Holiday Spice Homebrew

I was lucky enough to get the ingredients for a 5 gal batch of homebrew for Christmas. The beer is American Brewmaster's Holiday Spice Ale. I was hoping to brew it a bit sooner than the 3rd week in January, so that it would be ready while we still had some colder weather. The full body and spice additions make this style of beer perfectly suited for cold winter days.

Out of the box, the kit was designed for an all-extract recipe with slightly under a pound of specialty grains to steep. Since the last brewday was our first attempt at a partial mash, I decided to add some 2 row barley to the grains and make my own mini-mash. In some leftovers from previous recipes, I had 10 oz of melanoidin 2-row malt. Melanoidin is typically used in German style lagers, to add malt character and flavor. The kit included a spice bag that was added to the boil for the last 10 minutes. It contained a stick of cinnamon, a small chunk of ginger, and a few cloves. One pound of light clover honey was added after the boil was complete as well.

Everything went smoothly, and it was maybe my cleanest brewday yet. Original gravity was measured at 1.073, slightly higher than the 1.071 target, because of the change I made to add a partial mash to the recipe. The Holiday Spice Ale should stay in the fermentation bucket for a little over a week. Hopefully it will still be cold enough to enjoy this beer after it carbonates.