I love American Cream Ale. But for some reason each time I brew it I just keep messing with a good thing. This time I substituted flaked barley for the flaked corn!! Is it still a Cream Ale? Check it out.

I had heard a podcast of a commercial brewer (in England I think) that looked took a different approach to American Cream Ale and chose to substitute flaked barley in place of the corn. Knowing that traditionally perhaps flaked barley (of which they already had access to malted barley) would have been easier to source than flaked corn.

Anyway, I was looking for a recipe other than Galaxy Pale Ale to keep calibrating my process and system with post my high final gravity woes. I thought this sounded like a simple way to do something different and give it a go.

The beer looks just like my normal Cream Ale. There is a slight lack of grain sweetness on the nose that I think the corn sort of drove in other recipes. But the aroma is still pleasant. I use Liberty hops throughout the beer, but the alpha was a bit low (4%) and I should have used more. I think this beer could use a little late Cascade to make it smell more American too… but thats just me.

The flavor is easy and clean. There is a definite change in the mouthfeel with the barley substitution. Its fuller. Not full like a bigger beer per se, but fuller than a corn adjunct beer. Dare I say even Creamier than Cream Ale??? More experimentation is needed but its s good beer. I need to brew a traditional Cream Ale now so we can do a side by side before this one gets too old.

The basic recipe:
9lbs Rhar 2-row
1lb Briess Flaked Barley

1oz Liberty 60min
1oz Liberty 20min
10z Liberty 5min

US05 Fermentis dry yeast (Rehydrated)

CHEERS!