Blue Moon Clone

Lately when I go to bars and I’m not in the mood for craft beer I have been getting Blue Moon.  I started thinking that Blue Moon would be something I could have on tap to be my every day drinking beer.  I remembered I subscribed to a thread on Homebrewtalk.com in which Wayne1, an ex Coors Sandlot Brewer, posted details about Blue Moon …at least how it was made 13 years ago.  I decided to make 2 kegs worth of this beer to either ferment the second batch for me or to take into work.

One complaint was the run off time with the Wheat and the Oats causing slow sparges.  I added a pound of rice hulls to the mash to help counter this.  By the second batch sparge things were still draining slow.  I don’t know if more rice hulls would help with this kind of grain bill.  The second sparge did drain eventually but it took as long to run off the second sparge as it did the original mash and first sparge. 

I pulverized the spices in my spice grinder and added them at the times indicated. 

Malt Bill / Ingredients
Pounds	Type
9lbs 12oz	Pale Malt
7lb 12oz	White Wheat Malt
2	Flaked Oats
Adjuncts
1	Rice Hulls
.75 tsp	Sweet Orange Peel – 5 minutes
2.5 tsp	Coriander – 10 minutes
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
16	Hallertau	90
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
150F	90 minutes
Yeast	US-05
Stats
11 gal	75% efficiency	IBU: 16

German Water

This beer is an attempt at making a table beer that you might have found on a German table a few hundred years ago.  Beer at that time was used as an all day/every day drink since most water was undrinkable.  Before pasteurization was discovered people did not understand that the boiling of water to make beer is what made the beer safe to drink.  If this beer was made to strong people wouldn’t be able to go about their daily lives …and the cost would be to great for the average family to continually make.

German Water will clock in around 2.7% and have a whole 7 IBUs.  My other purpose for this beer was to see how well unfermented wort will store in a no-chilled keg.  So far I have had great successes with  no-chill beer and have put off fermentation for up to a week.  With this beer I am going to wait and ferment the second batch in about a month.  I don’t want to put it off much longer than that since it doesn’t have a higher IBU count to help with warding off microbes. 

There is a good possibility that this beer might be severely lacking so the second batch may get some dry hopping.  I will post an update on the beer once it is kegged and drinkable.  I also plan on naturally carbing this beer.  I have noticed most beers I have made taste better if they are naturally carbonated as apposed to force carbonation.

Malt Bill / Ingredients
Pounds	Type
10	German Pilsner
2	Munich 10l
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
4	Hallertau	45
2.5	Hallertau	20
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
150F	90 minutes
Yeast	White Labs WLP 036 -  Duesseldorf Alt
Stats
12 gal	75% efficiency	IBU: 6-7

Cold Weather Time - Oatmeal Stout

With fall and winter approaching I needed to make some beer that is good cold weather beer.  Stout definitely is a beer that I drink a lot more of in the cold weather months than I do during spring and summer.  The brew day was pretty uneventful and everything went off without a hitch.  I have made this recipe before using the seasonal Yorkshire squares yeast and it tastes a lot like Samuel Smith’s.  I also decided to not toast the oatmeal.  Partially this was laziness and partially because I wanted to see how much difference there was to the beer from previous batches.

One change I have made to my brew recipes is to shoot for 7 gallon batches.  This way it gives me a good size starter and a full keg of no chill beer.  It may sound like to much but you don’t get the shrink loss from pre-chilling the beer.  If I fill my keg up to the very top so I get some spill over when I put the lid on I usually have an inch of headspace when I crack open the keg to ferment later.

Malt Bill / Ingredients
Pounds	Type
10 lb 3 oz	Maris Otter
1 lb 4 oz	Instant Oatmeal
10 oz	Chocolate Malt - 450
10 oz	Dark Crystal
3 oz	English Roasted Barley
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
28	East Kent Golding	60
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
152F	60 minutes
Yeast	White Labs WLP 004 -  Irish Ale
Stats
7 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 28

Belgian Quad …Yet To Be Named

With my Divination supply starting to run low I started another Belgian Quad beer which will hopefully be ready when my supply is done.  This beer is inspired by Jamil’s Duppel recipe but I upped the base malts to Quad level and make my own Candi Sugar.  The Duppel recipe created a great beer so I am hoping that it translates well to a stronger base malt profile.

