I started out to make 10 gals of mild essentially as large starters for some upcoming 20 gal batches.
But, my efficiency was higher than I had expected. OG was about 1.045, was aiming for 1.038 or so.
My recipe was:
13 lbs Maris Otter
1 lb C45
1 lb C120
4 oz pale chocolate.
2 oz EKG@60
1 oz EKG at flameout with a 15 min stand
Split into two 5 gal batches. One with a very fresh Wyeast West Yorkshire, no starter. The other with two older but not expired vials of WLP Irish Ale.
I wasn’t anticipating the gravity so I didn’t use a starter, these were supposed to be a starter.
My question, if I had to categorize the beer, without tasting it I know it’s tough but would this be more similar to a Northern English Brown or a Best Bitter?
Thanks.
Looks to me like you’re smack dab in Irish Red territory, so you could certainly call the one with Irish yeast an Irish red. Otherwise it comes closest to a Northern Brown, but not quite brown enough. You could try adding a little tea made out of a quart of water and some roasted barley or darker chocolate malt if you want to bring the color down another notch, but it’s your beer so of course this is optional – you’ve still made good beer! But I think you’ll be alright calling it a red ale – one Irish, and one English I guess, but should fit as an Irish if you wanted to BJCP it.
I normally use roasted barley in an Irish Red which is what the plan is for the next one with the Irish yeast. I may do the roast barley tea as you suggest to finish it up a bit closer and round out the roast finish. For the other, I won’t add anything at this stage, it will just be beer or, I may even water it down to get it back in the mild range since I wanted some low alcohol beer out of this.