Carnegie and Co. Stark Porter - Tasting Notes

My first attempt at a Porter is now three months old and ready to be drunk. I chose an unassuming recipe for my first attempt and am now thinking it might be difficult letting it sit for an extra three months at which point the flavours are meant to peak.

Method: Extract

Specialty grains: Dark Crystal malt, Chocolate malt and black malt.

Hops: Northern Brewer (bittering), Styrian Goldings (flavour and aroma) 

Yeast: Irish Ale (liquid)

ABV: 5.5% (the recipe suggests 5.5%).

Yield: 23 litres

This pours with a cracking cream coloured head as you can see (possibly it's a  little too carbonated, but that doesn't appear to be a problem so far) and when you take a sip, you are presented with a very smooth bodied beer that has slight bitter notes on the back palate. Clear coffee notes are present up front and possible biscuit flavours hide in the back. It laces well, from start to finish, and that is where you find your first problem. It finishes altogether too quickly and you find yourself cursing that you didn't put more in the fridge.

Fat Angel - Tasting Notes

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.

Carnegie and Co. Stark Porter - Brewing Notes

I have never brewed a porter, or any type of stout before so I thought I would choose something  unambitious for my first one.

D. Carnegie and Co. Stark Porter is a, full-flavoured beer with plenty of roasted malt, toffee, chocolate and coffee flavours with a dry finish (according to the write up). It's brewed in Stockholm, Sweden and as such, should be a great beer for enjoying during the colder months. The simple list of ingredients and means I'm not too concerned if this goes horribly awry - something I wouldn't be happy about if I was brewing an Imperial Stout where the high starting gravity would require a considerably higher expense in grain or dried malt extract.


This baby should be ready for drinking in May, 3 months after pitching the yeast.

The beautifully black, inky, wort; a combination of chocolate, dark and black malts.

Gravity: 1.058 (Target 1.057). FG 1.020 (target 1.014) ABV 5.5% (target 5.5%)

Yield: 23 litres (target 23 litres)

Brew method: Extract with US batch sparging for the specialty grain.

Notes: The dark crystal, chocolate and black malt produce a beautiful black coffee colour which, because of the darkness, means I will get a better approximation of the correct colour for the beer. Most of my beers have the same colour profile because the local homebrew shop only stocks one variety of dried malt extract, so I am unable to get the lighter colours for my pale ales and lagers.


*edit* I haven't managed to hit my final gravity which a little disappointing. I'm not sure as to the cause of this - possibly the yeast was at the end of it's life. The brewing calculator still thinks I've managed to hit my target ABV so there is a plus. I'm wondering whether this will make this porter taste a little sweeter than it should. Who knows - I'll have to wait until mid-may before I'll know.

The Brewer's Assistant, showcasing the German Northern Brewer hops used for bittering

Magic Hat: Fat Angel

Magic Hat is a small brewery out of South Burlington in Vermont, U.S.A. While we were living in New York we found that there were very few palatable beers on tap, Magic Hat and Blue Moon being the two staples that we turned to. Many an evening was rescued by the appearance of the 'Magic Hat' above the bar tap and so this a homage to that upstanding brewery that made the bars of New York bearable.

Fat Angel is no longer produced by Magic Hat, however, it was the standard beer on tap so I have a fair idea how it should turn out. It's an American Pale Ale which takes crystal and Munich malts for the colour and flavour, and Styrian Goldings for the flavour and aroma. This beer is also dry-hopped, so I'm expecting a very tasty and citrusy beer by the end of it.

Gravity: 1.054 (Target 1.050). FG 1.016 (target 1.012) ABV 5.5% (target 4.8%)

Yield: 23 litres (target 23 litres)

Brew method: Extract with US batch sparging for the specialty grain.

Notes: I've upped the quantities so that I may get a full 23 litre batch out of the brew. So far, the recipe appears to have scaled well.

McNeill's Firehouse Amber Ale - Tasting Notes

Method: Extract

Specialty grains: US crystal malt.