I started this mash and then went on a few errands and to the local Farmer’s Market so it sat for at least 20 minutes.  With a strong grain bill the extra mash time won’t hurt the beer.  When I made my original Quad I mashed that beer for 3-4 hours. 

So far this beer smells great while it is fermenting.  The only thing I would change is a blow-off tube.  I have had to swap the airlock a few times with all of the krausen that has bubbled up.

Malt Bill / Ingredients
Pounds	Type
6.5	Pilsner
6.5	2 Row
1	Munich 10
.5	Caramunich II
.5	Special B
1	Homemade Amber Candi Sugar
1	Table Sugar
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
20	Tettnanger	60
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
148F	120 minutes
Yeast	White Labs WLP 530 – Abbey Ale - Cake
Stats
6 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 20

Super Session Belgian Single

My wife has recently requested that I start another batch of Belgian Quad to replace the dwindling supply I have in the house.  Since this takes a 6-12 months depending on how long I age it I started the project in motion with this beer.

Quads take a large quantity of yeast to ferment the 10% worth of alcohol producing sugars.  Instead of making a large starter for the one vial of yeast I want to use I decided to make a 5 gallon batch of beer to make all of my yeast, and I’ll be able to have 5 gallons of beer to drink while I wait.  This beer is pretty basic.

Malt Bill / Ingredients
Pounds	Type
2.5	Pilsner
2.5	2 Row
.5	Caramunich II
.25	Special B
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
12	Tettnanger	45
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
158F	60 minutes
Yeast	White Labs WLP 530 – Abbey Ale
Stats
6 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 12

Oud Bruin – 15 Gallon Project

 

Today I brewed 12 gallons of an eventual full keg of Oud Bruin.  My goal is to start the ferment with the this wort in a Sanke keg and then top up with unfermented wort after the initial fermentation dies down.  Next weekend I will brew enough to fill the keg the rest of the way.  By that time the fermentation should have died down enough.  Sanke kegs actually hold 16+ gallons of beer and I plan on filling the keg up to the neck to limit the amount of air space.

I have 2 packets of Wyeast Roeselare Blend that I will pitch directly into the beer.  I do not plan on racking this beer after the fermentation since I will have very little trub in the keg.  I have noticed almost crystal clear beer from no chill brewing as long as I leave an inch or two of sediment in the Corney kegs that I use as my no chill vessels.   I expect to get 10-10.5 gallons of beer since Corney’s hold 5.5 gallons of beer. 

For some reason I over sparged this beer and ended up having to do a 2 hour boil.  Overall the brew day went well except for the thunderstorms we had all day!

Malt Bill / Ingredients
Pounds	Type
4	Pilsner
3	2 Row
.75	Caramunich II
.75	Special B
.25	Carafa Special III
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
20	Saaz	60
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
156F	60 minutes
Yeast	Wyeast 3763 - Roeselare Ale Blend
Stats
6 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 20

Hefeweizen

 

Another beer that I brewed for the Brew-n-Que and am just now doing a write-up on.  I wanted to make something refreshing, a little sweet and a good warm drinking weather beer.  Hefeweizen is a pretty good beer to fit the bill. 

I added dried orange peel to the beer to give it a little extra kick of citrus.  I had previously bought some “Cutie” oranges last year and noticed how easily they peeled and how little pith they had in them.  I used a grapefruit spoon to scrape out as as much pith as I could and put them in my circa 1980 food dehydrator.  I have used them in a few Belgian beers with good results and used most of what I had left in this beer.  I figure I'll server this beer with some orange slices for anyone who wants them.

I wanted just a little bit of spice in the beer besides the yeast so I added uncracked coriander to the beer along with the oranges to give it some background note spicing.

This recipe is a double batch with half of it going to my work for a happy hour or two.

