I got my recipe from Brewer’s Friend, and it was a recipe posted by Cameron. He also has a YouTube video showing how he went about it.
Well it was that time of year again for the Christmas Ale to come rolling out, and I had my fill of it over the holidays. I’ve never tried brewing a clone of the beer, so this year I thought that I would. I got to it a bit later than I would have liked, but the five gallons I got will carry me through the snowy months as I brew Stout and then, in March, and Oktoberfest.
| Amt | Name | Type | # | %/IBU | Volume |
| 12 lbs | Pale Malt | Grain | 1 | 78.0 % | 0.94 gal |
| 1 lbs 3.2 oz | Caramel/Crystal Malt – 40L (53.4 SRM) | Grain | 2 | 7.8 % | 0.09 gal |
| 12.8 oz | Wheat, Flaked (1.6 SRM) | Grain | 3 | 5.2 % | 0.06 gal |
| 5.1 oz | Special Roast (50.0 SRM) | Grain | 4 | 2.1 % | 0.03 gal |
| 1.0 oz | Roasted Barley (300.0 SRM) | Grain | 5 | 0.4% | 0.00 gal |
| 1.0 oz | Liberty [4.30 %] – Boil 60.0 min | Hop | 6 | 11.6 IBUs | — |
| 1.0 oz | Liberty [4.30 %] – Boil 15.0 min | Hop | 7 | 5.7 IBUs | — |
| 1.0 oz | Ginger Root (Boil 12.0 mins) | Herb | 8 | — | — |
| 1.0 oz | Cascade [5.50 %] – Boil 11.0 min | Hop | 9 | 5. IBUs | — |
| 4.0 oz | Cinnamon Stick (Boil 5.0 mins) | Spice | 10 | — | — |
| 1 lb | Honey [Primary] | Honey | 11 | 6.5% | 0.08 gal |
I had to make some modifications based on the ingredients I had on hand, but this is the recipe I ended up with:
My mash volume was 6.52 gallons with a pH of 5.3 and my sparge volume was 3.73 gallons with a pH of 5.2. My pre-boil volume was 8 gallons (I overshot the 7.4 recommended), but boiled it 75 minutes instead of 60 minutes. I mashed at between 154 degrees and 156 degrees for 60 minutes, the sparge took around the same amount of time at 168 degrees. (I donated my spent grains to a neighbor who has chickens.) My measured pre-boil gravity was 1.056, and my measured original gravity was 1.070. I brew using a Grainfather, so the mash was continually re-circulating. I pitched a California Ale yeast (WLP001), for which I created a starter. The yeast was old (September 2021 expiration), so I hedged my bet and also pitched Safale US-05 into the fermenter. The wort went into the fermenter at 68 degrees, I oxygenated it via O2 and a stone prior to pitching the yeast. The beer finished fermenting three days ago, January 3, 2022, and started fermenting within 24 hours. It was a long fermentation as I brewed the beer on December 23, 2021. I’ll move it into a corny keg tomorrow and take final gravity readings at that time.
