Rye Saison IIa

This was the second beer to come out of the kettle on my first brewday back. This was a competition rebrew of my rye saison from this past winter, so not a lot to report on the recipe. The only planned difference was that I added the turbinado to the fermenter as primary slowed rather than adding it to the boil kettle. I actually waited longer than planned for this addition; by the time the turbinado joined the party, the krauesen had completely dropped. The fermenter showed very little activity even with more fermentables added. I gave it a few spins several times a day for about a week and fortunately it finished out properly.

The numbers from BeerSmith have been very different from those on Brewtoad when I first brewed this recipe, most importantly in IBUs and efficiency (versus my OG-to-volume numbers). I may look into the IBU formula settings, but as long as I'm sticking to BeerSmith, I should be able to trust the consistency of my numbers. The efficiency is probably based on different values for the grains between programs; until I get serious enough to input specific numbers for each lot of grain I use, I'll probably stick to relying on BeerSmith.

First taste at bottling displayed a more subdued yeast profile than the previous batch. I pitched very warm, but may have overcooled before fermentation really got going. Next time I may just let WY3711 start in the low 70s and free rise from there; I haven't encountered any issues with it generating fusels or other problematic compounds at elevated temps so far, and hey, it is a saison yeast. We'll see how this iteration does in competition in about a month.

Rye Saison IIa - rebrew for the NV State Homebrewing Championship 2015

Batch size: 5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.053
Projected SRM: 5.5
Projected IBU: 23.6
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 70%

Recipe

Brewday: 16 August 2015
5 gallons at 11.2P (1.044) (w/o sugar) to fermenter.
Chilled to 78F, 1 minute of pure O2, placed in swamp cooler. Active fermentation 15 hours later at 66F (cooler temp).
Fermented in swamp cooler at 68F; ramped up to 75F after 1 day of active fermentation.

21 August 2015: Active fermentation ended. Added turbinado (in solution). No activity witnessed over 24 hours; may have happened quickly overnight? Agitated regularly for a week; showed a little activity.

Bottled: 2 September 2015
FG: 1.003
ABV: 6.6%
Bottled with 4.3 oz table sugar.

1st Place, Belgian & French Ales; 3rd Place Best of Show: NV State Homebrew Championship 2015

Quick Summer Saison

As with many of the current generation ---perhaps every generation--of beer enthusiasts/afficionados/nerds, a single beer brand or style rarely holds my attention for long (though a case could certainly be made for IPAs, judging from my Instagram feed). Whether it's the wide range of commercial offerings available or just my own short attention span, I like a lot of variety in my drafts and bottles. I knew one type of homebrew wouldn't tide me over for the summer, so before I'd even brewed my recent pale ale, I was already planning the followup. When my brother-in-brew Ted sent me a photo of a beautiful glass of saison he and our other brew friend Joe had recently made together, my plans solidified on that style once again.

This beer distinctly departs from my recently successful rye saison. With under two weeks to go from kettle to bottle, I aimed to produce a table-strength beer that started in the neighborhood of 1.040. Looking for a little more malt complexity, I split the base malt between Vienna and dark Munich, including moderate amounts of malted rye and oats. Not needing the gravity boost and mashing low to reach proper dryness, I skipped the sugar on this one. While I dig the ease of use and results from a good pitch of WY3711, Ted's saison reminded me that I've wanted to get back to WLP566, which worked so well in my spiced petite saison noire a few years ago (and which I'll finally rebrew this fall, hopefully).

Fermentation happened even faster than I'd planned, so much so that I didn't really get to ramp up the primary temperature very much before the krauesen dropped. Final gravity was a touch higher than I'd like but not out of bounds, and consistent with my other results with this yeast; since I moved it to bottles so quickly, I just hope it was really finished! I'm keeping an eye on the batch, and the bottles have behaved themselves so far. Happy to have a little variety in my summer supplies, especially as I travel.

Peu Été

Batch size: 4.5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.040
Projected SRM: 5.9
Projected IBU: 22.9
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 78%

Grains
43.5% - 3 lb Best Malz Vienna
29.0% - 2 lb Weyermann Dark Munich
14.5% - 1 lb Weyermann Rye
13.0% - .9 lb Organic flaked oats

Hops
.2 oz Millennium (15.9%) (60 min)
2 oz St. Celeia (Styrian) Goldings (4.5%) (5 min)

Yeast
WLP566 Saison II - no starter

Extras
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (5 min)
1 tsp Irish moss (5 min)

Water
Profile: Reno
1 g Gypsum
2 g (3 g) Epsom salts
5 g CaCl
2 mL Lactic Acid (88%)

Brewday: 11 June 2015
Mash: 120 minutes - dropped to 129F
Pre-boil volume: 6.5 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 8.1P (1.032)

Water report and chemical calculations from brewersfriend.com, using "light colored & malty" setting.

Began fermentation in water bath at 69-71F (beer temp) for first 2 days. Krauesen dropped on day 2; beer temp 72F. Removed from water bath to reach ambient temp (75-80F) until bottling, yeast roused regularly for the first few days.

Bottled: 19 June 2015
FG: 1.009
ABV: 4.1%
Bottled with 4.9 oz table sugar.

Early tasting: 3 July 2015
It's only had two weeks in the bottle, but so far this reads much more like a Belgian pale ale: the fruity & peppery notes are much more muted than I'd expect from a saison, accompanied by a huge, warm bready character that develops as it warms. No overcarbonation/bottle bombs so far.

Rye Saison II tasting

Finally managed to do this long-promised tasting. Of course, I ran out of the first batch before this point, so we're down to a single non-comparative review. To make up for that, though, I'm including highlights from the comments I received on this batch from the 2015 Great Basin Brew Off here in Reno, in which this beer took first place in the Belgian & French Ales category. I also just learned/realized today that this beer--along with the first session IPA--is now eligible for the Nevada State Homebrewing Championship in the fall, so it'll soon be rebrew time for me. I may diversify the grain bill to a degree, but I'm not unhappy with what this beer has become with some age.

=====

Date: 10 May 2015

Venue: Home (Sparks, NV)

Appearance - Hazy golden orange. Medium bubbles collect at the top of the glass, creating a dense, lasting foam stand that leaves a bit of lace.

Smell - Perfume, a little soap, and pear. Maybe a bit of orange. Some spice in the background. Very low hop aroma.

Taste - Dry & spicy; clove, flowery, light fruit (pear again?). Finishes with a solid phenolic kick that definitely says saison. The yeast really shines here. Hint of malt in the back. Nice & clean.

Mouthfeel - Lively, prickly carbonation, but the body is still medium full; thanks, rye malt!

Overall - My early reservations disappeared with age. Spice & phenolics are right on. Maybe I'd go for more malt and/or fruity ester character, but I'm very happy with this simple recipe and looking forward to more saison brewing.

=====

Judges' comments:

Aroma - "Some very nice spiciness up front. A bit of black pepper, honey, tropical fruit."
   "Fruity aroma with some grainy maltiness, peppery aroma also. Very high carbonation makes it tingle in the nose."

Appearance - "Golden color, white rocky head that persists..."
   "Great color and appearance. Head is a little thinner that I'd like to see, but is persistent."

