SLC Dry Stout

Other than working through my backlog of vintage bombers--I bottle one from each batch, and had them stretching back three years and understandably some have stood the test of time better than others–our homebrew consumption has been limited to IPAs and lacto-soured beers since we got to town. Ready for a change of pace, my first Salt Lake City brewday was devoted to the other end of the spectrum: dark, roasty, and malty.

The first beer in the mashtun was a fairly conventional dry stout. Last year’s stouts taught me to stick with darker British roast malts for these beers; the depths of darkness they impart do not disappoint. The water report here shows a lot of minerals coming out of the tap, so I cut that supply with a significant portion of RO water. Cereal mashing still gives me the willies, for some reason; it was probably unnecessary in this case, but I went through it anyway with my flaked barley. Moderate bittering came from Challenger and Northern Brewer, and Nottingham yeast came in to give a light English flavour and flocc out quickly.

I did another overnight mash for this one to move along the brewday, particularly as I also brewed a robust rye porter following the stout. It took a little while to get my bearings brewing in our new digs, but it’s really nice to have the turkey fryer set up right outside the kitchen door, all of maybe ten feet from the sink. The beer sat waiting to be bottled for an extra week and a half past when I wanted to get it bottled, but no harm was done. Just waiting for this batch (and its brother porter) to carb up and get us in the mood for our first Mountain Time Zone autumn.

SLC Dry Stout

Batch size: 5.25 gallons
Projected OG: 1.044
Projected SRM: 32.4
Projected IBU: 31.7
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 83%

Grains
62.5% - 5 lb 2 row
25% - 2 lb Flaked barley
6.25% - 8 oz UK RB
6.25% - 8 oz UK Chocolate

Hops
.5 oz Northern Brewer (10.5%) (60 min)
.5 oz Challenger (7.2%) (60 min)

Yeast
1 pkg Nottingham


Water additions (mash)
4 qts RO water


Brewday: 3 September 2011
Cereal mash: Flaked barley and 1 lb 2-row with 5 qts @ 125F for 15 minutes.
Heat slowly to 165F and add to main mash
Mash-in: 5 qts (plus 5 qts in cereal mash) @ 154F overnight

1st sparge: 10 qts @ 200F
2nd sparge: 10 qts @ 180F
Pre-boil volume: 6 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 8.8P (1.035)

Into swamp cooler in low 60s; activity within 15 hours.


Bottled: 25 September 2011
FG: 1.011
ABV: 4.3%
Bottled 5 gallons with 3 oz table sugar.

Utah Beer Tasting

This evening DeAunn and I sampled three offerings from two of Utah’s premiere breweries, Epic and Uinta Brewing Companies.  While not all of the beers we tried were necessarily to our tastes, they all were flavourful and worth trying; at least two of them we’ll have to try again.

Epic Brewing’s Sour Apple Saison: Voluminous cumulous head on a golden bodied beer.  Big wheat & nearly hefeweizen aroma.  Did not taste of sour apple, but big estery quality of Saison Dupont (of which we’re not really fans; in yeast terms, we both prefer French to Belgian saison strains).  Lots of light fruit and a quenching finish, but overwhelmed by an almost celery flavour we get from wit yeasts.  Not our favourite.

Epic Brewing’s Brainless With Cherries: Small white head that dissipates even on pouring with a rich ruby beer.  Aroma starts with big cherry, but later transitions to a metallic aroma.  Flavour is heavily toward a Duvel-type Belgian golden strong; some cherry left late on the tongue.  Alcoholic, to be sure; tasty, and worth another sampling.

Uinta Brewing’s Crooked Line Series - Cockeyed Cooper Bourbon Barrel Barley Wine Ale: Pours deep amber with little head.  Aroma of heavy bourbon and bittering hops; smells like it weighs in as a young Sierra Nevada Bigfooot.  In tasting, though, it’s much more mellow; heavy bittering hops are subdued with a boozy, malty flavour coming through.  Finish is relatively bitter, but very enjoyable.  Definitely worth having young, and possibly putting away for a year and trying against a fresh bottle.

Home toasting malt

Three years ago I started growing hops in an effort to take a more active role in controlling my ingredients.  While we lack the real estate (and time and resources) to do any growing and malting of grain, we do have the ability to tweak some malt by home toasting it.

As previous posts indicate, malted rye is a grain in which I have a great interest.  I have a couple all-rye beers on the schedule in the next month or so, and toasting a small amount of rye malt sounded like a good proposition to add additional character to what will be essentially a Scottish 60/-.  As there won’t be much to the grist of this beer–just over six pounds total–I toasted just one pound to use as an accent.  Half a pound was dry toasted for a biscuit flavour; the other half pound I prepared as a light crystal malt.

A number of sources delve into toasting your own malt, including Randy Mosher’s ever-excellent Radical Brewing and John Palmer’s trusty How To Brew.  I followed Palmer’s method this time out, which is pretty

straightforward. There are other, more involved methods out there for making crystal malt that most likely create a sweeter, more accurately caramel flavour; depending how this batch turns out, I may try one of them next time.  To be fair, Palmer doesn't stipulate this as the way to make crystal malt, but as a way to produce more caramel flavour than dry toasting.  Smelling and tasting the grain just out of the oven and over the last couple days, though, I’m pretty happy with what I have right now.

The rye filled the house with an incredible bready, nutty aroma as it was toasted; I’d recommend doing this just for the domestic aromatics alone.  The dry toasted rye had a pleasing, light roasty/toasty flavour, though shy of a Biscuit or Victory malt.  The crystal rye was sweet, nutty, and had a touch of fruitiness to it.  I’ll be very interested to see how these grains impact this very uncomplicated grain bill.

For dry toasted malt: Make a shallow grain bed in a foil-lined pan and put in 350F oven for 30 minutes, turning grain after 15 minutes.

For crystal malt (~20L): Soak grain in filtered water for 1 hour.  Strain, then make a shallow grain bed in a foil-lined pan and put in 350F oven for 1 hour, turning grain every 15 minutes.

Most sources recommend storing the toasted grain and agitating it daily for two weeks before using it to allow the harsher aromatics to dissipate.