Today we are working on the Pinstripe variant that I have been looking forward to the most. While people love the flavored variants, my favorite thing with brewing has always been experimenting with malt, hops, and yeast. It is somewhat unfortunate that yeast is the most commonly overlooked ingredient in the brewing world since fermentation accounts for over 90% of the flavor compounds in every beer we drink. Our twist on this Pinstripe variant will exploit that statement in a pretty extreme way... Today we are brewing the first 100% Brettanomyces fermented beer to go in bottles in Alabama.
One of the fun things about Brett is that it seems to have a mind of its own. Even the brewers most experienced with Brett fermentations will tell you that it is unpredictable. Even when brewers repeat beers with the exact same recipe, temperatures, pH levels, water chemistry, etc. Brett seems to behave a little bit differently every time you brew with it. The unpredictability combined with the fact that brewers get concerned about cross contaminating "clean" beers is the main reason that we don't see more beers on the market.
I am hoping that by brewing this beer we can clear up a few common misconceptions about Brett beers. I was a huge fan of Yazoo's naming of their recent beer "Brett... Not Sour." So many people think of Brett beers as sour beers because Brett is a common component in sours. Brett on its own though does not produce *much* lactic acid. In fact, when used on its own, a lot of times Brett resembles normal Saccharomyces fermentations as far as flavor goes. The Brett strain that we chose for this Pinstripe variant is well known for its pie cherry flavor.
Another common misconception is that Brett beers have a horse blanket flavor. However, when Brett is used on its own, it does not have another yeast strain to compete with and it is unable to re-esterficate another yeast's byproducts. It is possible to still get a little bit of barnyard funk, but the dominant flavored typically involve more spicy flavors, or (my preference) fruity flavors. In some cases, Brett flavors can even be confused for fruity hop characters.
Lastly, people always expect Brett beers to take years to be ready to drink. In actuality, Brett fermentations can be done in the same amount of time as most lagers (12 days or so). Some of the confusion comes because Brett has the ability to ferment much larger chains of sugar than Saccharomyces can. When Brett is added to a clean fermentation, the Saccharomyces strain will only leave behind the larger sugar chains and the Brett works slowly to metabolize them. She used on its own though, the Brett is much more active and will tear through the larger sugar chains with ease. However, the timeline that Brett follows is very different from Saccharomyces... Instead of having a lag phase, log phase, stationary phase, and death phase, it will go through a lag, log, lag, stationary, and then a very long lag phase before dying.
Because of this unique timeline, Brett can live for a very long time. It will also continue to evolve the flavors in a beer for its entire lifespan. For this reason, I recommend buying several bottles and collaring them to experience all the different flavor profiles that Brett can develop. A lot of breweries will age Brett beers before sending them out, but we want you to be able to enjoy a fresh bottle, as well as aged bottles. If everything goes well with our fermentation, this beer could be ready to drink in as little as 4 weeks. I will be cellaring a case myself and I plan on drinking a bottle fresh, one at 3 months, another at 6 months, another at 12 months, and then one every six months afterwards. The maximum amount of pie cherry flavor should be present in the 3-6 month age range.
This should be a very unique beer for our area and even pretty unique for beers brewed in the U.S. New Belgium and Lost Abbey are frequently credited with being the first breweries to brew 100% Brett beers and that was only in 2004 that the first batch was brewed. Since then, very few breweries have taken the risk to brew 100% Brett beers, and I am very excited to be included in that group after today!
Friday, November 20, 2015
Thursday, October 29, 2015
Alalambics!
In the last year, every new beer that we have brewed at Blue Pants has had a "New Beer Brewday" blog post written about it. The exception to that is one batch of beer that I tried to keep secret for a while. Normally, I am very open about our recipes and beers in planning, but in this case, I really didn't want to tell too many people about it until the beer was closer to ready. This is a beer nearly two years in the works... Our first long term sour. Unlike our summer seasonal Wheat with Peach, these beers received extensive aging for secondary fermentation with bacteria to sour it.
The idea to brew this beer came from an idea to brew a series of local beers, which would feature local ingredients. The Apple Ale we brewed was the first one released, but this was actually the first one brewed.
The base beer was a very low IBU Amber Ale fermented with American Ale Yeast. After primary fermentation, we used Brettanomyces Lambicus and Pediococcus in oak barrels for aging. The use of American Ale yeast could be seen as a strange choice because typically, brewers would use a more flavorful, estery fermentation profile. However, my thought was that with less esters for the Brettanomyces to re-esterficate, we would keep the barnyard funk (flavors such as leather, horse stable, etc.) to a minimum, while still getting cherry pie flavors from the Brettanomyces. This was an experiment without being able to rely on other brewer's experience, and it seems to have worked. There is still a pleasant funkiness, but it is not over the top the way a lot of Brett beers tend to be.
