Civil Life Rye Pale Ale clone attempt

Civil Life Rye is one of my favorite beers. It's a great balance of malt and hops in a pretty low ABV beer. I had it recently and decided I would try to make it again. I made a previous attempt in 2014 but for some reason decided to add Citra hops, which made it nothing like the real thing.

Civil Life is pretty coy about the recipe details, listing the ABV and IBU. Malts are listed but not the quantities/percentages, nor the lovibond. The hops are simply describe as "American C-hops." The term "American" precedes the hops and the word yeast, presumably meaning the beer has american yeast as well, but they don't say the strain. In short, they give us clues but not a lot to work with.

I came up with a recipe and brewed it on January 14. I racked the wort onto the yeast cake from the Southern Passion rye pale ale. Fermentation took off quickly and was done within a matter of days. I kegged it on January 22.

First off, this is a tasty beer and I like it, but it's nowhere near the real thing and quite far off in terms of the pale ale category, as well. Though the ABV is fine for a pale ale, and the bitterness too, there's just too much punchy hop flavor and not enough background malt flavor to really make this a pale ale. Instead it borders on IPA and could probably be deemed a session IPA. Surprisingly it doesn't drink like one of those watery session IPAs that were popular about four or five years ago. Maybe that's due to the pound and a half of flaked and malted rye. It has a good body, maybe moderate, maybe chewy, but isn't sweet. It was fermented with the yeast cake from the Southern Passion pale ale (US-05).

So, where did I go wrong with my beer? Perhaps the most obvious problem before drinking is the color. It's yellow (and pretty clear; no gelatin on this one, just time), whereas the real thing is "deep amber." The only malt listed on the web site that could give the beer any color is caramel, so I will need a higher lovibond caramel malt next time, maybe 120. In addition, the real thing has a slight toasty/roast flavor in the background, which almost reminds me of brown malt, and i know Civil Life uses it a lot in their beers. But that's not listed among the ingredients. Again, there's just too much hop flavor here and not enough malt and the real thing is almost entirely malt.

Changes for next time? A darker color, achieved through caramel malt I guess. And way less hops. Maybe an ounce of Chinook? What gives it that sort of roasty/toasty flavor? Maybe a darker caramel malt? Mine does have a slight crackery malt flavor in the background at times, though hops is definitely the dominant flavor. Overall, mine is a tasty beer. Cheers!

OG 1.043
FG 1.007-1.008
~5 gallons
US-05