Mack and Jacks African Amber clone
One of the reasons that I started homebrewing is this beer. Beautiful Octoberfest like color, great session beer, although the abv is over 5%, I always had at least 4 of them at a sitting. My brother lives in seattle, and after 10 years of waiting for him to send me some in Massachusetts, I decided to make my own. I found this recipe on another site, and didn't see it here, so I thought I post. It's the byo version.
Mac & Jack?s African Amber (BYO, 3-4/2002, p. 18
Extract (with All grain option); 5 gallons; OG = 1.060; FG = 1.018; IBUs = 38; ABV = 5.5%
6.6 lbs Muntons light malt extract syrup
0.5 lbs Muntons light dry malt extract
1.0 lb Munich malt
0.5 lbs crystal 80
0.5 lbs carapils (dextrin) malt
9.3 AAU Centennial hops (1 oz @ 9.3% alpha) for 60 min
6.2 AAU Cascade hops (0.75 oz @ 8.3% alpha) for 2 min
4.2 AAU Cascade hops (0.5 oz @ 8.3% alpha) dry hopping
1 tsp Irish moss
White Labs WLP005 (British Ale) or Wyeast 1098 (British Ale) yeast
0.75 cups corn sugar for priming
Steep crushed malts in three gallons 150F water for 30 min. Remove grains. Add malt syrup and malt powder and bring to a boil. Add Centennial hops and Irish moss and boil for 60 min. Add Cascade aroma hops for last two min of boil.
When done boiling, strain out hops, add the wort to two gallons of cool water in sanitary fermenter, top off with cool water to 5.5 gal. Cool wort to 80F, aerate, and pitch yeast. Allow beer to cool over next few hours to 68-70F and ferment for 10-14 days. Add 0.5 oz Cascade pellets to dry hop your beer for five to seven days, the bottle. Pellet hops work well when dry hopping this beer.
All-grain
Replace extract with 9 lbs British pale malt. Mash all grains at 155F for 45 min. Collect enough wort to boil for 90 min and have 5.5 gal yield.
Decrease Centennial to 0.75 oz. Rest of recipe is same.
I did a few thing different, I couldn't get centennial, so I used 1.5 oz Cascade for the bittering. I added the irish moss at 10minutes. and I used the Wyeast 1056 American ale Instead of the british Ale. That's all they had at the LHBS, I hope it doesn't make that much difference, because I love this beer. Also, I'm not going to dry hop, because, well because I really don't like to, I added an ounce of Cascade at 30 min, and a half ounce of Cascade at flame out. I got an OG of 1.057
Just took a gravity reading, it was more for me to taste it, I just couldn't wait. reading was 1.23 so still a ways to go The taste is definately there, great citrus flavor from the hops, the 1.5 oz bittering Cascade was right on. Not exactly there yet, but enough to spark the memory of this fantastic beer. The Malt was perfect, great balance between the hops and Malt, and when I held it up to the light, it was that great color, reddish amber glow, hiding a deep dark secret. God I can't wait to drink this beer. For all you people out in Washington, you don't know how good you have to to have this beer everywhere.
Just transfered to secondary after 12 days, looked really good, i'll give it another week, then bottle, The fg was right on 1.018, so at least I got that going for me. I tasted it again after the second gravity reading, and it was fantastic, I'm going to carbonate this on the low side, as I remember the cabonation was a little low on tap, so i'm going to use coopers drops, and just use one per bottle.
Bottled it today, looks great, well see in 2 weeks.
Tastes great very close, the only thing that's missing is the yeast, keep that in mind when making this clone, use the british ale yeast. it's very very close, but it's missing the fruity esters that the British ale has. and because of that it's missing that grapefruit, citrus taste at the end that people are always searching for when they taste this beer. When I went to the LHBS that day, they didn't have any, so I went with the american ale, so there was a difference. I will definately make this beer again though, tastes great at room temp, or in the fridge, the mark of a great beer.