The Pediococcus was the scary thing for me to experiment with. I have used lactobacillus in the past with success, but Pediococcus is more prone to converting alcohol into acetic acid (vinegar). Great care has to be taken to eliminate any oxygen from dissolving into solution any time a barrel is sampled, moved, or has beer transferred from it. Pediococcus also can produce diacetyl and, unlike yeast, can not reduce the diacetyl content once it has been produced. It also requires that the beer is sampled regularly when aging in the barrel because the oak does allow some oxygen to pass through. Some acetic acid will be produced as a result and a small amount can be seen as desirable and is an important part of the flavor profile of a sour beer, but it needs to be kept to a low level. Once the beer is getting close to displaying acetic acid, it is time to add the fruit.
The fruit... I could go off on a multi-page rant about how much of a pain in the ass it is to deal with fresh fruit. We used peaches, grapes, and cantaloupes from Isom's, in these beers. For the peaches we had 800 lbs of peaches that had to be pitted (25% of the pits did get added to the barrels), and chopped into cubes small enough to fit through the barrel bung hole (about 1.5" diameter). That took 5 of us an entire day to chop up, and then it took Kara and I almost a whole other day to stuff the barrels and transfer beer on top of. The grapes had to be de-stemmed and smashed and the cantaloupe had to be skinned, chopped, and stuffed into the barrel. I think the last day, we worked for about 16 hours getting the grapes and cantaloupe stuffed into the barrels. The bright side, was that the work was mindless enough that Kara and I got to watch about a season's worth of Friends episodes while at work.
The amount of fruit used was approximately 3 lbs per gallon of beer. The beer then fermented the fruit for another 3 months, and is being bottled this week. One common complaint I have with fruited sours is that they are frequently carbonated to medium or high volumes of co2. In my opinion, the carbonic acid enhances the harsher acidic flavors from acetic acid and ethyl acetate and covers up the nice fruity flavors. As a result, I decided to leave the carbonation at a medium low level and the lactic acid tickles the palate in a similar manner to carbon dioxide. As a result, the carbonic acid is not able to diminish any of the fruit, or Brett flavors, and the beer is slightly easier drinking. These beers are very limited in supply, so if you see bottles on the shelves and you want to try them, I suggest not passing them up. They won't last long. Cheers!
A few fun facts:
-The Brett and Pediococcus were grown up from Wyeast homebrew packs. It was going to take too long to get them from Wyeast, so I propagated the cultures in my office at home.
-The cantaloupe was probably the 5th or 6th fallback plan since the fruits we wanted were not available. It is also my favorite version
-After the 16 hour day, I was at the brewery until 2:00 a.m. I woke up at 6:00 a.m. that morning and set off on a 2,400 mile motorcycle trip. The first day, I rode 600 miles in 12 hours. I suppose adrenaline got me through it,
The idea to brew this beer came from an idea to brew a series of local beers, which would feature local ingredients. The Apple Ale we brewed was the first one released, but this was actually the first one brewed.
The base beer was a very low IBU Amber Ale fermented with American Ale Yeast. After primary fermentation, we used Brettanomyces Lambicus and Pediococcus in oak barrels for aging. The use of American Ale yeast could be seen as a strange choice because typically, brewers would use a more flavorful, estery fermentation profile. However, my thought was that with less esters for the Brettanomyces to re-esterficate, we would keep the barnyard funk (flavors such as leather, horse stable, etc.) to a minimum, while still getting cherry pie flavors from the Brettanomyces. This was an experiment without being able to rely on other brewer's experience, and it seems to have worked. There is still a pleasant funkiness, but it is not over the top the way a lot of Brett beers tend to be.
The Pediococcus was the scary thing for me to experiment with. I have used lactobacillus in the past with success, but Pediococcus is more prone to converting alcohol into acetic acid (vinegar). Great care has to be taken to eliminate any oxygen from dissolving into solution any time a barrel is sampled, moved, or has beer transferred from it. Pediococcus also can produce diacetyl and, unlike yeast, can not reduce the diacetyl content once it has been produced. It also requires that the beer is sampled regularly when aging in the barrel because the oak does allow some oxygen to pass through. Some acetic acid will be produced as a result and a small amount can be seen as desirable and is an important part of the flavor profile of a sour beer, but it needs to be kept to a low level. Once the beer is getting close to displaying acetic acid, it is time to add the fruit.
The fruit... I could go off on a multi-page rant about how much of a pain in the ass it is to deal with fresh fruit. We used peaches, grapes, and cantaloupes from Isom's, in these beers. For the peaches we had 800 lbs of peaches that had to be pitted (25% of the pits did get added to the barrels), and chopped into cubes small enough to fit through the barrel bung hole (about 1.5" diameter). That took 5 of us an entire day to chop up, and then it took Kara and I almost a whole other day to stuff the barrels and transfer beer on top of. The grapes had to be de-stemmed and smashed and the cantaloupe had to be skinned, chopped, and stuffed into the barrel. I think the last day, we worked for about 16 hours getting the grapes and cantaloupe stuffed into the barrels. The bright side, was that the work was mindless enough that Kara and I got to watch about a season's worth of Friends episodes while at work.
