Molasses Mild

[dmonbeer]

I brewed this beer as my wife doesn't like the big hop beers that I do. I tried to make a big bodied, low hopped, full flavoured mild using crystal malt, honey, molasses (treacle) & demorara sugar to put sweet flavours in that the yeast would have trouble fermenting away.

Mash - 1 hour 20 min, 20 litres, 67°c for 60 mins

2 teaspoons citric acid
Pale malt 2.6 Kg
Crystal malt 1Kg
Chocolate malt 100g
Roast barley 10g

Boil - 1 hour

Treacle 2 heaped tablespoon
Dark demorara sugar 100g
Honey 1 tablespoon

This boil smells like I imagine a treacle tart factory does.

Verdict 2 weeks after bottling: Not overly sweet or cloying. Full bodied and malty sweet. Much more chocolatey than treacley. Will benefit from another couple of weeks maturing.

Verdict 8 weeks after bottling: This beer has dried out quite a lot leaving a definite molasses taste that isn't as fitting as in the younger, sweeter beer. A really deep red colour & still a good beer.

I found a bottle of this in under my friends stairs after what must have been 20 weeks. Now it was fairly dry but still plenty of body & malty flavour.