What's Brewing - June '17 edition

I bottled a NE/Belgian IPA. My standard NE IPA but with Westmalle yeast. But due to a recent rhinoplasty(barfight medal, I'm a mouthbreather) I have zero idea what it tastes or smells like.....

 

I brewed 8 batches in 2 weeks as soon as I started my summer break in May, so I haven't needed to brew until today really. This morning I kegged an all Citra Kolsch and a blended Sour that I'm donating to a local Summer Solstice festival and then I brewed up a 4 gallon no boil batch to add back into the Sour fermenter to refill it and keep that pipeline going. I blended 1 gallon of an older very puckery and complex whiskey barrel aged sour (multiple wild sacc, 4 lacto strains and 3 brett strains) with 4 gallons of a very light simple younger sour/Berliner Weisse (German ale yeast, 5 lacto strains and some Brett lambicus)...turned out pretty good for only my 3rd blend! My original intent was to donate a straight keg of the whiskey sour, but the organizer of the festival tried it and thought it was too sour for the masses.

 

A double brew day on Saturday. I need to slow down, lol. A 5 gallon batch of a slightly modified Avg Perfect ESB and 5 gallons of ESB using my tried and true normal recipe. It will be interesting to do a side by side, mainly to look for the Target hops (my modification was no Northdown) and the impact of using the invert sugar (my normal recipe is all malt).

I skipped the Northdown for the APESB. I was not a fan of having two unfamiliar hops in this recipe anyway, plus did not feel like placing an online order for only an ounce of Northdown since I could not source it from my LHBS or normal online retailer. Plus I want to know what the Target is adding to the mix anyway.

I will add that unless the invert sugar blows me away it will be my last attempt to make it. It's a PITA.

Overall I was amazed at how smooth, and fast, the brew day went. I got two 5 gallon batches done in 5 hours. It usually takes me that long to do one 10 gallon batch.

 

Have fun. I know I did not. This might be the stickiest and hardest to clean substance on earth.

 

Brewed up the John Snow House Pale Ale, with 2 changes. (1) I cut the base grain back to hit an OG of 1.042 and (2) I added 5 oz of spruce tips at 10 min. The spruce tips had been previously vacuum packed and frozen. When I opened up the package the tips were quite wet (no doubt the freezing burst the cells) and the smell was mostly unripe Mango with a bit of spruce. In the cooled wort the spruce seems to come through in the finish as a bit of bitterness and astringency. After the boil the spruce tip had no aroma. As this beer is a bit of a hop bomb (for a pale ale) I don't expect the spruce to dominate; my goal is to have it complement the hops. Will be interesting to see how this one develops. Cheers!

 

This is not my first sugar syrup rodeo. However, it really does seem to be the most viscous version I've ever made. I don't think I made a mess, but I did have to run off to work. I know I filled the pot with water to soak, but it occurs to me that I did not wipe down the stove top and adjacent countertop.

 

Nothing in the fermenters yet, but when my wife asked me what I wanted to do for Father's Day, I said "brew"

I'll be brewing Briess' Biere de Garde I:
http://www.brewingwithbriess.com/Recipes/beer/display/biere-de-garde-i

A couple of notes on this one:

1. The recipe says the target OG is 1.065, but no way am I getting that OG in a 5-gallon batch with the grain bill they list. I even emailed them to ask what they actually meant. Surprisingly I got a response the next morning. And yeah, there's a typo. I asked for grain percentages, and was told to shoot for 88.5% for the base, and 3.8% for each specialty malt (which, in my system, came out to about 12 lbs 6.5 oz base, and 8.5 oz specialty malts).

2. The recipe calls for wlp072, French Ale. Currently that's in "The Vault" at White Labs, so I can't get that one. I'm going with Wyeast 3725, Biere de Garde. Seems fitting. Ha ha!

And since I seem to be having a farmhouse ale "problem" right now, if I can swing it, I'll be trying to brew a Tank 7 clone in June, as well.

 

I have a yeast starter of my 5th generation WY1056 strain chugging for Sunday's brew day. This is my final pitch of this strain before I buy a new pack to keep re-harvesting.

