Rooibos African Ale recipe help

[benflath]

Hey all,
Making a beer for my boyfriend's birthday and trying to incorporate his fond memories of 2 years in South Africa. So here's the recipe I've come up with so far. It's somewhere between a red ale, a cream ale and mild pale. Thinking I'll do it as a small BIAB batch, though I've never done this before.

Batch Size: 2.5 gal
OG: 1.055
FG: 1.014

3 lbs 2-row
12 oz flaked corn
6 oz flaked oats
6 oz red wheat
3 oz crystal 120L
3 oz wildflower honey

1 oz Willamette @ 60 min
5 oz Rooibos @ flameout (additional steeped w/ priming sugar at bottling, if needed)

Big question: yeast type! I want something that will keep the earthy flavor and provide a nice the smooth/chewy texture I hope to get from the flaked grains. English Ale? Irish Ale? American Ale? Wheat?

Thanks, all!

 

[sicklesr]

I just did one of these. You can find my thread here.

My thoughts are:
Keep it as basic as possible to try an pull out as much tea flavor as I could. I used pre-bagged Rooibos tea from starbucks...
I used Wyeast American Ale II. The tea comes thro in a nice way. It smelled AMAZING in my brewery (basement) when I was chilling the wort. I used around 10-12 bags at flameout.
I did end up adding more tea at bottling (about 5 more bags for each 5 gallon bottling bucket).
It didn't come out as red as I'd like. Lemme know if you get a better color with your grain bill.

I love the stuff!

 

[benflath]

Thanks, sicklesr! I did see your post (your wife and I share a birthday) and took some of your ideas. Theoretically, my grain bill w/o the rooibos should land me with the color of a typical red ale, but nature does what nature wants, so we'll see.

What's the texture like? I'm going for something that feels kind of velvety and mild, like drinking rooibos with a bit of cream and honey. But also with hops. And alcohol.

 

[benflath]

Decided not to do BIAB since it's going to be 80 degrees on my brew day and I'd rather be outside. Final recipe below:

Batch Size: 2.5 gal
OG: 1.053
FG: 1.013
Mash: 150 deg F for 60 min

3 lbs 2-row
1.5 lbs flaked corn
1 lb flaked oats
8 oz red wheat
8 oz crystal 120L
8 oz wildflower honey

1 oz Willamette @ 60 min
3.5 oz Rooibos @ flameout
1-2 oz Rooibos steeped with priming sugar
Yeast: WL Cream Ale (if the LHBS has it) or Wyeast American Ale II

 

[Safa]

Very excited to see how this comes out, I'm South African and love rooibos!

Hell, I might even try a rooibos cider or mead!

 

[benflath]

Brewed today. The LHBS had WL Cream Ale yeast, so I used that. We are also in a warm spell, so keeping it between 70 and 75 should be no problem. There's already activity in the airlock!

Hit my gravities spot on, but my overall volume ended up a bit low. Really need to figure out how to track that better. Regardless, it smells fantastic and is a beautiful red color. I had a misprint in my recipe above, adjusted the post accordingly.

 

[benflath]

Transferred to secondary this weekend because the airlock activity stopped. Well above target gravity, for which I am blaming WL's labeling. On the container it specifically said between 70 and 75 F, which is where I kept it, but their website says 65 to 70 F. Dumb. If there's no more fermentation in secondary, which is what I expect, it will be around 3.5% ABV and a little thicker than I had planned, but it should still be tasty. Smelled fantastic and is a beautiful red color!

 

[Safa]

Sorry to hear man. I had a WL lager yeast once that the label said I ferment between 70 and 75. Great move WL!

 

[benflath]

Opened the first bottle last night. Everything turned out pretty much how I wanted with one exception: I had used a brand new stopper in secondary and even after an hour in Star San it still reeked of rubber. So does the beer. I'm going to leave it alone for a few more weeks to see if the flavor goes away, but if it doesn't the batch is undrinkable.

That said, I would absolutely consider brewing it again. Might bump the 2-row or wheat up a little or add some Victory, it felt a little thin.