Just a Man with a Mash Paddle

My friend Steph really wanted to see homebrewing in action which prompted me to get an early start on my first beer of 2007. 2006 saw an early flurry of beers, a long slow down, then a couple again right at the end (both of which will be ready for consumption in this month, but since the brewing began in 2006 they aren’t 2007 batches).

I’ve been doing a lot more crazier beers lately so I felt it was time to take a step back and return to something nice and simple. To start out the new year I made a very simple pale ale recipe. It’s primarily a grain recipe, but there is some extract in it to bulk it up.

2007 New Years Pale

• 8 lbs. 2-Row Brewers Malt
• 8 lbs. Pilsen Malt
• 1 lbs. 2-Row Caramel Malt, 40L
• 1 can Munton’s Extra Light Malt Extract
• 1 oz. Newport Hop pellets (bittering)
• 1 oz. Amarillo Hop pellets (finishing)
• Brewery yeast

This is the first time I’ve used yeast from the brewery in any of my beers so I’m curious to see how this one is going to come out. If someone else was making this beer I’d use an American Ale yeast for it.

The O.G. came out at 1.038 – certainly not the highest gravity beer in the world, but I’m going for something very smooth and drinkable. This isn’t like the last two beers I made where I was aiming for more of a higher gravity sipping beer.

It’s going to ferment for about 10 days before I rack it over to a secondary fermenter where it will sit for about another 7 days before bottling. This will give it time to ferment out to its full potential as well as allow a lot of the sediment to settle out of solution. “Floaties” are much more noticeable in a lighter beer than a lot of the darker stuff I’ve done.