Apple ale

hello, I was thinking of making a 5 gallon batch of a apple ale,what would be a good extract kit to use for this,and what kind of apple flavoring would be good to use for this,I really dont want to use a extract for this.I read about people using apple cider or apple juice in secondary ,what would be best :cheers:

I made this batch a year ago, and I liked it. I was going for a caramel nut apple kinda flavor. You need some sweetness here as the cider will dry this beer out.

6 lb Marris Otter LME
1 lb Belgian Biscuit malt
1 lb Caramel 60L
The last 2 malts were steeped at 160 degrees F for 30 minutes
1 oz Nugget whole hops (60 min). Use 10% less if using pellets
1 oz Amalia whole hops (15 min)
1 oz Amalia hops (5 min) You could substitute a low Alpha % aroma hop of your choice here
Used Coopers Ale yeast but probably would go with US-05 now.

After about 10 days in primary, I racked it onto 1.5 gallons of pasteurized apple cider. I left it in secondary for 5 weeks. Make sure fermentation is over because cider takes a while to reach FG. It came out a lot less hazy than I thought. Got 2 bottles left and still tastes great. Next time, I’d probably skip the Biscuit as the Marris Otter has a nutty flavor to it already although less pronounced.

I brewed dmtaylo2’s recipe for smoked apple ale a couple years ago and was really happy with the results. The key was to brew a good beer in a smaller volume than you want to end up with, and then top off with apple cider as it goes into the fermentor.

Hopefully he can chime in and give you some pointers for converting it to extract. Here is his AG recipe:

Smoked Harvest Apple Ale III
3 gallons

3.75 lb American 2-row
1.25 lb Bamburg smoked malt (do NOT use peated malt)
0.5 lb Carapils
3 oz Gambrinus Honey malt
3 oz Crystal 20
0.63 oz Mt. Hood (5% alpha, 60 minutes)
0.75 oz Mt. Hood (5% alpha, 10 minutes)
WLP400 Belgian Wit yeast
1 gallon fresh orchard cider

Mash in to hit 150 F for 30 minutes. Batch sparge with 185 F water. Bring to boil. During the second half of the boil, bring 1 gal cider to 170 F in a separate pot on the side (do not boil) for 15 minutes to pasteurize and add to the beer at flameout. Ferment 2 weeks at 68 F. Rack to secondary for 4 weeks. Prime with 4.5 Tbsp. table sugar and also add a couple ounces of lactose if required to sweeten (optional, do whatever you like).

rebuiltcellars, thanks for the support and I’m glad you liked it.

Conversion of this recipe to extract should be fairly easy. However you might want to skip the smoked malt, which to me doesn’t taste all that great, plus with extract brewing, it would need to be mashed and you might just want to skip a mash with this beer to keep it real easy.

Plan on brewing 2 gallons of beer, then adding 1 gallon of apple juice to make the full 3-gallon batch. The above recipe does only make 3 gallons. If you want 5 gallons, then use 1.5 times as much ingredients, and maybe plan to brew 3 gallons of beer and add a full 2 gallons of apple juice. Might turn out even better that way!

Beyond those things, only thing left to do is to convert the 2-row and smoked malt additions to extract instead. So, 5 lb malt converts to approximately 3 lb DME or 3.7 lb LME. Other ingredients stay the same as the recipe above. Instructions for the recipe change to this:

Crush the Carapils, honey malt, and Crystal 20 grains and place in grain steeping bag. Bring 3 gallons distilled or RO water towards a boil with the crushed grains, removing the grain bag when the temperature reaches approximately 170 F. Bring to the boil for 1 hour, adding hops per schedule. During the second half of the boil, in a separate kettle, bring 1 gal cider and the 3 lb DME or 3.7 lb LME to 170 F (do not boil) for 15 minutes to pasteurize, then add to the main wort at flameout. Ferment 2 weeks at 68 F. Rack to secondary for 4 weeks. Prime with 4.5 Tbsp. table sugar and also add a couple ounces of lactose if desired to sweeten the apple ale (optional, do whatever you like).

Cheers!