This Beer is a Pipe Bomb

Braggot

2011-03-08T00:30:00.000-08:00

A good friend of mine who just visited town decided that he is a "celiac" and must obstain from beer, as a result he did nothing but rot his gut with excessive amounts of malic acid from cider and booze from mead. His pervasive requests for me to smell his bottle of sweet mead inspired me to brew some sort of honey concoction, ultimately a braggot.

This ones for you Jeff!

The grain bill part of the recipe basically utilizes 2 grains which to me have an exaggerated maltiness, victory giving a distinct "perfectly golden toasted wonder bread" type maltiness, and the aromatic malt giving that wonderful "sweet bread" character to the flavor and especially the nose. The 2 row in the recipe is just for enzymes to convert the specialty malt's starches to fermentables, and also for husk material for lautering.
The rest of the fermentables come from local honey, harvested from bee's which have only been pollinating fruit tree's.
I used Westamalle yeast on this one since it is so fruity and should play well with honey-ish fermentation notes.

Braggot #1

6 gal
85%eff
1.061OG
18IBU

4# 2row
1# Victory
1# Aromatic
5# Honey

Hallertau@5% .75oz@60min
.25@ 5min

wyeast 3787.

* The fermentation on this beer has been shitty to say the least. I pitched at about 62 and put the beer under a blanket with my heater to let it warm up, the next morning I woke up with a beer fermenting at 80 degrees! I cooled the beer back to 70 and checked the fermentation, the beer had only fermented about 20 points so luckinly there shouldnt be too much hot alcohol, unfortunately the fermentation has been dragging since I cooled the beer. Hopefully it will ferment out to dryness without having to mess around with the fermentation.

Fat Fisted Ale

2011-01-13T23:23:00.000-08:00

Ever tried a beer that haunted you for a while? What are those flavor's, what style is it in, how could I ever brew something close? I've had several of these but the most long standing has been the original batch of La Terroir by New Belgium Brewing Company of Fort Collins Colorado. I first tried this beer 2 or 3 summer's ago at Belmont Station's PuckerFest ( A week long celabration of sour and funky beer's) For some reason this beer has stuck with me for so long, I can distinctly remember ordering the beer, taking a few sips , and then chatting with the bar keep about how this beer was basically Orval with a bunch of Biscuit or Victory malt. It was a beautiful mix of flavors and I ended up ordering several pints.
Fast forward several years, New Belgium has now bottled La Terroir atleast once in their Lips of Faith series. Ive bought several bottles in hope for a taste of what I tried some years ago, or atleast a taste of what that beer is after sitting with brett for many months, no luck, after several bottles and tap tastes it seems like a vapid dull shadow of my memory.

no worry's though, I have such a distinct beer flavor in my head from the initial taste that I've had no problem coming up with what I feel will be a similar recipe.

I'm calling this beer "fat fisted ale" because the two main flavor adding ingredients are rather over the top or "heavy handed" to say the least.

First off, Biscuit Malt. This is a Belgian toasted malt that tastes like wonder bread after being toasted in the toaster to "just browned" A beautifully focused flavor in my opinion that is often used excessively to a point that is cloying, or exhaustive to to the palate.

Second is Brett B. In my experience Brett Brux is overwhelming usually swallowing up all malt character with it's spicy phenols.

My hope with this beer is to have the biscuit malt's over the top toastiness balance out the brett.

My recipe is very much influenced by both Orval and Fat Tire (allegedly the first batch of Terrior was just a brett inoculated batch of Fat Tire)

Fat Fisted Ale

6.25 Gallons
1.060 OG
38 IBU
13SRM
86% Eff

82% 2 Row
12% CaraMunich
6% Belgian Biscuit

Magnum -8%AA .25 oz. @ 60 min.
Hallertau -3.9%AA 1 oz. @ 15 min - .5 @ whirlpool
Tettnanger -4.4%AA 1 oz. @ 15 min - .5 @ whirlpool
Perle - 8.8%AA 1 oz. @ 15 min - .5 @ whirlpool

US - 05 yeast
68 degree ferment

Arrogant Bastard's

2010-12-05T18:12:00.000-08:00

Stone's Arrogant Bastard is an over the top red ale that I've enjoyed more than a few of over the years, so I was pretty excited when I saw it as a challenge on the Brewing Network's ' Can You Brew It Show".

I was even more excited after I listened to the podcast and learned that Stone was completely unwilling to give any details on the grist or how to brew the beer. Although I've listened to most of the episodes I feel that the CYBI show is pretty bollocks seeing as how they get the full malt/ hopping bill as well as yeast/ sacch temp/ferm temp, why not just have the pro brewer set aside 6 gallons so jamil can ferment it in his garage? That said, they really had to work out what the flavors in this beer were and how to go about achieving them. I'm really impressed with Jamil's "pro brewer" logic of scaling a recipe and then rescaling to acount for grain bag size and most pro brewer's tendency to use a whole bag instead of holding back a few pounds.
Anyways give it a listen, it made way better radio to me than just " here's all the number's, ferment it"

Red Ale # 1 is based on the suggested changes to Tasy McDoles AB clone attempt #1

7.25 g. run off
85% eff
og 1072
fg 1015
90min boil
80ibu rager
colour: ~23srm
yeast:cal ale
mash @ 148

6.35kg pale/2-row
0.50kg Crystal 150
0.25kg Crystal 15
0.25kg Crystal 40
0.25kg Crystal 80
0.15kg Chocolate

28g Chinook @ 85
14g Chinook @ 45
14g Chinook @ 15
14g Chinook @ 0

fermented at 68 degrees for 7 days
and then raised to 72 degrees for 5 days
crash cooled and kegged

This beer does not taste anything like AB. But it kicks ass none the less. Those sharper more aggressive chinook notes are still very far in the background while the caramel notes stick out, brown sugar, buttery toffee, raisins browned with dark sugar, mixed with resiny tree sap from the hops, even at 80 IBU the malt seems to dominate the hop character.
I want to brew this recipe again but sub in some toasty malt character, most likely 20% munich for base malt, or aromatic/ biscuit. This beer is all caramel it needs, some toasty malts.
This recipe is a great starting point for adding roast malts. I will definitely be using this as a base for some brown ales and porters in the future.

Recipe #2 is Based off the actual re brew of AB on Can You Brew It, the recipe is much simpler yet apparently spot on, listen to www.thebrewingnetwork,com/canyoubrewit for more details

7.25Gallon PB
85%Eff
95IBU Rager
1.072 SG
1.015FG
21 SRM
cal ale yeast
148 sacc temp

89% 2 row
11% special B (120L)

chinook @ 12.9%
.85G @85 min
.85G @45 min
.85G @15 min
.85G @ 0 min

ipa

2010-10-30T23:47:00.000-07:00

boring old ipa...
I drink a ton of this stuff yet seem to find it somewhat boring to brew. I'm not exactly sure why, maybe the simple grain bill or the complications that come with blending a myriad of hop choices into a focused conglomerate. Either way, I don't think I have ever brewed an IPA that has been kick ass enough for me to stop experimenting.

This one is inspired by Lagunitas: it's big, hoppy, and dextrinous as hell. Twice this week, I have been drinking Lagunitas beers and trying to guess the FG's only to look them up and be shocked at how high they are. To me, all their beers taste like they finish at 1.015 yet are most often in the 1.017 - 1.025! range. This definitely goes against the Vinnie logic of always finishing around 1.012, yet seems to strike a different type of balance in my opinion.

