In my other most recent post (A gift that has kept on giving) I mentioned that the recent beers I've brewed have been somewhere over the 5% mark ranging from 5.2% to 5.5%. While on their own the ABV isn't a problem, it's when you have multiple amounts, maybe 3 or 4 pints worth. Then before you know it your kissing your wife goodnight and heading for bed as your done for the night!

Something I am more aware of now that I have a proper keg setup in the garage, it's all too easy to pop out there to fill another glass.

I have recently put myself to the task in designing a recipe that is low abv. (targeting 3-3.5%), fortunately on The HomeBrew Forum there has been recent discussions regarding brewing low/no alcohol beers which I found a good place to start.  I then started my own thread specifically in mind to get a few pointers on my 1st attempt of a sessionable beer.

The replies I got helped me alot to iron out a few holes, I also ended up looking in Camra's Essential Home Brewing to find Siren's Yu Lu recipe, with another great tip from Andy (the author) who says drop the Earl Grey & Lemon addition and you'll have a good base for a session beer.

Along with this I took note at 1 particular post on my sessionable beer thread and this was to look into Kernel's Table Beer. Although I probably wont get chance to find a bottle of this before I get to brew my own beer, I did find BYO magazine covered a version of their recipe.

Great! I have two examples that I could adapt....Now to put to paper. This was pretty tricky as I didn't want to have too many 'ingredients' and over complicate things or end up making essentially a hoppy tea.
Fortunately I had the replies from my thread, what I also read on The Mad Fermentationist blog and watched some videos on basic brewing youtube channel.

So...what did I learn regarding brewing low ABV beers:

• Mash high (68/69C is a good temp) for a full bodied beer. The high mash temp means you don't have enough fermentable sugars to get a lower FG 
• Rye adds a lot of mouthfeel so the brews would not taste too watery 
• Oats will add some more body 
• A slightly higher FG should help in the pursuit of some body, so use a yeast that has a lower attenuation AG brewers can manipulate mash temperature to achieve this, but for all brewers, careful yeast choice will drastically affect things.

For instance, using WLP002 English Ale yeast, rather than S-04 or US-05. The lowest attenuation for WLP002 is 63%, which means you can have an OG of 1.035 with an FG of 1.013 and ABV 2.9%.  https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/threads/low-alcohol-beer.18678/#post-399753

The two mentioned recipes, had already covered the above points, so I ended up mashing (pun was intended!) the malt bill's together but also adding abit of rye to be on the safe side and also the rye should pair well with the tropical/citrus hops. The hop schedule is based off Siren's Yu Lu recipe but I decided to pair my own choice of hops into the recipe, using Amarillo,Citra, Engima and Mosaic.

Artwork made up in parts of my wife's illustrations 

......Thus Creatures Great or Small was born. 


Download BeerXML for:All creatures great or small



It's been a interesting few weeks looking into this style of beer, I have learnt alot and having the homebrew community at hand has been invaluable. A home brewer is always learning! 

I'll update after I brew this beer in a few weeks. 

Until next time......Happy Brewing

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As some of you may have been made aware from my Tweets/Instagram/ previous blog posts I was given Camra's Essential Home Brewing Book for a christmas present from my lovely wife.

Although I haven't read it from cover to cover yet. I have used it quite extensively for a recipe book. Which my wife & I both agreed it would be a nice thing for me to help try some different beers, or not brewing my own designed recipes all the time.

The book has 30 recipes from UK craft breweries including Verdant, Left Handed Giant and Elusive Brewing.


Back in January I did two brews close together, so I could have a choice of beer to drink but also because I was pretty excited to deep dive into the recipes. Only paying one postage was a plus too, but I did have to work out on a calendar when I could do the 2nd brew & had to store the grains/hops for a few weeks.

What is so good, is the author Andy Parker (who also actually owns Elusive Brewing) also has put some really useful tips/points with most of the recipes.

As an example I wanted to give myself 1 more chance in brewing a Black IPA. Something in the past has either been a bit hit and miss. Mostly too roasty, sometimes too imbalanced towards the hops.
There is a recipe from Eight Arch Brewing, their Corbel IPA, the tip that Andy gives is that you could add 500g of carafe 3 (given that your brewing a full 21L batch) but add it towards the end of the mash so you don't impart too much roastiness.

I gladly followed Andy's point and set about my way punching the recipe into MaltMiller recipe generator  & BrewersFriend (other Home Brewing stores & recipe generators are available)

As I ordered the carafe 3 as part of the recipe generator it all came mixed into the main part of the malt bill, I will next time add a special note to have the carafe 3 separate, as it has imparted a fair bit of roast in the beer. The beer is still really balanced and the hop aroma is absolutely there, however the hop flavour is still developing, it might be because its only been 2 weeks in the keg, but its probably more due to the roast. You get an upfront Mosaic Punch then gets a bit lost as the roast comes through.

It still is the best black IPA that I've brewed, next time I'll brew it, maybe in a few months time while I can freshly remember how it turned out this time, I will add the carafe 3 in later into the mash and perhaps slightly boost the flameout/dry hops but not by much.

Like I mentioned earlier, the beer could still be developing and the roast may subside within another weeks time.

The other beer I have done from the book is a straight clone of Anspach and Hobday's The Cream Ale, which is really drinkable & full of flavour for a Cream Ale.  As in the book, the recipe lends itself to the possibility of switching the hops. Its the 1st time of using enough of Sorachi Ace hops to get the full flavour of them. They do have a unique profile, early tastes were heavy on the dill, but now I get lemon and coconut. Its very pleasant.



The pocket sized book would offer alot for a newer Home Brewer, with all the additional information about home brewing processes, but even for the recipes themselves this book should tantalise any Home Brewer to get it.  There's enough in there to probably make this year 'The year of the clones'  if I wanted to.

Both beers brewed so far I have to watch it with, as both came out exactly the ABV from the book (figures in the region of 5.2-5.5%) You have a few and know about it the next day....which will bring me onto my next post of constructing a 'low ABV' session beer.

Until Next Time....Happy Brewing

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