Recipe Critique: Brown Rye Ale

[lacticacid]

This is for a 6 gallon batch with 75% Efficiency:

73% 7 0 American Two-row Pale info 37 1 ~
10% 1 0 Rye, Flaked info 36 2 ~
6% 0 10 Chocolate Rye Malt info 31 250 ~
5% 0 8 Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L info 34 40 ~
4% 0 6 Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L info 33 120 ~
1% 0 2 Black (Patent) Malt

For hops, I have 4oz of Delta I wanted to use:
2 oz at 60min
1 oz at 15min
and 1 oz at flameout
the AA for the hops is 4.5%

For an OG of 1.045 and 30IBUs

Was thinking about using WLP001.

Looking for an interesting dark session beer.

Two questions:
- I added the Black Patent for color as the Chocolate Rye is lighter then normal chocolate. Would I be better upping one of the other grains for a darker color and dropping the patent?
- Would anyone dry hop with an oz of Cascade? I had a Stone Dark Ale recently that had cascade and it was a nice match with the dark malts.

 

[lacticacid]

I was able to get the same color by adding some rye malt and victory malt and dropping the black patent malt. Does this look better?

64% 7 0 American Two-row Pale info 37 1 ~
9% 1 0 Rye, Flaked info 36 2 ~
9% 1 0 Rye Malt info 29 4 ~
6% 0 10 Chocolate Rye Malt info 31 250 ~
5% 0 8 Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L info 34 40 ~
5% 0 8 Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L info 33 120 ~
2% 0 4 Victory Malt info

Bumps the OG uptp 1.049.

Heading off for a run then off to the home brew store.

 

[bassmaster911]

I like the second recipe. I also have some delta that I have not tried yet. Let us know how it goes.

 

[Quaker]

I prefer simple. So rather than 2% of Victory, I'd change your base malt to MO or another English pale malt, and if your color is too light I'd play with the chocolate rye and rye malt ratio (keep same total weight). Otherwise I'd go for it and report back.

 

[lacticacid]

I prefer simple. So rather than 2% of Victory, I'd change your base malt to MO or another English pale malt, and if your color is too light I'd play with the chocolate rye and rye malt ratio (keep same total weight). Otherwise I'd go for it and report back.

Changing to MO and the color was right there.

 

[Quaker]

I'm quite curious how it comes out. Part of me says mash high to keep it sweet to balance all that rye and roastiness. But maybe a drier finish is better. I think it really takes a batch to see what you get and adjust from there.

 

[lacticacid]

I'm quite curious how it comes out. Part of me says mash high to keep it sweet to balance all that rye and roastiness. But maybe a drier finish is better. I think it really takes a batch to see what you get and adjust from there.

Brewing got delayed. Raining today. I brew under my deck and don't think rain and deck drippings would go well with Rye.

 

[lacticacid]

Brewed it two weeks ago.

The hydro sample was very spicy with more fuggle flavor, so I decided to dry hop it with some cascade to get a bit of citrus.

It smelled very chocolately when I transferred it to the keg.

It will be a long week waiting.

 

[rollermt]

I'm thinking about brewing a Brown Rye, so I'm interested to know how this turned out. Have you tried it yet?

 

[lacticacid]

It turned out ok. I would like to brew it again with different hops as there is a weird bitterness I think from the delta hops. I had people over on Christmas and the beer was popular enough.