I'm hoping this beer finishes out around 1.018; preferably with most of that non fermentable sugar coming from the high mash temperature. 80 ish IBU's is where I usually put my bitterness for IPA's of this gravity but I bumped it up to 96 to account for all that extra body.
Oh, and the Lyle's Syrup? I put it in most of my English beers so why not an American IPA. It lends easily ferment able sugar along with a toffee like flavor to the finished product.

anyways

LAGUNITAS INSPIRED IPA

7.5 Gallon Pre boil
6.5 Gallon Post boil
90% Efficiency
96 IBU
1.066 OG

76% 2 row
9.4% domestic munich
9.4% domestic C-10/C-20 even mix
4.8% Lyles golden syrup

157 degree mash for 90 minutes

60 minute boil

Magnum@14.4% 28.5 grams @ 60 minutes
Amarillo @8.6% 28.5 grams @ 10 minutes
Columbus@14.6% 28.5 grams @ 10 minutes
Simcoe @ 12.2% 28.5 grams @ 10 minutes
Amarillo @8.6% 28.5 grams @ 0 minutes
Simcoe @ 12.2% 28.5 grams @ 0 minutes

US - o5 yeast

pitched @ 65 and let rise slowly to 68

This is a sweet find that I got for free from my work. An electric stand alone burner that I can use indoors or outside with an extension chord.

Almost Mackesons Milk Stout

2010-10-19T00:02:00.000-07:00

Some times brew days don't work out as planned. Usually drunkenness is the culprit, after that it's usually carelessness, forgetfulness or plain stupidity. I'm guilty of the latter on this particular brew day.
The brew in question was a recipe for Macasons Milk Stout circa 1936 curtesy of Ron Pattison on the shutupaboutbarclayperkins blog. Mackasons milk stout is one of the first beer's I can remember drinking, I couldn't resist and had to make this beer.

so here is how I shit the bed on this one,

Should be

68% Pale
.5 % oats
5.7% brown malt
5.5% choc malt
8% #2 sugar
3.5% cane sugar
8.5% Lactose

OG 1.051

In my scaling of the recipe I forgot to give the sugar (which I added together as Lyles golden syrup) an actual ferment able average, so my base grain made up for it in formulation.
As a result of this miscalculation my wort was much richer in the pre boil gravity. By the time that I had noticed this mistake I needed to make the decision whether to leave the sugar out and water the wort down to get close to the recipes' intended gravity, or carry on and end up with a much higher gravity and very different product. I decided to go ahead and add the sugar because I felt that the caramel notes from the light treacle would be a key part of this beer's overall taste. I also ended up bumping the bitterness a tad to balance the higher original gravity. Unless this beer ferments out to a magically low gravity I will most likely not be adding the Lactose to the fermenter.
Usually when I screw something up like this I get pretty down on myself, but this is an exception, mistakes happen and I think this beer should be right up my alley the way it is.

the recipe ended up being:

1.070 OG
36 IBU
90 minute boil
149 mash temp
6 gallons post boil

12# Golden Promise
.75# Brown Malt
.75# English Chocolate
1.2 oz. Flaked Oats
1.25# Lyles Golden Syrup

all fuggle pellets at 4.75 Alpha Acid

1.4 oz @ 90 minutes

.55 oz @ 30 minutes

The yeast used was a large starter of Wyeast 1469 "West Yorkshire Ale Yeast" and single packet of Wyeast 1028

68 degree ferment for 4 days and then roused and raised to 70 to finish out for a few more days.

Labels

2010-09-26T21:42:00.000-07:00

Which one is not like the others?

How do labels affect the the alcoholic beverages you buy?

It's been pretty well documented that label design drives most wine sales but how does this translate to beer?

I'm curious what money ( if any) brewery's spend on label design.

I know the wine industry spends a grip on labels, so I never buy off design or flavor descriptors on the back. Yet for beer I can't help but be a little biased. Many of the Belgian breweries' labels are beautiful yet playful (Caracole, D, Achouffe) they hint at what's inside while still being playful (not to mention pandering to Americans by reinforcing how "rustic" Belgium is); this somehow comes off as appropriate to me.

With American beer, things seem to become a little more convoluted. For instance, we have all of Russian River's barrel aged sours - worst labels EVER!! (I do like the little graphic that explains the aging and micro organisms used, someone should make that mandatory on sour and/or barrel aged beer product regardless of bacteria and yeast). It's amazing beer inside but, if I weren't enmeshed in the beer scene, I can safely say I would never ever, ever buy their product - even if i had money to throw at things in that price range.

I'm finding that when it comes to the cheaper range of American beers, I won't buy certain beer's simply because of the label or name. This might seem pretentious, but I have a policy: no beers named after dogs or dinosaurs. I don't want beer to become pretentious, but I feel these names and labels do nothing but dumb down the immense work it takes to create a quality beer.

There has to be a middle ground between spending a ton on label design and simply defining your company. As much as I dislike their business practice, I feel that Rogue has mastered this field. Their labels are distinct, hint at whats inside, and most importantly they are uniquely Rogue - ish.

tommy arthur???

This is turning into a rant but the key point is this:

If you are truly proud of what you make why would you make a label like this?????? *

* and for the record, this beer sucks and probably deserves this label; therefore my argument is moot. However, Laughing Dog's Alpha Dog is my one exception to the no dog/dino thing. It is excellent and y'all should try it.

Raviolis'n beer

2010-09-18T00:54:00.000-07:00

Guinness plus Brett C

2010-09-05T21:29:00.000-07:00

Randomly decided to make Guinness last weekend. I used Kristen England's number's but came up with a bit of a higher gravity because of an unexpected increase in efficiency ( thanks again FH Steinbart's for adjusting your mill) I also added some aroma hops and brettanomyces clausenii

Guinness Plus

1.050 OG
45 IBU
44SRM
6o minute boil

64% Ashburne Mild Malt
16% Roasted Barley
20% Flaked Barley

152 mash for 60 minutes

.45 oz magnums @ 16%AA @ 60 minutes

1 oz fuggles@ 6% AA @ 10 minutes

1 oz fuggles@ 6% AA @ 5 minutes

fermented with US-05 at 66 degrees

one packet of Brett C pitched 24 hours after the initial yeast pitch

"It's the water"

2010-09-03T17:27:00.000-07:00

Autumn Ale

2010-08-31T23:36:00.000-07:00

Autumn Ale

1.070 OG
1.015 FG
35 SRM
46 IBU
60 min boil
6.25 Gal. at the end of the boil

10# 2 row
1 # Brown Malt
.75# Black Malt (british)
. 25# C - 55 (british)
4 # Yams roasted at 315 for about 2 hours (until sweet and dripping all over the roasting pan), then mash with a fork and add to the mash*

1 vanilla bean chopped
a big pinch cinnamon
a pinch:
nutmeg
allspice
ginger

all @ flameout

The spice additions are next to nil. I plan to adjust this post fermentation for a much more dialed in flavor.

10 oz. Molasses @ 10 minutes

12 oz. Maple Syrup @ 0 minutes

152 mash
cal ale yeast

the initial fermentation has been a bit hot. 70 degrees for the first few hours.
I just put it in a water bath to set in in nicely around 67.

Oh yes,

We had a party recently so I must show the amazing out door keggerator design...It's 11th hour but I'm pretty happy with it.

