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Thursday, July 2, 2015

Amarillo Nights - "Not so Pale Ale"

Who doesn't like a good session-able Pale Ale?  It's an easy go to beer for those who like hops.  Most Pale recipes will call for up to 20 crystal malt.  When I first started brewing, I used a lot of Crystal 60.   Who didn't back in the day (two years ago).  Lately however, I have not been a fan of Crystal Malts opting to brew IPA's and most others without any crystal at all.  Instead, I've been experimenting with other steeping grains and one of my favorites is Special B.

I love the dark fruit raisiny flavors you can get out of Special B.  At the same time I was playing with other grains, I was also looking to develop a good low alcohol go to beer.  That's when I came up with the idea to do what I first called a Dark Pale Ale (Yes, I do understand the Irony).  I'm making this beer pretty much the same way I would have a Pale Ale only I'm eliminating the Crystal malt and adding Special B.

I'm now leaning more toward calling it a Brown Pale Ale to be somewhat consistent with the new BJCP style guides that were just released where they introduced a Brown IPA category.  While Brown Pale doesn't really exist, I'm hoping it does at some point because I really, really like this beer.   Either way, I really, really like this beer and will continue to have it take one of my taps until I grow tired of drinking it.

I've now brewed this beer three times.  The first time was simple...take a Pale Ale recipe and substitute Special B for Crystal.  After finishing that keg, I wanted to do it again but I thought it might be good if I added some Rye Malt to the mix.  To be honest, I don't know if just formulated wrong on the amounts of Rye vs. Special B or not because I just didn't like it so I went back to the original recipe and did one more substitution to see if I like it.   Good news is I have the original recipe ready if I don't like this newest version.    That said, it seems to be a good recipe to use as a base for a little experimentation. I've provided all three recipes below so please feel free to comment on #2 and #3 if  you have suggestions.  Especially take a look at #2 because I really didn't like this version and I typically love Rye IPA's so I'm guessing I either did something wrong in formulation or process.

Amarillo Nights - "Pale Ale" #1

Type: All Grain
Batch Size: 5.00 gal
Boil Size: 6.46 gal
Boil Time: 60 min
End of Boil Vol: 5.46 gal
Final Bottling Vol: 4.84 gal
Efficiency: 72.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 75.6 %
Ingredients

Amt
Name Type # %/IBU
8 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 88.9 %
1 lbs Special B Malt (180.0 SRM) Grain 2 11.1 %
1.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 3 41.3 IBUs
0.50 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Boil 20.0 min Hop 4 6.9 IBUs
0.50 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 5 3.4 IBUs
0.50 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 0.0 min Hop 6 0.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg WLP090 (San Diego Super Yeast) Yeast 7 -


Gravity, Alcohol Content and Color
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 4.6 %
Bitterness: 51.7 IBUs
Est Color: 17.9 SRM
Measured Original Gravity: 1.043 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.010 SG
Actual Alcohol by Vol: 4.3 %
Calories: 141.5 kcal/12oz


Mash
Single Infusion @ 156.0/60Mins

Amarillo Nights - "Pale Ale" #2 (With Rye Malt)

Type: All Grain
Batch Size: 5.00 gal
Boil Size: 6.46 gal
Boil Time: 60 min
End of Boil Vol: 5.46 gal
Final Bottling Vol: 4.84 gal
Efficiency: 72.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 75.6 %

Ingredients

Amt Name Type # %/IBU
6 lbs 8.0 oz Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 65.0 %
2 lbs 8.0 oz Rye Malt (4.7 SRM) Grain 2 25.0 %
1 lbs Special B Malt (180.0 SRM) Grain 3 10.0 %
1.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 4 41.3 IBUs
0.50 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Boil 20.0 min Hop 5 6.9 IBUs
0.50 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 6 3.4 IBUs
0.50 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 0.0 min Hop 7 0.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg WLP090 (San Diego Super Yeast) Yeast 8 -


Gravity, Alcohol Content and Color
Bitterness: 51.7 IBUs
Est Color: 18.4 SRM
Measured Original Gravity: 1.043 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.007 SG
Actual Alcohol by Vol: 4.7 %


Mash Profile
Mash Name: Single Infusion, 156/60Mins


Amarillo Nights - "Pale Ale" #3

Type: All Grain
Batch Size: 11.00 gal
Boil Size: 13.54 gal
Boil Time: 120 min
End of Boil Vol: 11.54 gal
Final Bottling Vol: 10.50 gal
Efficiency: 75.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 75.7 %

Ingredients
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
18 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 90.0 %
2 lbs Special B Malt (180.0 SRM) Grain 2 10.0 %
1.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - First Wort 60.0 min Hop 3 20.7 IBUs
4.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.80 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 20.0 min Hop 4 19.9 IBUs
2.0 pkg WLP090 (San Diego Super Yeast) Yeast 5 -
1.00 oz Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days Hop 6 0.0 IBUs

Gravity, Alcohol Content and Color
Est Original Gravity: 1.049 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.009 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 5.2 %
Bitterness: 40.7 IBUs
Est Color: 17.3 SRM
Measured Original Gravity: 1.048 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.010 SG
Actual Alcohol by Vol: 5.0 %
Calories: 158.4 kcal/12oz

Mash Profile
Mash Name: Single Infusion 152/60Mins (Wanted Medium body mash because I'm upped the Alcohol a bit and wasn't as concerned about compensating for under 5%)

NOTE: This batch is still fermenting.  It was brewed on 7/28/2015.  I will provide notes on it's tasting once it's legged up and ready to sample.


Tasting Notes: 
#1: This so far is my favorite.  Very easy to drink.  It was brewed to be a full bodied beer mainly because I was trying to keep it as a session beer and wan't expecting much body to come from the grain bill itself.   As it turned out, it was perceived as a medium bodied beer which is where I like my Pale Ales to be.   Very nice aroma.  Definitely picked up the darker notes from the Special B.  Little dark fruit and some nice raisin.  Amarillo came through quite nicely as well due to the dry hop addition.

#2:  This so far is my least favorite.  I'm still trying to power this one down.  It's not a down the drain beer but it's not what I was shooting for.  At this point, I'm thinking it was either too much Rye malt as 25% is very high or the Rye and Special B don't play off each other very nicely.  I'm pretty confident it was just too much Rye.  That said, what I didn't like about it was that it had a very astringent bite to it.  The flavor itself isn't bad but the astringency was hard to handle.  Especially at first.  Now that it's about 5 months old, it's smoothed out quite a bit and is much easier to drink but I'm looking for a quick beer that I can brew all the time and have on hand.  This recipe is not it.  I may try Rye again in the future but I'll do it at a much lower percentage and in a small batch since I'm now doing 10 gallons of this stuff at a time.

#3: TBD


Updates:


  • Friday July 3 - Gravity reading 1.006.  Dry Hopped with 4 oz. of Amarillo hops. 
  • Friday July 17 - gravity reading 1.004 (nice and dry). Kegged after cold crashing to 40 degrees.