Need Help Or Thoughts On This Attempted English Brown Ale.

[JakeSm]

Hi Everyone,

Today i put down a brew hoping to make something like a newcastle brown or a darker english ale.

This was the recipe i used:

1x TCS sparkling ale tin, 1.7kg
1kg Raw sugar
200g Brown Sugar
150g Dark Dry Malt
50g Crystal Grain
60g Dark choc malted grain
250g Roasted Barley

12g Fuggles added at 20 mins
4g Fuggles added at 10 mins
4g Goldings added at 10 mins
4g Fuggles added at 5 mins
4g Goldings added at 5 mins

Dry hopped 4g Fuggles
Dry hopped 4g Goldings

This smelt and tasted amazing, only after filling it to 24L it wasn't brown it was a golden colour..so i wasn't thinkng and went to the kitchen cupboard to find something to make the colour darker as i had used the last of all my grains.
I found and added 150g melted milk chocolate to the brew in a bit of boiled water.

It all still smells great but now the whoe brew is cloudy..will this cloudyness drop out of it when i add the finings or as it ferments???

i really dont want a milky looking brown beer...will the chocolate hurt the brew at all??

Any help would be much appreciated. Cheers.

 

[GashRash]

You added Milk Chocolate, I'm pretty sure that was a bad idea. There a lot of fat and other stuff in Chocolate. If you really want Chocolate I'd use some HIGH quality powdered chocolate, or even Cocoa pods.

If I was you I would of used the coopers English Bitter kit. With 150g of chocolate MALT, a tin of Coopers Amber Malt and 500g of DME. Very similar to the Hop Gobbler kit Coopers put out a few months ago.

Cheers Gash

 

[wyane]

Sounds interesting. As Gash said it depends on what other stuff was in your choccy bar. Brown sugar adds a lot of colour points per weight, so more of that and less raw sugar nexttime maybe?

I've done a couple of recent attempts at brown/dark ales, including the coopers hop gobbler clone, but had the opposite result -- much darker than expected. I think I added too much chocolate malt (200 and 300g) or bought the darker version without realising. Anyway, they ended up as nice porters

There's a good brewing with chocolate (as in cocoa) article here.

 

[RobboMC]

Learning experience number one!

The first thing to get a hold of is that it takes a brew usually 12-24 hours to 'get going'
so instead of chucking in what was available you did have plenty of time to get to the HBS and get some more choc or dark grain, of even some more dark malt.

That's the quick and easy answer, to get a darker beer add more dark malt.

As for your recipe, forget the raw sugar next time and at least use a Brew Enhancer.
Your taste buds will thank you for it.

Muntons Yorkshire Bitter turns out an excellent English Brown regardless of whether you put in sugar,
enhancer or liquid malt, well worth the extra $.

 

[JakeSm]

Hey thanks guys for your input. Yeah i thought i could go down to the shop and get some malt or somthing but it was closed and am at work for the next few days. I checked it this morning before i left and it seems to be seperating the fats and milk solids from the milk chocolate and they are floating on the top. So im just gonna skim them off whenever they rise and it seems to be clearing up underneath. Hopefully when i add some finings it should strip out the rest of it.

I have used raw sugar alot in beers and find it gives a rather enjoyable mouth feel and a slightly different flavour than dextrose, though its still not my first choice of sugars.. also the brown sugar adds and awesome caramely tone which is lovely... I reccommend doing a dark ale on all brown sugar its quite nice and works well with a tooheys old style.

Anyway if anyone has any idea what milk chocolate can do to a brew in the ways of spoilage please let me know so i can try to rectify the problem.

Cheers, Jake

 

[GashRash]

some reading on brewing with chocolate Chocolate

 

[JakeSm]

hey thanks GASH. this really helped me, i now know that milk chocolate cant hurt the brew, this is what i was wondering anyway.
i have checked the brew a few times and noticed that the fats and milk solids are floating to the top, like what happens with salad dressing. i just keep skimming the fats off the top to reveal clearer beer underneath.

anyway thanks again Gash.

 

[toolio666]

hey thanks GASH. this really helped me, i now know that milk chocolate cant hurt the brew, this is what i was wondering anyway.
i have checked the brew a few times and noticed that the fats and milk solids are floating to the top, like what happens with salad dressing. i just keep skimming the fats off the top to reveal clearer beer underneath.

anyway thanks again Gash.

How are you skimming off this stuff? Opening the fermenter is leaving yourself open to an infection...

 

[fcmcg]

How are you skimming off this stuff? Opening the fermenter is leaving yourself open to an infection...

Yeah, and you are probably also taking yeast away with your skimmimg....not ideal either...
Please tell me you've sanitised your spoon !!

 

[JakeSm]

Haha yes of cause i sanitised the spoon. I know opening it leaves risk for infection but curiousity killed the cat and i cant help having a look at whats going on in my brews. I open them all the time but never have had one die or taste crap due to infection or bacterial spoilage. I am skimming with a ladle and if i didnt do thia my beer would be cloudy and milky.

Not worried about the yeast there will be plenty more multiplying for the ones i take out.
Thanks all for the input, i am quite sure now this is going to be very nice. It smells unreal, the best dark or amber ale i have made even with the issues..

Cheers, jake

 

[fcmcg]

Dude...
Stop opening your fermenter " all the time "
Almost worst thing you can do...have some patience grasshopper
Your beer isn't gonna change just because you keep opening it for a skim...
Time is your friend for the best part...let it be !!!

 

[JakeSm]

Thanks for all the feedback fellow brewers and point of not opening the fermenter has been taken in and noted. I really appreciate all the help on this one guys!!!

Cheers