the caramel malt. Although I do want the beer to have more body/complexity, I don't want it to necessarily taste and "darker" if you know what I mean.

What should I do here? Go with a lighter caramel malt but more of it to get the color or a darker one with less to get the color?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Double_D]

If you use less of a darker malt it will make it more astringent which isn't necessarily what you're going for(I think). You could use a honey malt or a really light crystal like 10
L or 20L. There is plenty good recipes in the complete joy of homebrewing by charlie papazian. Have you looked there? I'm not fimiliar with the kits.