Formulation help/advice please

[PaddyX21]

Hi gents,

So I quite fancy having a go at formulating my own recipes, but not yet entirely sure what I'm doing!

I would really like to start with a clone to help me understand the process, so let's base it around a beer I really enjoy, the Shepherd Neame seasonal ale, Late Red.

http://www.shepherdneame.co.uk/brands/ales/late-red

There are plenty of clues and pointers here, which is useful!
However it also leaves me with a few questions that I hope you can help me with.
When it says "triple hopped" does it mean that EKG and Cascade are two of the three hops used, or that they are added at three stages?
It tells me that pale malt and crystal malt are used, but is that sufficient to live upto the tasting notes, or do they hint at other speciality items. Also will crystal alone be sufficient to provide the rich red colour of this ale?
SN pasteurise their bottled beers unfortunately, so I will also require some help choosing a yeast for the brew, which I realise is a minefield in and of itself! Again do the tasting notes give a hint here, or would any generic ale yeast be fine?

What I suppose I'm more after is an explanation of the thought process you have gone through to get to the answers, rather than the answers themselves!

By playing around in software programs then I can generate a recipe of sorts to get me in the right region, but hopefully some of you will be able to help me out here

I'd rather use DME than LME, but am open to persuasion either way.

Ask away on as many questions as you need to help answer my queries, especially if you aren't UK based, and have never tasted it! For that matter I've no idea how far across the UK the SN seasonals make it!

Thanks for any pointers you may be able to offer
P

[seymour]

In this context, it sounds like they use only two hops: East Kent Goldings and Cascade. I believe the "triple-hopped" means three times. They stated:

...brewed with Cascade and East Kent Goldings to create a hoppy flavour, double enhanced with the late copper addition of East Kent Goldings and Cascades added to the cask for racking...

Here's how I'd translate this to a homebrew recipe:

Bittering hops

• Cascade - 60 minutes remaining
  East Kent Goldings - 60 minutes remaining

Flavor/Aroma hops

• East Kent Goldings - 5 minutes remaining

Aroma Hops

• Cascade - dry hops added to fermenter a week or two before bottling/kegging

...Plum, prunes, raisins, a touch of toffee and tropical fruit are just of the flavour flourishing beneath the crimson-copper coloured cloak...

That statement makes me think higher mash temperature (perhaps 68°C) in order to leave some unfermentable residual sweetness, and a higher fermentation temperature (at the high-end of whichever yeast you select, especially during the first two days of primary fermentation) in order to generate fruity esters. Be sure to use a distinctive English ale yeast.

[PaddyX21]

Thanks Seymour, this is much appreciated.

Is there some way for me to emulate the higher mash temperature that you mentioned in an extract recipe, maybe an additional adjunct of some kind?

[Bradfordlad]

i may have got this wrong but wont you be doing a partial mash (at least) of the pale malt anyway? Just try and hold the temp a little higher.

[seymour]

...Is there some way for me to emulate the higher mash temperature that you mentioned in an extract recipe...

Oh right, sorry I missed that. Yes, though I got some push-back last time I recommended this: boil for at least 90 minutes, maybe more like 120 or longer. Hottest heat and rolling-est boil you can get, scrape the sides and bottom at the end, stir it in. We're looking for "kettle-caramelization" which is perceived as toffee, some nice sweet and toasty melanoidins. Alternately, dump in some mollasses.

You could do a partial-mash or soak some various caramel malts, but I wouldn't bother. In my opinion, if you're already putting in all that work, you oughta go all the way and become a real-life all-grain brewer Once you do, you'll have a lot more controls.

[PaddyX21]

i may have got this wrong but wont you be doing a partial mash (at least) of the pale malt anyway? Just try and hold the temp a little higher.

If I had the equipment to facilitate AG then yes, however I was planning on substituting the Pale Malt for Light Dry Malt Extract, and steeping the Crystal Malt.

I'll post up a preliminary recipe for this later on, using a new website I found yesterday called Hopville.
Link to work-in-progress recipe: http://hopville.com/recipe/1649382

Cheers
P

[Jocky]

...Is there some way for me to emulate the higher mash temperature that you mentioned in an extract recipe...

You could do a partial-mash or soak some various caramel malts, but I wouldn't bother. In my opinion, if you're already putting in all that work, you oughta go all the way and become a real-life all-grain brewer Once you do, you'll have a lot more controls.

I have to disagree a bit here.

For me, extract brewing is the simplest possible method that allows you to make your own beer to a high quality (vastly better than kits). Steeping speciality malts makes a big difference to the complexity of the taste of the end beer, and, like the rest of extract brewing, is simple as you just stick the grains in a bag and pop it in your partially heated brew water for half an hour at 65-75 degrees. Low effort, simple, with quite a big reward.

Whereas even the simplest mash (e.g. a no-sparge, brew in a bag) requires you to:
- Ensure your water is at roughly the right pH for what you are mashing
- Heat your water to a precise strike temperature (which you need to figure out)
- Add your grain and then hold the temperature in your narrow mash range for 60-90 minutes
- Mash out.

It adds several layers of complexity (not to mention significant time!), which, while they will give you an improvement over an extract/steeping beer, take you a long way from the simplicity of extract brewing. Certainly not mashing restricts the beers you can do, but for most starting out home brewers it gives them more than enough flexibility to start producing their own recipes potentially up to award winning quality.

Certainly if you're going to do partial mash then the step to all-grain is a no-brainer (unless you're stuck with a small brew kettle), but right now I can go do a small batch brew in an evening (3 hours, using a 30 min steep and 60 min boil), including all the clean up.

[seymour]

Point taken. I still use extract sometimes to brew a quick "prototype" idea since it is so much quicker, and as long as the extract is fresh and from a trustworthy manufacturer, it can certainly make better beer than an inefficient do-it-yourself mash.
I guess I overstated my point earlier, but I don't think PaddyX21 necessarily needs a partial-mash step for this particular batch, do you?

[Jocky]

No, I don't think so either - there's enough to worry about on your first own recipe! A partial mash would give him interesting flavours without necessarily knowing how he got there.

I would perhaps instead just do a steep of some dark crystal malt to get roughly in the right area, and possibly use a mix of pale and amber extract.

[PaddyX21]

Thank you both for your help, I really appreciate you taking the time

I'm going to play around with the recipe a bit, find a few different ways of achieving similar end results.

Will let you know what I end up settling on.

Cheers
P

[soupdragon]

I recommended this: boil for at least 90 minutes, maybe more like 120 or longer. Hottest heat and rolling-est boil you can get, scrape the sides and bottom at the end, stir it in. We're looking for "kettle-caramelization" which is perceived as toffee, some nice sweet and toasty melanoidins

It may be easier to boil a couple of litres of the wort in a seperate pan, try to reduce it back down to a syrup then add it back in the fermenter. As long as you get that caramalization that Seymour mentions, you should be on the right lines

Cheers Tom