Irish Red

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Amber Fluid

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I'm wanting to do an Irish Red today with the ingredients and I guess I am looking for confirmation that this should turn out ok as I really don't know much about this style. I have come up with the following:

---------------------------
26L

4kg Marris Otter
1kg Munich
400g CaraRed
300g CaraAmber
300g CaraPils
200g Choc

45g Fuggles (4.6%) @ 25 min
30g EKG (4.5%) @ 5 min

Hops have been adjusted for no chill
Efficiency is 70%

OG 1.052
FG 1.013

IBU 25.2
EBC 34.7

MASH @ 67C for 60 minutes
Yeast = Wyeast 1084
---------------------------

I have the following ingredients if someone thinks there maybe a better substitute anywhere:

Bairds Perle
BB - Pale
TF - MO
JW Traditional Ale

BB - CaraMalt
JW - CaraMalt
CaraAmber
CaraRed
CaraPils
JW - Munich
JW - Vienna
Victory
Wheat
Chocolate

EKG
Fuggles
Challenger
Amarillo
Cascade
Centennial
Perle
Nelson Sauvin
PoR
Galaxy
CZ Saaz
 
I'd back off on the Cara malts a bit, around 300g would be plenty and drop the Carapils entirely.

Late hops aren't really a component of Irish beers that I can recall so I'd give the EKG a miss and move the Fuggles back to around 45-60 mins. Unless you just want to hop it late because you like your beers that way. It's your beer after all.


Cheers
 
i use 1.4kg cara malts in my red at 20 litre brew, carapils is one of them.
also use some wheat malt, centennial for bittering at 60 min to 22ibu.
 
The idea of the late hops is adjusted for no chill... otherwise they would go in at 45 min and 15 minutes.

What say back off the cara malts to 300g CaraRed and 150g CaraAmber?
 
Agree with emnpaul. For crystal, the cara amber and cara red go very well.
If you're after a red colour, 200g choc will be too much. Id go for around 100g. I use about 50g of roasted barley in similar sized batches and that's enough.

I no chill too but I still just use a 60 and 20 min hop addition for this style.10 - 15g at 20. It's not about the hops.in this one.

There's some good threads in here discussing the style so have a look.

Good luck with whatever you go for!
 
i use 1.4kg cara malts in my red


Irish red?

Edit: Just saw your link. 3rd place at vicbrew, not bad.


Re-edit: As a counterpoint, however, from BCS "Irish Red is a balanced beer with moderate malt character" and "it is important to use restraint with with dark malts, caramel malts (which to my mind include the Cara's), and hops in this style."
BJCP "Ingredients: Scottish or English pale base malt. Small amounts of roasted barley add color and flavor, and lend a dry, slightly roasty finish. English hops. Clean, relatively un-attenuative ale yeast. Some commercial brewers add small amounts of crystal, amber, or wheat malts, and adjuncts such as sugar."

We are however on another continent and neither Jamil Zainasheff nor the BJCP are the be all and end all of style interpretation so if a 3rd place at Vicbrew with that recipe is good enough for you and the judges then by all means call it an Irish Red. Who am I to argue?
 
Looks good, I would stick with the 300 carared, but swap the caraamber out for 300 caramalt, drop the carapils altogether.
If you have any roast barley i would use that instead of the choc, or at least drop the choc down to 100g or so.

Hops look good. :)
 
Looks good, it's a malt accented easy drinking ale. I'm hoping to do an IR today and using a kilo of Vienna in it.
With that yeast, ferment at 22 or even warmer if you can get it there. It's related to the Guinness yeast that they run at 24
 
@ BribieG I am a bit surprised you recommend to ferment at 22C-24C. I can get it there but am a bit hesitant not wanting to ruin it. However, since you suggest it, I will try it out this time.

@ Dougsbrew I had been trolling through the database and somehow missed that recipe. I think I was more tied up with the Better Red Than Dead and was trying to find something along those lines. CM2's recipe looks pretty good. Thanks for the link.

@ itmechanic I don't have Roast Barley which is why I used the choc instead.

How is this for an adjustment?

4kg Marris Otter
1kg Munich
300g CaraRed
300g CaraMalt
100g Choc

I think I am pretty happy with the hops so will leave them.

IBU is 26.1
OG 1.048
FG 1.012

I think I will go with this now and see how it goes.... thanks for the tips everyone. I can adjust this if need be for my next one. At least I have a start now.
:beerbang:
 
A couple of years ago I lost my temp control back in my dead fridge swapping ice bottles and a batch of IR got away on me - it was the best beer I'd ever done to that point. got me thinking and confirmed in Bill Yenne's book "Guinness the 250 year quest for the perfect pint".

In Dublin they let the brew rise naturally to 24-25 degrees and primary is complete in about 40 hours, then they rack to conditioning tanks for a day or so then keg :eek: :eek: :eek:
I won a place at the BABBs comp with this yeast with a dry stout fermented at 25 and it went on to do well in the State.

Certainly it will work at 18 I'm sure. However reading many UK forums I get the impression that most of the real ale breweries go for low 20s as well. Maybe the "ferment cold, anything over 20 will ruin the batch" is a result of our Australian customary usage - until recently - of mainly dry yeasts and a horror of the kit yeasts fermented at 30 degrees.