Flavor - "A bit of sweet graininess in the front, followed with a lot of acid from carbonation. Pineapple. Some nice hop bitterness that lingers. Some spice pops through."
   "Spicy flavor with some low hop bittering and flavor, no tartness in flavor. Dry finish by the hop bittering lingers..."

Mouthfeel - "Medium body, high carbonation, no astringency, no tartness, no alcohol warming."
   "Carbonation is high, almost too high."

Overall - "Very tasty. High carbonation makes it appear very dry and with the lingering hops it seems a bit too bitter for the style..."
   "...Clean with peppery phenols but balanced. Seems a little higher hop rates but still very drinkable..."

Rye Saison II

Not entirely happy with how my recent saison with WY3711 came out, I did something out of character for me: a straight-up rebrew with a single change (basically). As I'd blamed my perhaps overzealous use of Amarillo hops for the prominent plasticky quality of the first batch, this batch instead received the more traditional Styrian Goldings for the flavor/aroma component. I also upped the pre-boil volume to finish with a full five gallons, added Irish moss at the end of the boil, and altered the fermentation temp a bit, as noted below.

While the brewday caused no fuss, the fermentation was where things got more exciting for this beer. I brewed this the day before we drove cross country for the holidays, putting it in a water bath with my aquarium heater to keep it in the mid-70s during our two-week trip. Over that time, not only did our car break down twice--both times in Arizona--but a poorly insulated sprinkler pipe in the attic of the house froze and broke, running water through half the house for several hours before the fire department turned it off. And where did it break? Just above the closet in which the saison was fermenting.

Our gracious landlords were very quick to clear out our belongings from the affected areas of the house and had the water evacuated. When we returned, I found the carboy still in the cooler, now drained of water. Miraculously, it was perfectly fine; no evident infection, with the airlock more or less firmly in place. Once the house drying was over and we were able to move back in--it'll be months before repairs are completed--I gave it a few days to let the dust kicked up by the work settle and then bottled this batch. Tasting the hydrometer sample at bottling, I'm afraid that the Amarillo may not have been the culprit in creating the quality I dislike in the first batch; though not exactly the same, it's present in this second batch. I'll do a side-by-side tasting of these saisons shortly.

Update: Given some aging, the plastic note has disappeared from both batches, leaving not one but two very nice saisons. I'll get into it in the tasting notes.


Rye Saison II (The Styrian)


Batch size: 5.3 gallons

Projected OG: 1.062

Projected SRM: 7.3

Projected IBU: 36.5

Boil time: 60 minutes

Brewhouse efficiency: 71%


Grains/Fermentables

60.0% - 6 lb Weyermann Organic Vienna

30.0% - 3 lb Weyermann Rye

10.0% - 1 lb Turbinado (10 min)

Hops

.5 oz Millennium (13.5%) (60 min)

2 oz Styrian Goldings (4.5%?) (10 min)


Yeast

WY3711 French Saison - 1.5L stirplate starter

Extras

1 tsp Yeast nutrient (10 min)

1 tsp Irish moss (10 min)

Water

Profile: Reno

1 g Gypsum

1 g CaCl

1 mL Lactic acid (88%)

Brewday: 20 December 2014

Mash: 147F for 3 hours

Pre-boil volume: 6.8 gallons

Pre-boil SG (w/o turbinado): 10.4P (1.041)

Chilled to 70F. Aerated for 30 min, pitched 8 hours after KO. Started in water bath @ 55F; raised to ~75F over several hours, left there for fermentation.

Survived the great NYE flood intact. Sat @ ~80F(?) for a few days during cleanup, presumably after active fermentation finished, then moved to 50F garage for a few days prior to bottling.

Bottled: 10 Jan 2015

FG: 1.006

ABV: 7.5%

Bottled w/ 5.2 oz table sugar.

Tasting: 13 May 2015
Success! Turned out clean, spicy, and fruity with a few months of age. Also took first in Belgian ales in a local comp! Will rebrew this fall for a statewide comp.

1st Place, Belgian & French Ales: Great Basin Brew-Off 2015

5-Year Tasting: Mad Elf Clone

While my parents were in town before Christmas, my father and I split the second-oldest homebrew I still have: the final bottle of my Troeg's Mad Elf clone. This beer at a year old was really spectacular; the alcohol harshness had mellowed, and the cherry character came through beautifully.

Unfortunately the ensuing years and treatment have not been kind to this bottle: at five years old, it had given up the ghost. While I could be disappointed, I'm instead spurred to continue my aging program. In addition, this beer definitely deserves a rebrew; it's a recipe that really shines with some age on it.

=====

Date: 16 December 2014

Venue: Our house (Sparks, NV)

Appearance - Cloudy red-brown. No head; thin lacing around the edges of the glass.

Smell - Sweet cherry, slight alcohol.

Taste - Belgian yeast peppery quality on the back of the tongue, which sits for just a few seconds before disappearing. The cherry from the aroma, which was my favorite element from the last tasting several years ago, doesn't carry through here. Its absence leaves nothing to balance the current tannic roughness and alcohol bitterness that follow the pepper note. The bottom has kind of fallen out, the Belgian yeast character becoming quite harsh.

Mouthfeel - Carbonation is still prickly, showing the bottle has held pressure well. The beer has a certain creaminess.

Overall - Disappointingly, this beer is well past its prime. We couldn't even bring ourselves to finishing the glasses we'd poured. It was a good experiment, though, and definitely worth it.

Amarillo Rye Saison

I've mentioned before that I have a messy history brewing saisons; I've often tried to use the style as a forum for weirdness before really figuring out the base beer. This summer's straightforward iteration was much more successful, though it may have suffered from some oxidation in the bottle. For my second batch of Reno-based homebrew, I continued my exploration of this fascinating, rustic beer.

The biggest influences on wort production were 1) the significant amount of Weyermann rye malt in my stores right now, and 2) an astonishingly good deal on Amarillo pellets at Reno Homebrewer, one of the local supply shops, right after we moved here. I've stuck with Wyeast's French Saison yeast over one of the Dupont strains. Dupont isn't my favourite example of the style and I really like how WY3711 tears right through a wort without fuss.

As an added bonus, it was on this batch that I finally checked the efficacy of my water bath method for stabilizing fermentation temperature. I've never been sure of the temperature differential between the water bath and what's going on in the fermenter during active fermentation. Thus, I didn't really know how much I

needed to drop the water bath temp to maintain my target fermentation temp. With the saison wort actively fermenting (just about high krauesen) in a glass carboy sitting in a ice chest water bath that only came halfway up the batch, the fermentation only ran a half a degree higher than the water bath itself. I'll definitely do more testing, but that's an informative first result.

The beer finished nice and dry--as expected with this yeast--and has been in the bottle for a few weeks now. As beer tends to do, it's evolved a bit over that time. Early on, the leading aromatic and flavour character was somewhat phenol-plastic; it wasn't terrible, but it definitely wasn't the best. That's begun to mellow a little, leaving room for a fruitier character to come through. My initial impression is that the Amarillo and rye (even at 30% of the grist) are not playing dominant roles; it's the yeast that still comes to the fore (see update below). If anything, some of the unpleasantness may have come from the interaction of these ingredients. It may be on the bright side for the cooling fall temperatures, but it helps me remember summer. Complete tasting notes coming soon.

