ESB Help

[rodwha]

Hello all! My British friend who lives in Germany suggested I bring my ESB question here as he's fairly new to brewing. What better place to ask for help with a great British beer but a British brew forum!

:hat:

So I've had about 7-8 or so ESB's so far. Some were great, many were ho hum, and one was terrible. The ones I liked most were Fuller's, Speckled Hen, Foster's Premium Ale, and an American version I drank last night that didn't really fit ESB as they used American ingredients.

What I am after is a nice upfront biscuit flavor with a nice bitterness to back it up. Something kind of like what Foster's had done. I like a nice slightly nutty taste as well, but I think I ought to try to nail down the biscuit first. Another suggestion was honey to go with the biscuit, which sounds great, but I'll worry about that later.

I had initially used a few American ingredients (Briess Special Roast and Victory) trying for those flavors, but wanted to try to make it as authentically British as possible. I'll need to use Briess LME as we just don't have any British extracts where I buy my supplies.

Here is what I have so far, which is a 6 gal partial mash:

5 lbs Crisp Maris Otter
4 lbs Briess golden light LME (added at flameout)
1 lb Fawcett Optic
1 lb Hugh Baird British crystal 70/80
1 oz Northern Brewer @ 60 mins
1 oz EKG @ 20/5 mins
S-04 dry yeast

1.060/1.013
9* SRM
33 IBU's
6.1% ABV

I initially wanted an SRM of 12 or so and an ABV in the upper 5%. The changes I made from suggestions changed my numbers to ^. I'm considering seeing what a little carafa III special will do with the color and alcohol (I don't really want it higher).

I'm at a loss as I'll be buying a 10 lb bag of milled Maris Otter so I need to use it all, as well as buying the 1 lb bags of milled Optic and crystal. The 4 lb bag of LME is as small as they get. So I feel stuck without much option, although I'm now contemplating a small batch (1.75 gal) as well so that I can make this work better.

I'd appreciate some recipe critique.

 

[bobsbeer]

Welcome :

 

[dennisking]

Hi and welcome.

 

[rodwha]

Thanks fellas!

 

[rodwha]

I altered my recipe. I just can't mash any additional grains (8.25 lbs was a bit much) so I adjusted my Cascadian Dark recipe that shares the Maris Otter. This is what I have now:

4.75 lbs Maris Otter
4 lbs golden light LME
1 lb Optic
1 lb British crystal 70/80
2 oz carafa II special

1.059/1.013
13 SRM
33 IBU's
6.0% ABV

Is this better? Could it be further improved upon?

 

[Good Ed]

grain bill looks ok, but you would want a BU:GU ratio more like 0.85 so to increase your IBU's to around 50, what hops are you planning? Fuggles or Progress are good early and Goldings late, also you need a nice fruity yeast

 

[rodwha]

I'm using Northern Brewer for bittering and British Kent Goldings for flavoring and aroma.

What kind of IBU's does Fuller's have?

Are flavoring and aroma hops used evenly (equal parts) with the bittering hops? I don't seem to notice much hop flavor or aroma.

 

[rodwha]

My brew calculator shows 40 IBU's to be the top of the range.

Were you to add hops where would you put them? Bittering, flavoring, all evenly?

 

[Good Ed]

I suppose it's just personal taste, Fullers ESB is about OG 1054 and IBU 35 (0.65 ratio) Fullers London Pride is about OG 1040 and IBU 30 (0.75 ratio).

So if you want 40 IBU, you could use NB for start of boil for 20 IBU, then EKG at 30mins for 10 IBU and EKG at 10mins for 10 IBU

 

[rodwha]

That's actually close to something I had considered as I wasn't sure there was much of an aroma addition in an ESB. Is it common or not?

What would a typical ESB hop schedule look like?

 

[clibit]

I don't think you need the Carafa, it's not usual in ESB, and it doesn't need it. Otherwise looks good to me. Not used Northern Brewer, but Northdown/EKG works well.

