Method: Extract
Specialty grains: US crystal malt, German dark Munich malt.
Hops: Chinook (bittering), Styrian Goldings (flavour, aroma, and dry hop)
Yeast: Irish Ale (liquid)
ABV: 5.5% (the recipe suggests 4.8%).
Yield: 23 litres
Tasting notes: As you can see, it pours a lovely amber colour with an off-white frothy head. Basically, until I start all-grain brewing, everything is going to be a lovely amber colour.You get a fresh hit of hops on pouring, with hints of melon. On drinking you can taste the sweet malt with slight hints of caramel. The medium body carries the bitterness of the hops which lingers slightly on the palate. I don't mind this - it's quite nice. I may make this one again with an all-grain brew to see the difference that makes.
It's time to start experimenting!
My new resolution is to move away from extract brewing, and to start brewing smaller batches of all grain beer. By brewing in smaller batches (11.4 litres which gives me 15 bottles) I can experiment more and have a higher turn over, hopefully developing a better sense for making beer.
This Jaggery Pale Ale is a recipe found in Randy Mosher's Radical Brewing which adds a twist to a classic pale ale recipe with the addition of jaggery and fenugreek.
Turns out, jaggery sugar, adds a maple flavour to the beer while the fenugreek enhances those tones in the final beer. It also has a lot of hops - 65g of East Kent Goldings in the flavouring boil which is approximately three times as much as I add to a brew twice the size. It will be interesting to see what it turns out like - I figure this would be a nice beer to accompany a curry!
Gravity: Original Gravity: 1.064 (target 1.076) Final Gravity: 1.010 ABV: 7.5% (target 6.5 - 7.3%)
Yield: 12 litres
Brew method: All-grain with US batch sparging.
Notes: Once again, my original gravity is off by almost ten points, which makes me think that possible my mash tun efficiency is quite low. The odd thing, is that I always seem to hit the ABV after fermentation. Go figure.