My next saison will be a rebrew of my petit saison noir from a few winters ago, hopefully with the WLP566 I originally used. I don't really have any "house" yeast strains, especially for saisons, though I've really been pulling to get what I want out of WY3711. Based on this current batch, though, I may start to mess around with others to find my preferred mix of fermentation characters. Of course, if this beer continues to mature into something along the lines of my last saison, I may just stay put.

Update: It's hard to keep everything in mind all the time. As I'm sure many of you have, I now recall reading a pile of anecdotal information on the plastic-phenol bombs that can arise when combining Belgian yeasts with American hops. I'd forgotten all about that until yesterday, when I watched Nate Smith's 2014 NHC presentation on using new hop varieties, courtesy of the intrepid Chip Walton of Chop & Brew. I'm considering rebrewing this beer soon with more traditional continental hops--either Styrian Goldings or something noble--to contrast with the current batch and possibly restore my faith in WY3711.

On another note, I really like the concept Nate presented in his talk for doing split batches to compare hops. He produces a large batch (15 gallons) of base wort, then splits it post-boil, running 5 gallons at a time through a hop back with a different hop variety, then through a plate chiller to each fermenter. He then usually follows up with a dry hop that matches the hop back charge for each split. It's a great idea that easily scales for smaller test batches, but requires a couple pieces of equipment I lack. Worth ruminating on for the future...

Update 2: After some time in the bottle, this beer has really turned around for me. While the combination of Amarillo and spicy yeast still throws me a little, the plastic character is gone. Much more drinkable, thankfully! Notes on this beer and the rebrew coming soon.

Autumn Denial - Amarillo Rye Saison

Batch size: 4.5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.063
Projected SRM: 7.3
Projected IBU: 30.1
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 79%

Grains/Fermentables
60.0% - 6 lb Weyermann Organic Vienna
30.0% - 3 lb Weyermann Rye
10.0% - 1 lb Turbinado (10 min)

Hops
.5 oz Millennium (13.5%) (60 min)
.5 oz Amarillo (8.2%) (10 min)
1.5 oz Amarillo (dry hop - 5 days)

Yeast
WY3711 French Saison - 1.5L stirplate starter

Extras
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (10 min)

Water
Profile: Reno
1 g Gypsum
1 g CaCl
1 mL Lactic acid (88%)

Brewday: 27 September 2014
Mash: 12 qts @ 147F for 3 hours - dropped to 116F
Pre-boil volume: 6 gallons
Pre-boil SG (w/o turbinado): 11P (1.044)

Chilled to 74F. Yeast pitched a little over 24 hours after knockout, once starter flocc’d out. Aerated for 30 minutes before pitching.
Fermented in swamp cooler at 70F for 2 days, then raised 3F/day to 80F.

Dry hops: 14 October 2014
Added loose to primary.

Bottled: 20 October 2014
FG: 1.003
ABV: 7.9%
Bottled with 4.8 oz brown sugar.

2014 Beehive Brewoff Results

We're just about settled in our new place in Reno. Helping this feel more like home, I put together a melomel a few weeks ago, which I'll move out of primary for clarification and further aging today. Today will also mark my first brewday in Nevada, an event that will definitely help me feel more at home here. The first bit of homebrewing activity here, however, came a few weeks ago in the form of my BJCP scoresheets from the 2014 Beehive Brewoff.

This was my second time entering this competition, and I felt the feedback I received both times was on the mark for the beers reviewed. I'm happy to report that this year the Belgian dark strong I brewed a couple years ago took second in the Belgian strong ale category with a respectable average score of 40. The years have treated this beer well, rounding off its sharp edges. It's gratifying as well as edifying to read reviews from impartial judges; even though they scored this beer well, they had suggestions for improving it.

Even more helpful were the scoresheets for the other two beers I entered, my second attempt at a Flanders red and my most recent iteration of Russian imperial stout. The RIS scored a 32, dinged primarily for high residual sweetness and astringency. The FG was quite high in the end, which I'd hoped would help balance the high amount of roasted grains (the main contributor of astingency). In the end, I missed the balance here; while I enjoyed the experiment of cutting out the caramel malts and upping the roasted component on this batch, it does make for a less pleasurable experience than it could be. I'll definitely retool for the next go-around, adding back some caramel and cutting down on the roast.

The Flanders red did not do well, scoring an average of 22. While it received generally good notes for the aroma, the judges pointed to a high level of acetobacter activity (vinegar) and high astringency. While they found it to be sour, they found little else. At the beginning of the summer, in the first few months after bottling, I got a ton of great cherry and bready malt riding the bracing wave of sourness in this beer. Tasting it now, however, I certainly agree with the judges; most of the cherry and malt have fallen off, leaving just a stomach-churning acidic burn. However, I think I've already had more mileage out of this batch than I could have reasonably expected: it blew out its airlock in primary over the summer while we were away for three months, then spent a year wasting away in a plastic bucket, prone to oxygen exposure and acetobacter infection, before I finally bottled it. That I was able to have a good tasting experience with this beer at all was a boon, given the amount of abuse and mishandling it received.

Though we're not in Salt Lake City anymore, I would not hesitate to enter this competition again. Furthermore, I plan to seek out competitions locally over the next few years; getting experienced opinions from others on how to improve my beers will certainly help me advance more quickly than just doing my own informal evaluations. Looking forward to brewing today, and improving those beers in subsequent batches.

Saison

Belgian beers don't always speak to my tastes, but saisons are usually a treat. That being said, my favourite isn't the standard bearer, Dupont; I'm a much bigger fan of St. Feuillien's version, as well as those by Rockmill in Ohio. For as much as I like a straight-up saison, though, more often I've brewed ones that were adulterated: soured, with citrus, or spiced. This beer was a move back to basics: simple grist, straightforward hopping, Wyeast's French Saison yeast.

Still learning to play nicely with my water, I believe I overacidified my sparge a bit. Thankfully the finished beer doesn't seem to have suffered terribly from it. Brewing and bottling went smoothly. I've gone back and forth on this beer: it was spicy and bready at bottling, but later seemed to overcarbonate and pick up a bit of an off-flavour, which I thought might indicate infection. Most recently, though, I've decided what I mostly taste is the yeast and a perhaps a bit of oxidation, which isn't the end of the world. I've already planned the next batch, which will bring in some rye and more assertive hopping, but otherwise will stick to the plan presented here.

Saison ‘14

Batch size: 5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.052 (12.9P)
Projected SRM: 4.9
Projected IBU: 26.7
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 79%

Grains
77.8% - 7 lb Weyermann Organic Vienna
22.2% - 2 lb Weyermann Wheat

Hops
.4 oz Magnum (14.2%) (60 min)
1 oz Amarillo (8.8%) (5 min)

Yeast
WY3711 French Saison (no starter)

Water Additions
8 qts RO water (w/ 3 qts filtered SLC water) (mash)
1 g Gypsum (mash)
1 g CaCl (mash)
2.4 ml Lactic acid (1st sparge)
2.6 ml Lactic acid (2nd sparge)

Brewday: 4 June 2014
Mash: 150F for 90 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 6.5 gallons
                                   
Fermented at 68F for two days, then 73F for two days. Krausen dropped at that point; raised to 75F for the remainder of fermentation.

