Honey Brown 1.0 Misfire

Over the years I’ve made a variety of Honey Brown beers.  They tend to drink well at most times of the year and are quite food friendly.  Also, they tend to be less intimidating for those new to craft beer.

Efficiency was not as expected on the beer, requiring some last minuted adjustments.  These were reasonably easily handled, but changed the resulting beer somewhat.

This beer was quite good but as I refined it further I learned a valuable lesson in simplicity.  While Honey Malt is not the same as regular Crystal Malt, it is similar in some respects.  I found that there is little need to add both to a beer.  Now if I want to darken the beer more I find it much easier to add a pinch of Black Patent or Chocolate Malt in addition to the Honey or Crystal.  As well, for such a simple beer there is no need for two bittering additions, but I had wanted to finish the hops that I had on hand.

 

Recipe Details

Batch Size Boil Time IBU SRM Est. OG Est. FG ABV
6.1 gal 60 min 37.1 IBUs 17.2 SRM 1.051 1.010 5.4 %
Actuals 1.055 1.008 6.2 %

Fermentables

Name Amount %
Pale Malt (2 Row) US 9.75 lbs 73.58
Crystal Light - 45L (Crisp) 1.25 lbs 9.43
Honey Malt 1 lbs 7.55
Chocolate Malt 4 oz 1.89
Dextrose (Briess) 1 lbs 7.55

Hops

Name Amount Time Use Form Alpha %
Northdown 0.99 oz 60 min Boil Pellet 7.9
Magnum 0.25 oz 60 min Boil Pellet 14.4
Fuggles 0.35 oz 0 min Boil Pellet 4.8

Yeast

Name Lab Attenuation Temperature
British Ale (1098) Wyeast Labs 74% 64°F - 72°F

Mash

Step Temperature Time
Mash In 154°F 60 min

Notes

Didn't boil down to 23.00L, thereby hurting efficiency. Reading of OG was seemingly low (1.046 heat corrected to 1.049) due to heat of wort, leading to a late addition of the Dextrose which resulted in (1.052 heat corrected to 1.055) a change of style from an English Brown ale to an American one. To change to an English would also have to knock the IBU's down a little. Primed with 180g dextrose.

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