New Batch - Irish Red

I bottled a new batch the other day - an Irish Red. This recipe is a modified Brewer's Best kit for a Red Ale, purchased at Kirk's. In an attempt to make the red ale more Irish I added three extra ingredients.

1) Toasted malt (crushed grains). I read about toasted malts in the homebrewer's bible, where it was listed as a key ingredient for Irish Reds. The process of toasting malt is to take whole grain malts - stick them in the oven for 10minutes @350F and then crush them with a grain mill (I used a rolling pin). You can buy a specialty grain called Victory Malt, which is basically the same thing, but I thought it would be fun to try making it - and it was....

2) More hops. I had some extra fuggle hops laying around, so I decided to add them in. I don't know if this will make the beer any more Irish, but I like my reds with a little bit of bite. According to my calcs, this addition should raise the IBU's by about 10 for a total around 40.

3) Food coloring. It wouldn't be St. Patty's day without green beer. A couple drops of blue food coloring in each bottle will hopefully give this beer a nice green glow. I only did this to a third of the batch because of the after-effects.

As you can see, my Irish Red isn't very red. The tinge of red that is there comes from the toasted malt and the little bit of black patent malt that came with the recipe. This recipe used pale malt extract which attributed most to the paler color. This time I let it slide as the pale color allowed for an easier dye job. Unless I am floored by the flavor, I'll probably use amber malt extract next time around.