Any good low ABV recipes out there?

[Kingfisher4]

I have tried the search functions, but unfortunately the key words seem too common to work; so apologies if there are threads already posted, direction to them would be great.

I would really like to try a choice of all grain recipes with low ABV of around 3% or so, but good flavour and body to the beer as an alternative to my usual brews, if I want a midweek lower alcohol alternative.

Does anyone have reliable tried and tested recipes which might fit the bill? Preferably with British hops, as I prefer our bitters & golden ales to American IPAs etc. Happy to branch out and try other styles of beer, though sours may be beyond my skills and equipment currently. I have so far struggled to find any good non-American recipes.

Tips so far seem to be using other malt in addition to Maris Otter or similar pale malt ( e.g. Vienna / Munich etc), for added flavour and body, mashing at a higher temperature to reduce fermentables and using lower attenuating yeast (I currently only use dried yeast).

I know Brewdog's Nanny State recipe is readily available for example, but don't like the intense American hoppiness and lack of body in the bottled version so don't want to try that format.

Sure someone must have developed all grain recipes along these lines for times when you want a beer without the usual alcohol level?

[bitter_dave]

Hi Kingfisher4, funnily enough I was thinking of posting an almost identical post! I want to make tastey ale around the 3% mark.

One option I was thinking of was making a mackeson stout clone. I like the stuff you get in cans and it tastes pretty full bodied despite being 2.8% abv because of the lactose. There is a recipe in one of the wheeler books.

Agree with you about nanny state - I think it’s thin and overly hopped.

Milds might be an alternative if mashed hot.

Alternatively, it is possible to make a tastey low abv bitter. Welton’s Brewery in Sussex used do a bitter called Pridenjoy which was 2.8% and really decent. It was in that book by Roger Protz ‘300 beers to try before you die’. I’ll dig out the book and see what it said because it did give some details about ingredients - about 4 different types of malt ire.

[Kingfisher4]

Great, thanks very much. Will be interested if any others have similar ideas.

Only been brewing for 9 months and collecting books for about 18 months so haven’t got any old ones.

Would appreciate any recipes very much.

[RobP]

Weak beer is probably the hardest to get right, I pretty regularly make sub 4% bitter, here's my thoughts.
Keep it reasonably simple, don't need loads of malts.
Use a high mash temperature to keep some unfermented sugars in the beer, I mash at 69C.
Use a yeast that will leave some unfermented sugars behind. SO4, Windsor work well enough, My current favourite for bitter is Lallemande ESB, which many appear to dislike.
Push the fermentation temps a bit to get some ester production for more taste. I tend to pitch at 22-23C and set the fermentation temperature at 18C so the beer cools during the lag phase, then I increase the set temperature by one degree a day until I hit the upper range of the recommended temperatures (22C for ESB, for instance).
For British style ales you need more balance between bitterness and sweetness so you're probably aiming for upper 20s IBU.

Bitter recipe for 25 litres, 1.037, 3.8 abv, 80% efficiency (I vary around the following):
3Kg Pale Malt, one or two varieties (I usually use 50:50 Maris Otter & Flagon, could use Vienna, American or Belgian for a small proportion).
250g sugar, leave it out if you like but most traditional bitter you ever drank had sugar in (raw cane, demerara, light Muscavado - read up on inverting sugar and do that if you like).
200g medium crystal, I don't often use crystal malt in bitter but most do. Do try without.
175g of flaked maize or torrified wheat. Maize more traditional but most modern brewers would use torrified wheat, I think.
two or three hops:
25 IBU of bittering hops, perhaps Admiral or Fuggles boiled an hour.
2-3 IBU aroma hops each for 15 and 5 mins. EKG, Brewer's Gold, Boudicea, Pilgrim etc, etc.
Minimal dry hopping, if you do. 20g.
Suggest Fuggles for bittering & EKG for aroma. Tradition!

