Maple ale recipe critique

[Ijp11]

My first take at Maple Ale open to critiques First Try!!!.

5 Gal batch.

9Lbs. 8 oz. Pale 2-Row US
2Lbs. Caravienne Malt
1Lbs. Caramel/Cryastal 20L
8 oz. crushed and roasted pecans mashed for 30min.

BOIL

60 min 2 oz Willamette
1 oz maple syrup at burnout

Yeast fermantation

i pkg. White labs wlp002 English ale

Secondary

Steep 5 oz. maple coffee beans whole for 20 hours before kegging/bottling

Any tips for single infusion mash all grain recipes?

 

[daksin]

A few critiques- looks like a fair bit of crystal malt but if you're going for a sweeter or bigger bodied beer it's not an outrageous amount. I would consider swapping the caravienne with plain old vienna malt.

I don't think the 1oz of syrup is going to give you much flavor. I've used the McCormick maple extract before and was pretty happy with it- it's not the most "authentic" flavor in the world but it definitely gets the point across. 1oz of that stuff in 5g was more than enough.

I would be worried about steeping maple coffee beans for fear of giving a lot of coffee flavor to a beer otherwise focused on fairly light/sweet flavors, but if that's what your'e going for, I recommend starting to taste after about 12 hours- coffee extracts quickly in fermented beer and you can quickly get beany/vegetal flavors.

 

[brewcat]

I would think straight maple sugar would give better maple flavor. Then use it like a Belgian candi sugar and add at like 15 minutes left in the boil.

For grain, maybe add 2-3 ounces of roasted barley.

 

[Bigfly]

One oz of maple syrup will not add any noticeable flavor. The thing I found about maple syrup is that once the sugar is fermented out it no longer tastes like maple syrup. I agree with daksin to use maple extract if you want maple flavor. I have brewed beer using maple sap instead of water then added 1 qt of maple syrup to the boil. In the end there was no discernible maple flavor. But just knowing it was there made it popular at the sugar shack while boiling down sap. I would not add coffee beans to my beer(not interested in coffee flavored beer) but you should never be afraid to try anything new.