Here is my latest recipe for an English Best Bitter. I brewed this back on November 11th and I’ll be transferring it to a keg soon. Look for a brew log discussion about the carastan flavor.
9.5lb English Pale Malt (Maris Otter)
0.75lb Carastan (35L)
0.5lb Crystal 60L
1.0 oz Fuggles (60min)
0.5 oz EKG (60min)
0.5 oz EKG (20min)
12 gram Gypsum (added to the mash/sparge water)
WLP013 London Ale yeast
OG: 1045
FG: ~1.008-1.010
IBUs: 31
JW
Mike,
What was the inspiration for this recipe? Was it a particular beer you were cloning? Was it a modification off another recipe? I’m getting ready to brew an Ordinary Bitter, but I’m still trying to hammer out the recipe. I want to use Maris Otter, Crystal 120, and then one other malt to add some character, but I’m stuck on what to select (victory malt, biscuit malt, etc). Any thoughts or inspirations you had when building your recipe might be helpful.
Slainte!
-JW
Mike
To really start to get a taste for this recipe I think a touch of 120L and biscuit/victory is the way to go. That was very similar to my first Ordinary Bitter. I wanted to make this version with carastan, because I had been reading that it has a distinct toffee like flavor. Interested in that aspect I figured it might compliment the english bitter style nicely. That and I am very familiar with how my “base” O.bitter tastes. So using a good dose of carastan in the recipe instead should teach me about how carastan really tastes. I actually have an Oatmeal Stout that I want to add it too, so I am using this milder flavored beer to figure out how much I might need to add a touch of toffee to my Oatmeal Stout! Good question! BREW ON!
chris
Will an ounce of Fuggles be bitter enough? The Fuggles I have are only 4% alpha. I’d be tempted to use an ounce an a half if yours are the same?
chris
Ignore me, i just saw the extra 0.5 oz of ekg was in for 60 min as well. I mistakenly thought that was a flavour addition.
Mike
Nice recovery Chris! Cheers. Actually the funny part about this is that I normally don’t use fuggles. I had bought a package of EKG that said 2 1/2 oz plugs. I thought it meant 2 AND 1/2 oz of plugs, but it actually meant TWO 1/2 oz plugs. So I didn’t have enough to go all EKG like I normally do. Luckily I had bought two 1 oz pkgs of Fuggles for a different beer. So I sacrificed one to get enough bittering.