Very First Beer - Advice

[BRGriffith]

I've been making wine for about two years now, and decided it's about time to give this a try. Like I said, brand new here, so please forgive me for any dumb mistakes I make :cross:.

5.5 Gallon Total Volume - For Racking Purposes
-6 Pound Amber Dry Malt Extract
-1 Pound Caramel 120L
-8 Ounce Chocolate Malt
-2 Ounce Golding Hops (Open To Suggestion On Variety)
-Nottingham Ale Yeast
-SG: ~1.050 (Don't really know if grain adds fermentables or just gravity here, so this is a guess)

Following what I understand to be the correct steps:
1. Crush the grains (Or buy crushed)
2. Steep at 158F for 30 minutes, remove spent grain
3. Add DME, Hops, Boil for 1 Hour
4. Cool to pitch temp, pitch and aerate

I'm hoping this will yield a pretty dark brown ale with a nice nutty, chocolaty character at ~5.5% ABV. Please give me some suggestions on anything I've said here, as well as some thoughts on process, end result, etc.

Thanks for reading guys! Cheers

 

[GenIke]

I would probably use light dry extract instead of the amber since you're adding a pound and a half of crystal and chocolate. To over simplify, amber would basically be light dry plus steeping grains already in the mix.

 

[dcross41796]

I've been making wine for about two years now, and decided it's about time to give this a try. Like I said, brand new here, so please forgive me for any dumb mistakes I make :cross:.



5.5 Gallon Total Volume - For Racking Purposes

-6 Pound Amber Dry Malt Extract

-1 Pound Caramel 120L

-8 Ounce Chocolate Malt

-2 Ounce Golding Hops (Open To Suggestion On Variety)

-Nottingham Ale Yeast

-SG: ~1.050 (Don't really know if grain adds fermentables or just gravity here, so this is a guess)



Following what I understand to be the correct steps:

1. Crush the grains (Or buy crushed)

2. Steep at 158F for 30 minutes, remove spent grain

3. Add DME, Hops, Boil for 1 Hour

4. Cool to pitch temp, pitch and aerate



I'm hoping this will yield a pretty dark brown ale at ~5.5% ABV. Please give me some suggestions on anything I've said here, as well as some thoughts on process, end result, etc.



Thanks for reading guys! Cheers

Depending on how strong of a boil you are going to have make sure you start with enough water to account for boil off. I would say 6.5 gallons to 7.
Grains will add some fermentable sugars if you steep correctly. Your method will do just fine. You can actually place them in while heating the water but don't let them sit on the bottom to avoid scorching them. Once water hits temp you want allow the 30 mins steeping while heat is turned off. Then some people will pour water over the grain bag to help wash the wort off the grain and out of the bag. I would do this.
I really don't remember when to add the dme but I suggest around the time of the protein break. When you see the white layer of foam forming add the dme in while stirring well to make sure it all dissolves quickly.
Once the wort begins to boil add your hops and boil for 1 hour. I would pick up some Irish moss or a whir flock tablet to add 15 mins prior to end of boil. I suggest uk goldings for your hops.
After you kill boil you need to cool down as fast as possible with a wort chiller or place pot in ice bath.
Once chilled to pitch temp. Siphon beer into your primary and pitch.
Invest in star san if you don't already use it. Use distilled water and you can reuse it as long as ph is still in range.
Goodluck on your first beer! Cheers

 

[ac22rush]

Typical hop choices for a brown ale can be styrian goldings, east kent goldings, wilammette, liberty, palisade, sterling. Most of those will be relatively similar in flavor and aroma, if you are just going for bitterness variety is much less important. Your steeping grains wont add much in the way of gravity points maybe a few at most. A pound of crystal 120 for a 5 gallon batch seems like a lot. That stuff goes a long way.

 

[solbes]

Looks pretty good. I echo the first poster who suggested using light DME. Your specialty grains should give you the color and flavor addition you are looking for. Darker extract can sometimes cause issues with higher FG when also combined with specialty grains.

Two good suggestions to hold true for any beer (and may be different than wine). Temp control: Cool your wort down to near the bottom end of the yeasts working temp BEFORE you pitch. Then try to control it cooler for the first 36-48 hours. After that you can let it rise some if desired for higher attenuation and additional esters. Second is to pitch plenty of yeast. Shouldn't be a problem for that OG, but rehydrate dry yeast or make a small yeast starter if pitching liquid yeast variety.

As to your recipe you will have a fairly sweet beer with plenty of chocolate flavor with the 1 lb of 120L and .5 lbs of chocolate. If thats what you want, make sure you give it a little extra bittering to balance the sweetness. Cheers!