The amount of fruit used was approximately 3 lbs per gallon of beer. The beer then fermented the fruit for another 3 months, and is being bottled this week. One common complaint I have with fruited sours is that they are frequently carbonated to medium or high volumes of co2. In my opinion, the carbonic acid enhances the harsher acidic flavors from acetic acid and ethyl acetate and covers up the nice fruity flavors. As a result, I decided to leave the carbonation at a medium low level and the lactic acid tickles the palate in a similar manner to carbon dioxide. As a result, the carbonic acid is not able to diminish any of the fruit, or Brett flavors, and the beer is slightly easier drinking. These beers are very limited in supply, so if you see bottles on the shelves and you want to try them, I suggest not passing them up. They won't last long. Cheers!
A few fun facts:
-The Brett and Pediococcus were grown up from Wyeast homebrew packs. It was going to take too long to get them from Wyeast, so I propagated the cultures in my office at home.
-The cantaloupe was probably the 5th or 6th fallback plan since the fruits we wanted were not available. It is also my favorite version
-After the 16 hour day, I was at the brewery until 2:00 a.m. I woke up at 6:00 a.m. that morning and set off on a 2,400 mile motorcycle trip. The first day, I rode 600 miles in 12 hours. I suppose adrenaline got me through it,
Wednesday, September 9, 2015
New Beer Brewday: Triple IPA with Wet Hops
Today, we are brewing a super exciting new beer... To celebrate our 5th Anniversary of operations, we are brewing a Triple IPA with wet hops. This is the first time we have brewed a wet hop beer and I'm pumped up about these hops. They were picked in the middle of the night in Michigan, immediately placed on a refrigerated truck, and driven directly to the brewery, arriving about 13 hours after being harvested. We had delayed mashing in our first batch by a few hours so that the hops would be able to go immediately into our wort, straight off the truck.
Unfortunately, brewing with wet hops has provided several problems. The first was obviously the logistics of scheduling a hop delivery for a brewday, knowing that we wanted to brew with the hops upon arrival. But the less obvious problem came from brewing techniques... At what point did we want to add the fresh hops? In the past, we have only used dried, pelletized hops as that is what our system was built to handle. Even just using whole hops would have provided a problem, but we decided to use whole wet hops for this beer. If we were to add them to our kettle, we would not have been able to get much of the wort to transfer through the heat exchanger since the flowers would have clogged our plumbing.
To overcome this problem, we decided that we would brew a batch as normal, but after boiling he wort, we pumped all the liquid back into our mash tun, which we filled with 120 lbs of wet hops and allowed the hops to steep in the hot wort. After 5 minutes of sitting on the hops, we used our mash tun false bottom to filter the hops out as the wort was pumped through the heat exchanger. Having never brewed this way before, I was horrified at the prospect of the false bottom clogging and not allowing any wort through, which would have resulted in the loss of nearly $6,000 of raw materials. Luckily, our makeshift "Hopback" method worked well and we were able to have a normal yield on our first batch of the day.
However, the next problem arose from having to use the mash tun for a hop addition... We were then unable to mash the second batch of the day until after the time that we were finished brewing the first batch completely. Normally, we would have two batches going at once, but in this case we couldn't have the overlap. That, combined with a delayed start, has resulted in what will likely be a nearly 20 hour day. Even with the annoyance of the prospect of being here late into the middle of the night, I still can't wait for this beer.
In addition to the Chinook wet hops, we used Mandarina Bavaria hops (discussed in my previous blog post about Hoptoberfest) and Cascade hops. The beer will be around 11% ABV, and as all of my hoppy beers are brewed, there is no bittering addition of hops, but rather, gratuitous amounts of late hop additions and dry hops. Look for the beer to hit the shelves in early October and DO NOT AGE this beer. Buy fresh, and drink fresh for maximum lupulin enjoyment!
Unfortunately, brewing with wet hops has provided several problems. The first was obviously the logistics of scheduling a hop delivery for a brewday, knowing that we wanted to brew with the hops upon arrival. But the less obvious problem came from brewing techniques... At what point did we want to add the fresh hops? In the past, we have only used dried, pelletized hops as that is what our system was built to handle. Even just using whole hops would have provided a problem, but we decided to use whole wet hops for this beer. If we were to add them to our kettle, we would not have been able to get much of the wort to transfer through the heat exchanger since the flowers would have clogged our plumbing.
To overcome this problem, we decided that we would brew a batch as normal, but after boiling he wort, we pumped all the liquid back into our mash tun, which we filled with 120 lbs of wet hops and allowed the hops to steep in the hot wort. After 5 minutes of sitting on the hops, we used our mash tun false bottom to filter the hops out as the wort was pumped through the heat exchanger. Having never brewed this way before, I was horrified at the prospect of the false bottom clogging and not allowing any wort through, which would have resulted in the loss of nearly $6,000 of raw materials. Luckily, our makeshift "Hopback" method worked well and we were able to have a normal yield on our first batch of the day.
