theneedle.net

I couldn’t resist the urge to pick up a few pounds of rye malt on a recent visit to Niagara Tradition.  I think it had something to do with a pint of Bear Republic Hop Rod Rye I had a few days earlier.  I hadn’t been planning on a rye beer, but the idea of an IPA slightly different than my last few hoppy batches stuck once it appeared in my mind.

03-13-2010 Rye IPA

A ProMash Brewing Session Report
——————————–

Brewing Date: Saturday March 13, 2010
Head Brewer: Rudy Watkins
Asst Brewer:
Recipe: Rye IPA

Recipe Specifics
—————-

Batch Size (Gal): 5.50 Wort Size (Gal): 5.50
Total Grain (Lbs): 14.05
Anticipated OG: 1.065 Plato: 15.86
Anticipated SRM: 8.4
Anticipated IBU: 74.5
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70 %
Wort Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Actual OG: 1.062 Plato: 15.28
Actual FG: 1.008 Plato: 2.05

Alc by Weight: 5.63 by Volume: 7.17 From Measured Gravities.
ADF: 86.6 RDF 71.8 Apparent & Real Degree of Fermentation.

Actual Mash System Efficiency: 71 %
Anticipated Points From Mash: 64.81
Actual Points From Mash: 66.16

Grain/Extract/Sugar

% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
—————————————————————————–
22.8 3.20 lbs. Bestmalz Pilsener Germany 82.23 2
26.7 3.75 lbs. Pilsener Belgium 80.07 2
32.0 4.50 lbs. Optic Malt (2-row) Great Britain 80.07 3
14.2 2.00 lbs. Rye Malt America 64.92 4
3.6 0.50 lbs. Wheat Malt Germany 84.40 2
0.7 0.10 lbs. Chocolate Malt UK 62.76 375

Potential represented as Yield, Fine Grind Dry Basis.

Hops

Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
—————————————————————————–
0.90 oz. Magnum Whole 10.50 35.8 60 min.
0.25 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 5.6 30 min.
0.20 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 5.9 30 min.
0.35 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 4.1 15 min.
0.30 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 4.6 15 min.
0.65 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 7.5 10 min.
0.35 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 2.5 5 min.
0.25 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 2.4 5 min.
0.45 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 4.3 1 min.
0.25 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 1.8 1 min.
0.80 oz. Centennial 2009 Whole 11.50 0.0 Dry Hop
0.80 oz. