Recommendations

[New Beer]

I am on my 3rd batch and so far I have used kits from on-line sites. I wanted to venture out a bit to make something outside of the typical kits. Being a beginer I am still only brewing extracts.
Are there any recommendation recepies out there? I'm sure there is plenty of good beers everyone has made but what your favorite. Lets see who can convince me yours is better?
I guess I would have to say I like several styles of beers from Sam all the way to Bud. My wife and I were just in Belguim and drank probably my most favorite beer. Tongerlo http://www.tongerlo.be/

If you think you may have somethig close to this.. Please let me know..

[dparsons]

Brew what you want to brew. If you want to do a Blond (Assuming that is the Tangerlo style you like) give it a go. Most any extract recipe can be broken down into:
1. light malt extract
2. Specialty grains and/or other additives
3. Hops
4. Yeast

What choices you make and how you combine them is what makes the brew what it is. For information on the style characteristics and constituents of a Blond see:

http://www.bjcp.org/styles04/Category18.html

The BJCP guidelines call for (with my comments)
1. Belgian pils malt (could use plain 2-row as difference will be slight, but pils extract is available too. Given the OG you'll want to use 9 lbs +/- of LME)
2. aromatic malts, candi sugar or sucrose (I'd steep 1/2 to 1 lb of aromatic malt at 154 F for 45 minutes before adding the malt extract and 1/2 lb candi sugar)
3. Styrian Goldings or East Kent Goldings hops (7.5 AAU's for 60 minutes will get you in the middle of the bitterness range. since the style indicates light hop aroma I'd add another 1/2 oz of goldings with <5 minutes to go)
4. Belgian yeast strains that produce complex alcohol, phenolics and perfumy esters (ex Wyeast 1214 or 1388)

All these can be obtained from a homebrew supply source. Have fun and ask if my shorthand on the recipe isn't clear enough.

[BrewDog]

Good to see you back, dparsons!

[beerking]

Newbeer,

I looked at the site. There are 4 very different varieties of Tongerlo. It will be hard to give you any real advice on recreating the beer you had if we don't know which one it was.

Let us know which version you had and we can help you more.

[New Beer]

Not exactly sure which it was. I think the dubble.. Except I normaly like the more Hoppy bitter beers. But just not sure.

dparsons, let me make sure I got the recipe right.
Belgian pils malt light malt (how much)
1lb of aromatic malts, candi sugar or sucrose (do I need all 3)
(is there a difference)


Styrian Goldings or East Kent Goldings hops (how much)

Wyeast 1214 or 1388 (my store may not have very limited)

My first batches I let ferment for 7 days then secondary ferment for 7 days. Is this enough?

Thanks very much guys.. It's hard when there is no-one to ask??