Beer Forum

Hello yall. This is the first recipe I have written myself and is kind of a frankenstein recipe combing some of my favorite commercial stuff with my own ideas thrown in. I like really aggressive beer with unique flavors so I wrote it with that in mind. Since I am totally amateur, I was wondering what you guys think, should I change anything? Does this sound awful? I want some expert opinions before I go buy ingredients.

Grains:
8 lbs malt extract
2 lbs 2-row
1.5 lbs amber malt
1.5 lbs crystal (carastan 30L)
1 lbs flaked barley
1 lb rye
Boling hops:
1 oz amarillo @60 min
1 oz simcoe @45 min
.5 oz warrior @30 min
1 oz cascade @10 minutes
0.5 oz warrior @10 minutes
(also one cup of honey in last 10 minutes)

Yeast: English Ale yeast (white labs)

Dry hops:
1 oz cascade
1 oz warrior
1 oz simcoe
(all added during secondary fermenter in small mesh bag)

Extras:
1 pint of grapefruit vodka tincture (added to secondary)

I really want to know what you guys think. Brutal honesty please!

And how much final volume are you shooting for? 5 gallons? 6 gallons?
Inquiring minds want to know...
Alan

5 gal.

my only suggestion is to cut down on the crystal and amber malt. Seems like a lot for 5 gallons.

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.., if you add your honey to the boil don't you lose a lot of the residuals that make honey what it is and your end product wouldn't have as much honey flavors... So I think you should add it at flame out or even a couple days into fermentation...

I don't think you need to worry about contamination bc the honey has some antiseptic properties that keep out the bugs.
Recipe looks great tho!

Josh

Not to be obvious but I note that you are planning this primarily as an extract brew but some of the grains you are adding need to be mashed to convert the starches. Were you planning on doing a mini-mash or were you just planning on steeping the grains?

Also your hop schedule runs to about 155 IBU's. First that's way more hop bitterness than its actually possible to get dissolved in your 5 gallons and second it may add an overly vegetal/harsh flavor to the beer. IHO, I'd scale back the hopping agenda to around 100 IBU's. I'd also add the extract to the brew kettle for only the last 15 minutes to optimize your hop utilization.

Definitely go with the honey at flame out or you'll lose a bunch of the desired aromatics.

OR...just do it the way you have it and make edits thereafter. Props for thinking outside of the kit beers!

One cup of honey isn't going to be noticeable.
This HAS to be a mini-mash. A simple steep won't work.
You have 2 lbs of 2 row, plus a lb of rye. Is it malted rye?
If so, that should be able to convert the rest. If not (ie, flaked), then you don't have enough
diastatic power in the 2 row to convert the rye, flaked barley, and amber malt.
I agree, a lb and a half of C30 is a lot (as stated before). If you really want that much crystal, add some complexity by dividing it up across a few lovibond ranges, like C20, C40 and C60. Otherwise that big of a single crystal addition by itself will end up cloying.

HTH-

Going to do partial mash.
Which grains and hops should I cut?
I only want subtle honey flavor.