Inspired/

2010-08-20T22:37:00.000-07:00

So I've finally decided to make a beer that I've been mulling (no pun intended ) over a long time. Pumpkin spiced beer! That wonderful beer that you only want 6 of a year.
Anyways I long ago decided to eschew the traditional route which usually consists of a grain bill mimicking pie crust, most often this seems to contain aromatic, and special malt for exaggerated munich notes as well as some sort of biscuit/victory type malt for all the fresh cooked dough notes.
My beer is a brew inspired by the nebulous between old ale / brown stout / and pumpkin beer, quite a void.

Tentatively,

Autumn Ale

1.080 OG
1.015 FG
8 % ish
32 SRM brownish darkish nessish
38 - 45 ish IBU
60 min boil
6.25 Gal. at the end of the boil
78% Efficiency

10# 2 row
1 # Brown Malt
.75# Black Malt (british)
. 25# C - 55 (british)

other things! -

5

4

3

2

1

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Randy Mosher OUT!

4 # yams slowly roasted until carmelized and then added to main mash until carmelized.

.75 # Black Treacle added at 10 minutes

9 oz. maple syrup added at flame out or possibly during the end of fermentation.

vanilla
allspice
ginger
nutmeg

all added to taste

The goal is a brew that has an alcohol presence in both sweetness and spiciness. The malt character should be mostly caramel and roast notes which should ideally blend together enough so that they seem like they are on the same flavor continuum. Toffee caramel, smooth espresso like roastiness, backed up by the toast/ cocoa notes from the brown malts.

and then all those spices plus yam( allegedly it tastes more like pumpkin in beer than pumpkin does)

cal ale yeast for this one.

Alright Dupont Yeast, your alright

2010-08-19T21:32:00.000-07:00

shit took 4 and a half weeks to attenuate completely. What a pain in the ass.
That said I might re pitch this yeast into another brew to see how the fermentation carries on during a re pitch. I'm thinking the beer will be a re brew of Sean Paxton's Archaic Beer, an Oierbeer type malt bill. This was one of the best beer's I've made in my opinion, the perfect mix of complex malt flavors, spicy yeast and low level sourness.
anyways,
I need to brew it's been a few year's since I've seen so many of my boy's empty.

Fuck you Saison Dupont yeast!!!!

2010-08-02T20:17:00.001-07:00

Yes thats right

Fuck you!

I pamper you and build you up, I give you delicious wort,I give you pure oxygen, I give you a nice warm enviroment, ( I even give you a nice warm rotating dryer to sit on), Most of all I give you ample time to finish your thing yet you still fail to attenuate past 1.020 after almost 3 weeks.
I will relish in the fact that the champagne yeast I plan to pitch next week will annihilate you and finish the job. Good riddance... that other french saison yeast's rubbery phenolics are almost seeming welcome at this point.

In other news.....

Sour Cherries!!!

Sean Picked me up 25 pounds of these bad boys last week. 11 pounds went in a dark rosemary spiced sour ale that's been sitting at around 1.014 for about a year now. I'm excited to see some new activity with this beer, and am hoping renewed fermentation will drive down the final gravity a bit.

The rest of the cherries are frozen and slated for Quinns birthday beer ( brewed on her birthday but ultimately wont be done anytime near her next). This beer is a strong malty dubbel type brew that is based on Cuvee de Tomme. I haven't taken a gravity reading in several months and probably won't until it's first birthday but I'm hoping to have this finish around 1.012 before the cherries.
Any extra cherries are going in pie

Mild Malt Barley Wine

2010-07-29T17:14:00.000-07:00

A Barley Wine strength beer brewed only with mild malt. Weird, definitely made a few heads turn at the home brew shop. The recipe for this came from Ron and Kristen at the shut up about barclay perkins blog. The recipe is for Barclay Perkins 1839 XXX Ale. An X ale for the Barclay Perkins brewery denoted a beer that was served fresh, this is the recipe for the stongest of their Mild ale line up thus the XXX.*

I'm curious to see how the hop presence comes though on this one, the huge charge of low alpha bittering hops should add a very tannic and drying note to the beer.

I'm a little worried about the malt though. I went with the Briess malted "ashbourne mild malt" because Paul's mild malt isn't available locally like it used to be. When I bit into the grain it didn't have any biscuit like flavors that I would associate with a grain that is malted to an English pedigree.

Barclay Perkin's 1839 XXX Ale

1.100 OG
1.020 FG
6.5 Gallons
10.3% ABV
11SRM
87IBU rager
90 minute boil

24 # Briess Ashburne Mild Malt

Mashed at 150 for 90 minutes
mashed out at 168

collected 8 gallons of wort at 1.080

Hops:

5.25 oz Kent Golding @ 4.5%AA @ 90 minutes

I used mostly imported plugs, 1 oz of the charge was Yakima grown Goldings

fermented 5 days at 65 degrees and then let the temperature rise into the 70's to help the beer attenuate and clean up.

* I don't actually think that this is a mild just because it has the X designation. There is no way in hell that this was drunk green let alone 3 months out. As far as modern labels go this is Barley wine or strong ale.

Salsa de Chiles Chipotles

2010-07-26T18:35:00.001-07:00

First food post I think, This is for a "salsa" from Rick Bayless's cookbook. I put salsa in parenthesis because while it looks like a salsa I think it would be better utilized as a topping on a meat dish or tamale, the sourness it gets from the tomatillos would compliment a rich dish but gets old after just a few tortilla chips. Next time I might sub tomatoes for tomatillos or some ancho for chipotles in an effort to turn this into a good dipper.

some interesting revelations from reading the book as well as from making this recipe.

- According to Bayless, the one commonality that ties all Mexican regional cooking together is the roasting and cooking of most ingredients, i.e. husked garlic, tomatoes, peppers. You could say char and the mellowness it brings is the signature in a lot of simple Mexican dishes.

- Tomatillos contain a hell of alot of pectic enzyme. Who knew? This shit set like jello after an hour or so in the fridge.

- As far as fresh salsa or sauces go, using the " chipotles in adobe sauce" cans from the supermarket are going to be better than re hydrating the readily available dried chipotles that you can pick up at any old tienda.

- never ask the guy behind the counter if they take debit because it's basically akin to " hey this is a Mexican market so you MUST be 3rd world - ish and not have the amazing technology that is credit/debit machines... ( FUCK YOU tienda guy!!! the suuuuuuper hipster coffee place 2 blocks away only takes cash!!!) I just don't want to look like an ass.

aaaanyways

here is the recipe

3 canned chipotles washed and seeded

3 tomatillos dehusked

2 cloves garlic with the husk left on

roast garlic and tomatillos for around 15 minutes

tomatillos are done when blackened and soft
garlic is done when it's soft, dehusk

add ingredients and some salt to a blender and blend with some water until a desired consistency is reached

Root Beer

2010-07-26T17:44:00.000-07:00

So I finally made root beer this past week end. Making a non extract root beer has been a longstanding project and I'm glad to have finally tackled it " you know your a homebrewer when making root beer is the most exciting beer you can recall brewingl".

I ended up using Sean Paxton's recipe omitting only the red ginsing since I couldn't find it. The root beer is pretty good but needs some tweaks, while not sweet I find the flavor of the molassas cloying and overpowering I might switch from black strap to a lighter variety, the sassafras could be bumped up a bit too. All in all this is a great recipe that provides a base from which I can tweak flavors.

