Brown Ale Recipe and the BJCP

[bsomogyi]

So I've been lurking for a while now, but figured I would finally start participating. I have a question about beer color. I'm getting ready to brew a Maple Hazelnut Brown Ale, but when comparing my recipe (through ibrewmaster) with the BJCP style guide my SRM as computed at 13.30 is a bit under the guide of 18-35 for a brown. What could I add to my recipe below which would help add some darkeness to my beer? Not that I care to meet the style guide that much, I'm just still new and I'm trying to understand more. The receipe is modified from a shared receipe on ibrewmaster, but I would also be interested in any other suggestions on how to improve the the concoction below.

Grains:
6.6 lbs Pale Liquid Extract
1.0 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine
.5 lb Crystal 60
.5 lb Pale Malt (2 row)
1 lb Maple Syrup (Final 10 minutes of boil)

Hops:
1 oz Williamette at 5 min
1.5 oz Williamettte at 60 min

Yeast :
1 pkg of British Ale Yeast

Additions:
2 tsp gypsum to boil
1.5 bottles of All natural Hazelnut flavoring to keg

Thanks!

 

[LexusChris]

I think a bit of chocolate malt would give you some good color points and also improve the flavor.

You could also sub-out some of the Cara-Pils with a darker crystal malt .. maybe some Crystal 40L or more 60L..

Good luck!
--LexusChris

 

[bsomogyi]

Thanks for the advice! I ended up reducing the dextrine and adding a half pound of chocolate malt. Brewing tomorrow. Can't wait to try it!

 

[djfriesen]

Does cooking your LME longer reduce fermentables? I know it would darken the beer slightly, but I don't have enough extract experience to know if it would carmelize the sugars somewhat. Seems like adding the LME earlier would be an easy way to darken the brew some, as long as it didn't affect the ABV and mouthfeel too much.