Another sour mash brew.

I was a bit disappointed with my last sour mash experiment because it didn't really seem to taste all that sour. This time around I soured a larger portion of the mash, 50%, and allowed it two full days rather than just over night to sour. This will also mark my second all Brett beer, and I am going to be aging this on some fruit and oak as well (inspired by Avery's Dépuceleuse). More on that later...
7 lbs German Pils
1 lb white wheat
10 lb frozen raspberries to be added to secondary fermenter
1 oz Hallertau pellet @ 90 min
.5 oz Crystal leaf @ 15 min
1/4 tsp Irish moss @ 15 min
.5 oz Crystal leaf @ 0 min
Wyeast 5151
Theoretical OG- 1.057 (accounting for the sugar and carbs from the fruit)
Actual OG- 1.042 (grain only)
Intermediate- 1.007
5/24/10- Made a starter for the yeast with some DME and a hop pellet or two. It took about a day and a half before I got any visible fermentation. Mashed 4 lbs of the grain with 1 gallon water at 148. Started this when I got up and it was down in the 130's after several hours. Added a handful of grain to introduce lactobacillus, covered with plastic wrap, and added my aquarium heater to keep the mix somewhat warm over the next two days.
5/26/10- Sour mash smells pretty sour and gross for sure. Skimmed off a little mold. Mashed the remaining 4 lbs of grain at 148 for 90 min. Sparged with 5 gallons of 170 degree water. Ran out of propane with 20 min left in the boil and had to transfer to my stove and two pots. Ended up working ok, though it took a little more time. I boiled an ounce of heavy toast oak cubes in 5 changes of water and have them soaking in a cup of zinfandel. I will add both to the secondary fermenter along with the berries.
Sour mash smells like dead people.
Boiling oak cubes (time to clean the stove too!).
Oak cubes in a cup of wine, pictured in the background. I never buy/drink wine and ironically I only bought it to make beer this time. I chose this one because the price was right (15-20) and the tasting notes specified raspberry and blackberry flavors.
Yeast starter. This worked alot better than my last all brett beer without a starter. It took two days for the starter to get going, but I had active fermentation by the next morning in my 5 gal batch.
Hop additions weighed out.
Sparging...
Original gravity, which was temperature corrected to 1.042. This sample did taste fairly tart, which is exactly what I was going for!
6/7/10- After a 2 week primary fermentation, moved to the secondary today, along with 10 lbs of frozen raspberries, 1 oz of heavy toast French oak cubes, and a cup of the zinfandel pictured above. I did not use the wine that the cubes had been soaking in. It tasted way too oaky and astringent and tannic. I kept it for future oak cube soaks or I could use a bit to add more oak to this beer if needed. It tastes pretty tart and somewhat fruity from the yeast. It'll probably be a month or more before it gets bottled.
10lbs of raspberries in a 6 gal better bottle.
Racking from primary to secondary.
Intermediate gravity.
The beer has already taken on a nice pink/red color.
Floating berries and oak cubes.
6/16/10- I finally remembered to get a wine thief and took a little sample of this today. The color has gone to a deep red. The nose is very wine like, actually smelling very similar to tart concord grape. Lambic like flavor profile, very tart upfront, finish of brettanomyces, fruit, hay. Not nearly as complex as a Lambic of course.
I have been thinking I will bottle this four ways- 1. as is uncarbonated. 2. as is carbonated. 3. blended with a red wine uncarbonated. 4. blended with a red wine carbonated. Though I am not entirely sure on all of that yet.
9/21/10- Finally amassed enough cap-able champagne bottles and bottled this. That magic number was 24 bottles. I primed with 12 oz of sugar to get 5 volumes of carbonation and reyeasted with some of the washed brett c from this batch. It tastes very lambic like but no where near as complex of course. A good amount of the raspberry seemed to make it through to the bottles despite some attempts at filtration. Oh well. Most of that will sink to the bottom.

Bitter Revisited.

