Of beer and blogging

Finally, I am back to a blog entry after far too long an absence. I am finding that Twitter consumes my ideas on a far quicker basis and leaves me not wishing to type at the end of the day. I would write that I resolve to do better, but I know such a declaration will not be long met. I will strive to do better though.

As I sit in my kitchen awaiting the boil, I am reminded that the last time I made this beer, I blogged during the boil, though it was a bit into it before I started. This is a recipe I've made before, though I am trying to make only one change. Until such time as my regular tasters have had their guess, I will not reveal here what I have made. It is enough, perhaps too much, to state that it is a crowd favorite and one long overdue for a revisit.

The one change, however, is something I do care to discuss. When I racked the Black Abbey to secondary, I took some of the yeast dregs and placed them in a sanitized mason jar. This was placed into the fridge awaiting a vessel to house a starter. I have never used a yeast starter, so I consulted multiple sources before pursuing. I would like to thank @derekclayton for allowing me to use his half-gallon growler. We had met at @rockbottomcincy to try their beers, but he was not able to get them to fill his growler with their Barley wine. All was not a total loss though was we were able to speak to their header brewer Mitch for a good length of time.

Boil nearly ready to start.

The hops scheduled to go the full 75 minute boil are in a bag that I hope is large enough. Paradise did not have any of the smaller hop bags, so I cut larger one that I tend to use for grains into three sections. Time will tell how well this will work.

Boil has started and so has timer. Hot break starting to form on the top. I will start scooping it out soon. The next hops do not go in for about 35 minutes. I have noticed that I get more foam when using grains from Paradise. I am beginning to wonder if they are perhaps cracking the grains too well and I'm getting more grain dust than I do when I crack the grains at Listermann's. One of these days, I'll get my own grain mill and have no one to blame save myself.

One of my nephews spent the night and today he and my son wanted some of the Root Beer we made several months ago with their lunch. When we made it, somewhere we goofed and the bottles do not tend to have carbonation (natural, of course). The bottle my son had, however, did have fizz. Hey, made it does work??!?! We will have to try some again later.

I am still in extract mode, though I am getting closer to at least trying a partial mash. Currently, I do not have a large enough pot in which to boil 6 gallons of water down to 5.5. I am wondering if perhaps I use 6-7 pounds of malt to get 3-3.5 gallons of water if that will be partial enough. I have begun the practice of boiling the fill water before pitching. I know that is not the same, but at least the water is boiled of its city water chemicals.

The first hop bag is floating well. It is 25 minutes till the next ounce.

Now more about the change. Technically, there are a few others, though they should have limited affect on the outcome. One being that the extract is different, though about the same SRM, but it is not made from a different grain. Another is that the alphas of the hops do not match. Again, I am not too bothered by that. One of these days though, I will need to decide on the IBU and adjust my hops and boils accordingly. The most significant difference is the yeast. Instead of an American ale yeast like last time, this one will have the White Labs WLP570. This will give a Belgian twist and it should be interesting.

I have some cleanup to do and the fill water needs to get boiled. Tomorrow will be a busy day with bottling the Black Abbey and I am sure my wife will want to start decorating the Christmas tree. I don't tend to get into the right mood for such until about the 20th of December, so I just smile and help.

Until then.

Belgian Barley Mead

My latest hair-brained idea of a recipe. I want to make this next, if I can keep the wort warm enough to ferment at 70-75F.

Ingredients

5# light/amber malt extract
4# buckwheat honey
1# Crystal 80L
1.5# Munich
.25# Carafa III
.5# Chocolate Malt
2oz Warrior or Simcoe hops (maybe 1 each??) 60 min
1oz Simcoe (1/3 @ 30, 1/3 @ 15, 1/3 @ off)
1oz Sterling (½ @ 10, ½ @ off)
1 tsp. Gypsum
1 tsp. Irish moss (15 min)
Belgian Strong ale yeast

Procedures

Put 2 gallons of water and Gypsum in a pot and bring to a boil. Remove from heat and let cool to 170F. Add grains and steep grains at 155F for 20 minutes. Remove grains, add extract and bring to boil. Hops as scheduled.

For honey, bring 1 quart of water to a boil for 15 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in honey. Cover and let set at least 20 minutes. Add to boil at heat off.

Cool to 70F, rack, fill to 5.5 gallons and pitch yeast. Would be best with a big starter. After 2 weeks, rack to secondary for at least 2 more.

For a twist, secondary for at least 4 weeks over 1 pound of medium oak chips.