Paxton's Rootbeer

25 Gram Sassafras Root, Indian

8 Gram Sassafras Root, Jamaican

10 Gram Licorice Root

8 Gram Kava Kava

5 Gram Star Anise

5 Gram Birch Bark

5 Gram Dried Sweet Orange Peel

3 Gram Cloves

1 Gram Angelica Root

½ Teaspoon Sea Salt

¼ Teaspoon Wormwood

1 Ounce Vanilla Extract

2 Vials Red Ginseng (available at Asian Markets)

2 Cup Organic Brown Sugar

1 Cup Organic Molasses

1 Cup Blackberry Honey

5 Gallon Filtered Water

To Make:

In a large pot, add all the herbs and spices with a gallon of water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for at least 2 hours.

Add Brown Sugar and Molasses and simmer another 30 minutes. Add the honey the last 2 minutes of cooking, bringing to a boil and then remove from heat.

Using a large fine strainer, strain the mixture into a sanitized keg or large bowl. Use remaining water pouring through the herbs and spices, to rinse them of any more flavor/sugar. Add the vanilla Extract and Ginseng to the keg, check the volume to make sure you have 5 gallons.

Force carbonate with 20 pounds of pressure for 2 days at 40 degrees. Keep this keg cold, as there is no yeast added to this soda recipe. This rootbeer will last about 3 weeks, without spoiling, if everything is kept clean and sanitized.

achouffe tripel

2010-07-25T18:11:00.001-07:00

Ive been so lazy lately....
trotting upstairs and blogging in the 95 degree plus bedroom has taken a backseat to things like playing the legend of zelda in the 68 degree living room.......

excuses

either way I think my blog is going to start to head more in the direction of only being posts of kick ass things that I've brewed or thing's that I am committed to re brewing to perfection, it may also open up to food, as Iv'e decided to dedicate the next few months to cooking traditional Mexican dish's, I'm so enamored with this idea that I have even been considering taking up the meat again (suuuuuuuper small quantities) just to get a handle on it.
anyways

said recipe is a direct reaction to Sean's tripel. It sounded really really good so I wanted to brew something similar but with a twist. What I came up with is a riff on a Achouffe recipe. ( thank you Drew Beechum)

Basically a tripple but sub in a ton of wheat and aromatic, and hop with a ton of amarillo for huge apricotty notes, this recipe is definitely in the rebrew group, It isn't attenuated enough... but I'm finding this to be a touchy subject for the style. This beer finished around 1.013 - 1.015 which is a bit too high for the amorphous tripel/belgianIPA style. I have been finding that alot of belgian ipa brewer's have been finding out about how well spicy ( read: not fruity) belgian yeasts go with amarillo hops.
In my humble opinion, These belgian IPA's need to finish in the 1.010 - 1.013 range with a malt bill that exaggerates honey or lite munich type malts (read: honey malt or a carapils/munich mix).
I pick up a strong to lite plastic/rubber/phenolic like note in many of the belgian beer's that feature high IBU's/late hop character, I am no scientist but I think that this will be the area that is honed in before this becomes a BJCP recognized style.

anyways

heres the recipe... change's for next time will include more base malt subbed out for dextrose and more amarillo!

OG. 1.080
FG. 1.014
IBU 50 IBU - Rager
SRM - 7
80%Eff

7Gallon pre boil'
6Gallon finished boil'

2Row: 69%
Wheat Malt: 26%
Aromatic Malt 5%

.50 pounds brown sugar @ 45 minutes

HOP SCHEDULE

Amarillo@ 8.5% .75oz@20min .75@10min .5 @ 2min

Citra @ 11% .25@20min .25@ 25min .25@ 2min

columbus 14%@ .5 @ 60min
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.hopefully more to come soon

Bowie 3

2010-06-18T00:57:00.000-07:00

I've finally got Bowie Porter to a flavor profile that I'm pretty pleased with. The only changes that I'm thinking of for a re brew are ones to turn this into a straight up baltic porter, as is, I feel like this beer is already skirting the line.

Bowie Porter

1.054 OG
1.012 FG
5.5% ABV
33 IBU
80% EFF
7.5 GAL

71% Marris Otter
8% Munich malt
4% Brown malt
12% E. Crystal 85L
5% E chocolate malt

Fuggles @ 4.5%

50grams @ 60min
14Grams @ 15min

148 degree mash for 9o minutes

us - 05

beers...

2010-06-15T01:59:00.000-07:00

I've brewed alot of shit recently. For posterity, here's the numbers.

Drunk Tank Ari Red ( or D - TARD)

I managed to brew this one cleanly amongst the chaos of having 7 or 8 drunken friends around ( yay me!) , most notably our good friend Ari who showed up at the beginning of the brew day 6 beers in ( go red wings! ) After asking me " your still brewing!?!????" 50 million times and letting his creepy stache near my beer twice as many, this beer carries his namesake.

One of many malt bills I've cribbed from jamil recently

1.067OG
12SRM
76IBU
1.013FG
6.8%ABV
86% eff

80% 2row
7% munich
7% crystal 40
3.5% crystal 120
3.5% victory

zeus 16% 1oz @ 60min
amarillo 8.6% 1oz @ 10min 1oz @ 2.5 min
cenntenial 7.8% 1oz @ 10min 1oz @ 2.5 min

dry hopped with:
1.5 oz centennial

American Mild

Inspired by the delicious "shut the hell up" i had at the alchemist pub and brewery in vermont. delicious, smells like a big double ipa yet is only 3.5 %ABV
The idea is to have a have a super sesionable, yet drinkable and hoppy beer.

1.041 OG
1.013 FG
3.5% ABV
25 IBU
80% Eff

91% marris Otter
6% Aromatic
3% Victory

Centennial @6% 14.2G at 5min
Simcoe @12.2% 7.1 G at 10 min 14.2G at 5min
Columbus @14% 21.3G at 5min 14.2G at 5 min 21.3G dry hop
Amarillo @ 9.8% 32 G at flame out

1.oz centennial
.5oz columbus

1.5 weeks @ 68degrees

keg hopped with:

an american brown with all columbus. Hoppy and resiny as fuck.
I used US 04 to see how it's fruitiness works with an american type hop and malt bill.
This yeast is a super shitty attenuator so that's where the pound of sugar comes in.
after using it a few times, I've got to give a thumbs down to US 04, while giving some very bright red apple and pear notes to a beer this yeast will just not attenuate past 6o% without adding dextrose.
I'm also feeling like columbus has changed. To me it is much less fruity and pungent compared to a few years back

American Brown

1.066OG
56IBU
80%Eff
1.012FG

10.5 # 2 row
1 # sucrose
.50 # C - 40
.25 # C60
.25 # Victory
.50 # Chocolate

Columbus @14%

1 oz. at 20min
2 oz at 10min
1 oz at 2 min

keg hopped with:

148 degree mash

us-o4

Being Lazy

2010-05-20T22:40:00.000-07:00

I've been very lazy brewing and post wise recently... mostly because of this thing sucking up my pre work free time.

no excuse though as ive brewed...

2 brown porter's, a NW red ale, a belgian ipa, an Orval type beer,a dark triple for blending, and a scottish 60 shilling since the last post.

Ive moved to a busier work schedule to save some extra money hopefully I can catch up on the blog soon.

Hop Shot/ Pils Pale

2010-04-03T01:42:00.000-07:00

So Quinn is in love with the candy like taste of Pilsener malt and demanded a pilsener based pale ale. As the "some one who must be obeyed" in my life I obliged. I thought this would be a good chance to try out the " hopshots" that I have recently aquired.

What are hop shots you say? These are the home brew sized doses of the hop extract that the big (actually little) guys use i.e. Russian river, Avery, Lagunitas, etc. This hop extract basically separates all the flavor and bittereing compounds from a Columbus hop while leaving the hop mass behind. In a nut shell you get all the good in a handy syringe while leaving the vegetle hop mass behind. Columbus is my favorite so I was pretty stoked on this brew.