I finally got myself a proper pint glass instead of the jelly jars. I have been tasting and had some friends tasting this beer. I have gotten some pretty good reactions to it. One person said it could use a little more body which I do agree with and can easily do the next time around. Others said they liked the hopping and found it like an IPA with the volume turned down. I can see that as well.
I think the next time I make a bitter I will change two things. The first is that I will use darker crystal malts to obtain to color as opposed to roasted barley. There is really only a touch of that in this beer but I feel like I get a little of the roastyness in the taste and I don't feel as though that should be there. This will also contribute more body.
Second, I will add more hops later in the boil. I feel like it could use a bit more hop aroma and flavor, while the over all bitterness is fine.
I am really enjoying this beer and it is disappearing all too quickly.
I have also updated the pages for my sour mash experiment(bottled) and second Saison(moved to secondary fermentation).

Etienne Dupont - Cidre Bouche Brut de Normandie.

The world's best cider?This cider comes from France in corked champagne style bottles. It pours out a clear golden color with minimal head and lacing, but contains prodigious carbonation.
I've been reading alot about traditional cider making, with the goal of making my own this fall. Ciders can often end up with a very high alcohol content because apple juice will ferment out very dry. From my reading, it is not uncommon to have a home made cider finish with a specific gravity under 1.000, that of water. This will give you something like high 7-8 percent abv.
Most ciders you see in the store will be somewhere in the neighborhood of 5%. How do they arrive at that?
In the case of French cider it is a process called keeving. The pressed apple juice is allowed to sit, and with the addition of calcium carbonate, the solids that make cider cloudy with both settle out and rise out, leaving a layer of clear juice that is removed and fermented.
Photo from Lost Meadow Cidery.
In this manner, the fermentation will naturally stop itself around 1.010-.015, leaving around 5% abv and a nice sweetness. But alot of ciders have sweetness. How is this different?
There are several methods to get a sweeter cider. First you can kill the yeast to stop the fermentation at the desired level of sugar remaining and force carbonate. Second, ferment, kill the yeast and add a sweetener and force carbonate. Third, take apple juice, add grain alcohol, preservatives, and force carbonate.
I think that most ciders are made in the third method, because most ciders list ingredients on the label. This ciders' label says "unfiltered, unpasteurized cider", which sounds a little more appealing to me than "potassium benzoate added to preserve freshness".
The nose of this cider is all apple, tart and sweet at the same time. There is a bit of wild yeast present as well, though it does not have that distinct brettanomyces smell.
The taste is huge of apples with great carbonation dancing on the tongue. A finish of wild yeast and more apple and a hint of citrus that lingers. Their website says the fermentation is entirely from native yeasts, and it definitely tastes like it.
So is this the best cider in the world? Quite possibly, but the same company also produces a reserve that I had once and found even better. But I think this is the one that people are most likely to find at their well stocked liquor stores. I have only seen the reserve twice thus far.
Next time you are looking for a cider and find yourself looking at Woodchuck, Woodpecker, Strongbow, Ace, etc., look a little farther and spend a little more money and drink the best cider in the world.
My rating: An exceptional product. Seek it out.
Abv: 5%.
Volume: 750 mL/25.4 fl oz.
Website: www.calvados-dupont.com
Price paid: Around 13 at Liquor Land.
Number of cans of Bud Light you could buy for the same price: 20.
For more information on traditional cider making and techniques, please visit Lost Meadow Cider.

A new Saison.