Hops: East Kent Goldings (bittering, flavour and aroma) and Cascade (dry hop)

Yeast: Irish Ale (liquid)

ABV: 5.3% (the recipe suggests 5.1%).

Yield: 19 litres

Tasting notes: Only 4 weeks in the bottle and it's ready for imbibing, pouring a wonderfully rich amber coloured body with an exaggerated stark white frothy head.

You are instantly hit with the lovely Cascade hop aroma and the cloudy body tastes very smooth as it glides down your throat. For a dry-hopped beer, there is very little lingering bitterness, allowing the full malt flavour and hop fruits to caress your palate. It's a well balanced beer and makes for a refreshing drink with a quick finish. I'm very happy with the outcome of this beer - this is one that is going to get repeated brews!

McNeill's Firehouse Amber Ale

This is another beer that uses East Kent Goldings for it's bittering, flavouring and aroma hops. This simple Amber Ale, coloured with US Crystal Malt, gets dry-hopped with Cascade to give it a bit more character.

Gravity: 1.054 (Target 1.055 - 1.056). FG 1.017 (target 1.016-1.017)  ABV 5.3%

Yield: 19 litres (target 18.9 litres)

Brew method: Extract with US batch sparging for the specialty grains

Notes: Straight forward brew. I transferred it to the secondary fermenter for dry hopping after about 5 days to ensure there was still some yeast activity to ensure a layering of CO2 (which will prevent oxidisation). I also boiled up a small amount of DME and finings to kick start extra fermentation and to hopefully clear the beer a bit more before bottling. This was all added during the dry hopping phase.


I also reclaimed the Irish Ale yeast from the brew for my next three beers: HobGoblin Extra Strong Ale, Tom Mik's Imperial Stout and, Shipyard LongFellow Ale.

Lucknow IPA - Brewing notes

For me, the word Lucknow evokes the drama and bloodshed of the Siege of Lucknow during the Indian Mutiny of 1857. The Occupy! movement around the world has nothing on the Indian Rebellion where the native population of a country took it upon themselves to try and shrug off what amounted to government sponsored corporate control of an entire country and it's occupants. Imagine having your entire country run by a company whose only purpose was tow ring as much wealth out of you and your natural resources to send overseas? To say things were in a bad way is an understatement. This was colonialism at its most unsavory, and it took the brilliance of Gandhi before independence was finally achieved, ninety years later.

Reading the histories of the many wars across Queen Victoria's empire, and the comical recounting by the fictional Harry Flashman, it was the battles of the Indian Rebellion that stood out the most to me, much as did this beer when I was flicking through my book of recipes.

It's an American Indian Pale Ale heavily hopped with Cascade, one of the most popular American varietals. One of the more important reasons for choosing this ale was it gave me an opportunity to use the London Ale yeast I had reclaimed from my Indian Summer Pale Ale (is there a theme here?).

Chinook and Cascade bittering hops

After the sparge (using my homemade mini-mash tun)

The boil

Gravity: 1.062 (Target 1.059)

Yield: 20 litres (target 18.9 litres)

Brew method: Extract with US batch sparging for the specialty grains

Notes: This went surprisingly smoothly and my method of using large ice blocks when topping up the water in the fermenter means I can get down to temperature in about 30 minutes. The yeast starter (using the reclaimed London Ale yeast) hadn't really kicked off when I pitched it so I'm just going to hope that it was reactivated and all will be well. 


*Edit* Twelve hours later and I have a very healthy krausen forming on top of my wort. Looks like the yeast survived!

My only frustrations today was finding out that the Brew shop had left off 3 kg of light malt extract from my order so I was unable to put the Ginger ale on as planned.


