Brews and Blues Beer and Smokin’ Blues

Homebrew – ESYFB

Here's one of my recent home brewing projects for review. This beer is my "ESYFB" which is a simple blonde ale. ESYFB stands for "Extra Special Yellow Fizzy Beer". Yellow Fizzy Beer is terminology that a lot of homebrew and micro/craft beer drinkers like to use when discussing beers from the BudMillerCoors family of beers.  I added the "Extra Special" to denote that this is a home brewed product.  My objective with this beer was exactly what you might think.  I was trying to replicate the light color and light body of the BudMillerCoors beers but produce a flavor and feel that makes it 'Extra Special' in nature.  My main objectives for making a beer like this is just to see if I could pull it off and also to have some beer on hand for friends and family who aren't used to drinking heavier bodied and fuller flavored home brews.  How did I do?  Let's see...

This beer, as you can see from the photo, poured with a golden orange color with a thick head.  My color objective wasn't exactly where I wanted it to be.  I wanted this beer to be a lot lighter yellow color.  The beer is also cloudy from a chill haze, which is a result of not being able to cool the beer quickly enough during the brewing process.  The haze (cloudiness) doesn't have any affect on the flavor though.  The color is darker than I expected because the mash tun I used (this was the first time I had used this equipment) produced an efficiency much higher than I expected, which also caused me to produce an alcohol level higher than I had originally planned for.  This beer came out at 5.5% ABV instead of my target 4.25%.  Problem?  Not really :)  This beer has the light body and crisp flavor that I was shooting for.  I'm very happy with that aspect of it.  It has a low hop presence of approximately 19 IBU which helps keep the malty sweetness of this beer dominant in its character.  The hops I chose for this particular brew provide a citrus mouth presence with a very slight citrus aroma. 

I plan to perfect this beer, because it's one that I want to keep on hand at all times, and I'll probably brew it more than once a year for that very reason.  My next batch will have some adjustments made that will lower the alcohol content just a little and clean up the chill haze to make a very nice looking beer in the glass.  I'll also hit the color

This beer was my second all-grain batch.  I'm letting my first all-grain batch sit just a little longer before I put it on the reviewing block.  I have been dipping into it and I'm waiting for it to age just a little more before I put it in the spotlight :)