The hop extract squeezes out alot like toothpaste, all in all very weird. The literature that came with the hop shots was pretty confusing. 1 ml in 5 gallons for 60 min in a 1.050G wort equals X...easy until you get into 5 minute and flame out additions. Anyways shorthand I found that the hop shots basically work universally as a 13% AA hop addition in whatever program you use.
At this point hop bombs aren't my obsession, YesI love hoppy beers, and I fiend Pliny/the maraja/hop stoopid/alpha dog etc. from time to time, yet im far more interested in the malt. That said... as a home brewer, Holy Shit! I can't wait for the day when hop extract is available right there next to whole/plugs/pellets. If I could get a range of hops in an extract form I would brew double IPA's and Reds every day!
The wort loss from whole hops as well as the un sanitariness of whole leaf dry hopping are the main reason I like the hop shots.
anyways I'm rambling,
Here's the recipe

HOPSHOTPILSPALE
brewed 1/20 ish

1.054 OG
1.010 FG
5.8% ABV
44 IBU
6 SRM
6 Gallon
86% Eff

90% German Pils
5% Wheat Malt
5% C 50L

150 mash for 90 minutes

Amarillo pellets 8.7%AA 15 grams@ 90min - 20 IBU
Hop shot "13% AA" 5ML @ 15min - 13.5 IBU
Hop shot "13% AA" 5ML @ 10min - 11 IBU

Zeus @ 16%AA 1 oz dry hop at 35F for 1 week
Zeus @ 16%AA 1 oz keg hop

Wyeast 1098

fermented at 67 degrees for 3 days
raised to 70 and continually roused for a week
lagered at 34 degrees for about 2 weeks before dry hopping.

* again, sorry for a lack of pictures

Sour Beers

2010-04-01T23:33:00.000-07:00

Belgian wheat (DeDolle)

Brettanomyces lambicus Wyeast

Brettanomyces sp. Rodenbach Foederbier

RF1 Rodenbach Foederbier

Pediococcus sp. Rodenbach Foederbier

Brettanomyces sp. Ongefilterd Palm

Brettanomyces sp. New Belgium La Folie

LF1 New Belgium La Folie

LF2 New Belgium La Folie

Lactobacillus delbrueckii Wyeast

ah AlB's famed Rodenbug Blend. A mixture of yeast and bacteria from the highest pedigree; blended in a ratio perfect for sour flanders type beers.

about 20mins after pulling it out of the fridge

Waiting on a list and repaying AlB in sour beers seems to be the norm. So I'm feeling very grateful, as well as a little guilty, for having brewed 2 beers from Sean's original pitch of this blend.

The first beer brewed was a Flanders Red ale recipe straight from the back of Wild Brews ( a wonderful book by Jeff Sparrows). This was also the second collaboration brew between myself and Sean. The brew day went down with out a hitch, except for us forgetting to add the tritcale until 70 minutes into the mash. All in all it was no big deal, it converted, and even if it didnt the bugs would eat through that starch like a pack of starvin' Irishmen.

The recipe is as follows:

Flanders Red. Brewed on 1/30/10

Recipe is for 12.9 gallons pre-boil, 11.7 gallons post-boil, all grain

O.G. 1.060 IBU's 16

12.25 lb. Vienna Malt

5 lb. Flaked Triticale

2 lb. Aromatic malt

2 lb. Caravienne

1.5 lb. crystal 15

.75 lb. Special B

.5 lb. crystal 120

.5 lb. crystal 75

***

52 gr. Willamette whole 4.7% AA 60 min

Mash 7.5 gallons water with the following additions:

5 gr. chalk

1 gr. gyspum

2 gr. calcium chloride

2 gr. baking soda

Mash in to 156

Forgot to put in the triticale! Put in at 20 minutes, dropping the temp to 148.

Pulled .75 gallons of mash liquor and heated to boiling, adding back to mash.

This raised temp back to 158

Total mash time 75 minutes

Sparge with 8.5 gallons at 170

Collect 12.9 gallons at 1.054 = 81% efficiency

Boil 60 minutes

yeast nutrient at 10 minutes

Chilled to 70, aerated by shaking for 2 minutes

pitched a slurry of AlB's Rodenbug blend / cali ale yeast

Fermented in the mid 60's for about 3 weeks, then racked to secondary for aging. Gravity was at 1.020.

*** damn you Sean! and your non percentaging self

After racking this beer into a corny keg for bulk storage, Sean was kind enough to let me keep a small pitch of the now 3rd generation rodenbug pitch. Into the fridge went the yeast and off to vacation I went; now 1 month later Ive finally gotten around to brewing a beer with my pitch.

Over vacation, Quinn and I did some brainstorming over what we wanted our sour beer to be. I knew that I wanted this one to be different from the other sours I've done by having a malt complexity in the finished product. Quinn wanted a sour beer that would get a fair amount of it's sourness from malic or citric acid a la Consecration or even more recently Supplication. After toying around with making a biscuit bomb as a base beer, I reconsidered and settled on making Tomme Arthur's Lost and Found Dubbel as our target base beer. If you have never had this beer, it could best be described as over the top: a blend of many very flavorful malts that that coalesce into a bready raisiny/plummy whole. Anyways, I thought this over-the-top base would still shine through a bit after being soured. *
This summer, Quinn and I hope to source some fruit to freeze or use immediately in this brew. I'm thinking raspberries or possibly cherries. (Quinn's coworker's grandpa own a cherry farm: "Quinn see if we can get schaarbeek cherries!")

* Interestingly the percentages for Lost Abbey's double (sans sugar) match up pretty close to the Wild Brew's recipe for Cuvee de Tomme.

Anyways the recipe is as follows:

Brewed 4/1/10
Quinns Birthday Beer
OG 1.087
24 IBU
27 SRM
7 gallons
87 eff.

65% Belgian Pale
8% Wheat
4% German munich
6% Aromatic
3% Biscuit
3% Caramunich
3% Caravienne
8% Special B

09' US Fuggles 4.1%AA
- 2 oz @ 60 min

152 mash

cha cha changes

2010-03-21T02:24:00.000-07:00

"Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes
Turn and face the strain.
Ch-ch-changes.
Gonna’ have to be a different beer.
Time may change me, but I can’t trace time."
"
sorry but this IS Bowie Porter part 2.. couldn't help myself.

I also just got back from vacation and have no batteries in the camera so I've got to apologize for shitting the bed image wise.

So Bowie Porter was a bit of a disappointment, by no means a bad beer, yet no where near the brew i was targeting ( Fuller's Porter, Anchor Porter, BJCP brown porter etc.). my complaints with Bowie #1 was with how malty it was. The brew finished very dry yet had an over powering "brown malt" character reminiscent to the Mild ale I brewed with Sean a few months back,again it is by no means bad tasting yet not quite as drinkable as a proper English ale should be. I'm finding brown malt to be alot like biscuit/victory malt to my palate, flavors I enjoy but only at very restrained percentages.

Bowie #1 didn't have the right caramel character either, much too shy, I'm looking for a strong toffee note and darker flavors like plum and raisin that the Fuller's and Anchor example's highlight so well.
Any ways, the original recipe was so off that I changed quite a few things instead of following the common wisdom of only changing one thing at a time.
anyways, here's the changes.