12 June 2014: Removed from swamp cooler; sitting at ambient temp (80F). Active fermentation complete.

Bottled: 28 June 2014
FG: 1.004
ABV: 6.3%
Bottled with 4.8 oz table sugar (~2.8 volumes C02).

Proserbräu

Steve, DeAunn's private teacher and a member of the orchestra here in SLC, has been a great friend to us in so many ways over the last three years. He's also one of the beer geekiest folks we know around here; we've enjoyed a number of get-togethers at his family's home where we shared new, interesting bottles with each other. Steve has a particular affinity for Belgians, so as we came to the end of our terminal degrees, nothing seemed so appropriate as brewing one for him.

Considering his favouring of beers such as Gulden Draak and Piraat, we aimed at crafting a Belgian strong. Vienna is my current go-to grain, as I'm working my way through a bag of Weyermann Organic Vienna; we augmented it with a bit of oats to add mouthfeel to what would be a fairly dry beer. A good dose of turbinado in primary increased dryness and colour, bringing it an amber hue. I've used the Duvel yeast strain on Belgian strongs in the past, but haven't cared as much for the "sharp" character it can bring. I was very happy, however, with the results I had with Belgian Abbey II in my Mad Elf clone a few years ago; in my aged quasi-side-by-side tasting, I actually preferred the rounded alcohol and more pronounced cherry presence of my version to Troeg's original.

My friend Brian came over to assist with part of brewday, including the ever-popular fermenter transfer/filtering out of hops. With his help, things went particularly smoothly. This was a small batch, and just about all of it went to its intended recipient; I only kept a six pack. I've had one so far; the yeast is even more muted than I'd intended, but it's still pleasant. Next time I'd probably push it to higher temps faster to try to increase ester production. So far it's hiding its alcohol very well; it's almost too easy drinking, and could cause some trouble if one weren't paying attention to consumption rate. Steve was really happy with our gift; DeAunn and I were pleased to be able to do something like this for someone who's done so much for us.

Proserbräu - Belgian Strong

Batch size: 3.7 gallons
Projected OG: 1.081
Projected SRM: 7.5
Projected IBU: 25.7
Boil time: 120 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 78%

Grains/Fermentables
79.0% - 8 lb Weyermann Organic Vienna
11.1% - 1 lb 2 oz Quick oats
9.9% - 1 lb Turbinado sugar (dissolved in water, added as primary activity slows)

Hops
.4 oz Magnum (14.4%) (60 min)

Yeast
WY1762 Belgian Abbey II - 1-liter stirplate starter

Extras
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (10 min)
1 tsp Irish moss (10 min)
1 vial Clarity Ferm (pre fermentation)

Water additions (mash)
10 qts Distilled water (w/ 2 qts filtered SLC water)
1 g Gypsum
2 g Baking soda
1 g CaCl

Brewday: 16 March 2014
Mash: 149F for 90 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 5 gallons         
Post-boil SG (w/o sugar): 16.7P (1.069)

Aerated with 5 micron stone for 45 minutes.
Begin fermentation at 60F ambient; raise 3F/day after 24 hours of active fermentation, topping out at 72F.

21 March 2014: Added turbinado.

Secondary: 1 May 2014
FG: 1.009
ABV: 9.8%

Added 1.7 oz bourbon-soaked oak cubes.

Bottled: 24 May 2014
Bottled with 3.4 oz table sugar.

Brown Rye (starter beer)

As I wrote about recently, I brewed a lot of beer with my dad this summer on his beautiful new all-electric setup.  He's been trying out a number of recipes in different styles he's found online--a frequent starting point for me as well--as well as working on scaled-up AG versions of beers I designed when he was doing small extract batches in my folks' former home.  Over the summer we'd trade off between us on the brew planning.  Having sought to finally brew a kölsch for some time--most recently this spring--that was my first choice.  Brewing such large volumes (11-12 gallons) and not having a stirplate on hand at the time (my dad built a nice one soon after this) meant that before the main brew must come a starter beer.

As it happened, my dad had a big Belgian/Trappist-style beer planned and needed to propagate yeast for that as well, so we brewed six and a half gallons of low-gravity wort to split between the two yeasts.  In some sense it was also a cleanup beer, finishing up some odds-and-ends grains in the brewery.  However the main malts, Munich and rye, I chose very intentionally, aiming to get a lot of richness out of this smaller beer.  Coincidentally this ended up encompassing long-term plans I've had to brew a Belgian rye table beer.  My original aim was for a red colour, but it ended up solidly brown.  Out of the two beers produced, I prefer the Belgian iteration, the kölsch yeast characteristics not really meshing well with the strong malt flavours.  In the end, though, we had large yeast pitches for both big brews and a couple interesting experimental beers to try.

Brown Rye - Kölsch/Trappist starter
Batch size: 6.5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.042
Projected SRM: 13.7
Projected IBU: 18.0
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 77%

Grains

64.2% - 6.5 lb Weyermann Munich Type 2
24.7% - 2.5 lb Briess Rye
4.8% - 8 oz Crystal 120
4.8% - 8 oz Dingemans Biscuit
2.5% - 4 oz Briess Victory
1.2% - 2 oz Dingemans Chocolate

Hops
1 oz Hallertau (4.3%) (60 min)
1 oz Hersbrucker (4.3%) (15 min)

Yeast
3.5 gal - 2 vials WLP029 German Ale/Kölsch
3 gal - 2 vials WLP500 Trappist Ale

Extras
1.5 tsp Irish moss (10 min)

Brewday: 7 June 2013
Mash: 154F for 60 minutes
Mash pH: 5.2
Mashout @ 168F
Fly sparge
Pre-boil volume: 9.5 gallons

WLP029 fermented at 60F ambient.
WLP500 fermented at 68F ambient.
Following fermentation, both crash cooled at 41F.

Bottling: 23 June 2013
WLP029 FG: 1.019 @ 50F - 1.018
ABV: 3.1%
WLP500 FG: 1.0??

Both bottled cold with sugar and rehydrated US-05 added.
Each bottled with 2.5 oz table sugar and rehydrated US-05.

Flanders Red - Attempt #2

The second beer of my doctoral brewing/aging program is a Flanders red.  It's this style that really sent me down the path of sour beer; while I couldn't stand Duchesse, purportedly a great gateway sour, Rodenbach Grand Cru had me hooked from the first sip.  I've made one attempt at this style before, which, after a year of aging, unfortunately turned out a beer that had a light, pleasant pie-cherry aroma but a very bland taste (the extra gallon of wort fermented with raspberries and with a Ziploc bag in place of an airlock turned out to be far superior).

Given the spectacular failure of that first batch, a few alterations were in order.  The recipe changed, but more significant for this beer, the mash temperature was increased to leave more dextrins for the souring bugs to slowly devour over the next couple years.  Instead of using an oak peg, this batch will get cubes, which should be much more manageable for long term storage.  Avoiding a boneheaded move from last time, I'll also remember to toast the oak before it goes in the beer.  Out of necessity, the primary ferment will last a bit longer; we're on the road for a while, so this batch will have been sitting for about six weeks before being transferred off the the cake to age.  Primary is also happening in a bucket instead of a carboy; though this time will be relatively short in the life of the beer, it might be enough to allow for some extra oxygen pickup through the more permeable (than glass) plastic and encourage some extra acetic souring action.