Malt Bill / Ingredients
Pounds	Type
12	2 Row
8	White Wheat Malt
1	Honey Malt
2 oz	Dried Cutie Orange Peel (5 minute addition)
2 tsp	Coriander (5 minute addition)
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
12	Tettnanger	60
4	Tettnanger	15
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
152F	60 minutes
Yeast	White Labs WLP300 - Hefeweizen
Stats
12 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 36

Brew-n-Que Gets a New Date

 

We have moved the date of the Brew-N-Que from Memorial Day Weekend to July 13th this year.  There was an overwhelming number of people who couldn’t make it on Memorial Day so we are going to reschedule it for Cait’s birthday.  I have been so busy lately (both at home and being out of town) that I have fallen behind on blog updates.  I will try to catch up on this during the extended weekend.  I have a Hefeweizen and a Fruit Punch Pale Ale that I need to do write-ups for and a bulk aging sour project that I am going to be doing within the next month.

Updates coming soon!

Beer Updates – Apple and Pub Ales

This morning I spent some time cleaning kegs and kegging a couple of beers for the Brew-N-Que. 
The first beer I kegged was my Pub Ale.  I had brewed a second batch of this because the first batch didn’t attenuate nearly as much as I’d hoped.  I tested it again one last time today and the London Ale III yeast must have kicked back in.  The gravity had dropped 12 points from my last test and the beer is perfect at 4.6% abv.  Looks like the second batch that I brewed last weekend will be 5 extra gallons of beer to drink.
The second “beer” I kegged was my Apple Ale. This ale turned out pretty well.  My hydro sample had a week amount of apple flavor to it, which was more than I was expecting.  Usually when I use apple juice in anything the apple flavor completely ferments out.  This session ale clocks in at 3.6% abv and I added 3 cans  of Old Orchard 100% Apple Juice concentrate to the ale to boost the apple flavor.  I might only use 2 cans next time but the extra sweetness will probably go over well with the non beer drinkers in the crowd.  The beer had a very fizzy carbonation now that I hope carries into the finished beer.
I plan to give the Belgian Single another week in the fermenter and keg it next weekend.  This beer didn’t have any simple sugars added to it and I usually ferment all of my beers a minimum of 4 weeks to allow the yeast to clean up the beer and for any solids to settle out.

British Pub Ale – Take 2

 

My first Pub Ale turned out a bit on the sweet side.  My wife said it was still tasty, and I liked it …but it wasn’t what I was looking to brew.  This next beer will be used to either blend with the first one or be served as a second beer.  I bumped up the gravity a bit and gave it a “church mash”. 

“Church Mash” -  Mashed in with the grains and let it sit while I went to church.  I started the mash early and got to it a bit later after church so the mash was 3 hours.  At the end of the mash it was pretty thick.  I added my first sparge water just above the mash temperature to bring the grain bed back up to 152* and then vorlof’d the beer and then drained.  My second edition of sparge water was at mash out temperature. 

I found some old Goldings in my freezer from last year.  They still smelled passable so I adjusted their AA rating down from 5.8% to 5.2% and used them as my bittering hops.  I used my fresh EK Goldings as my flavor and aroma hops.  This years batch seems to be quite a bit better than last years.

The beer is sitting in a corny keg in my garage and will be fermented either tomorrow or Tuesday.  I haven’t checked on the original pub ale in a week or so.  Maybe I’ll check on it and be surprised.  I can think of worse problems than having 10 good gallons of beer on hand!

Malt Bill
Pounds	Type
8	Maris Otter
.5	Crystal 90
.25	Honey Malt
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
26	UK Kent Golding	60
7	East Kent Golding	15
1 Oz	East Kent Golding	5
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
152F	180 minutes
155F	Batch Sparge
170F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	Safale S-04
Stats
5.5 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 36

Belgian Single/Apple Ale

 

This is the second beer that I have brewed for the Brew-n-Que event.  I brewed a larger batch of this beer to split and make a second beer with will probably be for my own use.  I recently tried a new ale on the market, Redd’s Apple Ale.  Although this beer was a little sweet, I liked it quite a bit.  I am hoping to make something similar to Redd’s with the second half of the batch.