However, the next problem arose from having to use the mash tun for a hop addition... We were then unable to mash the second batch of the day until after the time that we were finished brewing the first batch completely. Normally, we would have two batches going at once, but in this case we couldn't have the overlap. That, combined with a delayed start, has resulted in what will likely be a nearly 20 hour day. Even with the annoyance of the prospect of being here late into the middle of the night, I still can't wait for this beer.
In addition to the Chinook wet hops, we used Mandarina Bavaria hops (discussed in my previous blog post about Hoptoberfest) and Cascade hops. The beer will be around 11% ABV, and as all of my hoppy beers are brewed, there is no bittering addition of hops, but rather, gratuitous amounts of late hop additions and dry hops. Look for the beer to hit the shelves in early October and DO NOT AGE this beer. Buy fresh, and drink fresh for maximum lupulin enjoyment!
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
New Beer Brewday: Hoptoberfest
I'm starting to get really pumped up about brewing a bunch of new beers again. For a while, it seemed like we just kept brewing the same things over and over (Which looking back, really isn't far from the truth ever since we released our new core beers and seasonals). Now, it seems like we have nothing. But new beers coming up and not enough of our core beers to go around. Today, we are brewing 60 barrels of a beer that hadn't even been discussed at the brewery until last Friday... Hoptoberfest.
To be honest, I'm not sure if this beer started out as a joke or not. The way it works for me when I'm coming up with a new beer is not to brainstorm a bunch of beers that I'd like to brew, but rather to blurt out whenever a new beer comes to mind. Typically this happens pretty spontaneously without any reason that the thought crosses my mind. So last week as we were brewing our Oktoberfest and the brewery was a little too quiet, I turned to Mike and said that I thought we should brew the same basic beer, but with a ton of hops and call it Hoptoberfest next year. I got the typical non-committal "I like it." response that I typically get when these situations pop up.
Then we got to yesterday... We were planning on prepping to brew our last batch of Oktoberfest for the year when we realized that the batch wouldn't be ready until the first week of October... Too late to release 60 barrels of an Oktoberfest. We had thought for a moment that we would just skip the Brewday and gradually we would use all the ingredients in other beers. It wasn't until after deciding to skip today's brew day that we realized we had the opportunity to brew the Hoptoberfest a year sooner than we had discussed just four days previously. In a happy twist of fate, we realized that we had the perfect hops for the beer...
Due to a few upcoming beers, we needed to order some new hops and the suppliers needed for us to buy very large quantities all at once in order to be able to purchase the necessary varieties. This lead us to having an abundance of Citra and a newer, very hard to find hop varietal from Germany: Mandarina Bavaria. Mandarina Bavaria is notable for being a German hop varietal that has many of the qualities that American brewers desire in IPA's. It has a very distinctive mandarin orange flavor and aroma, that would normally be absent from hops grown in Europe where the common hop flavors are grassy, spicy, and lightly floral, but rarely fruity, tropical, or citrusy.
So that brings us the main hop component of our Hoptoberfest; a lager brewed with the same malt base and yeast as our traditional style German Oktoberfest, but utilizes enough hops in the boil to be on par with the extreme hoppy IPA's of the U.S. breweries, dry hopped twice with Citra and Mandarina Bavaria, and lagered for just as long as any of our other lagers to create a crisp, clean, refreshing finish. Be on the lookout for it in the first week of October in bombers!
To be honest, I'm not sure if this beer started out as a joke or not. The way it works for me when I'm coming up with a new beer is not to brainstorm a bunch of beers that I'd like to brew, but rather to blurt out whenever a new beer comes to mind. Typically this happens pretty spontaneously without any reason that the thought crosses my mind. So last week as we were brewing our Oktoberfest and the brewery was a little too quiet, I turned to Mike and said that I thought we should brew the same basic beer, but with a ton of hops and call it Hoptoberfest next year. I got the typical non-committal "I like it." response that I typically get when these situations pop up.
Then we got to yesterday... We were planning on prepping to brew our last batch of Oktoberfest for the year when we realized that the batch wouldn't be ready until the first week of October... Too late to release 60 barrels of an Oktoberfest. We had thought for a moment that we would just skip the Brewday and gradually we would use all the ingredients in other beers. It wasn't until after deciding to skip today's brew day that we realized we had the opportunity to brew the Hoptoberfest a year sooner than we had discussed just four days previously. In a happy twist of fate, we realized that we had the perfect hops for the beer...