There was no shortage of yeast that went into this batch.  Since different strains of yeast and bacteria grow at very different rates (with good ol' Saccharomyces usually coming out as the speed demon), making a starter of a yeast blend--in this case Wyeast 3763 Roeselare, originally from Rodenbach--can throw off the delicate balance of bugs and yeast in the packet.  Instead of a starter, two full smack packs went into primary.  As if that weren't enough, though--and it should have been--I also dosed it with the full Brett L yeast cake from my session sour.  Brettanomyces usually grows very slowly, but when used in place of Saccharomyces in primary it ferments much more quickly and cleanly.  In this beer it may hang back and let the Sacch from the Roeselare do the primary fermentation, then join in the funk-imparting process later...or it might do battle for dominance.

Evidence of the latter (or at least that there's just a whole mess of yeast in this batch) came in the form of kraeusen sputtering out the airlock, then the hole in the bucket lid as it filled the one and a half gallons of headspace in the primary with yeasty activity.  Before we left--on day four of primary--it had settled down a bit, and I replaced the stopped-up airlock with a fresh one.  By now, it's probably either blown off the second airlock or has settled down enough that it's out of that danger zone.  The fun will be not knowing until I get back in a few weeks.  This certainly won't be an uninteresting batch, though.

DMA Flanders Red
Batch size: 5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.066
Projected SRM: 14.8
Projected IBU: 13.8
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 88%

Grains
77.2% - 8 lb Malteurop 2-row
9.6% - 1 lb Weyermann Pale Wheat
9.6% - 1 lb Dingemans Cara 45
3.6% - 6 oz Special B

Hops
1 oz Hallertauer (4.3%) (60 min)

Yeast
2 pkgs WY3763 Roeselare Blend (no starter)
WY5526 Brett L (slurry)

Extras
1 tsp Yeast energizer (10 min)
Medium toast oak cubes, home toasted (secondary)

Water additions (mash)
10 qts RO water
1 g Epsom salts
1 g CaCl

Brewday: 15 June 2012
Mash: 158F for 60 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 6.5 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 12.8P (1.052)

Ferment in swamp cooler at 65F ambient
Strong activity by next morning

Update: 3 March 2013
Brewed right before leaving town for six weeks during the hottest part of the summer, we returned to find that this one hadn't stayed sealed, and had managed to develop a solid acetobacter infection.  I've left it alone in its fermenting bucket to see how it would develop.  Tried a sample a couple months ago; despite the infection, it's still just a pretty bland, non-funky, underhopped beer, much like my first Flanders was.  It's going to keep sitting around for now, and may stay in that bucket until graduation.  Maybe by then it will funk up and get interesting.

Secondary: 21 September 2013
Samples drawn over the past year haven’t been very impressive.  Needed the fermenter back for bottling, so transferred to several gallon jugs.  One jug got 1 oz bourbon-soaked second-use oak cubes, another got .5 oz, the rest were straight.  Will give it a few more months and see if anything positive develops from it.

Bottled: 12 April 2014
FG: 1.008
ABV: 7.6%
Bottled 4.3 gallons with 3.9 oz table sugar and rehydrated champagne yeast.

Tasting: 8 May 2014
Given this beer’s inauspicious start–fermenting at least semi-open for its first three months–it has really developed well beyond my expectations. Nice sharp sourness at the start, vinegar note that’s not overpowering, strong cherry later, and malty, bready finish. A bit thin and watery for a moment in the middle, but I don’t foresee any lack of enjoyment from drinking this beer. Definitely a testament to giving the bugs proper time to develop their signature flavours.

DMA BDSA

When we decided to go back to school for our doctoral degrees, I thought a great corresponding project would be to brew a few batches of beer that we could age until we finished our dissertation defenses. Considering what would improve over that time, I settled on a quadrupel/Belgian dark strong ale, a barleywine, and a Flanders red.  The plan was to brew them before we started back at school and give them the full three year school years to age.  Of course, we've now finished the first year and I have only just brewed the first of these.  Better late than never, at any rate; the Flanders will hopefully be brewed before we make our summer trip back east so it can start its long, long primary, and the barleywine by early fall.

I go back and forth on Belgian beers; many times the yeast phenolics don't agree with me.  Belgian dark strongs, though, are often a treat; when I come across St. Bernardus Abt 12 on draft (back in Chicago, anyway), there's nothing quite like it.  To allow this very big beer to be as "digestible" as possible, the grist is simple, unclouded by lots of dextrinous malts, and mashed low; to get a maltier quality, the base is Vienna instead of the more traditional pils.  The grist also includes nearly 10% sugar for increased fermentability.  While I've experimented with making my own candi sugar before, I was curious to try some of the commercial dark candi sugar available; some have said that though it's just plain cane sugar (and/or sometimes beet sugar) the flavour can be very different from homemade iterations.  There are a couple pounds of D-180 picked up at NB Milwaukee last summer just waiting to spring into action; one pound is for this beer, while the other is for another upcoming batch.  The rest was originally going to be simple table sugar, but when I found turbinado for a decent price, it seemed right to go with the more characterful choice.

WY3787, purportedly Westmalle's (and Westvleteren's, Achel's, and quite likely St. Bernardus's) yeast, produces some fine Trappist and abbey ales.  I've used it to make a nice dubbel, but the follow-up BDSA did not do as well, sputtering out at 1.050.  Unfortunately I haven't had an aeration system to get the proper amount of oxygen into the wort for big beers like this, which may be a major factor in the yeast failing to finish; I actually just acquired an aeration stone and an inline air filter, but not in time for this most recent batch.  To give the yeast a better chance at finishing out this time, though, I reserved the sugars for incremental additions during primary, along with some yeast energizer to keep the little guys up and moving.

The mash-in for this batch was so large (6 1/2 gallons of liquor) that there was only pre-boil volume enough left for a single batch sparge, as opposed to my normal double.  Thus, there was a significant dropoff in efficiency; next time I'll plan for a larger volume and increase the boil time.  It also took an inordinate amount to lauter, which I wasn't expecting from a mash that included no rye, wheat, or oats to stop up the works.  Coming off a smallish starter, the 3787 got right to work, requiring a blowoff tube in the first couple days.  Fermentation temps have been kept relatively moderate, coming up from the mid 60s into the low 70s only after most of the activity had finished; this should keep phenolic production while still keeping the yeast at work.

At the end of the first week, fermentation had slacked off significantly, so I added the first sugar addition.  The gravity was at 1.030, which doesn't seem too bad in under a week; if it hasn't dropped within a couple weeks of the final sugar addition, I'll get a fighting starter of the very attenuative Wyeast French Saison yeast on the stirplate and see if that will finish the job.

