Brown Ale Recipe / Guide Please

I've never brewed a brown ale before, and I'm not a fan of the most famous one in clear bottles. I was recently in Berlin and found ( at last ) some decent beer in a brew pub which was a converted butchers on the outskirts off the city and had some brown ale which was fantastic. It was only lightly hopped and was quite sweet but with a greater alcohol content than Manns.
Would anyone share a recipe if they've made something like this ?
Thanks
RD

Piddle Dribbles Moose Drool is one I've had on my list for ages, it should be on here somewhere.

As I understand, brown ale made in the north of England tends to be more bitter, while southern examples are sweeter with less bitterness.

I've made the southern brown ale in Gregg Hughes' book and it's a nice drop.

Thanks Kyle & HTH 1975, I've had a look at piddle dribbles & I forgot that there was a recipe in Greg Hughe's book, I'll do a recipe with some brown chocolate and biscuit malt in, but based on the above recipes. I'll post it later and welcome your adjustments. I do want it quite sweet .

Righto , I'd like a brown ale- much lighter than a porter but significantly browner than an amber bitter, sweetish and malty.
I'm having a bit of a pre-Xmas brew fest and will probably brew 4-5 different beers so I've got various malts arriving in the next couple of days.

Volume 50 litres

Grain :
Pale 8500 g 86 %
Brown 500g 5.1 %
Amber 500g 5.1 %
Dark crystal 100g 1%
Chocolat 100 g 1 %
Wheat ( for head ) 200g 2 %

Hops

Challenger 7.6 alpha 25g at 90 mins
Northdown 8.3 alpha 20 g at 90 mins
Styrian Goldings 20g at 10 mins

Yeast Safale S-04
OG 1044
Colour 42 EBC
Bitterness 20 EBU

Any Good ??
Cheers

If you want a sweeter brown ale, I'd suggest more crystal malt (5%) and mash at 67C.

Apart from that, it looks good. Personally I'd go with challenger for your last hop addition too.

IBU and EBC seem fine, possibly a wee bit dark according to recipes I have to hand (more like 27-37 EBC).

I used Ringwood for my Southern Brown Ale - it's very balanced and clears great. Works in porters/stouts and IPAs too. Great yeast.

68-72% attenuation for Ringwood.

75% attenuation for Saf-04, so it's gonna make for a drier beer.

HTH, Thanks for the advice , I'll up the crystal, It'll be darker, but actually so what- it's the taste that counts.
I'll think about the challenger swap - I think the styrian gives a little bit of a floral taste - but then again, if I ask for advice i'll change it to all challenger.
Good advice re a low attenuation yeast to make it sweeter, they don't do a bottle conditioned beer that I can nick the yeast off which is a shame.
Wonder what Kyle thinks ?

Well, I've had a look and walked away several times for a think and this is what I would do:

RokDok Brown Ale


Recipe Specs
----------------
Batch Size (L): 50.0
Total Grain (kg): 10.000
Total Hops (g): 100.00
Original Gravity (OG): 1.046 (°P): 11.4
Final Gravity (FG): 1.014 (°P): 3.6
Alcohol by Volume (ABV): 4.22 %
Colour (SRM): 25.7 (EBC): 50.5
Bitterness (IBU): 30.2 (Tinseth)
Brewhouse Efficiency (%): 75
Boil Time (Minutes): 60

Grain Bill
----------------
8.300 kg Maris Otter Malt (83%)
0.500 kg Chocolate (5%)
0.500 kg Crystal 120 (5%)
0.250 kg Amber Malt (2.5%)
0.250 kg Brown Malt (2.5%)
0.200 kg Wheat Malt (2%)

Hop Bill
----------------
40.0 g Challenger Leaf (7.6% Alpha) @ 90 Minutes (Boil) (0.8 g/L)
30.0 g Northdown Leaf (8.3% Alpha) @ 90 Minutes (Boil) (0.6 g/L)
30.0 g Styrian Golding Leaf (4.4% Alpha) @ 10 Minutes (Boil) (0.6 g/L)

Misc Bill
----------------

Single step Infusion at 68°C for 90 Minutes.
Fermented at 21°C with MGJ Newcastle Dark Ale

Recipe Generated with

With modern brown ales it is more to do with the residual sweetness and not so much the roast, bearing that in mind you will want a greater quantity of crystal and chocolate to achieve the base flavours, roast should come in support and a splash of wheat for the head retention, they key to brown ales is to mash high and ferment low if you do not wish to have an addition of lactose, S-O4 will dry the beer out and take away the sweetness unless you stall the fermentation.

Your bitterness isn't high enough to balance the malt/sweetness/bitterness and when it comes to crystal malts, this is one of the deciding factors as to whether the beer appears sweet or sickly sweet. This recipe will give you something around the 4 - 4.2% abv line with the sweetness you are after and a back note of roast.

Don't take my word as gospel but I hope it helps

Kyle, thanks very much. I'll give this a go. Quite excited to try this. I'll let you guys know how it turns out Cheers RD

Big brew day today Kyle , a bit close to Xmas but it'll be OK. Did 120 l of bitter and then 60 l of Brown. Forgot to multiply the Challneger and Northdown hops by 20 % so I put 60 g of Styrian Goldings in for the last 10 minutes. Running out of FVs , just about had enough for the bitter , the Brown is in the conical in the garage so will have to cool naturally. Cheers- I'll bring a couple of bottles to the festival . Thanks Kyle.RD

The Brown Ale will be ready in time for Christmas, they can be drunk young or old when the roast content is fairly low.

You'll have to report back and let me know how it is.

Looks good. Yeast choice looks important in this case ...... as already mentioned. Something with lowish attenuation.

I just brewed a dark beer and as an alternative to chocolate I tried Carafa III. It's less harsh I've been told.

Carafa III is Roast, Carafa I is Chocolate.

It will give a lovely smoothness to the beer.

One or two? My entire repertoire is made of them I need to go the other way but I make crap pale beers!

Glad to hear that the Brown can be drunk young !
How about trying a pilsner Kyle ?!

Steady on Dok!

Glad it appeals to you. Please do feedback as I haven't made it yet but am interested in what you guys think.

Well mine smelt fantastic - it's in the garage at the moment but fermenting at 17 degs as it is so cold, As the temperature outside increases then so should the FV. As Kyle said - Mash high, ferment low !

It's stayed at 1080 for the last 5 days or so, I've given it a good stir and increased the temp gradually to 22 degrees, so I'm pretty sure this is the final AG rather than the mash being stuck- may well be due to a combination of a high mash temperature with lots of dextrins and the low attenuation of the yeast. It tastes really nice and malty, will be bottling it this weekend. Thanks Kyle- how's yours doing Lanky ?

1080!? How big a beer did you make?