Looking for recipe input - Imperial honey nut brown

Greetings fellow BA'ers,

As a frame of reference, I brew in a bag, have only 2 solo batches under my belt, have brewed with a group of guys from work numerous times before that. My first batch was an extract with steeping grains IPA which was a good learning experience (no comment on the beer...). Second batch was a hoppy APA modeled after the ingredient list of Great Lakes Alchemy Hour DIPA which turned out pretty damn well.

That said, I'd really like to make batch #3 as good as possible as I'll be sharing it with some old friends at a golf outing in early May. I want to brew a brown ale with higher than typical gravity and very noticeable honey and nut flavors. I also intend to split the batch at bottling and add coffee to maybe 2 gal of the 5.5 gallon batch. Brew day scheduled for this Saturday, LHBS run probably after work Fri.

Here's what I got so far; any and all input would be greatly appreciated.

Honey Nut Brown Ale – 5.5 gal into carboy
1.073 Target OG

Grain Bill
12.5 lbs Marris Otter
1 lb Honey Malt
1 lb Victory
.5 lbs Flaked Oats (cereal mash)
.25 lbs Pale Chocolate

Hop Schedule
FWH .75 oz Premiant
15 1 oz Mt Hood
0 1 oz Mt Hood

Mash 151* for 60 minutes
Whirlfloc -3
WLP013, cultured from batch #2 bottle dregs, multi step starter (in progress and looking good)
63* ambient fermentation temp through active fermentation, 68* after
Fermcap in primary

Thanks!

 

Much appreciated on all accounts, inchrisin.

Is there any harm to a cereal mash for flaked oats? I got generic instant oats from the grocery store which certainly look like flaked oats, but the ingredients list calls them rolled oats. I wanna make sure i don't stab myself in the foot.

I'm looking for a sweeter beer since I've been on a huge hop kick and am looking for a break.

My next coldest available ambient temp is in the low 50's, so I'll either keep the carboy in some water or rotate some ice packs during peak activity at 63*. I appreciate the advice. I'm definitely in the market for a used chest freezer and adding temp controls in the near future though.

Thanks again
Curt

 

Thanks, I did not realize that rolled oats could be mashed regularly. I will omit that step and RDWHAHB :-)

 

I've used a lb of crystal in a beer before, but never more than .25 lb of honey malt in a beer. I didn't want it to get lost in a bigger beer. Would you suggest backing off on the honey malt or lowering the mash temp to avoid cloying sweetness? I had picked 151* as it seemed a lot of people were getting good attenuation around there.

I was thinking it might help balance out some of the honey sweetness. I'll definitely yank it if I decide to lower the honey malt qty


Thanks for all the input so far, you guys rock.

 

Thanks, I really appreciate all of the suggestions. I'm going to back off to 1/2# on the honey malt and replace with base malt.

Do you think I should bump up the mash temp a degree or two to compensate for the loss of unfermentables?

 

Tasty - Will do.

Fat - Noted. I'll probably shoot for 152 too

Brewing starts bright and early on Saturday!

 

13# MO
.5# Honey Malt
Mash 152*

Everything else same as first post.

I'm keeping the FO addition because YOLO. Also going to hold off on the special roast for this batch... I'd like to test it out in a milder beer first.