February 8, 201214 yr ... Tomorrow I'm finally brewing the hopefully 11%ABV Tripel IPA, and I'll make no mistakes in underhopping. Using one relative unknown variety, Sorachi Ace, new Japanese bred strain designed for Belgian style beer. I've got 2 ounces of that to throw at this beer, probably split between late and dry hop. Another 8 ounces or so of good whole hops and an ounce of Simcoe pellets since that's such a bitch to find fresh. Going on a quick production schedule, a week in primary, two in secondary on the dry hops, and just under two in the bottle before H day. The hops should be well preserved, at least. I expect it to be extremely boozy at that point but we shall see. My second beer at FFF the other night was Rune Priest, their Belgian Ale which used Sorachi Ace Hops. It was an excellent beer and the hop flavor was unique, in a good way. Sounds like this will be an interesting brew.
February 10, 201214 yr Most vigorous ferment yet on this one. Needs to drop 85 points from the OG to not be a sticky sweet mess. Go Achouffe yeasts!
April 4, 201214 yr Trying to push through a tight brewing schedule till May 15th, when I retire everything for the really hot months. The Scotch Ale gets a properly awesome name now. Full lineup of bottled beer by August: PO'd Peated and Oaked Scotch Ale. 7% Mostly Rye Stout 10% Seriously Oak Aged Rye Stout 10% Matt The Younger Tripel IPA 10% And for the next crazy bullshit: Schwartz Kirsche Bock, AKA Black Cherry Bock. Making a strong black lager in the tradition of a schwartzbier but cranked to 9%, Cherry juice will be added after primary fermentation, and I'm splitting the batch with an oaked sour cherry variation.
April 5, 201214 yr Those all sound like some awesome brews you have going! How is that PO'd? Working on getting my setup going again. It will allow me to brew all year round (seeing that I get it working). All electric Brewtroller RIMS system. Still needs a ton of wiring done to the controll panel and kegs/pumps.
April 5, 201214 yr you sir are a pimp ass bitch Your more than welcome to come down and smack my hoes anytime.
April 5, 201214 yr Distilling is fairly illegal in the states on a small scale, but brewing and winemaking are open game. Any decent city has a homebrew shop or three.
April 5, 201214 yr Amazing. So you can get drunk drinking a gallon of your self made beer, but not drinking 10oz of your self made whiskey. No wonder who controls the law makers
April 5, 201214 yr Those all sound like some awesome brews you have going! How is that PO'd? Working on getting my setup going again. It will allow me to brew all year round (seeing that I get it working). I like the PO'd. The peat flavor in beer is odd so it takes a bit of a paradigm shift, I tend to think of Lagavulin while I'm drinking, it makes sense in that context. Truly superb brewing rig there. My meager equipment is pretty well set except for the chest freezer I'm going to need very soon. Other than that just a cheap cooler, 10 gallon aluminum pot, badass dual jet propane burner and glass carboys.
April 12, 201214 yr Author http://uncrate.com/stuff/brew-cave-walk-in-beer-cooler-kegerator/ Seems like a few people here could use one of these.
June 10, 201214 yr Well I still haven't gotten around to the big bock. I'm Brewing on Monday but... no way that would be ready by the Chicago thing, so I want to do something with a shorter conditioning period for now. Bock will be delayed till next brewdate and lagered for some moons. I already have another batch of much more different rye stout in secondary ready to be bottled. Matt the Younger Part 2 will spend a week on dry hops starting Monday and then get bottled as well. What I'm considering for Monday is another belgian palm sugar thing similar to The Younger but less alcohol and spiced. I have whole cardamom, coriander, and indian black pepper that I would roast and mash in. Possible split for secondary, but I can't nail down a treatment if I add the spices to the whole batch. Best idea so far is to toss the palm sugar in two batches at the end of fermentation. One batch straight and one cooked for a darker color. Other ideas included mushrooms (per Radical Brewing's inspiration but + spices I'm not sure this is the one), or some kind of citrus fruit, perhaps paired with sour cherry. Anyone else got some inspiration on a non-stout, non-IPA, non-lager, short aging brew that's worthy of bottling? EDIT: Or I dump the spices, dump the palm sugar, and pick up some acid malt and make an over the top berliner weiss. Fuck it, spicing the whole thing and adding truffles. Yep. This is why we small batch homebrew, people. Edited June 10, 201214 yr by NightWoundsTime
June 10, 201214 yr I looked into doing a berliner with acid malt but it's a risky move apparently, and the real lacto deal of course takes months. So, final answer. Brew the base beer with belgian 2-row, only a small amount of acid malt, a conservative 7%. No spices or palm sugar in the base batch, very lightly hopped to 10 IBU with Sorachi Ace. Either on brewday or about 4 days out I'll cook half of the sugar to a nice dark brown and add the crushed spices at the end of that process, then filter out and add to one 3 gallon batch. The other half gets straight boiled palm sugar and 2 whole black truffles shaved and soaked in vodka for a few days before being added with the final secondary transfer, hold about a week and bottle. Will update with final brew cost, if I dare to add it up . Oh and the names, Younger Spice and Younger Fungus. Edited June 10, 201214 yr by NightWoundsTime
June 10, 201214 yr Elder Spice and Elder Fungus are more appropriate, I'm supposing. Sorry I obsess. Almost literally dreaming up a recipe overnight is fun.
June 23, 201214 yr The base recipe for both was brewed on Wednesday. Fermentation took off like a rocket and produced liberal amounts of foam. When the airlock was still on my brewing partner said it sounded like someone was in the house. I used a tiny bit of german wheat malt and the Achouffe yeast again. I'm waiting for the tasting to decide whether this is the right beer for truffles. It should be interesting either way.
June 25, 201214 yr Bottled the new batch of Mostly and Seriously yesterday, and I'm cold shocking the new Younger for bottling next week. Tasted the base recipe we brewed Wednesday. Finished out at 1.001. Very weizen like, but I think my choice of malts will work out with the tuffles well, 8% wheat, 8% acid, 5% biscuit, 2.5% aromatic. The rest was belgian pilsner malt. I attempted to cook the palm sugar for the spice batch but threw on 1.5 lbs of palm sugar cakes with too much water and after an hour of holding what may or may not be the correct temperature for caramelizing palm sugar (since I was following directions for table sugar), I got nowhere. I'll try again with a smaller amount and much more experimentation. Anyway the spice beer is not dark, but does have a nice dose of toasted coriander and just a little peppercorn. Edited June 25, 201214 yr by NightWoundsTime
July 2, 201213 yr I would say... mmm looks yummy... but that would be a lie... but I do look forward to the report on the results...
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