Due to a few upcoming beers, we needed to order some new hops and the suppliers needed for us to buy very large quantities all at once in order to be able to purchase the necessary varieties. This lead us to having an abundance of Citra and a newer, very hard to find hop varietal from Germany: Mandarina Bavaria. Mandarina Bavaria is notable for being a German hop varietal that has many of the qualities that American brewers desire in IPA's. It has a very distinctive mandarin orange flavor and aroma, that would normally be absent from hops grown in Europe where the common hop flavors are grassy, spicy, and lightly floral, but rarely fruity, tropical, or citrusy.
So that brings us the main hop component of our Hoptoberfest; a lager brewed with the same malt base and yeast as our traditional style German Oktoberfest, but utilizes enough hops in the boil to be on par with the extreme hoppy IPA's of the U.S. breweries, dry hopped twice with Citra and Mandarina Bavaria, and lagered for just as long as any of our other lagers to create a crisp, clean, refreshing finish. Be on the lookout for it in the first week of October in bombers!
Wednesday, August 19, 2015
New Beer Brewday: Cream Ale
Yikes... It has been too long since my last blog post. We've been busy brewing 360 Barrels of Oktoberfest, while trying to keep up production of our year round beers. As a result, I haven't had much time to brew new beers or do blogging about other happenings in the brewery. Today however, we were able to sneak in a new 30 barrel batch of Cream Ale. For several reasons, I am super excited about brewing this beer.
Many people don't realize that just about every American style of beer has roots that harken back to other countries' brewing traditions. In fact, the California Common is the only style that I can think of that is truly an American invention. In the case of American style ales, most of them stemmed from English Ales and evolved to be what they are now. However, it surprises a lot of people to hear that cream ales really evolved from German style lagers (and the hybrid style Kölsch).
In Germany, when Pilseners first became popular, the style took off. At the time, it was revolutionary to have a beer brewed with such a light color and full hoppy flavor. Several styles evolved from the Pils, including the Helles, which was a result of consumers liking the light color and body of Pils, but wanted less bitterness. When brewing lagers in America gained popularity, American brewers found that with North American ingredients, they were unable to brew a beer as light as the Germans. In an attempt to brew lighter colored beers, brewers began using adjuncts like corn and rice and the American Adjunct Lager was born.
The Kölsch is another style that evolved from the Pils and is also moderately hoppy. Similar to Kölsch, cream ales are fermented with ale yeast and go through a short lagering period. The idea is to produce a beer that is as highly drinkable as light lagers, but to have more flavor. The original cream ales were really pretty subpar as a result of using American 6-Row Barley (as opposed to 2-Row), inferior American hops, and bland yeast strains. In an effort to brew the type of beer that the original cream ale brewers would have wanted to brew if they had the resources available, we are using German Premium Pils Malt and Kölsch yeast.
Recently, cream ales have gotten a bit of a bad reputation as not being a crafty enough beer for craft beer drinkers and having too much flavor for light beer drinkers. A large reason for this I think is that a lot of craft brewers don't put the time into the style to lager it correctly, or they use yeast strains that are really intended for clean ales that showcase hops. However, using Kölsch yeast, a significant part of this beer's character will come from fermentation and will have light fruity esters which taste somewhat similar to Riesling wines.
The biggest reason that I am excited about this beer is that when I first decided to start brewing, it was because I wanted to make a beer as good as my (at the time) favorite beer. The first beer that I had ever drank was a cream ale from New Glarus in Wisconsin; Spotted Cow. I got hooked on craft beers when I was spending my summers in Madison, WI. Spotted Cow was always my go-to choice. Coming back to Alabama for college, I went to my first keg party and tried my first lite beer. That day I decided that if I couldn't get craft beer in Alabama, I would just learn to brew it myself. I always wanted to brew a Spotted Cow clone.
Early in my home brewing days, I was reading BeerAdvocate and saw a post from New Glarus Brewmaster Dan Carey. He rarely ever posted and he is pretty secretive about his recipes. I sent him a private message with my attempt at guessing their recipe. He was very kind to tell me to change one of my caramel malts to a darker caramel malt and that other than that, it was good to go. Looking over the recipe now, and knowing that Dan Carey was trained in Germany as well, I realized that the correct way to brew this beer is to use more of a German approach to the beer.
On two occasions I tried brewing that recipe. The first time, the beer was ok, but I didn't have a good fermentation temperature control in my apartment at the time and I thought it could have been better. The second time was actually about 3 years ago at Blue Pants, I brewed a 1 barrel batch and it was way over gravity. Now that I understand the German brewing traditions of Kölsch a lot better, I am
very excited about this batch that we are brewing now. While the recipe has changed a bit so as not to be an exact Spotted Cow clone, I do think that fans of Spotted Cow will see the relation between the beers.
Many people don't realize that just about every American style of beer has roots that harken back to other countries' brewing traditions. In fact, the California Common is the only style that I can think of that is truly an American invention. In the case of American style ales, most of them stemmed from English Ales and evolved to be what they are now. However, it surprises a lot of people to hear that cream ales really evolved from German style lagers (and the hybrid style Kölsch).