The beer this weekend is a palate wrecking, dank IPA. 6% ABV and 100 IBU (theoretical is somewhere around 200, FWIW).

Chinook, Nugget, Simcoe, Centennial and Columbus dominate the hop bill. With a touch of Galaxy and Citra in the dry hop (along with the first five in various quantities). Expected FG is 1.006-1.008... Looking for a purposely un-balanced, bitter IPA. Big charge of Chinook as a hopefully "harsh" bittering hop, vs. my typical Columbus. After brewing so much NE IPA lately, I want complete opposite side of the spectrum.


Then piggybacking next week is my second variant of my "International Bitter" recipe, 3.4% ABV and 30 IBU. Golden Promise, Pilsner, Vienna, Carapils, Midnight Wheat, Carafa Special II and Melanoiden malt. Magnum, Mittelfrueh and Galaxy for the hopping.


After that, too many options I want to brew and not enough time… Vienna Lager, Rauchbier, Pilsner, various pales/IPA’s, coffee/cocoa/bourbon porter, etc… I need to invite some more friends over to start killing these kegs sooner.

 

Planning on attempting my first Barleywine this weekend! Made an imperial "blonde" ale last weekend that I plan to reuse the 1272 yeast from. Hoping to push the ABV to 12% with this one so will need to use some tricks to keep the yeast happily going in the primary!

Going with 2 Row and Golden Promise for base along with some Crystal 90, Carapils, White Wheat, Sugar, and a bit of acidulated to help with the PH. Nugget, Fuggle, Northern Brewer hop mix. Will probably be adding additional sugar to primary during fermentation to keep it going. And will be oaking it as well.

 

How well did the pH drop in this beer? 110F is a bit hot for Goodbelly. Which strain of WY lacto did you use? If it was 5335 - L. buchneri that's quite a bit hotter than it likes as well.

Just curious, is all.

 

Next weekend I'll brew another NE DIPA. Maris Otter & winter wheat plus a couple pounds of white sugar. Cascade, Citra, and Comet. Maybe some Amarillo. We'll see how I feel on brewday. Couple packets of Muntons Dry Ale yeast. Easy peasy, lemon squeezey.

 

Here's my kettle soured gose. 50% 2 row & 50% pale wheat. 10 IBUs and added .8 oz of pink Himalayan salt near flameout. I cultured up Bell's Oberon yeast. Added guava nectar and 3 lbs of mango after fermentation had finished. Going to let it sit on the fruit until next Friday. Can't wait to try it!

 

Yakima Valley Hops just got in fresh 2017 Galaxy Hops... Jumped on 2lb of those real quick! I only had about 6oz left of my 2016 harvest left, so glad I was able to re-stock already!

 

No idea. I couldn't find my test kit, I think my wife tossed it during our recent spring cleaning. I'll know in a few weeks when I take a gravity reading. The wort started at 100F, but I didn't use a heating pad. I wanted to let the Wyeast get a hold, and let the Goodbelly take over after. It was in a 80F room for 5 days. Hopefully it soured!

 

I think you'd have a way better chance at that temperature than at 110F.

 

I'm feeling the same way. Next brew here will be along the lines of a Pliny clone.

 

Elder or Younger?

 

Kegged a NZ Super Alpha single hopped Session IPA this morning...this is the end of a series of 7 New Zealand and Australian single hop IPAs. Right now I'm brewing up the 2nd in a series of 4 Experimental hop single hop IPAs with an Experimental J-Lime Session IPA...this will replace the NZ/Aussie pipeline.

Going kayaking and deep water bouldering all day tomorrow, but should be able to still keg a beer I'm calling "Oxymoron", a New England Cascadian Dark Ale

 

You shouldn't have any problems souring at those temps...I use Goodbelly/L. plantarum and L. buchneri (along with L. brevis) in all of my sours and I pitch wort between 120-130 and allow it to free fall to around 85-90 for the rest of fermentation. I usually have a fairly complex sour in a month or so and prefer this method over kettle souring any day!

 

That just made me shudder.