Sunday, April 11, 2010

AG #1: NUTS Brown Ale - First Taste Test

Well just over three and a half weeks ago I brewed my first ever all grain brew and today I got around to my first taste test. The beer (NUTS! Brown Ale) was in primary for 11 days, it was then transferred to secondary for 6 days and then transferred to a corny keg. The corny keg cold conditioned for 3 days and then was force carbonated for 3 1/2 days. The results overall are not bad for a first attempt.

Appearance - The colour is a little darker than I would have liked, I was aiming for 39 EBC's and it probably came out a bit darker than that. A great tan head forms and laces the side of the glass. For future versions I will probably scale back the chocolate malt slighty to bring the colour down. 

Aroma - The aroma is all about the malts, chocolate and crystal combine quite pleasantly, again I would consider scaling back on the chocolate for the next version.

Feel - Great mountfeel to this beer, medium bodied with a nice creamy texture. Very pleased with this aspect of the beer.

Taste - So how does it taste? Actually pretty good. A very smooth well balanced beer (if I do say so myself) once again the only negative I can discern is possibly the chocolate malt is a little too much to the fore, as a result it leaves a slightly cloying taste at the back of the throat. Also there is a very slight medicinal/metallic aftertaste that I think is due to the fact that I did not do any water treatment for this brew. However overall I am very happy with this and I am looking forward to seing how it develops as it is still quite young.

Summary - Overall very happy with this as a first attempt, hoping to get my second AG in the fermenter next Sunday.

3 comments:

Reuben Gray - TaleOfAle said...

Look forward to it next Thursday at the ICB meet.

Mark (Halite) said...

update - I tasted the bottled version of this last night ahead of the monthly IirishCraftBrewer.com tasting and it tasted really good. Slightly different than the draft version but really nice and that slight medicinal/metallic taste is very subdued. Will post the feedback from tonights tasting later.

Mark (Halite) said...

Got really good feedback from last Thursdays Irishcraftbrewer.com tasting for this beer. Had mentioned to a couple of guys the aftertaste I had tasted and they could not pick it out, probably just paranoia :-

Will definitely brew this beer again.