Figured that might be the case. Denny’s Waldo Lake uses a bunch of carared and I’ve made that before. The recommended usage rate is up to 25%, but I didn’t typically associate maibocks with a lot of crystal malt. I could be wrong but was intrigued by the ingredient choice!
I rarely use more than 5% crystal in any beers (especially lagers) out of personal preference.
I know that some brewers are using Red X in place of crystals to get a malty profile. Just a thought.
Good call. I love Red X at the right amount. Seems like 15-20% would do it. I am chilling the batch right now so it’s too late for that…
Final recipe is
75% weyermann pilsner
25% weyermann munich I
21g Magnum FWH
28g Sterling 10 min
14g Crystal Dry Hop
14g Sterling Dry Hop
Yellow Balanced Water
Mash ph = 5.4
90 minute mash at 150F
S-189 yeast slurry harvested on Tuesday
1.070
~34 IBU
Couldn’t be happier with how this turned out. Finished at 1.014. Needs a coulple more weeks to fully smooth out. Loving a bit more balance from higher bitterness.
I usually find their articles well worth the time to read but I strongly disagree with 40% Maris Otter in any German style recipe. One of my numbskull brewers once accidentally used Maris Otter in our Oktoberfest recipe and the MO was unmistakably present in the beer. It tasted English, not German.
I just scale up my Helles and add a nice charge of Tettnanger to my Helles bock. Mostly pilsner malt with some cara foam.
That’s great that it turned out nice. The one I made recently didn’t last long which speaks to how much my wife and friends liked it. I’ll be making this every spring from now on.
Since I don’t brew beers like this I am very surprised at how drinkable it is for 7.4%. I may make some tweaks next time but I think it’s a keeper. I am thinking about doing it in the fall instead of my festbier which it’s basically a bigger version of.