DMA BDSA
Batch size: 5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.101
Projected SRM: 24.2
Projected IBU: 28.6
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 58%

Grains/Fermentables
80.0% - 18 lb Weyermann Organic Vienna
9.0% - 2 lb Weyermann Organic Munich I
2.2% - 8 oz Dingemans Cara 45
4.4% - 1 lb D-180 Belgian candi syrup (primary)
4.4% - 1 lb Turbinado sugar (primary)

Hops
.7 oz Warrior (16.7%) (60 min)

Yeast
WY3787 Trappist High Gravity (2-qt starter)

Extras
1 tbsp Yeast nutrient

Water additions (mash)
20 qts distilled water
2 g Epsom salts
1 g Salt
1 g CaCl2
1 g Chalk

Brewday: 5 May 2012
Mash: 148F for 90 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 5.8 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 17.0P (1.070)
Post-boil OG (w/o sugars): 20.2P (1.085)

Ferment started in swamp cooler at 62F ambient
Activity took off in under 12 hours; by 36 hours had to replace the airlock with a blowoff tube

Sugar addition #1: 11 May 2012
8 oz turbinado with yeast energizer (boiled & cooled with enough water to dissolve)
SG: 1.030 - may need 3711 to finish the job
Bumped up temp over the last couple days to a high of 74F ambient as activity slowed.  Fermentation put out ~800 ml of blowoff by that time; replaced blowoff tube with an airlock when activity slowed and gave the fermenter a good spin to rouse the yeast.  Activity took off again, so dropped the temp back into the mid 60s.  Activity was slacking again before the sugar addition.

Sugar addition #2: 15 May 2012
D-180

Sugar addition #3: 20 May 2012
D-180

Sugar addition #4: 25 May 2012
Turbinado with yeast energizer

Secondary: 5 June 2012
SG: 1.022
Pitched rehydrated champagne yeast to encourage the gravity down into the teens, hopefully.

4 August 2012
SG: 1.016

Bottled: 10 August 2012
FG: 1.015
ABV: 11.3%

Bottled with 4.8 oz table sugar.

Tasting: Substantial with lots of fruit.  Belgian yeast character as all get-out, generally complemented by the residual sweetness.  A very decent sipper; I don't know how much will make it all the way to the end of this degree.

2nd Place, Belgian Strong Ale: 2014 Beehive Brew-Off

Saison with Citrus

A couple events conspired to bring about this breath of sunnier times.  First, while the White Labs Platinum Saison II I used for the Petit Hiver fit that beer well, I really missed the more expressive character of the Wyeast French Saison yeast I’d originally wanted to propagate for a batch of Belgian dark strong ale in the new year.  Second, our local Whole Foods put 5-pound bags of California mandarin oranges on sale at the beginning of December.  It was time to bring a little bit of summer to the Utah winter.

I put together a simple low-gravity grist–base malt, white wheat, a little light crystal for sweetness–threw in an ounce of citrusy Amarillos, and ramped up the fermentation temperatures to push the esters on the yeast.  While this was in primary, there was another sale, this time on satsumas, so my citrus addition to secondary doubled.  I skinned and froze the citrus; I also zested the first bag of fruit, but by the time it came to

transfer to secondary it had started smelling funky, so I tossed it.  All told, I had six and a half pounds of citrus flesh go into secondary with the base beer, which had fermented pretty far down and was nice and estery.

Secondary has been cool to preserve as much of the citrus aromatics as possible.  Even better, I took this opportunity to properly wash yeast for the first time, with great success; I have a thick slurry of 3711 ready to tear through that coming BDSA sometime next month.  In the meantime, we’ll have an light summery beer to break up the line of dark beers and help us forget about the skiing weather outside for a while.

Sunshine Saison - saison de table with mandarins & satsumas

Batch size: 5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.043
Projected SRM: 4.2
Projected IBU: 21.0
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 90%

Grains
76.9% - 5 lb 2-row
15.4% - 1 lb White wheat
7.7% - 8 oz C 20

Hops
.5 oz Amarillo (9.3%) (FWH)
.7 oz Amarillo (15 min)

Yeast
1 pkg WY3711 French Saison (no starter)

Extras

6.5 lb mandarins & satsumas, crushed & frozen (secondary)
23 mandarins worth of zest (secondary)

Water additions (mash)
6 qts RO water
1 g Epsom salt

Brewday: 27 November 2011
Mash: 10 qts @ 148F for 75 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 6.3 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 8.2P (1.033)
Sat for about 12 hours before the boil - no souring occurred

Started in swamp cooler at ~68F ambient; ramped up to 80F after 3 days

Secondary: 11 December 2011
SG: 1.006
Adjusted OG (w/ citrus): 1.048
Zest (sprayed with Star San, stored in tupperware container in fridge) smelled gamey, so skipped it this time.  Stick to fresh!

Bottled: 21 January 2012
FG: 1.003
ABV: 5.9%
Bottled with 4.2 oz table sugar and rehydrated champagne yeast

Initial tasting: Strikes me as overly puckering.  DeAunn likes the bready quality it has in the aftertaste.

Petite Hiver

While my interest in session beers isn’t new, it was again spurred by our new home’s liquor laws that, among other things, limit beer sold (on tap at least) to 3.2% ABW (4% ABV).  Not that I’m planning to jump into commercial brewing here (or even getting a keg setup) but this seemed like a perfect opportunity to take up the challenge of getting as much flavour as possible out of a small amount of raw materials.  My recent rye 70/- may not make the grade, unfortunately; coming in at just 3.1% ABV, the hydrometer sample at bottling was very watery.  There may be more hope for the second beer from that brewday, a spiced petite saison noire, which derives much more of its character from the yeast and spices.

Saison is a very loose style, varying greatly in strength, colour, spicing, level of funkiness, etc.  I’d originally planned a big, burly saison noire with wintry spices, based on a Zymurgy article from a couple years back, for the early part of this year; when the yeast starter didn’t take off, switching to dry yeast, ditching the spices, and changing the hopping schedule transformed it into a tongue-flaying black IPA.  I’ll come back to that

high-octane saison sometime; being in a session mood, and having plans for the yeast following this batch, I scaled it back to table strength for this winter.

“Holiday spices” (cloves, ginger, allspice, nutmeg) have rarely agreed with me in beer, though there have been notable exceptions.  However, I’ve added a number of other non-Reinheitsgebot elements to beer before, including fruit, chocolate, cacao nibs, and vanilla and coffee beans.  Branching out ever so slightly, this batch will get a cinnamon stick as well as a couple vanilla beans.  My normal method for adding spices like these is to make a tincture and add the spices and liquid to secondary; I’ve tried adding them at the end of the boil, but haven’t felt as though they really came through very well.  My spices here have been marinating in a small amount of vodka for the best part of a week, I’ll hopefully be able to transfer this beer onto them in the next couple days.

My go-to saison yeast is Wyeast’s French Saison (3711), but unfortunately my LHBS was out; they recommended the White Labs Platinum strain Belgian Saison II (566) as their closest sub.  The plan was to use this low-gravity batch as a yeast starter for a Belgian dark strong ale I’m planning for next month; the last BDSA I brewed (with a cake of Wyeast 3787) finished out at a miserable 1.050, so I was anxious to see what the 3711, a ferocious attenuator in my experience, would do to a really big beer.  The ester profile of this saison de la table will determine whether I forge ahead using this yeast cake or track down a fresh smack pack and get a normal starter on the stirplate.