 

[rodwha]

I just didn't want a 9 SRM ESB. It just doesn't seem right, and I'm not sure how else I can pick up the color as my local brew shop doesn't offer any British crystal. Is there something commonly used other than crystal that has 100 or more L*?

 

[morethanworts]

Graham Wheeler used a small amount of black malt just for colour...

I will be brewing this ESB as at the weekend. I'm happy to leave it a little malt-forward.

Everards Original (adapted from Wheeler)

Recipe specifics:

Style: Extra Special/Strong Bitter (English Pale Ale)
Batch size: 23.0 l
Boil volume: 34.5 l
OG: 1.050
FG: 1.013
Bitterness (IBU): 30.6
Color (SRM): 13.6
ABV: 4.9% (5.1% to 5.2% after priming and/or further attenuation)

Grain/Sugars:

4.15 kg Maris Otter Malt, 83.3%
0.43 kg Crystal 50-60L (British), 8.6%
0.20 kg Cane Sugar, 4.0%
0.15 kg Torrified Wheat, 3.0%
0.05 kg Black Patent (British), 1.0%

Hops:

26.00 g Challenger (AA 8.7%, whole) 90 min, 28.2 IBU
12.00 g Willamette (AA 4.7%, whole) 10 min, 2.4 IBU
20.00 g East Kent Golding (AA 5.1%, Pellet) dry hop

Yeast/Misc:

Irish Moss, 1.0 unit(s), Fining , boil 10 min S-04, 2.0 unit(s), Yeast

Recipe Notes:

White Labs Nutrient at 10 mins.

Batch Notes:

Pre boil gravity should be around 1.038 (1.028@50C), based on 34.5L boiling down to 26L.

 

[clibit]

Yeah fair enough, a bit of dark malt for colour will do no harm. BJCP guidelines say SRM 6-18 though.

Some sugar or flaked corn is an option too. Maybe some wheat. You could use a darker crystal, like Crystal 120. A more flavoursome yeast than S04 may be a good idea?

 

[rodwha]

I didn't know that table sugar could be used.

I'm using S-04 as I've had it for a while. But I'm sticking with dry yeast for a while as we'll be moving and I don't want to mess with liquid yeast until I'm settled.

 

[rodwha]

Oh, and I initially went with crystal 50/60, but moved up to 70/80 as my SRM's had dropped. The few ESB's I've had didn't seem s though really dark crystal was used, at least in large quantity.

I'd be willing to use a little 120, butI can't get British grains in anything less than a pound. I could, however, use a small amount of American 120, though it'll take a bit more than 2 oz, which might put me back at 6.1% ABV. Not that I dislike stronger beers, but it just doesn't seem right...

But I'm far from a refined pallet or being well knowledged. I've been brewing for about 2 1/2 years, and though I've been compiling my own recipes nearly from the git go, I'm always looking at other recipes to find what's common for the styles I want to brew.

 

[rodwha]

I just now realized that you dry hopped your ESB as well, and don't have much of a flavoring addition (I understand that 15-20 mins is more common for flavoring, and 5-0 mins is more common for aroma, which leaves 10 mins a compromise between the two).

One of my hop schedule ideas was for a 60, 40, and 20 min addition, but it seems there still ought to be a 5 min aroma addition, even if it were small.

 

[clibit]

S04 will work fine. There are fruitier dried English ale yeasts, of the ones I've tried S33 and Mauribrew ale are, and I believe Windsor is too. I've not used any Mangrove Jack yeasts as yet.

 

[Wezzel]

I can recommend Wyeast 1968 which is a Fullers strain. There is also a Whitelabs version (wlp 002?). Drops really clear without findings.

For colour you could add a quarter teaspoon of brewers caramel. A little goes a long way.

 

[rodwha]

"For colour you could add a quarter teaspoon of brewers caramel."

I'm not familiar with this. Can you explain what it is or any other names it goes by? Does it add flavor as well?