Mild, More specific with this one.
25l 1.035, 3.5 abv.
2.5Kg Mild Malt
500g Dark Muscavado
25.g torrified wheat
125g Medium Crystal malt
125g Dark Crystal Malt
adjust colour with brewer's caramel if you want, could use 50g roat barley/black malt.
40g Fuggles (20 IBU) 60 mins.
Windsor yeast

[PhilB]

Hi Kingfisher/Dave

There's a bunch of low-er ABV recipes available there (link) ... only a couple are down around the 3-ish% ABV, but there are some ideas you can work with there ... and I have brewed the Rye Wit one from there and would recommend it

Cheers, PhilB

[bitter_dave]

Hi Kingfisher/Dave

There's a bunch of low-er ABV recipes available there (link) ... only a couple are down around the 3-ish% ABV, but there are some ideas you can work with there ... and I have brewed the Rye Wit one from there and would recommend it

Cheers, PhilB

Thanks Phil

[bitter_dave]

I checked Pridenjoy and they used pale, amber, chocolate and wheat malts in their 2.8% abv bitter. I normally keep it simple with my bitters at around 4% (pale + crystal) but when you get down to 3% or lower perhaps having a variety of malts helps?

[bitter_dave]

It’s not for everyone, but here’s the Wheeler recipe I have for Mackeson stout (23 litres)

2830 gm Pale malt
470 gm Chocolate malt
125 gm Black malt
580 gm lactose (add in last 30 mins of the boil)

30 gm Target hops - full boil - 26 IBU (presumably any hops would do)

67 c mash
OG 1042
FG 1020
3% abv

May have to try a variant of this

[Trefoyl]

I was blown away by Sam Smith’s pale mild, only 2.7%. I think I had 4 pints in a row delicious.
I think the yeast handling has a lot to do with the body in their case and the recipe is anybody’s guess.

I was thinking of mashing higher and using a lower attenuating yeast like Windsor, which I bought on a whim and have in the freezer. Something I want to try this fall, not hoping for a clone by a long shot, but hopefully a decent beer.

[Robwalkeragain]

Made a nice 3.4%er for the pub a few weeks ago. Maris Otter + 10% caramalt, 30 IBU and a big centennial dry hop. Us-05 yeast mashed high.
The only real factor to consider is yeast attenuation. It's possible that a beer can taste more or less the same at 3% or 5% if the attenuation is right - use Original Gravity as a guide for amount of body in a beer first, then select a low attenuating yeast with a high mash temp and you'll have plenty of flavour. Windsor is the common choice as it doesn't ferment maltotriose, so you'll probably hit around 65% attenuation. Job done!

[Kingfisher4]

Made a nice 3.4%er for the pub a few weeks ago. Maris Otter + 10% caramalt, 30 IBU and a big centennial dry hop. Us-05 yeast mashed high.
The only real factor to consider is yeast attenuation. It's possible that a beer can taste more or less the same at 3% or 5% if the attenuation is right - use Original Gravity as a guide for amount of body in a beer first, then select a low attenuating yeast with a high mash temp and you'll have plenty of flavour. Windsor is the common choice as it doesn't ferment maltotriose, so you'll probably hit around 65% attenuation. Job done!

Thank you, simple but variable generic recipe & technique ideas were exactly what I was looking for; will try that out soon and adapt from there.

[f00b4r]

Hi Kingfisher/Dave

There's a bunch of low-er ABV recipes available there (link) ... only a couple are down around the 3-ish% ABV, but there are some ideas you can work with there ... and I have brewed the Rye Wit one from there and would recommend it

Cheers, PhilB

Thanks Phil

The rye wheat beer on that link is pretty good and worth trying.

[bitter_dave]

Hi Kingfisher/Dave

There's a bunch of low-er ABV recipes available there (link) ... only a couple are down around the 3-ish% ABV, but there are some ideas you can work with there ... and I have brewed the Rye Wit one from there and would recommend it

Cheers, PhilB

Thanks Phil

The rye wheat beer on that link is pretty good and worth trying.

Looks interesting collection of recipes; thanks for the tip about the rye wheat beer

Not sure I agree that a session beer could be 4.5% as the link suggests, but I guess it’s all relative.

Ron Pattinson’s recipe looks like something I might do and I have some Windsor in freezer to keep attenuation low

[bitter_dave]

Ron Pattinson’s recipe looks like something I might do and I have some Windsor in freezer to keep attenuation low

55 IBUs seems high though!

[Kingfisher4]

Hi Kingfisher/Dave

There's a bunch of low-er ABV recipes available there (link) ... only a couple are down around the 3-ish% ABV, but there are some ideas you can work with there ... and I have brewed the Rye Wit one from there and would recommend it

Cheers, PhilB

Thanks Phil

Thanks Phil,
That link was one of the American ones I'd found and very few of the brews listed were either low enough ABV or within my current brewing skill set, so it is useful to get the feedback from people who have tried some of the lower ABV ones listed too.

Very glad the topic has already sparked interest and helpful ideas. Thanks to all.