My homebrew and Civil Life Northern Brown Ale side by side

I've never done this before. I've brewed clone kits/recipes (NB's Sierra Madre and Caribou Slobber).  Mostly though I've brewed my own recipes without trying to emulate anything in particular. More styles than particular beers.

So it was with my homebrew NEBA as well. I used The Civil Life's information in crafting my recipe, but I wasn't necessarily trying to clone their beer.

Nonetheless, here are my notes. The most prominent difference is the roast/toast character imparted by the brown malt. Their beer must have a lot more of it, because it's strongly apparent in the nose and flavor. Whereas, mine is more of a background flavor, sort of melding with a pretty significant caramel note, and the aroma of mine is not as strong.

Mine is just a hair lighter than TCL's. Mine seems to have better "head retention."  That's never been a goal of mine in brewing, but I did notice a difference.  It might just be because mine was from a keg pour and theirs from a can (and a fairly non-vigourous pour).

Also, their beer is dryer and more carbonated. Again, the aroma of TCL's is stronger, of coffee, chocolate, roast, toast. No caramel flavor in theirs.

All of that said, mine is a really good beer and still up there with the best I've ever brewed. Someone who tried it expressed surprise when I mentioned adding more brown malt. But I think I will. It's rare for me to brew the same beer twice (maybe just one beer in the over four years that I've been brewing?) and the challenge of brewing their is enticing. Nonetheless, this beer is certainly worthy of rebrewing as is! Cheers!

Edit February 10, 2018:

This keg has been out in my garage to take advantage of the cold weather, since my kegerator, which fits just two kegs, is full. I kegged a pale ale last weekend in a separate keg and put it in the garage as well. I have only one picnic tap to switch between the two kegs in the garage. So I removed the tap from the brown ale and put it on the pale ale. Yesterday morning, I went to Airgas and exchanged a 20 lb CO2 tank. I came home and topped off each keg with CO2 to make sure they hadn't lost pressure after my CO2 tank ran dry. I noticed a some beer on the out post on the brown ale keg, but didn't think much of it. I'd seen it before the other day. It definitely wasn't flowing out. Unfortunately, by the time I got home, that slight drip turned into a full leak, with probably one or two gallons of really good brown ale spewing all over the floor. 😭 Oh well, at least I got to enjoy most of it, and on the plus side, I have space for the bitter I brewed last weekend.

Stout Brew Day - 1/6/18

Last summer, my homebrew club hosted a competition and the winner was a really nice stout. The brewer described it as an Irish stout. I reached out to him for the recipe and he was kind enough to reveal most of it, though remained coy about certain aspects, such as the starting gravity and water treatment. On top of that, the beer is actually from the second runnings of a bigger beer, adding even more variability. But I had the grains and their respective percentages for the beer and adjusted the amounts according to the gravity that I wanted to achieve.

I thought a beer in the 4.5-5% range would be good. I've been aiming to brew beers that are more drinkable lately, which means less alcohol and less intense flavors (which really just means less hoppy).  So I designed a beer with about 8.25 lbs of grain total and a starting gravity of 1.046.

I started brewing around 11:30 AM and was finished by about 5:15. During that time I also kegged another beer and really took my time in general. I could have been finished earlier if I was really efficient. But either way, this was a fairly short brew day by my standards. It also helped that it has been really cold lately, so the ground water was extra cold, so chilling the wort took less time. So cold in fact that my hose seemed to be clogged with ice, which was concerning at first, but it cleared up after a few minutes.

Total brew time was also reduced since I had the brew shop mix and crush everything together, something I normally don't do. So I didn't have to spend time measuring grains at home. They mixed and crushed 7 lbs Avangard pale ale, 8 ounces chocolate, 6 ounces carafa ii, 3 ounces roast barley, and 3 ounces flaked wheat.