Bowie Porter #1

1.049 OG
7 Gallons
26 IBU
22SRM
85%Eff

76% Marris Otter
12% Brown Malt 70L
10% English Crystal 75L
2.1% English Chocolate 450L

Mashed at 152 for 60 minutes

43G Fuggles@ 4.75%AA 90 min
14G Fuggles@ 4.75%AA 15 min

Bowie #2

1.054OG
24IBU

80% Maris Otter/Golden Promise
5% Brown Malt 70L
4% British C - 75L
8% British C - 120L
4% English chocolate 450L

Fuggles@ 4.5%AA

32G @ 90
14 G @ 15

wyeast 1028

Pedio Infection (or) K.Y.-iezenbock

2010-02-26T21:18:00.000-08:00

So I'm finally getting around to posting some pictures of a weird infection that 2 cases of wheat bock got.

I have pretty much narrowed the infection down to Pediococcus because after 3 months in the bottle it has contributed a significant lactic sourness and some Diacetyl.

The infection is some what understandable since the wheat bock was brewed during a time when I was brewing nothing but sours. What is so confusing is the purity of the infection. Assuming it is an infection from some sort of transfer line, than this beer should also have a heavy brett presence ( lacto too if it weren't such a pussy bacteria) but it doesn't.

The other interesting aspect of this infection is the "ropiness" or at least this is what I think is going on. The wheat bock finished around 1.012 ( wayyy too low which is why it was bottle conditioned to age in the first place) but tastes like it has a FG of around 1.050! It's reminiscent of carbonated maple syrup.

I have never had "ropiness" or had an intentionally sour beer get "sick" before so I'm pretty fascinated about this, it is also my understanding that when beers get "sick" it is usually not until after the bulk of souring is done, immediately after bottling seems fast.

So what to do?
Malt and bitterness wise this could make at the very best an interesting sour beer. My concerns are:

1. how long does the "ropiness" last

2. how much diacetyl will it produce ( it's no where near objectional at this point)

3. How to add brett to about 45 bottles to metabolize the diacetyl should it get out of control

BALTIC THUNDERBOLT!

2010-02-25T21:09:00.000-08:00

Photo's from a great day of brewing Baltic Porter and racking some sour beers with Sean.

cold steeped Carafa 2

Victory's Baltic Thunder

Adding the cold Carafa right before sparging

Sean stirring the mash

Mash foam art

Fresh Lupulin

racking my portion of Flanders red for bulk storage

a nice pitch of Al's Bugfarm for a later use

Sean's Homemade bazooka tube

Dealing with the plate chiller's ''gravity feed'' issues

the money shot

right on mark at 1.076 OG

dis-re-garde

2010-02-20T16:42:00.000-08:00

Biere de Garde, yum, One of the styles I find fascinating. I drink about ten times more Saison yet find its French sister even more intriguing, this is most likely due to the lack of information on it, (Farmhouse Ales is great but history aside, I feel it doesn't goes as deep into Biere de Garde as it does Saison).

Farmhouse Ales describes most classic examples as having a "huskiness" or "maltiness" that can be mimicked with additions of munich and biscuit/victory. The preportions of these malts that are recommended seem a bit too high to me though. To me the best bottles of the examples I can get ( La Choulette, La Goudale, Castletain, and Jenlain) only seem to have a very low level of husky/toasty maltiness, the prominent flavor seems to be a candy like sweetness from quality pilsener malt, low hopping and a fermentation that lets the malt flavors shine.

For my recipe I ended up using mostly German Pilsener, Aromatic malt and U.S. 6 Row. What's that you say? 6 Row? that malt used by BMC for its diastatic power to convert shit tons of rice and corn into fermentable suger? Yes! I am starting to love this malt for the grainy/husky notes that it gives when used like a specialty malt. Almost every old school English recipe I've brewed seems to include 6 Row and it has allowed me to get a pretty good handle on it.

The part of my recipe where I am really deviating from what is recommended is in yeast choice. Rather than using a super clean ale or lager yeast Ive decided to use T - 58 a wit beer yeast. This choice was based mostly on

A. I am a cheap ass

B. This yeast gives off big pepper esters that I feel will compliment this brew if held to low levels

C. I want to test how a low fermentation temperature, a larger pitching rate and an extended lagering will effect ester production in beer brewed with an expressive yeast.

Dis - re - Garde

6.5 Gallon Batch
1.070 OG
5 SRM
22 IBU - Rager
83% Eff
90 Minute Boil

69% German Pilsener
21% US Six Row
3.4% Aromatic Malt
6.9% Cane Sugar

Mashed at 143 - 146 degrees for 100 minutes, then mashed out at 168 degrees before fly sparging.

50G Willamette - 3.7AA @ 60minutes

Pitched 2 Packets of T - 58 (23 grams, or roughly 400 billion cells)

fermented at 65 degrees.

And equally important...

Mashed in to David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust, Hunkydory, and The Fall

Sparged and Boiled to Iggy Pop's Raw Power and Blood On The Wall's self titled.

Hop Oil

2010-01-31T22:46:00.000-08:00

What is it? how its made? how to use it? and most importantly how the fuck do you take a clear picture of a bottle so small?

I picked up a small dropper of this stuff at Steinbarts a few weeks ago and it's taken me a while to get a good handle on it. The only information the bottle gives is that it adds aroma and flavor without bitterness and to use it at a dose of 1 drop per 12 oz finished beer. hmmm not alot to go off of. The most info homebrew shop guy could offer up is that its fun to put in peoples budweisers at parties, not being a huge fan of secretly dosing peoples beers with mysterious chemicals at parties I thought i might try it out in some commercial beers as well as homebrews.

All in all I think this stuff is great.
Whatever the stuff is that Steinbarts is selling its 100% Centennial based.
At first I didn't care for the extract because I felt it had a twang. Now that Ive been using it for a while i realize that the twang is really just the total purity of this stuff. It basically tastes like the concentrated yellow lupulin that gather's at the bottom of whole hop packages. whats different about it is that nothing is mellowed from fermentation and therein lays it's weakness. It's awesome but only when used in the presence of many other aroma and dry hops, otherwise the flavor and aroma seem too focused. 1 drop in 12 oz. of an other wise non hoppy beer is going to make said beer taste like you dry hopped it with upwards of 4 oz of centennial. Mix it into an IPA though and this stuff is great. At 5 bucks a batch i think this stuff is a steal.

so what is it?

acording to Hop Unions website

Preparation:	Oil - fractionated from whole LCO2 extract and purified by vacuum distillation Essences - fractionated from whole oil by column chromatography
Major Role:	Enhancement of hop aroma and flavor in beer
Method of Use:	Oil - addition to the kettle or added to the final beer as in dry hopping Essences - addition to beer at any post-fermentation stage

Composition
Oils	-	pure varietal oils or a blended oil
Essences	-	1% solution of hop oil fraction in 80% ethanol
Late Hop Essence Spicy	-	terpene and sequiterpene oxides and alcohols
Late Hop Essence Floral	-	the ketone fraction

Advantages

Oils	-	easy to handle and store
	-	standardized and consistent
	-	available in variety specific or generic forms
Essences	-	easy to handle store and use
	-	standardized and consistent
	-	available in generic and now variety specific forms
Both	-	provide means for precisely adjusting and controlling the flavor of beer
	-	produced totally by physical means with no chemical processing
	-	free of residues and foreign matter

Disadvantages
Oils	-	require emulsifying or shaking with alcohol-based solvent prior to use
Essences	-	costly shipping of flammable materials in small quantities
Both	-	minimum quantity and notice required for variety specific product

I'm curious to try thhe hop oil pre fermentation. I'd be willing to bet it's like adding food grade lactic acid. gross post fermentation but not too bad when fermentation has mellowed and rounded its character.

