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.