For the Apple Ale I am going to take 2 gallons of Mott’s apple juice and 3.5 gallons of the Belgian single.  I am going to ferment this with S-04 and keg.  I am going to add apple juice concentrate to to the beer when I keg it to give it additional apple flavor and some sweetness.  Kegging seems my best option since the ale will be back sweetened but I don’t want it to continue to ferment.

The Belgian Single is a beer that I have brewed before.  This beer is a great session beer and should go over real well.  People who usually aren’t beer drinkers like this beer.  It is low on the bittering side, malty, and slightly sweet.  I brewed a bit extra to be able to do a real wort starter which is currently on the stir plate with the wlp400.  I have two 5 gallon kegs currently in the garage cooling down with the wort in them.  My no chill beers so far have been great.  I haven’t had an infection with them yet and my beer always clears really well after a couple of weeks in the kegerator.  Another plus with doing no chill is that when I rack my beer to a fermenter I leave a TON of break material in the bottom of the kegs.  I get very clean beer going into the fermenter which helps keep the beer clear through out the whole process.

 

Malt Bill
Pounds	Type
11.75	Pilsner
1.75	Honey Malt
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
16	Tettnanger	60
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
154F	60 minutes
175F	Batch Sparge
170F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	White Labs WLP400 – Belgian Wit
Stats
10 gal		IBU: 16

1st Annual Brew-n-Que and British Pub Ale

 

This year I am starting a new tradition.  I am going to have a homebrew sampling and I am going to make some of my pulled pork.  People have been invite with a Facebook invite.  The Que part will be run as a potluck.  I am hoping that we will have a backyard full of people …Rain or Shine (I have large popup tents).   The first beer that I made is my British Pub Ale.

This pub ale is a higher gravity version that then session version I usually brew for myself.  This recipe was one of the first beer recipes that I created when I started brewing.  I actually had a year and a half old sample that I found over at my Grandpa’s house (he is an avid Old Milwaukee Light drinker and couldn’t bring himself to drink something else).  This beer was still great after all of this time.  I usually add Fuggles to this brew but have changed it for only East Kent Goldings.  I opened up a brand new package I got from HopsDirect.com and it smelled so good I decided to only use them.

I am doing this batch as a No Chill brew with a Real Wort starter.  The last few beers I have done like that I have really been happy with.  I don’t have to waste a ton of water chilling the beer down and I don’t have to keep DME in stock to make starter wort with.  It is a win/win situation

 

Malt Bill
Pounds	Type
9	Maris Otter
1.25	Crystal 60
.25	Honey Malt
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
24	East Kent Golding	60
6	East Kent Golding	15
1 Oz	East Kent Golding	5
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
152F	60 minutes
175F	Batch Sparge
170F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	Wyeast London Ale III
Stats
6 gal		IBU: 32

Belma Session Blonde Ale

 

I recently found a new hop while I was ordering from Puterbaugh Farms …Belma Hops.  Belma Hops were breed onsite by the Puterbaugh staff.

Description - A very clean hop, with a very orange, slight grapefruit, tropical (but not mango/guava, more like pineapple), strawberry, and melon

I have been looking for a hop that would be good in a session ale that I will keep permanently on tap as my every day drinking beer.  Belma’s description sounded really good, and at $5.25 a pound I threw this one in with my order.  I have a suspicion that next year once the word spreads this hop won’t be $5.25 a pound.

I burst hopped this beer and will dry hop it so I get the most out of the Belma’s.  I have heard recently this is a good accent hop to other hops, but I want to see how this hop does on its own.  I may use it with Citra or some other tropical flavored hop.  Try as I might I have never really developed a taste for Cascade or other C based hops.  I am usually more of a English/European hop guy.

The last batch of Mild that I No Chilled turned out great.  I am going to try again on this beer.  I’ll see how a lighter colored beer does with this.  I know when I siphoned my last batch out of the Corny keg and into the fermenter their was a lot of break material and hops that had settled out just like they do when I use my chiller.

Malt Bill
Pounds	Type
6	2 Row
.5	Crystal 20
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
10.5	Belma	20
6.5	Belma	10
1 Oz	Belma	Dry Hop
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
150F	60 minutes
170F	Batch Sparge
170F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	Safale US-05
Stats
5.5 gal	75% efficiency	IBU: 17