Quinn's Anarchy Wheat Wine

2010-01-31T18:52:00.000-08:00

I'm taking no credit for this brewday as it was Quinn's beer and i was pissed for the majority of it. I probably shouldn't post it, but what the hell? Heres for posterity sake ( oh and this beer actually tastes AMAZING going into secondary)

A wheat wine based on an excellent Smuttynose example we had in Vermont over the summer as well as the beautifully hopped Barley Wine that the local favorite Walking Man Brewery makes. The idea with this one was to have a focused malt profile with all caramel/melanoidin based flavors coming from the extended boil. Quinn used some nice clean magnums for most of the IBU's along with lots of late hopping with fuggles for a nice woody, green hop flavor that should meld well with some of the ester that the wyeast 1028 puts off.

This massive beer was brewed on our Sunday. The only major issues with this beer where:

A. I had brewed the previous 2 days and had no interest in helping
B. Whether or not the mash would fit in our mash tun was never looked into pre brew
C. The kettle that was used was not marked for volume so the boil was wonkity
D. The brew day which consisted of a 3 hour boil started late in the evening

The Massive mash which had to be mashed and maintained in two separate vessels.

Quinn maintaining the mashes'

when added together the main mash filled up about 13 to 14 gallons of my keggle tun

I believe this is what happened

6.5 Gallon batch
1.120ish
7 SRM
100ish IBU
73% eff
9.5 Gallon pre boil volume
1.075 pre boil OG
152 degree mash

59% Marris Otter
61% Red Wheat Malt

57G Magnum@ 13.5% @ 90 minutes
28G Fuggles@ 4.75% @ 15 minutes
28G Fuggles@ 4.75% @ 10 minutes
28G Fuggles@ 4.75% @ 5 minutes

pitched a massive starter of wyeast 1028 at around 64 degrees. Took off to around 70 degrees in the first 12 hours or so before quickly being taken down and holding at 67 degrees

This mess from cleaning a carboy is probably why our roomate is moving out. (whoshitthetub?)

Dictator Of Hops For Life

2010-01-30T01:11:00.000-08:00

Bitch's ain't shit!
This beer is gross. Big for Bridgeport but the hop variety's they chose are gross. oniony and pungent, yuck! It's rare for a sixer to stick around for a few days at my house yet this one did.
That said the retarded image and name have also stuck around for a while at my house ( sneaking up on your lady telling her your the "hop czaaaaaar" never gets old)

anyways, I brewed a big bad ass ipa myself named "Dictator of hops for life"
It's basically a blind pig clone. I've brewed this one before and it's the type of IPA I like, aggressive high cohumulone bitterness, and big centenialish aroma and flavor hops. The only major process change is the warm steeping at the end of the boil. I basically add my flame out hops and then cover the boil kettle for about ten minutes before starting the chiller. Ideally this mimics commercial breweries "whirlpool" and will extract more flavor from the late hops whithout letting too much DMS form. It should be interesting to see how much this will increase the late hop character of the beer as well as how much added bitterness i get from the hops sitting in the kettle an extra 10 minutes.

anyways the recipe is

HOPS DICTATOR FOR LIFE

1.068 OG
6.5 ABV
6 SRM
86% eEff
7 Gallons

90% 2 row
3.5% wheat malt
3.5% C- 40
3.5% Carapils

42g Chinook (13.0%) - 60.0 min
15g Cascade (5.8%) - 30.0 min
28g Cascade (5.8%) - 15.0 min
15g Amarillo (8.5%) - 2.0 min
15g Simcoe (13.0%) - 2.0 min
8g Amarillo (8.5%) - dryhop
8gSimcoe (13.0%) - dryhop
15g Cascade (5.5%) - dryhop
28gCentennial (10.0%) - dryhop

us-05

pitched and fermented at 67 degrees

David Bowie Porter

2010-01-20T23:54:00.000-08:00

I wish my camera worked so I could take a picture of my computer desk. It's littered with tons of 3 dolla-a-can Fuller's London Porters. I just tried this stuff recently for the first time and I'm absolutely hooked. Cocoa nose,deep toffee flavors and a slight creamy sweetness that is somewhat similar to coffee. So I had to brew some, off to check out brown porter recipes, I ended up brewing this.
Oh and I decided this beer will be named after David Bowie, Ziggy Stardust era in particular, It's made more than a few brewdays go quickly.

David Bowie Porter
1.049 OG
7 Gallons
26 IBU
22SRM
85%Eff

76% Marris Otter
12% Brown Malt 70L
10% English Crystal 75L
2.1% English Chocolate 450L

Mashed at 152 for 60 minutes

43G Fuggles@ 4.75%AA 90 min
14G Fuggles@ 4.75%AA 15 min

servomyces and wirlfloc @15 min

pitched 1 packet each of Wyeast1028 and 1882

Saison

2010-01-17T23:08:00.000-08:00

or..
Cascadian Albino Saison

I've got a nice little saison next to me happily bubbling away at 80 degrees as I type. I've only used the dupont and the french saison strains before so I'm excited to taste this beer which uses WL 566 (allegedly dupont but with another strain that attenuates faster)
My recipe is very simple, just 2 to 1/3 split of belgian pils and belgian pale with a pinch of carafa2 for color ( in retrospect I have no clue why i added the carafa2, being a cascadian, I should have just added 3 quarter pounds black malt)
anyways the rest of this beer is heavily riffing on brewery Fantome's wonderful Saison Printemps, a beer I look forward to every spring. Fruity esters,grassy lemony aromatics, lactic tang and that classic mustiness.. yum

Dupont for Dummies
7.5 Gallons
1.061 OG
33 IBU
7 SRM
90% eff*

72% german Pils
28% Belgian Pale
.25% Carafa 2

.5Lb Cane sugar

49.6G Hallertauer 4.6AA @ 90min
14.2G Hallertauer 4.6AA @ 5min
28.5G Crystal@ 4.8% @ 5min
28.5G Crystal@ 4.8% @ flameout
5g lemon rind @ 10 minutes**

wirlfloc and servomyces at flameout

mashed at 146 for 120 minutes

chilled to 170 and pitched 1 package of lactobacillus

oxygenated and pitched WL566 12 hours later

fermenting at 78 - 80 degrees

dry hopped with 46G styrian goldings for 2.5 weeks
brett brux was added along with the dry hops

* i somehow got 90% eff on this brew ( I ground my grain super fine and mashed for extra long this time) anyways I ended up dumping a gallon of run off and replacing with water to hit my numbers.

** As I drank a bottle of Printemps post brewing i realized that the beer most likely just has lemon juice added to the fermentor. If I were to brew this again I would cut the lemon rinds and crystal hops out, late hop more with the Hallertauer and add some lemon juice before bottleing.

Freezer Cleaning

2010-01-17T22:05:00.000-08:00

Time to clean out the freezer and make use of all those hop odds and ends, it's not ideal but makes you feel like your getting a deal when you purchase all your other supplies.
This recipe is a riff on beers like Stone's Arrogant Bastard, big caramel, big bitterness, big aroma and big alcohol.
I ended up brewing this about a week or 2 ago.

