Help with Strong American Brown recipie?

[mindcrime]

I've perused the recipie forums here, and cobbled together the below recipie for a thanksgiving brown ale. I'm shooting for something along the lines of DFH's Indian Brown. Big, slightly sweet, fairly hoppy and velvety mouthfeel.

10 lbs dry malt extract
(I was thinking about changing this to 6 lbs pale LME and 6 lbs amber LME, juse cause im more comfortable with LME than DME.)

14 oz Crystal 60L
2 oz Black Patent Malt
2 oz Chocolate malt
(all steeped together at 155 for 30 minutes pre boil tea.)


Steep grains for 30 min all together.

Malt extract split, 1/2 at 60 minutes, the other 1/2 at 15 minutes.

Hops:

1 oz Newport @ 60 minutes
(any suggestions for a replacement here? not 100% sure my LHBS has any.)

1.5 oz Willamette @ 20 minutes
1.5 oz Willamette @ 5 minutes

Fermenting using Nottingham yeast cake from previous brew.




So, heres my questions.


What would switching from 10 lbs light DME to 6 lbs amber LME and 6 lbs pale LME do to the recipie? I figure the conversion is relatively close, but would provide a bit more color and perhaps some carmel malty flavors?

What replacement hops for Newport if I cant get them?

60L the right crystal, or should I go darker? 80 or 100L?

Any other thoughts to make this bad boy be the best beer it can be? (within reason, im not going AG, for example, hehe.)

 

[bob1852]

I believe DFH uses Warrior for their bittering hop...

 

[Tonedef131]

I came in here to say "don't be stingy with the Willamette"...but it looks like your already on top of that.

 

[eschatz]

My american brown uses 1 1/4 # Crystal 60, 4 oz Chocolate malt, and 1/2 # carapils (for that velvety mouthfeel/head retention. You can hop with anything. If you dry hop it you'll be a happy man.

 

[mindcrime]

Brewed this up as advertized this weekend with one minor change.

Final Recipie:

6 lbs amber LME
6 lbs pale LME
(1/2 of each at 60 min and at 15 minutes)
1 lb Crystal 57L
.5 lb Domestic CaraPils
2 oz black patent
2 oz chocolate
(all steeped together at 160 for 30 minutes)

1 oz Warrior pellets @ 60
1 oz willamette pellets @ 20
1.5 oz willamette pellets @ 5

.5 oz willamette pellets @ dryhop when I rack it off the primary.

Pitched at 78 degrees on to a Nottingham cake from an IPA.

OG - 1.084 @ 78 degrees

Smells heavenly, and the ferment took off quick. In about 8 hours I was already seeing a bubble a second in my blowoff bowl. When I left for work, it was holding steady at about 69 degrees plus or minus a degree or so.

I have high hopes for this one, and I'll report back!

Plan is 3 weeks in the primary, 4 weeks in secondary, 1 week on dry hops, 4 weeks at room temp in bottles, and then a week or so in the fridge to cold crash before I dig in. That leaves about 2 weeks or so before Thanksgiving to come up with a backup plan if it sucks

 

[mindcrime]

Holy crap batman. I finally cracked the tester bottle of this with a little over a month to go till turkey day. BTW, this finished at FG: 1.02.

It is FINE!

Thick, velvety mouthfeel with nice lacing from the head on the glass. The head itself doesnt stick around terribly long, like an IPA, but doesnt vanish like a porter's does either.

Smells of slightly sweet brown bread. Tastes initially like a shot of bitterness (pleasantly so) leading into a malty, bready, almost molassassy flavor (no molassas used though.) Finishes with a hint of alcohol over a tich of malt sweetness, but not unpleasantly so. Not as bitter as DFH's indian brown, the hop notes are a bit quieter and the hop nose is less present. None of that is a bad thing though.

This is the best beer I have ever brewed.

Contemplating crossposting the recipie over in the actual recipie section for the first time ever

 

[bob1852]

This is the best beer I have ever brewed.

Contemplating crossposting the recipie over in the actual recipie section for the first time ever

Congrats!