Honey Orange Cream Ale

[bricks]

Just got through brewing up a Honey Orange Cream Ale. Recipe was 7 lbs. Briess Light LME, 1 lb. honey malt, 1 lb. carapils. Added .75 oz Cascade hops at start of boil, and with 10 minutes left added 1 oz. sweet orange peel, 1 tsp. irish moss, and 1/4 oz. cascade pellets. Cooled to 78 degrees and pitched a vial of White Labs Cream Ale yeast.

OG was 1.047 and Beersmith gave an OG of 1.048. Will let it ferment in the primary for about 3 weeks then bottle, and sample one after another couple of weeks.

I have brewed this before minus the honey malt, but used too much sugar for priming, and it was like drinking champagne. I will cut back on the priming sugar this time and hopefully it will come out OK. The taste of the last batch was good, just too much carbonation.

On a side note, while brewing this today, I was sampling a Maris Otter/Kent Goldings SMASH i brewed, and it just gets better with time!

Hope the honey orange cream ale turns out as good as the SMASH

 

[BlauMaus]

How long did you boil the honey malt?

 

[bricks]

I steeped the honey malt and carapils in about 3/4 gallon of water. Starting temp was around 155 and after 30 minutes was around 145. I then added that liquid to about 5 1/2 gallons of water for the boil.

 

[JoppaFarms]

You've convinced me to try this in my next batch, a Cream Ale. I'll skip the orange for now so it'll just be a Honey Cream Ale. Pretty excited about this one.

 

[bricks]

Came home from work this afternoon and checked on the brew. I had krausen in the airlock! Not a big mess, and I use vodka in the airlock so I am not too worried about contamination. This is the first time out of the five batches I have made since I started brewing again where there is actual airlock activity. It is bubbling away. It was not enough that I need to use a blow off tube, it was just up to the top of the plastic lid on the fermenter. I have not seen the krausen get this high since I started brewing again. Will replace the airlock with a clean one full of vodka and let it keep going.

Hopefully this one will turn out great!