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My first "from scratch" extract recipe
This is my first attempt at making my own recipe. I'm looking for any feedback on how this looks. Its a belgian abby ale. I took the style guidelines from the brewmasters bible and shot for the middle.
Amaranth Abby Ale
OG 1.0762
FG 1.012-1.020 ? not sure how to calculate this correctly? I'll let you know when I brew it.
IBUs 36
Potential ABV %8.5
1 lbs Caramunich Malt
1/4 lbs Biscuit Malt
1 lbs Candi sugar
7 lbs DME
2oz Hallertau (bittering)
1oz Saaz (finishing)
Wyeast 1214
Planing on 3-5 days in the primary 14 days in secondary and at least a month in bottles although I think this would definitely benefit from 3-6 months in the bottle (I'm just being realistic no way I'll be able to wait that long to drink it 
)
I'm really just trying my hand here at creating my own recipe and staying true to style. I plan on brewing this the first week of December. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated and anyone wanting to brew it and give feedback would be extremely appreciated.
Also I read lukedukes thread and found all this very useful info. Hows that coming along by the way. This will be my first attempt at a belgian as well. Thirsty if you read this go easy on me
You might be a homebrewer if:
You attempt to sparge your tea bag when making your morning cup.
Looks great to me.
I say you have to just try it and then learn and adjust from there.
Also I read lukedukes thread and found all this very useful info. Hows that coming along by the way. This will be my first attempt at a belgian as well. Thirsty if you read this go easy on me
Actually, my belgian is on hold for right now because I'm planning on doing a spiced vanilla porter for my next batch. I have a big X-mas party I throw every year that includes a beer tasting and I thought I would give out a bottle as party favors. But I might end up picking up my belgian ingredients this weekend while I'm at the store.
The only thing I would recommend would be to leave this brew in the primary at least 10-14 days to let the yeast really finish its job and clean up the beer. I have a big IPA (8.5% hopefully) thats been in the primary for close to 3 weeks now. I plan on racking it over to the secondary for dry hopping this weekend.
I also read something (probably on here - thirsty, i think!) about fermenting belgians around 65 degrees initially and then increasing the temps later on to the low to mid 70s to help bring out the esters. Might want to give that a try.
Good luck and let us know how it goes!
Rph Brewer, why only 3-5 days in the primary? I think that's way too soon to be transferring to a secondary. The beer may not be done fermenting after a few days and even if it is it will benefit from sitting on the yeast cake to allow the yeast to clean up any by products.
FirePitBrew wrote:
Rph Brewer, why only 3-5 days in the primary? I think that's way too soon to be transferring to a secondary. The beer may not be done fermenting after a few days and even if it is it will benefit from sitting on the yeast cake to allow the yeast to clean up any by products.
Someone once told me or I read somewhere that letting beer sit too long on the trub will give it off flavors. All of my batches (especially the lighter ones) seem to have a slightly sour aftertaste. I have heard that this may be caused by the krausen formed during primary fermentation and am now experimenting with a blowoff hose to help eliminate this.
I guess I just figured I was trying to balance optimum fermentation with minimum trub exposure. (I know I should use a hydrometer to be sure of optimum fermentation but I usually just wait untill the yeast falls out and rack over. I leave the hydrometer readings for prior to bottling because I hate wasting beer by taking a sample) However after reading your posts maybe not leaving it in the primary long enough is my problem. i.e. the yeast arn't cleaning up my beer.
If anyone has any more info on this I would love to figure out how to get rid of that "sourlike" aftertaste. It's not horrible and others who have tried my beer don't seem to know what I'm refering to or don't notice it so maybe its just me.
It may also be that I'm drinking my beer to soon as well.
People who are overly concerned with trub exposure or have problems related to sitting on the trub to long are using unhealthy yeast.
You should let the beer sit in the primary for at least 10 days. My normal practice is 14 days in primary. Depending on the strain of yeast I'll go right to packaging from there. However, I recently did do a secondary with US-05 American Ale yeast because that stuff just doesn't settle out very fast.
At least not as fast as the English Ale yeasts I regularly use.
Based on the comments above I did a quick search on when to rack to a secondary. I will definetly be changing my brewing habits. Sounds like 14 in the primary will be the order of the day for this brew. Maybe 14 more in a secondary, depends on clarity at day 14. Thanks to all who posted advice on this previously.
Just wanted to post an update.
This is my best brew ever! It sat for a little over 3 weeks in the primary (I did raise the temp a bit towards the end with a heating pad on low on the outside of a blanket.) Then I cold crashed for a month at around 35 degreen F. Its been in the bottle for a little over a week now and even though its not quite fully carbed yet I can't stop drinking it.
I can't wait to make this again. I think next time I'll add another lbs of extract and definately make a starter.
All in all a great beer. Thanks to all for the great advise.
Prost!
Good work! Glad we could all help.
Now I only wish we could all drink it.
CHEERS!
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