Especially with the spices, this small beer didn’t need too many other flavours competing for dominance.  Munich provided a malty base, with a bit of rye to add a touch of body; along with darkening the beer, the Carafa and Special B added a light roast and a little dark fruit character, respectively.  The brew went into the wee hours of the morning; especially at that hour, the weather's finally starting to get crisp.  I’m hoping this will be a lighter cold-weather alternative to the bigger, boozier beers I’ll brew this season.  It also has me feeling adventurous enough to consider doing another sessionable batch with some of those “pumpkin pie” spices that normally give me pause, to serve at Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Petite Hiver - a petite saison noire spiced for winter

Batch size: 4.75 gallons
Projected OG: 1.040
Projected SRM: 25.7
Projected IBU: 14.9
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 80%

Grains
69.0% - 5 lb Munich
13.8% - 1 lb Rye
6.9% - 8 oz Organic Carafa II
3.4% - 4 oz Special B

Hops
.5 oz Northdown (7.2%) (60 min)

Yeast
1 vial WLP566 Belgian Saison II (no starter)

Extras
1 Cinnamon stick, soaked in vodka (secondary)
2 Vanilla beans, chopped and scraped, soaked in vodka (secondary)

Water additions (mash)
4 qts RO water

Brewday: 2 October 2011
Mash-in: 150F for 60 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 6.25 gallons

Fermented at ambient temp (67F) for 3 days, then ramped up to 80F over 3 days

Secondary: 22 October 2011

Bottled: 12 November 2011
FG: 1.010
ABV: 3.9% - UT street legal success!
Bottled with 4.6 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.

Sour Rye Saison

For my last Chicago brewday, I was looking to make a beer that would refresh us as we unpack in our new place in Salt Lake City.  Given how well last summer’s saison went over, another one, lower in gravity, was in order.  Rye has found a solid place in my brewery over the last year, adding its spiciness and slick mouthfeel, so I wanted to make it a major player in this recipe.

I was also intrigued by how the Cherry Sour turned out following a long sour worting; it produced a prominent, very clean lactic sourness.  While using a neutral ale yeast made for a fairly one-dimensional end product, it seemed this method, applied gently, could add another layer of complexity to what the saison yeast would contribute.  I had just a couple ounces of Amarillo hops left to help build on the citrus character of the sour worting; to augment this I made my first foray into the world of New Zealand hops by adding an ounce of Pacific Jade, known for their citrus and black pepper notes (which should go well with the yeast).

When I started using rye, I followed conventional wisdom in keeping the percentage low to limit its purported gumminess from stopping up the mash.  After reading about a beer made with 100% malted rye, I went bigger; I did an English bitter made almost entirely of rye, and from then on I haven’t had any of the mashing/sparging problems attributed to rye (or wheat, for that matter).  Or at least I hadn’t until this brewday.

I mashed low to keep the final beer dry, as I did with the previous saison; despite the high percentage of rye in the mash and being in the temp range that can make its proteins so notoriously gummy, my experience with my system gave me confidence that I’d come sailing through this without incident.  On top of that, my poorly insulated mashtun lost almost 15 degrees (F) during the long mash.  The time came to start the vorlauf; I attached the hose, opened up the valve per usual, and after the first small surge, it slowed to a trickle.  Minutes

went by, and next to nothing came out.  I stirred the mash, I blew back through the tube, but nothing got it moving.  So I resorted to a method I consider fairly un-French; I decocted.

This traditional German technique is used to raise the mash temperature by drawing off a thick portion of the mash (lots of grain, a little wort), boiling it, then adding it back to the main mash; it also tends to increase mash efficiency and produce maltier beers.  I’ve only decocted once, to add extra maltiness to a small batch of weizenbock; in this case, though, I figured raising the mash temperature to “unglue” the rye proteins was my best bet and this was the only option I had for doing that on my setup.  Unfortunately, the first decoction of just a couple quarts of thick mash didn’t have much effect at all, not even getting it back up to mash temp.  So I doubled the size for the second decoction, which bumped up the temp to 160F.  And the runoff was still interminably slow.

Eventually, I just brought the water for the first sparge to a boil and put it in on top of the mash, bringing the temp to 176F.  That’s hot enough to start extracting unwanted tannins from the grains, but I hoped it would also be hot enough unstick the damn rye.  And the runoff was STILL slow...but moving.  The brewday ended up much longer than planned, but I was able to collect my runnings and get the thing to the boil.  Between the Munich malt and the decoctions, this will probably fall on the maltier side of things than saisons normally do.

Of course, since I was sour worting this beer, I wasn’t even close to the end.  After a 20-minute boil to get past the hot break and sterilize the wort, I cooled it down to about 115F, pitched my lacto starter, covered it with plastic wrap, and put it in the swamp cooler to let the bugs stew just overnight.  The next day I found that I must’ve done a pretty poor job keeping the plastic wrap right down on the wort (to inhibit unwanted bugs that need oxygen, like acetobacter), as the wort had a frizzy, frothy head unlike the thick, controlled scum that showed up on the Cherry Sour.  Still, it didn’t smell out of bounds, so to speak, and it was about to get a full 60-minute boil, so I didn’t worry too much about it.

The normal boil proceeded without incident, other than it seemed impossible to keep this one from boiling over; even though I’d boiled it past the hot break before souring, the head as it came to boil was immense, it still billowed up despite spritzing with a water bottle and keeping the flame low, and it persisted to some degree through the end of the boil.  I chilled and set it aside, but was unable to get back to it for almost a full day.  Eager to avoid a double souring, I brought it back to a short boil and chilled it again; on reheating, it had

a really wonderful, gentle fruit aroma that I attribute to the late hops.

Primary fermentation chugged away, and the dry hops went in right on top when it subsided.  I’d only planned to have them in there for about 5 days, but with us busy packing, painting and cleaning for the imminent move, I didn’t have a chance to bottle before leaving for my music festival.  By the time we get back, they will have had 3 ½ weeks of contact time.  After all the hassle of this brew session, I’m looking forward to bottling this one, along with the Russian imperial stout, which has been sitting on oak for 2 months now.

Sour Rye Saison - Farmhouse ale with lacto starter

Batch size: 5.5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.048
Projected SRM: 8.4
Projected IBU: 28.9
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 80%

Grains
50% - 5 lb Rye malt
50% - 5 lb Munich

Hops
1 oz Amarillo (7.8%) (20 min)
.5 oz Amarillo (10 min)
.5 oz Pacific Jade (13.4%) (10 min)
.5 oz Amarillo (Dry hop 5 days)
.5 oz Pacific Jade (Dry hop 5 days)

Yeast
Sour starter (pre-boil)
WY3711 French Saison - 3L starter from stirplate (primary)

Extras
1 tsp Irish moss (10 min)
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (10 min)

Water additions (mash)
2 g Chalk

Brewday: 2 July 2011
Mash-in: 12.5 qts @ 148F for 2 hours - added .5 qt to bring down temp
Temp drop to 134F; viscous & very slow runoff
1st decoction - 2 qts thick mash boiled for 5 minutes; raised temp to 144F
2nd decoction - 4 qts thick mash boiled for 5 minutes; raised temp to 160F
Sparge still stuck; eventually just added 1st sparge in with mash
1st sparge: 10 qts @ 212F - raised temp to 176F
STILL running off super slow!
Pre-boil volume: 7 gallons
Pre-sour OG: 10.8 P (1.044)
Boiled through hot break, cooled to 115F, pitched sour starter, covered in plastic wrap, kept warm in swamp cooler overnight

3 July 2011: Following 20 hours souring, normal 60-minute boil
4 July 2011: Didn’t pitch yeast yesterday; brought back to boil, cooled again, aerated, pitched - wonderful fruity aromatics on reheating

Fermentation started in basement at ambient (68F) for 2 days, then brought upstairs to ramp up

Dry hop: 11 July 2011

Bottled: 6 August 2011
FG: 1.010
ABV: 5%
Sample nicely tangy, but dominates the yeast; next time only sour a portion of the wort
Bottled with 5.5 oz table sugar

First tasting: 20 August 2011
Bright and fruity from the souring, but not overly so.  Good breadiness as it warms, but sourness overshadows the yeast character.

