Considerations on a first Recipe

[Barnzy02]

So i've been reading here for awhile, rarely post. After years of attempting to start homebrewing i finally got my first batch brewed back in April. Have since made 4 or 5 batches, all have seemingly turned out great...IMO. Planning on brewing a Vanilla Stout this coming weekend, will be my first brew that didn't come from a kit, have the ingredients coming in this week to brew on Sunday. With this in mind, i'm looking to my next batch after the Stout and considering coming up with my own recipe for the first time. Where better to come for advice and suggestions than here, eh?

So here goes - Still doing an extract brew, the first draft i've thrown together so far looks something like this:


Extract:
5 lbs Light LME
2 lbs Amber DME

Steeping Grains:
.5 lb Carapils
.5 lb Crystal 30L
.5 lb Crystal 10L

Hop Schedule:

1oz Cascade 60min 19IBU
.5oz Cascade 30 min 7IBU
.5 Cascade 5min 2IBU
.5 Centennial 5min 3IBU
Total 32IBU

Yeast:
Wyeast 1098 - British Ale

Was looking to do something along the lines of an American Pale Ale, but like the idea of using the British Ale yeast. Although in my Brewpal Software on my iPhone, this apparently resembles more of an ESB rather than an APA, but isn't too far off the mark in regards to BJCP style guidelines.

So, i'm open to suggestions, comments, being told this is terrible, whatever.
LIke i said this is a first draft and wouldn't mind seeing it change over the next week or two before i get the ingredients.

 

[Yooper]

It looks good, except that's too much crystal. I prefer using light DME (not amber) and getting the color/flavor with specialty grains. In your recipe, you've got 1.5 pounds of crystal (carapils is also a crystal malt), and the amber DME has some crystal, too but we don't know how much.

I'd increase the light DME and get rid of the amber DME. I'd also decrease the crystal to no more than 1 pound total. The hopping is ok, but I prefer my additions to be 60 minutes, 15 or 20 minutes for flavor, and 5 or 0 for aroma. 30 minute hops give you some bitterness, but not the flavor so I'd change it like this:

Cascade 60
Cascade 15
Centennial 5
Cascade 0

If you don't get enough IBUs with dropping the cascade to 15 minutes, you could increase the 60 minute addition.

 

[Homebrewtastic]

Looks like a solid brew. My one suggestion though would be to scrap the centennial hops and go all cascade. Not that centennial is a bad hop choice, or that your bill looks bad because of it, but because if it's your first recipe it's always a good idea to get more familiar with your ingredients.

Brewing only with the cascade will let you know definitively what cascade hops taste like.

Search the forum for the term "SMaSH". It means Single Malt and Single Hop brewing. One of my favorite APAs is a SMaSH of Vienna and Cascade. It rocks out loud.

This approach to brewing helps with recipe development as you become more and more familiar with each ingredients characteristics.

 

[Homebrewtastic]

Also for recipe development check out http://hopville.com for their "Beer Calculus" tool. It's kind of a dumbed down beer smith but gets the job done.

I'm plugging in your recipe and your OG, FG and ABV are all too high for an APA. Cut your amber down to 1lb.

You should also up that 30 minute hop addition to 1 oz. to hit a decent IBU.

 

[Barnzy02]

Thanks for the input. I was definitely considering the Amber to assist in coloring, So i should just swap the Amber for Light DME and adjust the specialty grains accordingly?....I'd probably just drop the 10L and leave it as the carapils and 30L ....

I also was giving some thought to the hop schedule as was pointed out, i definitely would want the flavor over the extra bitterness so putting it at the 15 mark instead of 30 would probably make more sense, and deliver more of the result I'm looking for.

Homebrewtastic, that is a simple, but really good suggestion to be able to pin down the characteristic of a specific ingredient. Part of the reason i chose the cascade is because it's one I'm more familiar with, while doing some reading I read that centennial is somewhat similar to the cascade so i figured it might be a decent addition to maybe make it a little more 'complex' while still staying fairly simple.

 

[Barnzy02]

Thanks for the link, i'll definitely check that out and tool around with it for a bit.