Planning some Belgian beers

What is an Enkel?

 

Two packs of D180 works very well in a dark Belgian. Not sure how comparable it is to D2.

 

I brew Belgian Abbey/Trappist style beers frequently and my preferred yeast strain is Wyeast 3787 fermented warm (e.g., 72-73 degrees F).

I homebrewed a Quad about 3 years ago and I used Brun Fonce Candi Sugar (2 lbs.) and I was very pleased with that ingredient.

Good luck with your Belgian Ales!

Cheers!

 

low gravity triple is a bit confusing. I thought belgian triples were 9 %.

I used 1 pack of D90 in my belgium quad. Blended well with the special B ,cara munich and aromatic malts.

 

In this case the WLP500 is an excellent choice as this is my preferred yeast strain for my Tripple. The slight Banana and bubble gum esters is wonderful. Have fun!

 

In terms of colour, D2 is somewhere between D45 and D90, but closer to D90. With Candi-Syrup Inc., the number following the "D" means degrees Lovibond, so D-90 would be 90 L. With the other products, the number following the "D" is just a reference to the general darkness of rhe candi-syrup. D2 has an SRM of 80.

In my opinion, the candi-syrup made by Candi-syrup Inc. is far superior, and for instance, nothing else will do when trying to clone a Westvletern 12. They just recently released a D240 (SRM 240):

http://www.candisyrup.com/

 

Brewing a Single is an excellent jumping off point. A couple of months ago there was a thread on "fast turn around" beers which I thought was BS. But I tried the technique (low OG, lots of yeast) on a Trappist Single. It started at 1.042 and I pitched a lot of 3787. After eleven days it went to the keg under pressure. In another week (18 days) it was drinking as nice as you ever want a sessionable beer. Those Monks are craftier than they appear.

Obviously your stronger Belgians will need more time. I've had good luck with 3522 as well as the Westmalle strain, it's a great way to build up some yeast. My Blonds, Strong Goldens, and Saisons seem to some real improvement with time . . . essentially I'm lagering them. That's not a normal technique, but I find extra time at cold temps (lagering) shows a markedly better beer.

Once you start the yeast pipeline it is essentially self-perpetrating. Start a little more yeast than you need, then use your final running to re-start on brew day . . . which leads to another brew cycle . . . which leads to more yeast, etc. You're going to wonder why you waited 5 years . . .

 

Another vote for 3787 (westmalle) - which is likely the same as WLP530. I'm also a big fan of Wyeast 3864 (Unibroue) as a 'general purpose' Belgian strain, even if it's from a Canadian brewery!

Have also heard some very good things about 3942 ('Belgian Wheat', de dolle), but haven't tried it yet.

 

Yes, Wyeast 3787 and WLP530 can be used interchangeably. These are awesome yeasts but (for Westveletern) requires fermenting at fairly high temperatures, up to 82 F. The fermentation is the most active I have ever seen, requiring the largest diameter blow-off tube possible.

 

D-180 is incredible and has many of the subtleties found in Belgian beers that you'll never find in home-made candi-syrup (beet sugar) or candi-syrup made by other companies! Candi-syrup specifically made D-180 to replicate the taste of Belgian candisyrup (still a carefully held secret). It's what I used in the Westvleteren clone. I'm glad I did.

 

Brun Fonce Candi Sugar: “This is the same candi sugar used by the famous Rochefort brewery in Belgium.”

http://www.midwestsupplies.com/brun-fonce-soft-belgian-candi-sugar-1-lb.html

Cheers!

 

It claims to apply to the candisyrup used by Rochefort, but I doubt very much if it's the same as used at Saint Sixtus (Westvleteren).

 

I will await to read the quoted source in your next post.

Cheers!

 

You do know that for almost 50 years, all beer sold as 'Westvleteren', 'St. Sixtus' and 'Sixtus' was brewed at St. Bernardus, and that St. Bernardus continues to this day to brew the original Westvleteren recipes, right?

Westvleteren was propelled to 'greatest beer in the world' largely due to the fact that it was so absurdly tedious to acquire, complete with 'beer phone', 1 cs/day limit, the monks recording of license plate numbers to prevent 'duplicate' purchases. It's the stuff of beer geek 'whale' legend... mostly because the monks didn't want to commercialize it after the license agreement with St. Bernardus expired in 1992.

But the beer? It's good. But it is not any more 'special' than those from St. Bernardus. It's just harder to buy. Their sugar isn't magic. It's the same candi sugar the others are using.

 

Enkel translates as Single. So it is a single strength beer. You can guess double and triple in Flemish, I think.

 

Comes directly from a conversation on a forum I was involved with, with one of the actual partners of Candi-Syrup Inc. He was involved in much of the testing, analysis, etc.