Belgian Dubbel - "Duplication"

This recipe is from Brewing Classic Styles with only one minor adjustment.  I brewed this on the same day as my Belgian Single recipe.  Every year I talk my birthday off and spend the day making beer.  This year my birthday was inspired by my love of Belgian Beer.

My friend Larry also had the day off so he came over and we spend the day making and drinking homebrews.  I like when Larry is over, he carries heavy crap for me!

Malt Bill
Pounds	Type
10	Pilsner
1	Munich 10L
.5	Aromatic
.5	Caramunich
.5	Special B
1	Amber Candy Syrup – 75L
.5	Table Sugar
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
23	Tettnanger	60
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
149F	90 minutes
170F	Batch Sparge
170F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	WLP-530
Stats
6 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 23

Belgian Honey Single – Standard and Soured

I have come up with an easy way to get my sour pipeline going.  I am going to start making 12 gallons of some of my beers.  Some of the beers will be fermented like normal…some will be fermented with sour blends.

With this beer I decided to ferment the whole 12 gallons with the same yeast.  The second half of this batch was racked into a Better Bottle with Wyeast Roeselare Blend and 1 medium toast oak spiral that I boiled for 30 minutes, changing the water every 10 minutes.  I don’t want much oak flavor, just a place for the bugs to live.

I racked 5 gallons of the standard into a keg which is in my kegerator carbing.  The beer tastes great flat.  I have high hopes for this beer once it is carbed and ready to go.

Malt Bill
Pounds	Type
12	Pilsner
4	Honey Malt
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
15	Tettnanger	60
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
158F	60 minutes
170F	Batch Sparge
170F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	WLP-400
Stats
12 gal	80% efficiency	IBU: 15

You can see that this beer has a very simple grain bill.  The beer finished out at about 1.012 which gives it a good mouth feel.  With a FG of 1.012 that gives the Roeselare Blend some residual sugars to eat but the beer shouldn’t be overwhelmingly sour.

My next beer I am doing this with is a Dunkleweizen which I will ferment the second half of the batch with the sour blend from the beginning.  Thinking about calling the soured half  “Alte Braune” – Old Brown in German.

Kentucky Common with Rye

I wanted to brew a beer that is going to be low on calories but hopefully have some more taste than a BMC type beer.  I found Revvy’s Kentucky Common recipe on HomeBrewTalk.com and modified the gravity down so it would be a 100 calorie beer.  I wanted an everyday beer on tap that I can drink one with dinner and still be keeping my daily calories lower.

I mashed this beer pretty low so it will dry out and hopefully get some of the crisp, bready flavors of the Rye malt up front on the beer.  That is another reason for the one 90 minute hop edition.  This should give me bitterness with very little hop flavor.

I racked a little under 12 gallons into a Sanke keg @ 95*.  It is currently sitting in my basement dropping down into the high 60s.

With the weather hot and my ground water not very cold this time a year I have been only chilling to the high 90s and letting my basement do the rest of the chilling.  So far I have had good results with this.

Malt Bill
Pounds	Type
8	2 Row
2.5	Flaked Corn
1.5	Flaked Rye
.38 (6 oz)	Carafa II Dehusked
.38 (6 oz)	Crystal 120L
9.5%	Sugar
Hops
IBU	Type	Time
20	Willamette	60
10	Hallertauer Mittelfrueh	30
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
148F	90 minutes
170F	Batch Sparge
175F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	US-05
Stats
12 gal	85% efficiency	IBU: 20

Pacific Northwest Saison

Having never had a good Saison (local beer selection isn’t that great) I decided to make my own.  I wanted to use up some hops that I had and make this a bit different so I used a package of Falconer’s Flight and a pack of Citra I had lying around.  This isn’t standard hops for the style but I wanted a dry beer with a bit of fruit aroma. 

Malt Bill
Amt (lbs)	Type
5	Pilsner
1	White Wheat
1	Caramunich
1	Honey
Hops
Amt (oz)	Type	Time
.75	Falconer's Flight (11.5%)	60
.25	Falconer's Flight (11.5%)	10
.25	Citra (14.5%)	10
1.0	Citra (14.5%)	Flame Out
Mash Schedule
Temp	Time
150F	90 minutes
170F	Batch Sparge
170F	Batch Sparge
Yeast	Wyeast French Saison #3711
Stats
6 gal	85% efficiency	IBU: 36

I wanted to try using a real wort starter so I used my chiller to get the wort to about 135*.  I then filled 2 jars and my fermenter with the wort.  Once my starter jars were at pitching temperature I split the smack pack between them and put them on my stir plates.  I am using one of the jars to ferment the wort and the other jar to farm some yeast for my frozen yeast bank.  What is left from the yeast that I don’t bank I am going to add to a 8oz capable Coke bottle and throw in the fridge.  It will leave me enough yeast to ferment another batch if I make another starter like the one pictured.





With the wort I put in my fermenter I let it cool to pitching temperature overnight in my 67* basement.  I aerated and pitched the yeast this morning and will move it into my loft bedroom in a day or two which is 10* hotter to help the yeast finish out.

A Blog About Beer

I am making this blog to have a online journal about beer brewing.  I am hoping to post about the beers that I make, projects I hope to start, and tips and advice that I come across from other locations.

I am starting to get into sour beer brewing and would like this blog to help others (along with getting input from other brewers) about making sour beers.  There are very few sour brewers out there and information doesn’t seem readily available without a lot of digging.  I have found a few sites that are really great sites and have even talked through email with some of the guys.

Our local scrap yard seems to have a steady supply of kegs that they sell for scrap value ($35).  I have used one of these kegs to ferment double batches of beer in and that got me thinking about using them as 16 gallon, long term stainless steel barrels.  Some of the projects I hope to eventually get going

Belgian Quad Solera – I currently have a 5 gallon batch of a Quad aging in a Corny keg.  With the Solera I want to start 15 gallons fermenting and pull 3 gallons a year after the one year mark and replace that with either the same beer …or slowly change the recipe and therefore the character of the beer.

Flanders Red

Oud de Bruin

Lambic – Split into 3 5 gallon Better Bottles and aged on Cherries, Another fruit depending on season, and a 3rd Better Bottle to continue to age to blend with future beers.

Three out of the 4 of these projects are for sour beers.  Generally people do these as 5-6 gallon batches.  I had thought about doing this but …with the 12-18 month fermentation time on these beers if I really like them it will be another year or more at best to make more.  This way I will have 15-16 gallons of beer.  If the beer doesn’t turn out well then I am not really out any more than I was if the 5 gallon batch was bad since I buy all my grains in bulk.

Hopefully in the next couple of weeks I’ll have a brew day if the weather breaks a bit.  Standing around in 105* weather around a pot of boiling wort isn’t something I am in a hurry to do.