Brew the Madison River
Ennis American Amber Ale — home brew kit
American Amber Ale · 5.4% · 5 gallons
from $29In stock · Ships in 2-3 days
A five-gallon all-grain american amber ale kit named for the Madison River: grain, hops, yeast and the recipe, milled and measured.
Brewed and boxed by Derek Leavitt
In the glass
Caramel and toast up front, a clean citrus-pine finish that does not linger.
Serve 45°F, in a pint glass
Alongside A burger after a long float, which is what it was built for.
Fifty miles of unbroken riffle between Quake Lake and Ennis, fished hard and still generous.
The box arrives with the grain already milled and weighed, the hops in marked packets for each addition, and the yeast kept cold. You supply the pot, the water and the time. Nothing in here is a concentrate.
Full instructions come in the box and are written for somebody on their second batch, not their twentieth — every step says why it is there, so you can tell which ones you can bend.
- All grain, milled and weighed to the batch
- American Amber Ale · 5.4% ABV · 32 IBU
- Hops bagged per addition, so nothing goes in at the wrong minute
- Instructions written for a second-time brewer
The numbers
5.4%Alcohol by volume
(1.054 − 1.013) × 131.25
32Bitterness, IBU
Bitterness only means anything against the style. This one is a American Amber Ale.
13Colour, SRM
The swatch above is this number on the standard reference ramp, not an impression of it.
Gravity1.054 down to 1.013 — 76% apparent attenuation.
The day, and the wait
One mash rest, one ale temperature, nothing to time tightly.
- First pint
- about five weeks35 days from brew day, including conditioning
- Batch size
- 5 US gallonsAbout fifty twelve-ounce bottles
- You supply
- Pot, fermenter, thermometer, hydrometer, bottlesThe starter kit below is exactly this list, if you have none of it.
- Mash in60 min at 152°FHold the temperature. This rest is where the body of the beer is decided.
- Sparge and run off45 minSlowly. Rushing it pulls tannins out of the husks.
- Boil60 min3 hop additions, each timed from the END of the boil.
- Chill and pitch30 minDown to 66°F before the yeast goes anywhere near it.
- Clean up45 minThe part nobody photographs, and the part that decides the next batch.
Brew day4 h, kettle on to kitchen clean. The rest of the wait is the yeast doing its own work.
What arrives, and what you supply
In the box
- Milled grain, weighed for a 5-gallon batch
- Hops in marked packets, one per addition
- Yeast — SafAle US-05, American ale
- Priming sugar for bottling
- Printed recipe and brew-day instructions
Worth knowing
- You will need: a brew pot, a fermenter with an airlock, a thermometer, a hydrometer and bottles or a keg.
- Ferment at 66-68°F for two weeks — temperature control matters more than almost anything else in this box.
- A burger after a long float, which is what it was built for.
The recipe, in full
Printed on a card in the box as well. Nothing here is a concentrate and nothing is a trade secret.
Grain bill
- Pale 2-row
- 8 lb
- Munich
- 1 lb
- Crystal 60L
- 12 oz
- Victory
- 4 oz
Hop schedule
- Centennial
- 0.75 oz at 60 min
- Cascade
- 1 oz at 15 min
- Cascade
- 1 oz at flameout
Fermentation
- Yeast
- SafAle US-05, American ale
- Schedule
- 66-68°F for two weeks, then a week cold
- Batch
- 5 US gallons
Named for the Madison River
Southwest Montana · MT
The water it is named for
- Water type
- Freestone
While the wort cools
- Brewing starter kit$139
Six-gallon fermenter, airlock, auto-siphon, hydrometer, thermometer, bottling wand and a capper. Everything the recipe assumes you already own.
- Madison airbrushed hat
The same water, hand airbrushed onto a trucker cap.
Where this came from
river beer · made
0 — nothing entered the score yet, at the Derby's published weights, since . Views are not counted.
- madison
- home-brew
- american-amber-ale
- mt