Cascadian Red Ale huh?
6.5 Gallons
1.072 OG
82 IBU
16 SRM
8% ABV
75% Eff

89% American 2 row
3% Victory Malt
8% British C 135 - 165

30G Magnums 12.8%AA @60min
60G Ahtanums 8%AA @5min
48G Simcoe 12.7%AA @5min
32G Centennial 10.2%AA @5min
20G Chinook 13%AA @5min

48G Amarillo 8.9%AA Dry Hop

wirlfloc and servomyces @ 10 minutes

mashed @ 148 degrees for 90 minutes

Fermented at 68 degrees with us-05

1/17/10
checked gravity and tasted the beer today after cold crashing at 32 degrees for 2 days. I'ts at 1.012 and I can't believe how balanced it is and how much it is lacking aroma and flavour.
Balanced is ok but if i were to re brew something similar I would definitely shoot for around 100 IBU's to get the aggressive bitterness I was looking for. I'm also looking into steeping for around 10 minutes post boil before chilling for aroma since im not getting enough with massive late charges.

QUADRAPHENIA

2009-12-26T12:18:00.000-08:00

Just finished up brewing my Christmas Quad. I opted for a much simpler recipe than anything Belgian Ive done before, allegedly this is more true to how they are brewed in Belgium (debatable)
Either way I will also be brewing a similar gravity Quad using the everything and the kitchen sink method that seems to be so popular at some highly regarded American breweries.
Even with the simple recipe I chose to favor a certain malt profile. This beer is highly geared towards the belgian browns that are very raisiny and fruity. Some don't care for this flavor but I can't get enough.
I chose a blend of Chimay's and Westmalle's yeast, from what Ive heard this should give off lots of fruit when young but mature into a more subtle complexity.
As a side note I had terrible efficiency on this batch which I'm blaming on fly sparging. I was inspired to try fly sparging ( instead of batch sparging) after brewing with Sean. I should have known better, any time Ive ever deviated from my super anal, ghetto but tried and true brew day process it ends up being bad news. It is nice to not have to vorlauf 3 times though.....

6.25 gallon batch
Shit efficiency
30 IBU
1.090 OG

79% Pilsner
7% British C 135 - 165
2.3% British C 80 - 95
7% D2 Syrup
5% Cane sugar

Mashed for 90 minutes at 150 - 152 F

Yakima Goldings @90 minutes

yeast pitched at 64 F

Collaborations and milds

2009-12-05T17:58:00.000-08:00

Just finished up the second of the 2 english brown ales I'd planned to brew this week.
The first was an dark mild brewed with Sean http://seanywonton.blogspot.com/. We brewed about 10 gallons on his system ( about as ghetto as mine, but in different ways.) It was fun to brew with someone new, as well as see how their process and practices differ from mine. I definitely picked up some new ideas ( star san in a small untensil box, fermometer taped to the mash tun during chilling/whirlpooling? genius!)

Anyways, the mild recipe was pretty BJCP classic for the style with brown malt being the only "out of the ordinary malt, actually I take that back, Sean's 7.5L marris otter was a new one for me too.
Brown malt is a higher kilned malt that to me has a biscuityness that falls somewhere between vienna malt and biscuit/victory malt, there are also some slight mild roasty notes in there that I find reminiscent to Jamil's beloved pale chocolate malt.
until Sean posts the official recipe, heres the rough base

Dark Mild

80% Marris Otter
8% Crystal 120
5% Brown Malt
7% Crystal 70

Came out around 1.038 SG. The hydrometer sample we tasted was bready and biscuity to me. I was surprised at how drinkable it was ( Malta Hatouy anyone?) prefermented worts always taste very hop resiny to me no matter the gravity), this was quite palatable and balanced though.
We are using a slug of yeast acquired from HUB http://hopworksbeer.com/ This strain is allegedly from the makers of Boddingtons Pub Ale ( very subtle brew, almost like a pilsner fermented with ale yeast {cream ale?}) anyways i have a soft spot for Boddingtons as it was one of the first beers I ever tried ( a pint of boddingtons and homo erectus at the horsebrass at 19 years of age for one's first beers? thanks Casey I feel privileged)
Anyways this is a new yeast for both of us and apparently we are both fermenting around 68 degrees.

So the second brew is a "double brown" recipe is from Fuller's circa 1962.
Ronald Pattinson http://barclayperkins.blogspot.com/ has been anylizing brew logs from English breweries that date back to the late 1800's. One that caught my eye was the recipe for Fuller's double brown, a dark copper ale that is still brewed, but to a stronger gravity 6.5%

I chose the recipe for it's simplicity and it's higher gravity ( the much smaller milds cause problems with my sparging because the grain needed for 5 gallons is so small)
The recipe for this beer is very out of the ordinary and challenges much of what I thought I knew about brewing English beers. The recipe calls for mostly assorted English base malts and gets its color from assorted caramel syrups. I decided to use both belgian amber and dark syrups because it is what i had on hand and i don't quite have a solid grasp of how to reproduce the English brewing sugars accurately. The most important thing seems to be that its inverted and that the sugar contains a certain amount of unfermentables produced through maillard browning.

Fuller's 1962 Double Brown
6.25 gallons
1.054 OG
21 IBU
9 SRM
90 minute boil

1# Marris Otter #1
.44# Six Row
2.67# Gambrinous ESB malt
1.79# Golden Promise
2.6# Marris Otter #2
1.04# Flaked Corn
3.2 oz. Glucose
.68# Amber syrup
.29# Dark syrup

servomyces
whirlfloc

Yakima Goldings @ 5%AA
17.1 IBU @90 min.
3.6 IBU @ 30 min.

.25 oz. dry hop

Wyeast 1968 @ 68degrees

Belgian Stout

2009-11-19T17:04:00.000-08:00

With the weather here in Portland getting colder and colder my thoughts have turned towards brewing a big bad ass stout. After a week of planning and about 20 recipe idea permutations ranging from "RIS with vanilla, chocolate and coffee added below threshold levels" to "100% Brett L. fermented stout" I settled on a less is more approach.

This recipe is heavily inspired by some of the De Dolle beers as well as Brewery Bosteel's Triple Karmeliet.

I know what your thinking."Neither of these breweries are known for brewing stouts let alone beers darker than 25 SRM"
Well im taking inspiration from their amazingly creamy rich mouthfeel courtesy of a high percentage of flaked barley and wheat.
To the base of Maris Otter and nearly 16% flaked oat, barley and wheat, ive added some crystal 120 for figgy dark sugar like notes, as well as a pound of Aromatic ( which i feel will be the malt percentage i will need to play with to get just enough of that graham crackery tastines to peek out over the roasted malts)

anyways the recipe is

Belgian Stout
1.093 OG
45 IBU (rager)
75% efficiency
7.5 Gallon Starting Volume
6 Gallon Final Volume
90 minute boil

10 lb. Marris Otter
1 lb. Aromatic
1 lb. Crystal 120
1.25 lb. Flaked Barley
.5 lb. Flaked Oats
.5 lb. Flaked Wheat
1.25 lb. Roasted Barley
.5 lb. Black Patent

1 lb. Cane sugar
1. lb brown sugar

09' Magnums 12.8%AA @ 60 minutes - 37.7 IBU
09' Yakima Goldings (EKG) 5%AA @ 10 minutes - 3.7 IBU
@ 5 Minutes - 3.2 IBU

servomyces
whirlfloc @ flameout

wyeast 1214

brewed 11/21/09
-yeast pitched at 64 degrees and held there for a day before free rising to 74 degrees

11/28/09
- 1.020 FG, tastes spicy and estery

Beginnings

2009-11-19T16:57:00.000-08:00

This blog will be used to catalog my (Paul Key) homebrewing recipes and experiments, and who am I kidding, it will probably also have a lot of self righteous ranting.