*Edit* 6 Days later, fermenting activity has subsided so I'm now moving onto the dry hopping stage. This will add extra hop flavour and whole lot of hop aroma. 
To dry hop, you add the hop pellets to a secondary fermenter and then drain the primary fermenter right into the second. There is no need to worry about contamination at this stage as most of the fermentables (read "food for infections to grow on") have already been converted to alcohol, and the hops have antibacterial properties (hops were originally used in beers as a preservative which is why IPAs are heavily hopped - they required a highly level of hop oil to preserve the liquid for the long voyage on ships from England to the Indian subcontinent where they served to slake the thirst of the colonials).


The beer will stay in the secondary fermenter for 2-3 weeks till it clears further (meaning the sediment will settle out of suspension) and it will then be bottled in the regular way.

transferring the beer to the secondary fermenter

Japanese Lager - Ashahi Dry clone

I'm very fond of Japanese beers (at least the ones they export. The Japanese do some strange things with beer on occasion, such as All Clear - a zero alcohol beer made by Suntory. It may be zero alcohol, but it is also zero taste.) and so when I found this recipe in Clone Brews I jumped at the chance to make it. Whilst the end result does not really match the commercially made Asahi, I am very happy with the results.

Method: Extract 

Specialty grains: German light crystal malt.

Hops: Czech Saaz.

Additional: Rice Syrup extract.

Yeast: Pilsen lager (liquid)

Comments: I added finings to clear the beer in the primary fermenter and bottled with carbonation drops after a week and a half.

ABV: Not recorded (the recipe suggests 4.1%).

Yield: 19 litres

Tasting notes: This was ready to drink after 4 weeks and is a very refreshing brew. It has a bit more body than the commercial version and the flavouring hops are more present on the tongue. The dryness from the Rice syrup is there and it finishes clean so it tastes similar and feels like an Asahi however, when drinking you can't help but feel there is more beer there; fruitier and more complex. I am very happy with this one. The only problem will be keeping it all for myself. In fact, scratch that. It's a terrible beer - worst I have ever made. It made me violently ill. Twice.

What I learnt: I managed to get the wort down to temperature quite quickly by adding ice instead of water when making up the wort to 18.9 litres in the primary fermenter. One thing I didn't manage which may have changed the flavour was to keep the fermenter under 15 degrees during fermentation (it was just too warm. I even tried leaving it out on the balcony overnight in the chill air but could not get the temp down - and I have no space for a second fridge in our one bedroom apartment) so the yeast had done it's work in under a week. I'll probably think twice before brewing another lager (which require brewing temperatures between 6-11 degrees), particularly now as Summer has finally arrived.

Belgian Ale - Duvel clone

The first recipe I tried from Clone Brews was an ambitious Belgian Ale. I managed to knock up a mini mash tun from a 10 litre esky and some steel braid and then set off to buy the specialty grains. For a first attempt I think it went smashingly well.
As with all recipes that I take from this book. I shall only be listing what ingredients I used. It is up to you to hunt down the original recipe (let no one accuse me of not respecting another man's copyright!)

Method: Extract 

Specialty grains: Belgian aromatic malt, German light crystal malt.

Hops: Styrian Goldings (bittering), Czech Saaz.

Additional: Belgian clear candi sugar.

Yeast: Belgian Ale yeast (liquid)

Comments: I added finings to clear the beer in the primary fermenter and bottled with carbonation drops after a week and a half.

ABV: 7.8% (compared to 8.5% from the recipe).

Yield: 19 litres

Tasting notes: This hits you like a velvet glove filled with a brick. Strong and fruity. The alcohol sits there behind the flavours ready to give you a black eye as soon as you drop your guard (which is after 2 pints). As you can see from the picture, it developed a great white frothy head made up of fine bubbles and the beer was clear with an excellent colour and has a short finish (which I learnt  is a characteristic of malty or sweeter beers (low hops) ). Compared to a commercial bottle of Duvel, this recipe is very close. 

What I learnt:

I ended up putting a little to much liquid into the wort when trying to cool the liquid enough to pitch my yeast. and I think this affected the final ABV however; I'm not too fussed as this tastes fantastic.