I purchased all this stuff and am planning on making the beer tomorrow. Just wondering if anyone sees any blaring issue that would make this suck.
Slick Dark Ale 1
Style: Brown Ale OG: 1.065
Type: Extract FG: 1.015
Rating: 0.0 ABV: 6.55 %
Calories: 218 IBU’s: 53.36
Efficiency: 40 % Boil Size: 5.57 Gal
Color: 18.1 SRM Batch Size: 5.00 Gal
Preboil OG: 1.063 Boil Time: 60 minutes
Fermentation Steps
Name Days / Temp
Primary 21 days @ 68.0°F
Grains & Adjuncts
Amount Percentage Name Time Gravity
3.15 lbs 31.03 % Dark Liquid Extract 60 mins 1.036
1.00 lbs 9.85 % Briess Caramel 60L 60 mins 1.034
6.00 lbs 59.11 % Amber Liquid Extract 60 mins 1.036
Hops
Amount IBU’s Name Time AA %
1.00 ozs 45.95 Warrior 60 mins 15.00
1.00 ozs 4.78 Liberty 10 mins 4.30
1.00 ozs 2.75 Fuggles 5 mins 4.50
1.00 ozs Cascade 14 days 5.50
Yeasts
Amount Name Laboratory / ID
1.00 pkg California Ale White Labs 0001
Additions
Amount Name Time Stage
1.00 tsp Irish Moss 15 mins Boil
First thing I would recommend when making extract recipes is to get light dry malt extract as your base. On dark and amber extracts you have no idea what the original brewer added to make the wort, could have been crystal malt or munich or vienna or who the hell knows what. So, to have control over the process you need to add your own specialty malts.
I be willing to bet the dark and amber extracts have plenty oif crystal malt in them already, and since extract beers tend to be on the sweeter side, I’d recommend to ditch the crystal malt.
You also may want to rethink dry hopping with cascades. I don’t think you need a dry hop on a malty beer like what it looks like you are going for.
HAHA! Not at all! This was exactly what I was hoping someone would say. What you said makes total sense. I think am going to save those 2 ingredients for lighter hoppy brew I am thinking of.
why not light liquid instead of dry? i don’t do any extracts (okay, first beer was extract but not since) and i understand about the dark, amber idea but not sure why dry vesus liquid
I THINK it is because dry is slightly more fermentable than even golden light liquid. but I could be totally off base on that. I like dry, can’t really pin down why, except perhaps that I feel it stays fresher longer so when I have a mason jar full in the cupboard for a few months to makes starters with it is still good.
I agree with this, unless you know exactly what is in the liquid extract. The first time I created a recipe of my own, it was similar to yours. I used nothing but dark and amber LME from a homebrew store I had never dealt with. The gravity finished at about 1.022. Way too sweet and tasted nothing like I’d planned. Stick with light LME or DME options until you’re comfortable with your supplier of extract.
Dry definitely stays fresher longer. I also believe it is slightly more fermentable. The reason I prefer to use dry extract as opposed to liquid is that I can measure dry extract with more accuracy, allowing me to control my OG more accurately.
What garc said. The dry stays fresher longer and tends to actually be lighter in color. The liquid tends to get oxidized easier, which both darkens and stales it quicker.
If you want something with color in it you can use straight amber extract. It’s already formulated with a variety of malts and it tastes great as-is. Same with dark extract. Once you understand those you can start mixing things up.
I have to disagree here with Euge. Most recipes start with a grist of a pale 2 row. Even an Irish stout is predominantly pale malt with a small addition of color grains and adjuncts (roasted barley and flaked barley) added in. The only exception to that rule is beers that start with a base of Vienna or Munich, but even here, these malts are not “dark” and even in the case of Munich most brewers add in a little pils to help out with the low diastatic power of the malt.
So if the ultimate goal is to eventually move to fashioning your own all grain recipes, why start with a dark or amber extract in which the wort is already made for you? You may as well not use any specialty malts in that case because the specialty malts were already added to the original wort. As I mentioned before, you could be compounding malts and too much of a particular specialty malt (like crystal) can throw a beer out of whack.
Since you already bought the extracts, you may as well go ahead and use them with the caveat that on your next beer you progress to formulating your recipes with a base of pale extract (preferably dry) and build your recipe around that base.
Also, be aware, as was mentioned above, that the dark extracts have a tendency to finish on the high side. I personally do not like “sweet” beers, you may sub in a little sugar to help dry the beer out. Sugar is near 100% fermentable and when substituted for malt will dry the beer out. I’d say no more than 5% in your case.
Well, I see your point but as slickdaddy420 is fairly new to brewing why not use an extract which has done all the work for you grist-wise? An opportunity to concentrate on consistency and quality and have great beer at the same time.
Combining as he is already leads to plenty of confusion and might be a little difficult to translate into a grain recipe further on down the line.
His best bet at this point is to use pale extract and then steeping grains- this will give him the best shot at translation to a grain recipe in the future.
Well, for one thing would have a hard time duplicating it on an all grain level. For another the dark LME finishes notoriously high. Not saying he shouldn’t go ahead and brew with it since he bought it but I would encourage him to move toward a pale DME base on next batch and use specialty malts for color and flavor.
Theoretically, there should be no difference in fermentability. It’s becasue dry stays fresher longer than liquid, which can easily get oxidized and stale.
Thanks for all the input guys. I did end up brewing it this weekend. I replaced the Caramel 60L with 8oz of table sugar(~5%). I do think the points about using light extracts and steeping grains for color(and flavors?) makes a TON of sense and will be doing that from now on I think. Its more interactive too I think I understand correctly now. Basically, the darker LME/DME basically already have the steeping part done for you.
