The "Weird Beer" thread

OK, Now I'm wondering if you and I were at the same party. I'm originally from Houston, and I too attended a "weird beer" party long ago with the same entry fee - 6 pack of something unusual.

Anyway, my latest isn't really that weird - it was just an attempt to use up some of my leftover grains and hops from previous batches. I brewed pale ale using 2-row and a little bit of crystal 20 & munich. Then, I threw in a Lb of smoked malt. Hopped it with Magnum and Hallertau (both Mittlefruh and Hershbrucker) and used White Labs 2.

It turned out pretty nice, and I just drank the last of the batch this week. The smoke was just a bit too much for the pale ale, so if I do this again, I'll cut back to a half a Lb on that grain. All in all, not a bad "leftover" beer.

 

I'll jump on the weird beer train.. I brewed this a few weeks ago.

Pils 70%
Munich 30%
50/50 Hall Mit/Saaz 18 IBU
Weinhenstephan Weizen Yeast
OG 1.065
FG 1.008
Fermented on warm side, 76F
Keg carb'd, priming with saved wort

Samples taste like a Dunkelweizen to me, malt forward, but with strong banana notes, and some clove.
so maybe it's a wheat-free Dunkel

 

If I ever brew a clone of any DFH beers I will have to remember to post it here. Otherwise, no weird beers yet.

 

Not extremely weird but I have a Brett C cider going right now. The brett has added a pleasant funkiness to the cider and has helped smooth it out by by diminishing some of the "bite".

 

I rarely go with weird. Mostly, I stick to basic styles, pales, browns, porter, Belgians, and the occasional lager, in the 1.04-1.06 OG range. Early on, I tried a few spiced beers - fenugreek (to enhance maple), cocoa, pumpkin spices - but if you brew a few offbeat disasters and plain old beer starts to look pretty good. The weirdest stuff in my brewhouse in the last few yeasts includes a farmhouse ale with brett and spelt and a Berlinerweiss with sour grapes. But brett beers and sour fruit beers are not too weird, anymore. Heck, spelt is not even odd anymore.

 

Weird Shit I Brewed (At work so no recipes):
Sweet Potato Stout (1st all grain batch on a whim, upended metal collander as a false bottom in an igloo cooler, added 8 lbs of mashed, oven roasted yams on top of grain bill, best stuck sparge ever).

Peanut Butter & Chocolate Imperial Milk Stout

Chai and Vanilla Bean Imperial Milk Stout

Soured Blend of Barleywine, Mild and Bourbon Barrel Aged Imperial Milk Stout

Franken-Weizen (Weizen bock with Honey, Late additions of Wilamette & Mt Hood, Dry hopped with Cascade; First kitchen sink beer)

Wheatwine (10.5%) with Gerwurtztameiner (sp?) must added, hopped with Nelson, Galaxy, Amarillo, Citra, Pacifica (One of my favorite beers)

Imperial Red Ale with 30% Rye (~12% ABV) and a metric shit ton of hops (Mash, Boil, Hopstand, Hop Back, 3 dry hops)

 

man I don't make enough weird beer. usually just weird cider. I always want to but there are not enough openings in the brew plan.
I made a guava perry with French Saison yeast, so at least there's a nod to beer in there.

 

Damn that sounds good. I don't like Nelson normally but I bet this rocked.

 

If it wasn't for some diacetyl in a couple bottles I filled incorrectly (didn't purge adequately with beer gun; first time using it), you might have been able to buy it on the shelves at stores

When I rebrew this I'll make sure to send you a bottle, along with that Sticky Monkee clone

 

My heart just melted a little bit.

 

My 4th batch (eons ago) was a spruce lager, inspired by something in CP's book. Used spruce extract, and too much of it. Weird and not really drinkable. I do try mixed styles sometimes: malt and hops from one style, yeast from another, for example, but none of those has been particularly weird, just interesting.


EDIT: I did recently make a chocolate wit. A bit weird, but most people liked it, even if it wasn't exactly what I was shooting for.

 

a friend and I brewed an aggressively hopped Imperial Stout with honey and fermented it with a Belgian yeast strain (WLP 545), we called it Flying Dogfish Head - Raging Bitches Brew. The idea was better than the beer

 

Don't know how weird it is, but I brewed a smoked dark IPA. The plan was to brew a beer that evokes the though of spending the night camping. So, dark for night, smoke for the campfire, and hops concentrating on simcoe and chinook for the smell of a pine forest. Needs a bit of tweaking for the next time I brew, but I'll get it where I want it eventually.
Besides that, weird has been cider I did - most with bourbon-oak chips, and a gallon that was done with pure sour bug blend.

 

Carling Black Label.
Nuff said.

 

That shit is delicious in South Africa (Where I'm from). Every time my mom comes back to the states she asks me to brew a clone of it!

 

Champagne yeast, brosef... but yeah, bottle conditioning that bad boy would be a bit scary and less of a sure bet than kegging it.

BTW forgot to add to the list of weirdness, did a 120 minute esque (esque refers to 14.5% not 18%) barleywine with "special" hops, and a coffee-less coffee stout.