Homebrew Recipe of the Month
July 2025 - Carny's Cut Cream Ale
This is our very basic cream ale we generally modify for other situations - like the "wedding beer" varieties we've done, or the lactose-filled desert cream ales of our Boardwalk Cream or Caramel Macchiato Cream Ale. Fun fact, a traditional cream ale does NOT have any cream or lactose in it. In the same way as Root Beer or Ginger Beer isn't really a beer, cream ale is named for its smooth, silky texture, not for any dairy ingredients. It's a marketing term that originated in the 19th century to describe a type of ale that was lighter and easier to drink than traditional ales, mimicking the perceived smoothness of European lagers. So brew this up, it's fast to make, and is a great summer "lawnmower" beer.
ALL-GRAIN
Batch size: 5 gallons
Brewhouse efficiency: 72%
OG: 1.042
FG: 1.005
IBUs: 13
ABV: 4.9%
WATER
We target: Calcium 46ppm , Magnesium 2ppm , Sodium 6ppm , Sulfate 38ppm , Chloride 39ppm. We achieve target through light additions of Gypsum and Calcium Chloride. Messing with the water chemistry on this recipe, however, is not really that necessary. If your water is tasty, you'll make good beer without any adjustments.
MALT/GRAIN BILL
7 lbs Pilsner
7 oz Malted Corn (see notes below)
10 oz Cane Sugar (at 10 minutes left in the boil)
HOPS
1.25 oz Crystal at 60 minutes [10 IBUs]
1 oz Crystal at 10 minutes [3 IBUs]
YEAST
Fermentis US-05 or any clean-fermenting Chico strain.
DIRECTIONS
Mill the grains and mash at 150°F for 60 minutes. Recirculate until the runnings are clear, then run off into the kettle. Sparge and top up as necessary to get about 6 gallons of wort, depending on your evaporation rate. Pre-boil gravity should be somewhere in the 1.033 - 1.036 range. A 60 minute boil is fine for this recipe, although if you are paranoid about DMS, you can boil for 90 minutes. Add hops and cane sugar according to the schedule. Chill to about 68°F, aerate the wort, and pitch the yeast. Ferment at 68°F. When fermentation is complete and the gravity has stabilized, crash to 32°F and age 2–3 weeks. Clarity is important in presentation for a cream ale, so employing any fining techniques (Clarity Ferm, Whirlfloc, Biofine) will work great, but so does time at cold temps. Package and carbonate to about 2.5 volumes of CO2.
BREWER’S NOTES
Crystal has always been our go-to hop for cream ales, we really love the spice (flavor, not heat) complexity it gives to the beer, and is a very low alpha hop. The biggest decision to be made is the corn - we use malted corn from Root Shoot currently, but have used a variety of flaked corn and maize from various producers. You can make these adjustments without a huge impact, but we've always liked the toasted corn flavor. Do NOT use any off-the-shelf cereal flaked corn... that has preservatives that will not allow your wort to ferment.
June 2025 - Monkey Business IPA
This is a modified version of a recipe that owners Jeff and Cammy started with (as a kit) back in the day when they were just starting out homebrewing. It's also the first beer ever brewed at LUKI Brewery. The homebrew name was "Simple Jack", a reference to the easy ingredients and a joke from the movie Tropic Thunder. Obviously the name changed for more of a circus reference. It's a bit of a throwback to the late 90's/early 00's, as it's considered verboten to include ANY darker crystal malts in an IPA at all now, unless going for a Red or Black IPA.
ALL-GRAIN
Batch size: 5 gallons
Brewhouse efficiency: 72%
OG: 1.058
FG: 1.008
IBUs: 69
ABV: 6.6%
WATER
We target: Calcium 110ppm , Magnesium 25ppm , Sodium 20ppm , Sulfate 250ppm , Chloride 60ppm. We achieve that target generally through a heavy addition of Gypsum and Epsom Salt, then a bit of Calcium Chloride and Table Salt. The key takeaway is the Sulfate-to-Chloride ratio being right around 4:1 to accent bitterness.
MALT/GRAIN BILL
10 lbs 2-Row
1 lb Simpsons Crystal T50
HOPS
1oz oz Centennial at 60 minutes [37 IBUs]
0.75 oz Cascade at 15 minutes [7 IBUs]
0.75 oz Centennial at 15 minutes [13 IBUs]
1.5 oz Cascade at whirlpool (180° F) [5 IBUs]
1.5 oz Centennial at whirlpool (180° F) [7 IBUs]
1.5 oz Cascade at Dry Hop
1.5 oz Centennial at Dry Hop
YEAST
Fermentis US-05 or any clean-fermenting Chico strain.