Cherry Sour

With the apparent failure of my Flanders red to sour (aside from the partial gallon batch done with raspberries, which turned out pretty nice), I’ve been hungry to find success with a sour beer.  With the approach of summer and our imminent move, however, I only had a matter of months to produce it; while I look forward to letting wave after wave of different bugs produce a richly layered, sour and funky beer over the span of many months and years, it’s not going to happen before we head west.  I’ve produced three Berliner weisses in the last few years, the first turning out the best (most sour and to style), so I turned once again to my friend lactobacillus to produce the sour I crave.

Michael Tonsmiere’s Mad Fermentationist blog has been a guide and inspiration in my journey into funk; without serious contender, it’s my favourite brewing blog.  Having read his post on sour worting some time ago, I finally gave it a go myself; other sources I considered for this project included a long thread on Berliner weisse brewing on the NB forum and a recent article in Zymurgy on quick souring.  I made a sour starter with some brown sugar and uncrushed Munich, kept between 90 and 100F; the low gravity sugar water and warm temperatures (up to 120F) provides the lacto present on the grain husks ideal conditions to grow.  Having given the starter the best part of a week to get really disgusting and sour as possible, I made up a simple moderate-gravity wort of 2-row and wheat, brought it to a boil to kill off any bacteria present in the wort itself, cooled it to about 115F, and pitched the starter.  The wort then went

into the swamp cooler in the brewpot, covered in plastic wrap with as much air pushed out as possible to inhibit aerobic bacteria growth.  It was kept warm (around the same temps as the starter) for five days to get as sour and nasty as possible.  Once the wort was sufficiently sour (and smelling relatively unpleasant) I treated it like any other beer: I gave it a full 60-minute boil with a small amount of bittering hops, chilled it, and pitched the yeast.  Looking for a clean ferment, I went with US-05 at reasonably cool temps.

The pre-fermented wort (post boil) already tasted pretty darn tart; I was a little worried it would be a violent, enamel-stripping machine once it fermented out.  Once primary was completed, though, it had a pleasant, bright acidity that begged for a hot day and a large goblet.  I wasn’t done with it yet, though.  The Mad Ferm blog mentioned that the sourness this method produces is very one-dimensional when compared to traditional slow-souring methods, and suggested adding another layer of flavour to complement the acidity and add to the overall profile.  As DeAunn has especially liked dosing Berliner weisse with a small amount of fruit syrup (as is traditional), I made my “extra something” a healthy hit of cherry.

To the secondary I added a gallon of Knudsen’s cherry juice, half black cherry, half tart, and a 16-ounce bottle of Montmorency cherry concentrate, which, according to the bottle, has been pressed from over 1,000 cherries.  Needless to say, on its own it’s pretty damned potent.  All of the cherry juice and concentrate was pasteurized, so I didn’t worry about infection from it.  Entering secondary, the beer gained a deep red colour from the cherry and came up to just over 6 gallons in volume.  I put the fermenter in the swamp cooler with water that was about 60F; I wanted to preserve as much of the cherry aromatics as possible during the secondary fermentation, which would be blown off if it got too violent.

After several weeks in secondary, the cherry had fermented out almost completely, and I bottled a very pink, fairly sour beer.  Despite the low secondary temps, the flat sample didn’t display much in the way of cherry flavour or aroma; given that it feremented out so far, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.  If I try this again, I might bump up the amount of cherry even more.  At this point, it seems like what I’ll end up with is a pink Berliner weisse; while that’s not quite what I had in mind, I won’t be upset if that’s what comes of it.  For more fun next time, I might try using a Brett strain for primary to follow the sour worting to layer on the funk with the straight sourness.  I also forsee using this method to add a touch of sourness to a porter for a more "authentic" quality.

Cherry Sour

Batch size: 5.2 gallons
Projected OG: 1.044
Projected SRM: 3.2
Projected IBU: 10.7
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 77%

Grain
53.9% - 4 lb 5 oz Belgian Wheat
46.1% - 3 lb 11 oz 2-row

Hops
.2 oz Columbus (14.5%) (60 min)

Yeast
Sour starter (pre-boil)
US-05 (primary)


Extras
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (pre-sour boil)
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (10 min)
1 tsp Irish moss (10 min)
1 qt Knudsen Just Tart Cherry Juice (secondary)
1 qt Knudsen Black Cherry Juice (secondary)
1 pt Cherry concentrate (secondary)

Water additions (mash)
1 gal RO water
2 g Chalk
2 g Baking Soda
1 g Gypsum
½ tsp Acid blend

Sour starter: 6 May 2011
Boiled 2.5 oz dark brown sugar in 1 qt water
Cooled to 110F in Mason jar, added small handful of uncrushed Munich
Kept 90-110F to encourage lacto growth; grew some chunky funk and aroma; hard to discern sour flavour amidst sugar sweetness

Brewday: 11 May 2011
Mash-in: 13 qts @ 152F for 12 hours - dropped to 116F
1st sparge: 9 qts @ 212F - added to mash to extend sacch rest - settled at 152F for 15 minutes
2nd sparge: 10 qts @ 212F
Pre-boil volume: 7 gallons
Pre-soured SG: 9P (1.036)
Brought to boil, cooled to 115F, pitched sour starter, covered in plastic wrap, kept warm in swamp cooler

15 May 2011: Normal boil for 60 minutes with hops, chill & add yeast as usual
Smelled mildly awful coming out of the cooler, which changed to tart during the boil
Post-boil volume: 5.2 gallons
OG: 11P (1.044)
Quite sour already, unfermented; almost afraid this will be undrinkable

Fermented in basement at ambient (62F)

Secondary: 26 May 2011
Added cherry juice & concentrate first, splashed a bit to aerate; fermented out below 60F in swamp cooler to preserve as much of the aromatics as possible

Good tangy lactic sourness; very quaffable.

Cherry juice mix SG: 21.8P (1.092)
SG (w/o cherry): 1.009
SG (w/cherry): 1.024

Bottled: 15 June 2011
Composite OG: 1.053
[(1.044 x 5) + (1.092 x 1.125)]/6.125 = 1.053
FG: 1.012
ABV: 5.3%

Bottled 6 gallons with 6.4 oz table sugar