2023 homegrown hop pale ale

The previous owner of my home had planted hop plants and put in some hooks in the eves to run line for the plants. The line broke and disintegrated a long time ago, and since then I've just let the hops grow the best they can without anything - other than some bamboo stakes - to climb. The roof is pretty high and I haven't had a good way to get twine that high.

The other issue I've had with growing hops is that they seem to be maturing way too early. As I recall, I had mature hop cones in May of last year. Other cones were still immature. So that made harvesting a bit complicated. In the end, I chose to wait until August to harvest the hops. By then, some had turned very brown and crisp. Frankly, they didn't look very appealing. But they smelled good.

So I decided to take a chance and use both fresh, green hops and the brown hops as well. I also decided to buck convention by using only homegrown hops for this pale ale. I added the hops (wet) in three 140-gram quantities, at 25 minutes, 3 minutes, and 1 minute. Of course, I don't have any idea what the alpha acids were, and there are three different hop varieties in this plot, all grown and mixed together. So it was a bit of a crapshoot.

Overall, the beer turned out pretty drinkable, with a few imperfections. I finished the keg, just last week actually, which probably indicates I wasn't really in a hurry to drink it. At times it was astringent and I seemed to pick up some spicy yeast off flavors. It was also off balance and drank like an IPA. But, I'm not too surprised given the amount of hops I used and the unknown alpha acids. It's possible the brown, crispy hops added some off flavors, but I'm not entirely convinced. Overall, it was fun to harvest the hops and brew and drink this beer. 

9 lbs 2-row

8 oz Crystal 60

US-05 yeast

Simcoe pale ale - summer 2023

For several years I've been mostly making easy to drink, fairly straightforward beers. Light to moderate ABV, moderate to low bitterness, moderate to low hop flavor. This beer was no exception. Just an APA, nothing fancy. Simcoe hops from the 2016 crop. They've remained vacuum sealed and seem to still have good flavor. I'd generally been making pale ales with a standard mix of 2-row and crystal 60 malt, but to change things a little I decided to use Crystal 80 this time. It resulted in a slightly darker, redder beer and maybe just a touch more sweetness, which worked well with the Simcoe hops. It was a really good beer, but if I make something like this again, I'd probably go back to Crystal 60. I've read that Crystal malts can cause oxidation. Perhaps the higher roasting level of Crystal 80 causes more oxidation than Crystal 60? Or maybe the beer just hung around in the keg longer than usual--I didn't notice loss or degradation of hop flavor until the beer was a month or two old. Nonetheless, a tasty beer and I definitely want to use Simcoe hops again. 

Recipe for 5 gallons:

8 lbs 2 row

8 oz Crystal 80

1 oz Simcoe at 15 minutes (13.3 AA)

1 oz Simcoe at 1 minute 

(about 30 IBU)

US-05 yeast

Civil Life Brown Ale clone

This is an attempted Civil Life American brown ale clone (summer 2023). I’ve always liked Civil Life beers, as can be seen by how many times I've mentioned that brewery on this blog. Their brown ale is one of my favorite beers. It along with more of their beers are available at local stores, but as a challenge to myself I decided to try to clone it. 

Civil Life used to list the ingredients on their web site but it seems they no longer do. Using the ingredients listed on an archived version of their site, I pieced together a recipe that I thought would get me close. Malt amounts were not listed. Nor were hop amounts or a specific yeast. 

When I developed my recipe, I had not had the real thing for a while. I had remembered it being a fairly dark beer. I’ve had the real thing a time or two after brewing this and am now aware of a few differences. The real thing is slightly lighter than mine and appeared very dark red or amber when held to light. Mine is also more roasty/astringent, which I attribute to the Carafa. Reducing that ingredient should solve the astringency and color problems. The real thing also has a strong brown malt flavor. If I brew this again I will increase the brown malt. 

Recipe for 5 gallons:

4.25 lb Maris Otter

3 lb 2 row

.75 Brown malt

.5 Crystal 120

6 oz Carafa III

1.25 oz Cascade hops at 60 minutes (6.3 AA, targeting about 33 IBU, although the link above indicates 40 IBU)

US-05 yeast