In Germany, when Pilseners first became popular, the style took off. At the time, it was revolutionary to have a beer brewed with such a light color and full hoppy flavor. Several styles evolved from the Pils, including the Helles, which was a result of consumers liking the light color and body of Pils, but wanted less bitterness. When brewing lagers in America gained popularity, American brewers found that with North American ingredients, they were unable to brew a beer as light as the Germans. In an attempt to brew lighter colored beers, brewers began using adjuncts like corn and rice and the American Adjunct Lager was born.
The Kölsch is another style that evolved from the Pils and is also moderately hoppy. Similar to Kölsch, cream ales are fermented with ale yeast and go through a short lagering period. The idea is to produce a beer that is as highly drinkable as light lagers, but to have more flavor. The original cream ales were really pretty subpar as a result of using American 6-Row Barley (as opposed to 2-Row), inferior American hops, and bland yeast strains. In an effort to brew the type of beer that the original cream ale brewers would have wanted to brew if they had the resources available, we are using German Premium Pils Malt and Kölsch yeast.
Recently, cream ales have gotten a bit of a bad reputation as not being a crafty enough beer for craft beer drinkers and having too much flavor for light beer drinkers. A large reason for this I think is that a lot of craft brewers don't put the time into the style to lager it correctly, or they use yeast strains that are really intended for clean ales that showcase hops. However, using Kölsch yeast, a significant part of this beer's character will come from fermentation and will have light fruity esters which taste somewhat similar to Riesling wines.
The biggest reason that I am excited about this beer is that when I first decided to start brewing, it was because I wanted to make a beer as good as my (at the time) favorite beer. The first beer that I had ever drank was a cream ale from New Glarus in Wisconsin; Spotted Cow. I got hooked on craft beers when I was spending my summers in Madison, WI. Spotted Cow was always my go-to choice. Coming back to Alabama for college, I went to my first keg party and tried my first lite beer. That day I decided that if I couldn't get craft beer in Alabama, I would just learn to brew it myself. I always wanted to brew a Spotted Cow clone.
Early in my home brewing days, I was reading BeerAdvocate and saw a post from New Glarus Brewmaster Dan Carey. He rarely ever posted and he is pretty secretive about his recipes. I sent him a private message with my attempt at guessing their recipe. He was very kind to tell me to change one of my caramel malts to a darker caramel malt and that other than that, it was good to go. Looking over the recipe now, and knowing that Dan Carey was trained in Germany as well, I realized that the correct way to brew this beer is to use more of a German approach to the beer.
On two occasions I tried brewing that recipe. The first time, the beer was ok, but I didn't have a good fermentation temperature control in my apartment at the time and I thought it could have been better. The second time was actually about 3 years ago at Blue Pants, I brewed a 1 barrel batch and it was way over gravity. Now that I understand the German brewing traditions of Kölsch a lot better, I am
very excited about this batch that we are brewing now. While the recipe has changed a bit so as not to be an exact Spotted Cow clone, I do think that fans of Spotted Cow will see the relation between the beers.
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Oktoberfest
This morning I started milling for our first batch of Oktoberfest of 2015. It got me thinking back to this time last year... Holy crap has a lot changed? Last year, we brewed 180 Barrels of Oktoberfest and there was no way we could have brewed more. However, this year we knew that 180 barrels wouldn't be enough, so in anticipation of the Oktoberfest coming up, we got 2 new 60 barrel fermenters a few weeks ago. Now we will be able to at least double last year's production.
When we first started talks again about the Oktoberfest this year, I was excited to finally be brewing a seasonal that we had brewed before, and that we didn't have any plans to tweak the recipe or procedures. In doing so, that would make this the first seasonal offering that has stayed the same as the previous year's version in 2 years. All that to say, that plan fell apart and I decided to make one last really small tweak. Although, this change is one that no one would ever know that we made unless told that a change had been made.
One thing that a lot of people don't realize is that this is actually our 3rd year brewing the Oktoberfest. The first year, we did just 30 barrels and it was draught only in a few places. To be honest, that first batch was one of the beers that I was really disappointed in. At the time, our kettle gave us a lot of issues during our boils and as a result, the first year of Oktoberfest had a noticeable amount of DMS (vegetal flavor). Thankfully, not too many people had the opportunity to try that beer, and the majority of people that did try it did not pick up the DMS flavor.
By last year, we had our kettle issues fixed and we brewed the exact same recipe with a minor tweak in regards to the water chemistry. Using softer water, we were able to brew the beer with more of a crisp, clean finish. Without the DMS and with the better mouthfeel, the Oktoberfest was a huge success. In addition to those changes, we were in the middle of making a change to a new maltster. Since we brewed three batches of the beer last year, we were able to see the evolution of the beer as we converted the beer over to using malts exclusively from Germany. By the time we brewed our last batch a year ago, we had made the switch completely and the improvements in the beer really showed.
