American Amber Ale for Feedback

[ShatteredReality]

I recently created this as my first "custom" recipe and also my first competition entry. I got a 28/50 on the competition and I'd love feedback to help refine it.

I've adjusted the hop schedule/quantities a little bit since my original recipe due to the AA% being off.

The water chemistry stuff is also new to me, I didn't adjust the water at all for the first batch and am going to try and take a crack at that this time around.

Feedback was: low hop aroma and flavor, hop flavor that was present was herbal/vegetal. Body was thin. Flavor was balanced but both malt sweetness and hop bitterness were low.

Hoping this new hop schedule will help but if you have feedback to help me improve I'd love to hear it!.

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/613549/shard-of-amber

 

[J A]

With the malt bill, I really doubt that you need almost 30% Crystal-type malts (Victory is a little different but still adds sweetness). I did an Amber that turned out very well and it had about 12% total of various Crystal and specialty malts. I'd suggest dropping some of that specialty malt load and adding Munich and use a little Special B to gain back some color. Definitely don't need the CaraPils on top of all the C-60.

The hop schedule should work okay but it seems a little unconventional. My rule of thumb for hoppy NW style beers is about 1/3 of the IBUs at 60 minutes with a "neutral" bittering hop, and the rest in 3 or 4 additions from 20 minutes on. Definitely want flame out hops in a beer like this and I like to leave all the hops in through the cooling process so that they get an additional few minutes contact time.

For drinking, I like beers on the lower end of the style range but for competition, consider getting closer to the max. I think judges like to see a beer that's a bold, robust example of the style. No need to overdo it, but I'd wager that a 1.055+ of this beer will fare better on the table.