In the dark (series, beer #2)

Next up in my In the dark series of beer styles not normally dark is Black Abbey Ale. This is an adaptation of my In the Abbey, but is not a straight conversion. The crystal malt is swapped for Aromatic malt and Dark Candi sugar replaces the light brown sugar. The yeast is also different with White Labs WLP570 being used. As Listermann's was out of Hallertauer hops, Spalt is being used instead.

As promised, here is the recipe:

Ingredients

10 lbs Canadian Pale Malt Extract (est. 8 SRM)
1.5 lbs Carafa III malt (500 L)
2 lbs Aromatic Malt (26 SRM)
1 oz Sterling hop pellets (5 min)
1 oz Spalt hop pellets (60 min)
1 oz Kent Goldings hop pellets (60 min)
1 vile of White Lab's Belgian Golden yeast (WLP570)
2 tsb Gypsum
2 tsb Irish Moss
Priming Sugar for bottling

Procedures

Place 2.5 gallons of cold water in the kettle with the Gypsum and stir. Place cracked grains in a grain bag and bring water to a boil. Heat off, remove bag and allow to drain. Stir in extract and candi sugar. Be sure they are well dissolved before adding heat. Bring to a boil and skim off heat break. Put Spalt and Goldings in a hop bag and place in the kettle. Boil for 1 hour. At 15 minutes to go, put in Irish Moss. At 5 minutes to go, put in Sterling hops (hop bag is optional here, I prefer not).

Turn heat off and cool. Rack to fermentor and fill to 5 gallons. Aerate and pitch yeast.

Primary fermentation: 2 weeks
Secondary (if desired): 2 weeks

Bottle or keg when fermentation complete.

Your Scotch is me beer!

Tonight is a review of Mikkeller/BrewDog's Devine Rebel. This one is a collaboration between two of Europe's best extreme brewers. It is somewhere amongst a barley wine and a strong ale and has noticeable influences from both sides of the North Sea.

Upon opening the bottle, it is immediately apparent that something is different. The fill level is nearly to the top! Most interesting. This one is bottle aged, so pour to leave the yeast in the bottom. The coloring is a deep caramel and the head is the color light brown sugar (ok, perhaps lighter than that). Not bad, let's see where this goes.

Cold, the Scotch flavourings from the barrels smacks your nose. There are hints of barley malts and some hops in there, but the Scotch is quite forward. The tip of the tongue is greeted with Scotch bitterness and alcohol. It has the smooth feel of beer aged in old whiskey barrels.

Mid-mouth, the malt sweetness blends with the Scotch tones. As it gets warmer, the sweetness becomes easier to detect. Hold it in your mouth and the sweetness increases. It is one to savor the moment and close your eyes. The finish is quite pronounced with Scotch and hop bitterness. It very eagerly removes the sweetness from the tongue leaving Scotch flavors.

A few swirls of the glass and all these aromas and flavors intensify a bit. This is one to hold and breathe through your teeth. The Scotch flavor really picks up.

This one is quite interesting. I'm no fan of Scotch, but I do like this mixture. It is not one for the timid, but it doesn't require a strong hop palette to enjoy. At 12%, it pretty much is a "one and done." Just be sure to find your feet before you stand up.

A Rogue among men

Last Friday, Jim Cline from the Rogue Brewery was at Jungle Jim's for a tasting. It was quite nice for the brewery to finally send him out this way. On the taste list were 11 beers, but one more was added as a surprise.

As is customary when the brewery sends a representative, the telling of the back stories of the beers is one of the main reasons I like the tastings at Jungle Jim's. It would be quite easy for me and a group of friends to buy the beers to taste, but the stories of how and why help round out the picture. One of these days I might actually take notes of the stories instead of just the beers.

Anyway, on to the beers.

Maierfest Lager
This one seems to want to be a mix of an Oktoberfest and a Maibock. It is orange in color and the Munich malts are pronounced on the nose and tongue. Mid-mouth there is good malt sweetness with some hops on the finish. Very nice. Where's the Rotwurst und Senf?

Juniper Pale Ale
What an interesting one this is. Made with Juniper berries, it is clean on the nose with hints of yeast and juniper. The juniper adds to the bitterness and blends with the hops mid-mouth and on the finish. It is a nice blend and doesn't swerve into tasting like Gin.

American Amber
A bit of a low gravity beer, it has a malty nose and hops are mid-mouth to finish. Some lingering malty sweetness.

Dead Guy Ale
Now we are starting to talk here. Malt on start with caramel start to finish. There is a slight hop presence mid-mouth. This one reminds me of the Alt Biers I had in Germany. It is a lager recipe made with ale yeast. Quite homebrewish.