With my historical Saison still very much fermenting, I decided I had to brew another for more immediate consumption. I am looking forward to that one very much, but thinking it will probably be at least the fall if not next spring before it is ready for consumption.
So I came up with this recipe, loosely based on Saison Dupont in that they share the same grain bill and my target original gravity is what theirs is.
Saison
10 lbs German Pilsner malt
1 oz Styrian Goldings pellet @ 90 min
.75 oz Czech Saaz pellet @ 15 min
.75 oz Czech Saaz pellet @ 0 min
Wyeast 3711 French Saison
Mashing:
Mash in at 143 for 45 min
Decoct to 149 for 30 min
Decoct to 152 for 20 min
Decoct to 158 for 20 min
Decoct to 165 for 10 min (mash off)
Target og- 1.054
Actual og- 1.048
Intermediate- 1.002
Final gravity- .998
6.6% Abv
104% Apparent attenuation
86% Actual attenuation
5/12/10- Sparged with 5 gallons of 170 degree water. Boiled over again, added .5 gallon of water to compensate. The og is off because I ended up with around 6 gallons of initial volume, not 5. Should have boiled longer or not added that water. I need to make gallon marks on my pot so I can tell what volume I am working with. I wasn't too worried about it because I have used this yeast before and I should still get to around 6% abv, but with 6 gallons of beer instead of 5. I will ferment for 24 hours at room temp and then go to a water bath at 78-80 degrees.
I also added a spigot to my pot which made things a little easier to deal with.
Rapid fermentation by the next morning.
First decoction.
Weighing hop additions.
Mashing.
Sparging.
Boiling in my 15.5 gallon pot.
Not enough evaporation.
The original gravity.
Fermenting in the bucket. Historical Saison in the carboy behind.
5/18/10- Racked to secondary. My jaw dropped when I measured the gravity and found it at or just below 1.000 - the specific gravity of water. With a temperature correction, it is currently at 1.002. May see that drop another point before bottling. I love 3711!
Tastes pretty good, similar to the Grisette but stronger of course. Fruity and spicy. I may dry hop with an additional dose of Saaz. Great golden color.
Fatty glowstick? No, beer in a cylinder.
In the secondary, a 5 gal better bottle filled right to the top. Had too much beer and had to dump a little. A shame, but I didn't have anywhere to put it.
From working with this yeast before, I expect it to drop out and clear up pretty quickly. I may be able to bottle next week, but I will most likely wait two weeks.
5/25/10- Added .5 oz Czech Saaz and .5 oz Styrian Goldings pellets to dry hop. Bubbled up a ton and lost maybe half a cup of beer. Oh well, it'll be worth it!
6/1/10- Bottled with 6 oz corn sugar, aiming for 3 volumes of co2. Tastes pretty good! Nice flavor from the yeast and a nice hop flavor and bitterness. I bottled half with brett to see if that does anything. Final gravity is 0.998, less than water. That being considered, I am glad I came in under my target gravity. The beer would have been too strong. I definitely recommend using Wyeast 3711. It is a beast!

Bavik- Petrus Aged Pale.

Yum! Petrus is made by Bavik in Belgium. I am under the impression that this is one of the larger brewers in that area not owned by Heineken or InBev. Looks like that is correct. Good for them.
This beer is great. This is what Bavik uses in the blend that becomes their old bruin. The late Michael Jackson (the beer writer) suggested that they release this brew all on it's own. Good idea.
It is aged in oak barrels for 20 or more months before being bottled. Of course that can make it a little pricey, around 5.50 for a 11.2 fl oz bottle. However, this seems to be pretty even in pricing with other sour ales from Belgium and you don't have to open and drink a 750mL/25.4 oz bottle in one sitting.
The first whiff I get is that of a fine cider. Tart, apply, with maybe a touch of lemon.
Very pale clear yellow, with some yeast dregs remaining in the bottle (added this to my saison). A thin white head that stays with it to the end. Little to no lacing.
The taste is similar, pretty sour but not in a bad way. It is actually very refreshing. Alcohol is not noticeable. Very vinous in some ways, probably good for wine or champagne fans who 'don't like beer'. The carbonation is nice, abundant, not too much though. Pretty dry and light bodied. Light bitterness. After you swallow you get an amazing taste of oak that just takes over your whole mouth. Lingering vanilla and oaky finish.
Michael Jackson was onto something.
My rating: I would put this in my 10 best of all time.
Abv: 7.3%.
Volume: 11.2 fl oz.
On teh interwebz: Bavik.be
Price: 5.50 at Liquor Mart.
Number of cans of Bud Light you could buy for the same price: 8, almost 9.