I am a Mac & Jacks fan myself and a new homebrewer (first batch almost done with primary fermentation, actually) and am going to try your extract recipe as my next attempt.
I am just a 10 minute drive from the Mac & Jacks brewery and would like to use their African Amber as a starting point for developing my own recipes - being a regular there, I may even try to get some of their yeast to employ - so thank you for the updates, I will keep you informed with how I am progressing.
Please do, I love their beer, and the next time im in seattle, i'm definately going to take a growler home with me, and pull the yeast. My brother is good friends with the owner of the Elysian, and he had no problem giving him everything he needed to make their immortal Ipa, I might even post the recipe here, they have it on their website, but it's a great ipa.
Here is the Elysian Pub's recipe for their immortal IPA. From what I can remember of it, it definately makes you feel immortal, even if just for a few hours.
For all of you east coast brewers that don't know the magic of seattle brew, I can tell you that it's worth the trip, and the Elysian is one of the reasons why . Great pub setting with some really great names, and some great beers.
The Immortal IPA
5-gallon batch
10.5 # Highly modified Pale malt
0.25 # 70°-80° Lovibond Crystal malt
0.5 # Munich malt
0.25 # Light dextrin malt such as Cara-hell
7.5 AAU Chinook hops
2 minutes before the end of the boil, add:
1 oz Amarillo hops & 0.5 oz Centennial hops
When kettle is turned off, add:
0.25 oz Centennial hops
Mash at c. 153•-154•F
Boil 90 minutes
Use attenuative American ale yeast such as Wyeast #1056
Had to delay the start until this weekend - going to stick with the recipe as you outlined, other than the liquid extract brand. Once it is ready I will try it side by side at the brewery before I hit them up for any of their yeast.
i'm down to my last 4 , I promised the guy who gets me bottles that I'd give him some, but I just had one tonight, and it's so damn good. I might have to make an excuse, and just give him two. The malt really comes through, and the pop of the hops is right on.
Bottled the batch on 6/7/2008 - Only got the gravity down to 1.020, can not remember what the OG was - higher than it should have been as I made it in 4-gallons instead of 5. Going to chill one down tonight and see how it turned out.
cool. let me know how it turns out.
Made another batch of this, but my LHBS didn't have any Munice malt, so I used Vienna.(Can you believe that, no Munich?) I also threw in an ounce of dried valencia orange peel that I had left over from doing the Belgian wit at 30 minutes, Took a quick og of 1.020 after 2 days, and tasted it, it tastes like a winner. The color isn't really there because of the Vienna, but everything else is right on. I'll be dry hopping this time, so I can't wait to pass it out at a labor day cookout. I promised everyone this beer, but it looks as though they will be getting somthing a little different. The orange peel really makes the Cascade in this pop.
This is the second time I made this beer, and I dry hopped it, which really made a difference. This beer came out fantastic, and with the addition of the orange peel made this taste right on. I think that may be what they use , I added a half ounce of dried valencia orange peel the supermarket brand , at 30minutes during a 60 minute boil, I used SAFEALE-04 which is the yeast i'll probably use for every ale I make besides Belgians. Not only did it give this beer the correct finish, but it formed a great compact sediment in my primary, and bottles. It also took my hops into the sediment, as I hopped in the primary with Cascade pellets after 4 days, and it saved at least another week, as I racked straight to bottles. The only thing that was off was the color, as I didn't have Munich, and used Vienna, so I'll keep striving until I get it just right. Besides that this beer tastes exactly like African Amber, even better, fresher tasting.
Made an all grain version of this, and can't wait to taste the results. If I nailed it like I think I did, this beer is going to be something special.
I split the batch, 5 gallons with Safeale S-04, and the other 5 with Wyeast 1098 British ale smack pack, I'll let you know what one is better, I hope it's the Safeale, as I love the S-04. I used the Peels from 2 Valencia oranges at 30 minutes, I really think they make a difference in this beer, and I won't make this batch without using orange peels again.
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