I’m generally not a huge fan of the Brown Ale style. I feel like I’ve said that more than once before. See my Uptown Coffee Brown
So for this brew I decided to try and make a Brown Ale with no adjuncts (i.e. Coffee & Vanilla). I chose a water profile (getting better at that), malt bill, and mash schedule to address one of biggest issues with most Brown Ale’s I’ve had. Normally I find them to have a thin body and lacking in flavor.
Malt:
- Pale Malt, Golden Promise – 84%
- Brown Malt, Crisp – 4%
- Carafa III, Weyermann – 4%
- Caramel Malt 40L, Briess – 4%
- Pale Chocolate, Thomas Fawcett – 4%
Hops:
- .5 oz Columbus 14.2% AA at T-60 in boil
- .5 oz Cascade 6.9% AA at T-5 in boil
Yeast: I forgot to write down what I used, but I’m pretty sure it was SafAle US-04.
The end result is a 5% 25 IBU full bodied very dark Brown Ale. The variety of malts used definitely add a depth of character/flavor. I’m really digging this brew. Maybe I’ve under carbonated it, but one strike against this beer so far is the foam recedes fairly rapidly. Maybe the dark malts inhibit foam retention? Either way I need to work on that.
UPDATE (4-15-2021)
I really liked this brew. It kicked this past past weekend. I decided to send this beer to the National Homebrew Competition. It will be interesting to see what they think of it.