 

[buzzerj]

With 6 lbs. of even Light DME your SRM will be 22 so that's a very dark beer. I used pale chocolate in calculating what you've got. The O.G. is about 1.056 and with a 1.014 F.G you are looking at a 5.5% ABV. You didn't say what style of ale you are shooting for but it fits the style for an American Brown Ale. With the 1 lb. caramel 120 you want raisiny flavors. You can do the DME route and stir like hell. I'd suggest you maybe do 7 lbs. light liquid extract instead. Add 1 lbs. at the start of the boil, stir it in well to avoid caramelizing the sugar on the kettle bottom. Add the remaining LME just after flameout, stir vigorously and let sit for 10 minutes to pasteurize. No need to boil all the sugar, this will bring out a few more IBU from the hops. I wouldn't steep the milled grain malt at 158F as you'd get a real chewy beer, I'd suggest 153-154F max. You are only steeping 1.5 lbs. of malt. With Nottingham yeast rig a blow off tube into a water container. Notty will really foul up your airlock with it's vigorous start of fermentation. I played with your ingredients a bit - if you knock your Caramel 120 down to eight oz and add 1 lb. of 2 row and use 7 lbs. Light LME instead of 6 lbs. Amber DME you will get an O.G of 1.057, an F.G.of 1.014, 5.6%ABV, 20.3 IBU and an SRM of 17.5 (still a dark brown). I do agree with the earlier poster that a bit more IBU might be in order. What do you think?

 

[BRGriffith]

Wow guys! Thanks for all the responses and advice. First, buzzerj, I would love to know what calculator you're using to get these results, I think it would be very useful to me. From what I'm hearing about my plan, it sounds like there are no major flaws and that it would work the way I have it, which is awesome! With regard to the actual recipe, I love really dark beer, and am not a huge fan of really hoppy beers, so I'm gonna keep it the way it is.
If I happen to not like it, I'll adjust it next time. I'll post up the progress and results as I go along, so thanks for all the help!

 

[buzzerj]

I actually just jumped on a simple free brew builder software from Brewmaster's Warehouse. You can dial in your recipe most anywhere. Beersmith is a good piece of software if you wish to buy one. Also check out Brewer's Friend if you want good calculators.

 

[Bob]

In my experience, that's an excessive amount of 120L crystal. That stuff is potent. When used in excess the flavor is very unpleasant. Trust me; I speak from experience.

In a beer like this I'd not exceed 4 ounces of 120L. I would add 8 ounces of 60L crystal to provide some caramel sweetness. 4 ounces of 120L will provide plenty of the flavors inherent in that grain.

Consider adding a character malt like Victory, Special Roast, or Biscuit. 4-6 ounces in five gallons is ample.

I've won awards with a Brown Ale that's simply dry malt extract, 60L crystal, and chocolate malt. Simple is cool.

For software I recommend BrewTarget. Free and dead simple to use.

 

[Yooper]

In my experience, that's an excessive amount of 120L crystal. That stuff is potent. When used in excess the flavor is very unpleasant. Trust me; I speak from experience.

In a beer like this I'd not exceed 4 ounces of 120L. I would add 8 ounces of 60L crystal to provide some caramel sweetness. 4 ounces of 120L will provide plenty of the flavors inherent in that grain.

Consider adding a character malt like Victory, Special Roast, or Biscuit. 4-6 ounces in five gallons is ample.

I've won awards with a Brown Ale that's simply dry malt extract, 60L crystal, and chocolate malt. Simple is cool.

For software I recommend BrewTarget. Free and dead simple to use.

I totally agree- there is one beer in the world that I made and enjoyed that used a whole pound of 120L- but it was an Arrogant Bastard clone, and it was extremely well hopped and bitter to counteract the huge amount of crystal- and it was a much higher OG beer so the 120L was a significantly less percentage of the recipe than in this beer.

I would cut the 120L in half at least, and probably 1/4 it, as Bob suggested. It's definitely strong stuff, and not in a good way when overdone.

Eight ounces of chocolate malt will come across as pretty roasty, if that is what you are going for. Also, chocolate malt isn't 'chocolate' in flavor- the name is more about the color. It's definitely a roasty flavor and maybe not exactly what you are looking for? There won't be any nutty flavors at all- unless you add some victory malt or other grain that will provide it.

 

[BRGriffith]

Okay, so it seems like you guys are keeping me from screwing up my first batch, which is awesome! Much appreciated. So I got a few more ingredients to play with from the LHBS. Again, my goal is a dark brown or porter type beer, so here's the revised plan:

6 Pound Amber DME
8 Ounce Chocolate Malt
4-8 Ounce Carabrown Malt
8 Ounce Caramel 60L
2 Ounce Styrian Golding
Water To 5.5 Gallon

So do you guys think this will give me the color (and flavor) I'm looking for? If not, any suggestions on a recipe that might yield something like that? The LHBS also had Briess Midnight Malt if that could help the situation .

 

[solbes]

Try plugging your recipe into the free brew calculator below. I like the omission of the 1 lb of 120L, this one looks better to me.

http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/calculator

You are in the range for color in both Brown Porter or American Brown Ale. A little on the lighter side, but should be a dark russet color with maybe a little garnet red color with light shining through. 22 SRM with the amber DME. If you switched it out to light DME (which might lower your FG in a good way), you're down at 20 SRM. Upping the carabrown to 8 oz from 6 oz gets you back to nearly 21 SRM.

 

[BRGriffith]

Oh, that is a brilliant piece of software! I'll be using that constantly. I'll just try and pair up the right flavors, and we should be right on track.

Edit:
After looking at the recipe calculator and seeing as you think this recipe looks good, I'm on board with this recipe with 8 ounce Carabrown . I'll be moving forward with this within the next couple days!