Into the mash tun it went. This time I was much more careful with the mash temperature. It mashed at 152 for about 1 hour and 15 minutes. I added 2 ounces of 4.5% AA Fuggles for about 33 IBUs total. Perhaps too much? The wort was less chocolatey than I thought it might be. Maybe even fruity, from the hops I'm guessing. But fermentation usually rounds those flavors out, so I'm expecting more malt in the finished beer. And hopefully this one turns out to my liking. The original beer was fantastic. Really smooth. No acrid flavors. I don't like acrid flavors in stouts. I prefer a smooth, chocolate flavor.

OG was around 1.046 with about 5 gallons of wort. I kegged my Styrian bitter and noticed some bubbles on top seemed to have a slight film. The beer tasted fine, but I didn't want to take any chances. So I bought a fresh 1469 smack pack. Fermentation had taken off by morning on January 7.

Northern English Brown Ale Brew Day - 11/10/17

I'm a big fan of The Civil Life Brewing Co. in St. Louis. I tried it out for the first time in June, 2014 at public defender training on the advice of a friend and fellow public defender. I bought one of their growlers and filled it with their Rye Pale ale, one of their beers for which they're most notable.

Since then I've learned that they really good English ales, whether it's their bitters or their brown ales, and they have a few of each. They specialize in session beers and as best I can tell adhere to classic styles, so I don't expect to ever see a fruited beer or a barrel aged stout.

One of the best things about the place is the atmosphere. The pub area is a relatively small portion of the building. It's long and narrow and has a bar that runs the length of the room. It's cash only. They serve their beers in 10 oz pub glasses ($2.50) or 20 oz ($5.00). If you hand over $3.00, they'll give you a Kennedy half dollar as change. They set out reading material for their patrons, such as the Post-Dispatch or The New York Times.

The beer and the atmosphere meld perfectly. The beers are delicious. And you really feel like you're in an English pub. I've never actually been in a real English pub, but it seems like The Civil Life is a good approximation.

Unfortunately, Civil Life is over three hours away from me. So I can't just drop in after work for a pint or two. And yet, the types of beers they're making are the beers that I want to drink!

Thankfully homebrewing is here to save the day. I'll just have to (try to) make the beers they serve myself. That was the plan for this brown ale. A Northern English Brown Ale. Is it a recognized BJCP style? I'm not sure. There's a British Brown Ale, which lists Newcastle as a representative beer, and which has an SRM that matches the one I was going for with this beer. But what's the difference between Northern and Southern English Brown ALe? It seems there is a difference, but the 2015 BJCP doesn't seem to make room for a distinction. Alas, the 2008 BJCP guidelines did. Why has this category been combined? I'm not sure. I'll have to leave that to the experts.

Wort was a rich caramel brown color. Time got away from me - including a business trip to St. Louis along with a visit to Civil Life - and so this beer remained in the fermenter for about six weeks. I kegged it on December 17, the same day I brewed a Styrian Goldings English bitter. FG was 1.08.

Wort.

I bottled six bottles. The rest went into a keg, which for most of the last two weeks has been out in my garage, taking advantage of exceptionally cold temperatures. In that time, the beer has carbonated and has cleared (it was actually clear in the fermenter too; apparently with time 1469 does flocculate pretty well).

Tasting Notes:

Aroma: Toast. Malt. Chocolate. Coffee. Caramel. Malt sweetness. No hops. Aroma is actually pretty strong. 

Taste: Follows the aroma. Chocolate, coffee, malt sweetness, a sweetness that lingers in the aftertaste. Sort of like chocolate that melts n your mouth. A slight tanginess. Low bitterness. Nutty. Slightly toasty. Caramel. Again, no hops.

Overall, really solid beer. The only change I'd make is to be more careful with the amount of malt. This beer clocks in at around 6%, but the goal was 5.4%, per the recipe. Next time I'd reduce the base malt by a pound or so.

https://www.brewtoad.com/recipes/northern-english-brown-6dedea