My first batch, a pretty tasty hefe, is barely ready, and since I have deemed it a success its on to batch 2. I am pretty undecided about what to make, but I am going for a extract brew with steeping grains. This should be a small step up from the super simple hefe I did. Other than that I am open to suggestions. I have been thinking about an amber or red ale, maybe a Scottish ale, I have even thought about trying a dubbel. Right now I am leaning towards a red ale. My preference is for a strong malt backbone and with a decent balance. I wouldn't mind a decent amount of hop flavor, but I could do without a lot of bitterness. There are a number of kits for Irish red ales that are available, and most have pretty good reviews, but they seem to all use liquid malt extract. I used dry with my hefe and for some reason I am put off by the liquid extract. So in summary I am pretty open to suggestions, but leaning towards a red ale. Anyone have any great extract recipes or have a specific kit they have had great success with? Anyway, let me know what you think I should do.
Ambers and stouts are very forgiving styles and are usually ready within 6-8 weeks if you treat it nicely. Scotch ales tend to take a little longer in my experience. (10 weeks before really drinkable at 6.5ish abv). My only recommendations are to think about what you want to drink and when you want to drink it. Lower abv beers tend to shape up quickly, whereas barleywines and RIS usually aren't worth even testing until 6 months. I'd stay away from the bigger beers if you're ever considering all grain brewing. It's a hellovalot cheaper. I'm pretty frugal when it comes to brewing and always try to squeeze every drop I can out of those big beers. Edit: When I used malt extract, I think I did better with the dry as well. It's more expensive, but it just seems like it's easier to store when you don't use the whole bag. I was worried about dumping half a can of LME in the fridge, you know?
Pick up the book Brewing Classic Styles. It has probably been the most help for me when creating my own extract with steeping grain recipes. It gives you the guideline for each style and at least one proven recipe. When brewing a new style I always start there first. And when creating your own recipe keep it simple. I recently watched Drew Beechum's presention on SMASH beers. The thing I really took away from it is not to over complicate things. He showed one of his first recipes and it had a bunch of different grains and hops with a lot of additions. Then he showed a more recent recipe that was much simpler but produced a better beer. I used to many types of steeping grains on my first recipe and ended up with a muddled beer. My best overall beer so far was mostly light DME with a little wheat DME. No steeping grians and two types of hops. Wish I had a good red ale recipe to pass along but haven't gone down that road yet. Good luck with the next brew.
FWIW, I agree about DME vs LME. Dried extract is easier to measure, less prone to become stale. If you're going to brew with extract, that's the way to go. As for the next beer: it's really all about what you want to drink! I would probably stay away from bigger beers (ie, stuff over about 1.065 OG) until you've got another brew or two under your belt, just because yeast management gets more tricky. But I'm sure you can handle it either way. I really like Scottish ales when it comes to malty beers, but as others have said, they do take some aging.
this was an early batch of mine that came out great, and it was a red (hoppy). You could adapt the recipe a little to suit your needs (less magnum bittering hops or a different bittering hops, substitute dry for liquid malt extract, etc). Al's red-eye ale I would stick with dry yeast.
Bear Republic Red Rocket Ale Clone Jamils Recipe from Beer du juor 8 lbs 12.0 oz LME Pale (Alexander's) (0.0 SRM) Extract 75.17 % 11.2 oz LME Munich (4.0 SRM) Extract 6.01 % 1 lbs Caramel Malt - 40L (Briess) (40.0 SRM) Grain 8.59 % 8.0 oz Caramel Malt - 120L (Briess) (120.0 SRM) Grain 4.30 % 8.0 oz Victory Malt (biscuit) (Briess) (28.0 SRM) Grain 4.30 % 3.0 oz Chocolate Malt (light) (200.0 SRM) Grain 1.63 % 1.10 oz Horizon [13.00 %] (60 min) Hops 41.2 IBU 1.00 oz Centennial [9.00 %] (10 min) Hops 9.4 IBU 1.00 oz Cascade [6.00 %] (10 min) Hops 6.3 IBU 1.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] (0 min) Hops - 1.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (0 min) Hops I haven't had the clone but Red Rocket is one of my favorite Reds and Jamil has a lot of great clone recipes.
Is that for a 5 gallon batch? Nearly 10lbs LME seems like a lot for a 5 gallon batch on top of another 2lb steeping grain.
Welll... it's only 8.7 lbs of LME (not nearly 10). And Red Rocket is a fairly big beer, more of an 'Imperial' red.
The second line is another 11.2 oz, so the total is 9lb 7.2 oz total LME. Six gallons makes more sense, it seems like it wasn't really twice a 5 gallon batch, but did seem more than a 5. After I posted that I was wondering if it was more like 7.
The really sad part is that first recipe was one I generated after 4-5 years in the hobby. However, it was my first Double IPA!