DIRECTIONS
Mill the grains and mash at 153°F (66°C) for 60 minutes. Recirculate until the runnings are clear, then run off into the kettle. Sparge and top up as necessary to get about 6 gallons of wort, depending on your evaporation rate. Pre-boil gravity should be somewhere in the 1.050 - 1.052 range. Boil for 60 minutes, adding hops according to the schedule. After the boil, perform a whirlpool step: Stir or recirculate to create a vortex, add the whirlpool hops, and allow 20 minutes of contact time. Ideally, get the temp of your wort 180°F or lower before adding hops - you want the aroma and flavor, not significant bitterness. If not able, consider cutting Centennial and Cascade at whirlpool down to 0.75oz each. Chill to about 68°F, aerate the wort, and pitch the yeast. Ferment at 68°F. Add dry hops at day 7, which should kick off some additional fermentation. If concerned about diacetyl production, when the gravity has dropped to about 1.020, dry hop then and let free rise no higher than 73°F. When fermentation is complete and the gravity has stabilized, crash to 32°F and age 2–3 weeks. Package and carbonate to about 2.5 volumes of CO2.
BREWER’S NOTES
If you practice good sanitation techniques, it's hard to mess this one up. If you skip the water chemistry, you will still make a good beer, although the dry pop of bitterness won't be as pronounced.
May 2025 - Feisty Ferret
Don't know where and how exactly Jeff decided on a "rodent trilogy" of some classic style favorites, but malty English beers were always his jam. It started with Cheeky Weasel, an ESB, then we followed up with Sneaky Stoat, a Pale Ale. And now we finish with Feisty Ferret Amber Ale, inspiried by Lefthand's Sawtooth Ale which we drank the heck out of back in the late 90s.
ALL-GRAIN
Batch size: 5 gallons
Brewhouse efficiency: 72%
OG: 1.049
FG: 1.010
IBUs: 42
ABV: 5.1%
WATER
We target: Calcium 39ppm , Magnesium 3ppm , Sodium 6ppm , Sulfate 51ppm , Chloride 29ppm. We achieve target generally through additions of Gypsum and Calcium Chloride. Keep the Sulfate-to-Chloride under 1.75 unless you really want this more as an ESB and accent bitterness.
MALT/GRAIN BILL
7 lb Root Shoot English Pale
12 oz Root Shoot Munich 10
10 oz Simpsons Caramalt
10 oz Simpsons Crystal T50
4 oz Simpsons Crystal DRC
3.5 oz Root Shoot Winter/White Wheat Malt
1 .5 oz Briess Blackprinz
HOPS
0.75 oz CTZ at 60 minutes [37 IBUa]
0.33 oz UK Golding at 10 minutes [3 IBUs]
0.75 oz Cascade at whirlpool (180° F) [2 IBUs]
YEAST
Fermentis S-04 or any preferred English Ale Yeast
DIRECTIONS
Mill the grains and mash at 153°F (66°C) for 60 minutes. Recirculate until the runnings are clear, then run off into the kettle. Sparge and top up as necessary to get about 6 gallons of wort, depending on your evaporation rate. Pre-boil gravity should be somewhere in the 1.043 - 1.045 range. Boil for 60 minutes, adding hops according to the schedule. After the boil, perform a whirlpool step: Stir or recirculate to create a vortex, add the whirlpool hops, and allow 20 minutes of contact time. Ideally, get the temp of your wort 180°F or lower before adding hops - you want the aroma and flavor, not the bitterness. If not able, consider less Cascade at whirlpool. Chill to about 68°F, aerate the wort, and pitch the yeast. Ferment at 68°F until your gravity has stabilized. If concerned about diacetyl production, when the gravity has dropped to about 1.020, let free rise no higher than 73°F for a rest. When fermentation is complete and the gravity has stabilized, crash to 32°F and age 2–3 weeks. Package and carbonate to about 2.5 volumes of CO2.
BREWER’S NOTES
To focus on malt flavor complexity, this brew features a layering of different levels of crystal malt, unlike many of LUKI's recipes - we usually like to keep it simple. The whirlpool hop addition is important to give this traditional Amber or ESB (it's right on the line) a nice modern pop of citrus and pine. Careful with that whirlpool temp, however, if you can't cool it down before adding hops, you can send this squarely into ESB territory if you don't adjust the hop quantity. Dry hopping instead is something we've discussed, but never tried.