New Recipe Help - First All Grain - Oat Pale Ale

[Brew Engineer]

So, I'm planning my first all grain batch. Not sure when I'll be able to brew it, I still have a few weeks to heal from hernia surgery, but I need some help formulating. Specifically, help in creating a good mesh of hop flavors, given the varieties I have to choose from.

Please offer suggestions, but here's where I am so far:

Oat Pale Ale

6 gallon batch

Grain bill:
9 lbs 2 Row Rahr Malt
1 lb Fawcett Oat Malt
.5 lbs Cara Pils
.75 lbs Victory Malt
1 lb Munich Malt


This is my hop inventory I have to choose from:

Type AA Oz
--------------------------
Amarillo 7.0 3
Cascade 5.9 1
Cascade 7.8 2
Centennial 8.0 3
Chinook 11.1 1
Columbus 12.3 1
Horizon 10.9 1
Santium 4.6 2

Any suggestions on hop combinations to really make this pop? I'm thinking of some combination of Amarillo or Cascade with Centennial for late flavor hops, but I'd like opinions

Thanks crew!

[MF Tyler]

Your recipe looks fairly similar to the one from BCS except using a 1 lb of oats to sub for 1/2 lb of wheat - that seems like a good plan to me.
If you're going to use the malt bill you might as well try the hop bill as well and use that as a jumping off point.
So...my suggestion...
35 IBUs Horizon for bittering
.25 oz cascade & centennial at 10 mins
and .5 oz cascade & centennial at 0 mins
good luck with you recipe.

[BDawg]

BE-

While I really think the oats will be fine, I do ask myself why you want to fuck around with them on your first bach? Oats get sticky, you haven't done an AG batch yet, let alone gotten comfortable enough with your equipment to be able to instictively deal with a stuck mash. I say stack the deck in your favor. Leave the oats out this time and do a regular old Pale Ale. Better yet, take your favorite Pale Ale recipe and let us convert it to AG for you so you know how it's SUPPOSED to taste ahead of time. No need to be fancy here. You will have enough to deal with without worrying about shit like oat gooeyness and oat haze, etc.

Best of luck- Ask any and all questions here and somebody'll be online to answer it.

[Brew Engineer]

You make a good point, and I'll consider that. I don't really have a "house" pale ale though. And I've been jonesing to try an oat pale ale ever since Macgruffus was bragging about his months ago.

We'll see. I'll post my brew day summary when I can get the beer brewed.

[mediumsk]

+1 to what Bdawg said.

for hops, bitter with horizon for clean bitterness, or chinook if you want some grassy harshness, I've found amarillo and centennial play nicely together if your looking for a fruitier beer

[tavish2]

You make a good point, and I'll consider that. I don't really have a "house" pale ale though. And I've been jonesing to try an oat pale ale ever since Macgruffus was bragging about his months ago.

We'll see. I'll post my brew day summary when I can get the beer brewed.

my house pale ale is really simple

11.5# pale 2row
.25 # C20
.25 # C40

mash at 148 for 60-90 min
pick your favorite hops

7 gallon batch after boil, 78% eff

1.048 Estimated OG

do about 45 IBUs with two of your favorite hops

I do cascade for bittering
about 1.5 oz for around 30 ibus
and finish with a few amarillo additons. gives you a nice dry hop forward pale ale with a slight sweetness. it definately tastes like another to me

[Brew Engineer]

BE-

While I really think the oats will be fine, I do ask myself why you want to fuck around with them on your first bach? Oats get sticky, you haven't done an AG batch yet, let alone gotten comfortable enough with your equipment to be able to instictively deal with a stuck mash. I say stack the deck in your favor. Leave the oats out this time and do a regular old Pale Ale. Better yet, take your favorite Pale Ale recipe and let us convert it to AG for you so you know how it's SUPPOSED to taste ahead of time. No need to be fancy here. You will have enough to deal with without worrying about shit like oat gooeyness and oat haze, etc.

Best of luck- Ask any and all questions here and somebody'll be online to answer it.

I took your advice, and dropped the oats, but otherwise used the same grain bill. I ended up getting 80%+ efficiency and the day went well! Thanks for the advice!

[BDawg]

Great job, dude. I saw the pics in the other thread. Sweet!

1.058 makes a great pale ale.