So that brings us to this year... The one that we here at the brewery have all been looking forward to. Going back to what I mentioned earlier, this beer was supposed to be the first seasonal that we could look forward to doing exactly the same as the previous year. For us, that feels really big because we have made so many changes and introduced so many new beers that have been really popular. We've been kind of fantasizing about what it would mean to brew the same beers, but to have a following for them before they're released. For us it means greater predictability of our brew schedule, easier sales pitches to restaurants and bars, and the ability to forecast the necessity for expansion with greater precision than before.
So here it is... The last minor tweak to any of our seasonal beers. Last year, I loved the clarity of the filtered beer, the color was a nice golden color comparable to the Oktoberfests most commonly served in Germany, the aroma was great, the flavor was nice and bready, and the mouthfeel was exactly as we wanted it. But, the one thing I thought could be better was the size of the head. The foam had the appropriate white color and it had great retention, but it did not have the huge fluffy head that you see in German steins. Last year, I kept wanting to use hop extract for bittering as it provides a smoother, cleaner bitterness and is more common in Germany than hop pellets. The extract is made with supercritical CO2, which extracts all of the desirable compounds that we want from hops, but leaves behind a lot of the polyphenols and vegetal matter. It is also more consistent from year to year than hop pellets are. In addition to the hop extract for bitterness, there is another advanced hop product (hexahydro-iso-alpha acid) which helps to greatly enhance beer foam and retention. When the beer is released, there will be no noticeable change in the flavor of the beer, other than it will feel more easily drinkable as a result of the the softer bitterness and the appearance will be better.
For those of you that did not have the opportunity to try the beer last year; our Oktoberfest is indicative of a Helles-Marzen (Pale Marzen) like what would be found most commonly in Germany, which is a contrast to the type of Oktoberfest most commonly brewed in America. The result is a crisper, less sweet, and lighter colored beer, while still being full bodied and malty.
Prost!
When we first started talks again about the Oktoberfest this year, I was excited to finally be brewing a seasonal that we had brewed before, and that we didn't have any plans to tweak the recipe or procedures. In doing so, that would make this the first seasonal offering that has stayed the same as the previous year's version in 2 years. All that to say, that plan fell apart and I decided to make one last really small tweak. Although, this change is one that no one would ever know that we made unless told that a change had been made.
One thing that a lot of people don't realize is that this is actually our 3rd year brewing the Oktoberfest. The first year, we did just 30 barrels and it was draught only in a few places. To be honest, that first batch was one of the beers that I was really disappointed in. At the time, our kettle gave us a lot of issues during our boils and as a result, the first year of Oktoberfest had a noticeable amount of DMS (vegetal flavor). Thankfully, not too many people had the opportunity to try that beer, and the majority of people that did try it did not pick up the DMS flavor.
By last year, we had our kettle issues fixed and we brewed the exact same recipe with a minor tweak in regards to the water chemistry. Using softer water, we were able to brew the beer with more of a crisp, clean finish. Without the DMS and with the better mouthfeel, the Oktoberfest was a huge success. In addition to those changes, we were in the middle of making a change to a new maltster. Since we brewed three batches of the beer last year, we were able to see the evolution of the beer as we converted the beer over to using malts exclusively from Germany. By the time we brewed our last batch a year ago, we had made the switch completely and the improvements in the beer really showed.
So that brings us to this year... The one that we here at the brewery have all been looking forward to. Going back to what I mentioned earlier, this beer was supposed to be the first seasonal that we could look forward to doing exactly the same as the previous year. For us, that feels really big because we have made so many changes and introduced so many new beers that have been really popular. We've been kind of fantasizing about what it would mean to brew the same beers, but to have a following for them before they're released. For us it means greater predictability of our brew schedule, easier sales pitches to restaurants and bars, and the ability to forecast the necessity for expansion with greater precision than before.
So here it is... The last minor tweak to any of our seasonal beers. Last year, I loved the clarity of the filtered beer, the color was a nice golden color comparable to the Oktoberfests most commonly served in Germany, the aroma was great, the flavor was nice and bready, and the mouthfeel was exactly as we wanted it. But, the one thing I thought could be better was the size of the head. The foam had the appropriate white color and it had great retention, but it did not have the huge fluffy head that you see in German steins. Last year, I kept wanting to use hop extract for bittering as it provides a smoother, cleaner bitterness and is more common in Germany than hop pellets. The extract is made with supercritical CO2, which extracts all of the desirable compounds that we want from hops, but leaves behind a lot of the polyphenols and vegetal matter. It is also more consistent from year to year than hop pellets are. In addition to the hop extract for bitterness, there is another advanced hop product (hexahydro-iso-alpha acid) which helps to greatly enhance beer foam and retention. When the beer is released, there will be no noticeable change in the flavor of the beer, other than it will feel more easily drinkable as a result of the the softer bitterness and the appearance will be better.
