Cream Ale Recipe

[Firefly]

Having not brewed one before I thought I'd have a go at a small batch of cream ale.

Anyone have any thoughts on this recipe. I'm not sure about the hop varieties most of all - any recommendations?

Batch Size: 10 Litres
SG:1047
FG: 1012
ABV: 4.62%
Assuming 75% efficiency (I average around 80%)

Grain Bill :
1.0Kg Maris Otter Malt
0.800Kg Pilsner Malt
0.200Kg Flaked Maize (Corn)

Hop Bill:
6.0g Cascade Leaf @60 mins
3.0g Amarillo Pellet @60 mins
11.0g Cascade Leaf at flame out.

3.0g Irish Moss at 10 mins

Mash at 66C for 1 hour.
Boil for 60 mins

Yeast: Mangrove Jacks California Lager. (ferments at ale temps,18-20 to give a clean, crisp lager taste without off flavours)

Thanks

[Piscator]

Hi Firefly - I'm interested in how this turned out for you.

I just did an impromptu brewday yesterday and did a cream ale as I wanted a light easy drinking summer pint, using flaked maize and rice in mine (to a total of 25% of the grainbill) and 22 IBU from Cluster at the start with no late hops.
I'm fermenting fairly cool with MaltMiller West Coast yeast as it was what I had to hand in the freezer - I'd seen the Mangrove Jacks California Lager yeast advertised and wondered about trying it in the future, but I wasn't very impressed with the Burton Union M79 (in fact it was awful and nothing like a Burton yeast) so wondered if the California Lager was true to type?

I'm calling my brew General Cluster as it was a fairly generic sort of cream ale recipe.

Cheers
Steve

[Barley Water]

Your cream ale will come out a lot better than the stuff they make in this country mostly because the base malts used in yours actually have some flavor. Cream ale over here is essentially the ale version of Bud/Miller/Coors. Over here we would likely make it with 6-row barley which really doesn't have the flavor of either M.O. or a decent pils malt. You also want to use fairly soft water by the way because God forbid you accentuate the hops in that style.

[Piscator]

Your cream ale will come out a lot better than the stuff they make in this country mostly because the base malts used in yours actually have some flavor. Cream ale over here is essentially the ale version of Bud/Miller/Coors. Over here we would likely make it with 6-row barley which really doesn't have the flavor of either M.O. or a decent pils malt. You also want to use fairly soft water by the way because God forbid you accentuate the hops in that style.

Hi BW, Yes I was conscious that my levels of calcium, chloride and sulphate are somewhat higher than would be typical for the style and that my base malt has quite a lot more favour. I went with a 1:1 ratio for chloride:suphate to be fairly neutral, although I am finding that in low IBU English ales this actually seems to promote a good level of both hop flavour and malt. It'll be fun seeing what I get

[Firefly]

It's still conditioning at present, been in bottle for a couple of weeks, but an early taste suggests it will be a nice summer ale. It's not turned out as crisp as I would have liked though so I can't give the yeast a total thumbs up. We'll see how it pans out over the next couple of weeks.

Just used cluster in an elderflower blonde ale Piscator. Nice hop.

My water is really soft BW so I know what you mean about muting the hop flavour....would make a great Pilsner though, if I had a lagering fridge.

[Barley Water]

Generally if you use really soft water it makes beers taste more rounded everything else being equal. If the beer is not crisp enough for you look at the attenuation, is the beer pretty dry or did the yeast leave some unfermented sugars? Lower attenuated beers will also come across rounded or in extreme cases even flabby tasting (if that makes any sense). Make sure you are pitching enough yeast and oxigenate the wort to ensure a good fermentation. You can also add some straight sugar to the grist with a cream ale and I promise that will dry it out for you. At least over here some folks that make that style claim that sugar is almost a necessity. I've done it a couple of times but I like to add about 20% corn to achieve essentially the same thing, although I have seen formulations that contain both sugar and a pretty big percentage of corn. Besides drying it out it also lightens the color and you can get a straw colored beer.

If after making it and drinking a bunch of bottles you may decide that the style is a little "pedestrian" for your tastes (I did). If that happens what I suggest is to jack up the hops to as much as 40 IBU then start calling the beer a preprohibition ale (or a UK Steam beer if you dare). That will seem very posh to the folks in the UK plus I bet you'll enjoy the beer that way as well.