Double Dead Guy
Dead Guy kicked up a few notches, this is the kind of beer I like buying. It is a bit of a sweet beer as malt is noticeable from start to finish. There is some hops in there and the finish has a slight presence of alcohol. Would be quite easy to drink too much of this one.

Hazelnut Brown Nectar
If you like hazelnuts, this is your beer. They are present from start to finish. They give the beer a bit of sweetness, but it is not syrupy. Would go well with breakfast.

Captain Sig's Northwestern Ale
A good ale with nice hop presence. There are hops on the nose with Munich again noticeable (yeah, I'm starting to detect a pattern). Cascade and Willimette hops dance from mid-mouth to the finish. Pass me another.

Yellow Snow IPA
In typical American IPA style, this one has citrus and grapefruit on the nose. Mid-mouth, the malt and citrus tone together nicely. The grapefruit taste continues all the way to the end. The use of Amarillo hops is quite noticeable. It is 70 IBU, but it doesn't feel that high thanks to the generous malts. If the 5L kegs get sold around here, I'm buying one.

Mocha Porter
The first of the dark beers, this one has a coffee presence, but it is not overpowering. There is coffee and chocolate on the nose. Mid-mouth it is a bit malty and the finish is smooth.

Shakespeare Stout
There is malt bitterness on the nose. Mid-mouth is clean with notes of oats (yeah, I know). There is some malt bitterness on the finish.

Santa's Private Reserve
The truck from the brewery to the local distributor was held up one day just for this beer. It has malt on the nose and is sweet in the start. Mid-mouth, the Chinook hops come up and say hello. Not nearly as fruity or spicy as other Christmas beers, it is more a red ale than a holiday one. Quite good.

Smoke Ale
When Jim said it was a smoked beer, there are certain expectations that enter your mind, but on the pour you realize they are not correct. This one pours orange and there is smoke from the nose all the way to the finish. There is malt presence mid-mouth. Typically, I'm not a fan of smoked beers, but I do like this one. Would go well with a double bacon cheeseburger.

At the end of the tasting, we stood up and took the Rogue Nation oath. I did this previously via the website while I was drinking a Northwestern Ale, but it was nice to do it in a crowd. Rogue, thanks again for sending Jim all this way and I do hope you make to next year's Spring Beer fest at Jungle Jim's. Also thanks for having a nice, clean website that makes deep linking easy.

And to that table that was too loud and made it hard to hear, a pox on your house. Talk about the beers guys.

Next up

I finalized the recipe for the next beer this past Saturday, but I've yet to buy the supplies. I do hope to do that this week and get Brainmuffin's Beer Kitchen going before the trick-or-treaters start showing up on Saturday. Not sure if I will go to Listermann's or Paradise.

The Rogue beer tasting at Jungle Jim's last Friday night was quite good, with the only exception being the loud talkers at a table near us. It would not have been too bad had they been talking about the beers, but they were not. I'll get my review of the beers in later this week. I was surprised how many of them had a Maibock base.

I did deliver some of the one hop ale - Cascade to some of the usual suspects, as well as a homebrewer I met. He also gave me a bottle of his latest. Not bad for a basic ale and considering that it is his second ever batch. He wants to learn more and made do this professionally. Here's to his conquest. I look forward to trading beers and ideas with him.

Trying One Hop Ale - Cascade

I bottled this version of the one hop ale on the 17th, so it has been in the bottle about 5 days. Time to see how it is doing. This morning I put a test bottle in the fridge to enjoy in the evening. I set the bottle out on the counter for a bit to allow it to warm.

The particulars as calculated by BeerSmith:
34 IBU
8 SRM
4.9% ABV

It pours nice and golden, with a thick, foamy, white head. Not as clear as I had hoped, but clearer than the Crystal Ale. On the nose, the one ounce of dry hop Cascade in the secondary is quite noticeable. There are also slight hints of Crystal malt.

The drink starts with a little bit of sweetness and some hop bitterness. The bittering hops here were one ounce of Cascade, so not too much bitterness. Mid-mouth the feel is quite light and thin. Perhaps I should have used a little dextrin malt in this one. The fruitiness of the Cascade is present and so is some malt. Pause for a moment, and the hop bitterness can be detected.

The finish is a clean mix of the hop flavor and its bitterness. There is a lingering bitterness, which seems surprisingly high for this variety. The lingering does make one search for another sip.

All in all, not bad for this experiment. This is a nice session ale that is easy to drink, yet has good flavor. As would be expected with a one hopper, there does seem to be something missing, but it isn't enough to detract from the beer. I can't wait to do this same recipe with another hop. Perhaps Northern Brewery or Warrior???