Also our taste for more APA "cleaner" beers as opposed to pommy traditionals where you very often want to push esters.

Eg Ringwood at 22 is about spot on.

However often you don't want to do this, for example I always run my 1469 at around 17 if I can.

So the "never go above 20" school is a bit of a knee jerk IMHO and not based on experience - horses for courses if you have good reasons for a particular temperature.

:icon_offtopic: - Temperature Nazi-ism is even more apparent with lager yeasts. Ross for example blew this one out of the water by producing excellent lagers at 19 and a lot of German breweries nowadays go for 13 which would have been a shooting offence until recently.

edit: speelinck
 
Try this recipe... it worked for me


Irish Red Ale

Batch Size: 22 L

Ingredients



3.0 kgPale Malt, Maris Otter Malt (TF Floor Malt)

1.5kg Weyerman Vienna Malt
0.30 kg Melanoidin (Weyermann)
0.30 kg Maris Otter Crystal Heritage (medium)
0.40 kg Carared (Weyermann)
0.05 kg Bairds Unmalted Roasted Barley
22 g Goldings, East Kent [5.6 %] 40 min


29 gFuggles (4.2%) 40 min

0.5 Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 min)
Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale

Total Water required 36.1L

Total Grain 5.6kg





Heat 36 L of water to 75 deg C

Set Tun Temp at 67 deg C

Mash at 67 deg C (14.6 L at 75 deg C strike) for 60min

Mash out 20 min at 72 deg C (Add 3 L of boiling water)

Double Sparge with balance water (18.5 L of water at 75 degC)



Boil for 90 min, add hops for 40 min boil 0.5 whirfloctablet in last 10 mins



Ferment at 20 deg C



Target OG = 1058 (assume 75% efficiency)

Target FG = 1016

ABV = 5.4%

SRM = 31.3

IBU = 24.3





5 eyes
 
Thanks for the elaberation BribieG. I'll be doing 22C and see what happens B)

@5 eyes I am sure that is a nice recipe but I do not have some of those ingredients on hand. I'll book mark it and try it in the future, thanks.
 
I use this yeast commercially at 21 degrees, ive used it at 18 and it is quite clean, but i like the esters it produces at 21, i run ringwood in my bitter at the same temp.
 
Beers in the garage are sitting on around 18.5 here at the moment, I'll ferment the IR in a switched off fridge and let it warm itself up inside the insulated cabinet, see how it goes, might poke its head above 20 - gotta love this perfect brewing weather here at the moment. :icon_cheers:
 
Irish red?

Edit: Just saw your link. 3rd place at vicbrew, not bad.


Re-edit: As a counterpoint, however, from BCS "Irish Red is a balanced beer with moderate malt character" and "it is important to use restraint with with dark malts, caramel malts (which to my mind include the Cara's), and hops in this style."
BJCP "Ingredients: Scottish or English pale base malt. Small amounts of roasted barley add color and flavor, and lend a dry, slightly roasty finish. English hops. Clean, relatively un-attenuative ale yeast. Some commercial brewers add small amounts of crystal, amber, or wheat malts, and adjuncts such as sugar."

We are however on another continent and neither Jamil Zainasheff nor the BJCP are the be all and end all of style interpretation so if a 3rd place at Vicbrew with that recipe is good enough for you and the judges then by all means call it an Irish Red. Who am I to argue?
have a proper look at the recipe. its exactly within style guidlines. the recipe is for 46L so there is only a small amount of crystal. its a classic irish red. not sure if you didnt look at the recipe properly, or whether im completely missing your point.
and it would have got better than 3rd if i had of used fresh hops. the judges could tell the hops were stale. everything else was spot on.

now if you just want a beer that resembles irish red but isnt within style guidelines, then go for it. no one says you have to brew to bjcp guidleines. hell the oinly time my beers are brewed to style are for comps.

edit: perhaps you thought the recipe was doug's and had 1.4kg in a 20L batch?
 
Spot on CM. I do a red perhaps six times a year and usually omit the RB. I prefer the raisin sweetness and fragrance of the caraaroma which I crank right up, and only use RB for comps to get the roasty hint.

Time for a recycled photo and why not I say:

Redsmall.jpg
 
have a proper look at the recipe. its exactly within style guidlines. the recipe is for 46L so there is only a small amount of crystal. its a classic irish red. not sure if you didnt look at the recipe properly,


edit: perhaps you thought the recipe was doug's and had 1.4kg in a 20L batch?

You're right on both counts. Sorry.

I will in future finish my morning coffee before making any wild statements.
 
I'm a bit of a beer noob and the closest to an irish red I've ever had was a kilkenny - that was till I made my own the other week. Bottling tomorrow so it's still a bit green but the chocolate/coffee aroma/taste is coming through quite strong.. I only used 50g of roast barley too. Is this usual for the style and kilkenny is just a coloured bit of bath water?

Used 200g each of CaraAroma and CaraAmber with my base malt. Everything else went perfectly but the chocolate taste really took me by surprise.
 
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