For those of you that did not have the opportunity to try the beer last year; our Oktoberfest is indicative of a Helles-Marzen (Pale Marzen) like what would be found most commonly in Germany, which is a contrast to the type of Oktoberfest most commonly brewed in America. The result is a crisper, less sweet, and lighter colored beer, while still being full bodied and malty.
Prost!
Wednesday, May 6, 2015
Slip Rose Alterations
For the last three summers, Slip Rose Strawberry Saison has been a popular summer beer among our loyal followers. Many people that didn't like fruit beers found that they were fans of the saison because the strawberry flavor was so subtle. However, the subtlety of the strawberry flavor threw off a lot of first time buyers and having the word "strawberry" in the title scared off a lot of beer drinkers who refused to try fruit beers. As a result, Slip Rose never managed to achieve the level of success that our new seasonals have enjoyed. We realized that it was time to move on from Slip Rose as our main summer seasonal. We replaced it this year with our Wheat with Peach berliner weisse. Despite the new beer though, we wanted to give Slip Rose another shot. Yesterday, we brewed 15 barrels of an updated recipe which will make the beer quite different from what it was in the past.
It is a fairly unique situation to be able to brew a smaller batch of an old recipe and say "If I were to do it again, this is how it would be done." But that is essentially what we are doing now. We have gone back to the drawing board and given the Slip Rose recipe a major overhaul. We narrowed down what we believed to be areas that needed improvement. In addition to the strawberry flavor being too subtle, being a saison, Slip Rose used a French Saison yeast strain which left the beer extremely dry. There was no residual sweetness to support the flavor of the strawberry. Additionally, the beer left a little bit of a harsh mouthfeel on the back of the tongue.
To address these issues, we have made several changes. Firstly, we were previously using a fresh strawberry concentrate. We have now made the switch to a strawberry puree. That first little change would bring strawberry flavor out more on its own, but in addition to that, we have also bumped up the usage rate. The new Slip Rose recipe will now use 1.5 lbs of strawberry puree per gallon of beer... That is close to 700 lbs of strawberry puree for our small batch of beer.
Secondly, to address the mouthfeel issue, we decided to change out about 1/3 of the malted barley for wheat. Wheat will provide a softer, fluffy mouthfeel and should also increase head retention, body, and drinkability.
Lastly, the biggest change we have made is our yeast selection. We decided to utilize our house Kolsch yeast for this new recipe. The French Saison yeast that we used to use was one of the most efficient yeast strains I have ever used for fermenting high molecular chains of sugar. The beer was very dry, and for my tastes, a little too phenolic. The big thing that seems to be working with our customers lately has been cleaner fermentations and crisper, more "sessionable" beers. Using our house Kolsch yeast, the phenols will not be present and the yeast strain will leave some higher molecular sugars to provide body for the beer. In addition, the Kolsch yeast provides a pleasantly tart ester profile and a crisp, clean finish.
Since Slip Rose was only brewed as a 15 barrel batch, the plan for this year is to keep it as a draft only option in select locations. However, I am looking forward to seeing all your reviews on BeerAdvocate and Untappd!
It is a fairly unique situation to be able to brew a smaller batch of an old recipe and say "If I were to do it again, this is how it would be done." But that is essentially what we are doing now. We have gone back to the drawing board and given the Slip Rose recipe a major overhaul. We narrowed down what we believed to be areas that needed improvement. In addition to the strawberry flavor being too subtle, being a saison, Slip Rose used a French Saison yeast strain which left the beer extremely dry. There was no residual sweetness to support the flavor of the strawberry. Additionally, the beer left a little bit of a harsh mouthfeel on the back of the tongue.
To address these issues, we have made several changes. Firstly, we were previously using a fresh strawberry concentrate. We have now made the switch to a strawberry puree. That first little change would bring strawberry flavor out more on its own, but in addition to that, we have also bumped up the usage rate. The new Slip Rose recipe will now use 1.5 lbs of strawberry puree per gallon of beer... That is close to 700 lbs of strawberry puree for our small batch of beer.
Secondly, to address the mouthfeel issue, we decided to change out about 1/3 of the malted barley for wheat. Wheat will provide a softer, fluffy mouthfeel and should also increase head retention, body, and drinkability.
Lastly, the biggest change we have made is our yeast selection. We decided to utilize our house Kolsch yeast for this new recipe. The French Saison yeast that we used to use was one of the most efficient yeast strains I have ever used for fermenting high molecular chains of sugar. The beer was very dry, and for my tastes, a little too phenolic. The big thing that seems to be working with our customers lately has been cleaner fermentations and crisper, more "sessionable" beers. Using our house Kolsch yeast, the phenols will not be present and the yeast strain will leave some higher molecular sugars to provide body for the beer. In addition, the Kolsch yeast provides a pleasantly tart ester profile and a crisp, clean finish.
Since Slip Rose was only brewed as a 15 barrel batch, the plan for this year is to keep it as a draft only option in select locations. However, I am looking forward to seeing all your reviews on BeerAdvocate and Untappd!
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