De Ranke- XX bitter

The self proclaimed hoppiest beer in Belgium would probably have little on some American IPA's. And I will freely admit that IPA's are not my favorite. I usually find them way too hoppy with little else to offer for my tastes. But part of this blog and my brewing experience is to push myself to try things that I might normally not try.
This beer was once apparently fermented with a mix of brewers and wild yeast, for a flavor that was both marked by Brettanomyces as well as being extremely hoppy. Now they are back to using a brewers yeast only (I think), though the hops remain.
This brewery was started by two friends who took their hobby and passion for craft beers to the next level. By all accounts, they are now quite successful as their beer is exported around the world. They only use whole hop flowers and no extracts or pellets in their beers. They believe this gives a better end product.
This beer pours a great golden orange color with streaming carbonation. Very hoppy aroma as expected. Citrus and pine. Looking at their website, they used a large amount of low alpha acid hops in this beer, as opposed to a smaller amount of high alpha acid hops as what I think is the norm in IPA's. Nice head and lacing in the glass as it is drunk.
Taste is hoppy, but not too much amazingly. Citrus, pine, light malt. Belgian character from the yeast. Very dry and refreshing.
I guess after this, my next step is to try some American IPA's. Maybe I won't dislike them as much as I thought. Maybe I will actually brew one myself.
My review: Some people like really hoppy beers and some don't. I don't, but I would still buy this beer again, though not all that frequently.
Abv: 6.2%.
Volume: 33cL.
Website: www.deranke.be
Price: 5 at Harvest Wine and Spirits.
Number of cans of Bud Light you could buy for the same price: 8.

Brasserie Dupont - Foret.

I should point out in this review that I recently sampled my still fermenting Saison. This is something of that style made by Dupont, brewers of the famous Dupont Saison. However this beer is also organic.
Pour with a nice thick white head. Something I can't get over that I have seen in all Dupont beers is a level of skunkiness. I attribute this to their use of green glass bottles, which do not block the same amount of light as brown glass. In this beer, the skunky aroma was all there.
Though in all of them I have found the aroma doesn't continue to the taste, which in this case is spicy, fruity (citrus), light yeast, and very complex. It is amazing that such a result can be obtained from only pilsner malt, yeast, and hops.
Unfortunately I found myself burping several hours after finishing this beer and each burp brought up that skunky aroma that I could now taste. Kind of gross.
If it were stored properly, this is a world class beer. Make sure you buy it at a place that has a high turnover. The place I bought it probably doesn't turn over beers like this all that much. I think I am going to brew this week and make something very similar to this. See how it tastes fresh.
My rating: world class if stored properly. The skunkiness really turned me off though. Brown bottles would be a good idea.
Abv: 7.5%.
Volume: 750 mL/ 25.4 fl oz.
Website: www.brasserie-dupont.com
Price: around 9 at Liquor Land.
Number of cans of Bud Light you could buy for the same price: 14.

Avery Brewing Co. - Depuceleuse.

I have no idea how to even pronounce the name of this beer and I'm not going to try. But wow.
It is hard from that photo to see the coloration of this beer, I'd say mahogany about does it. Light white head that quickly dissipates. Aroma of tart cherry, Brettanomyces funk, reminds me of some kriek lambics. The gravity sets it aside from those however.
First sip is great - tart cherries in the forefront, Brett and light malt up in there too. Good carbonation, really dances on the tongue. Great flavor, long lingering finish. Great sipping beer.
I have had some good Avery beers, but this one is a must try. Yeah you'll pay eight dollars or more for a 12 oz bottle, but it is worth it! I would like to try to do something similar. Now is probably the time as I know that Wyeast has Brett Claussenii out as a VSS strain and that is used by some brewers in the area. Not sure if that is what is used in this or not.
My rating: seek it out! Call your local liquor store, and if they don't have it, force them to get it for you!
Abv: 9.59%
Volume: 12 fl oz.
Website: Averybrewing.com
Price: 8.49 at Liquor Land.
Number of cans of Bud Light you could buy for the same price: 13.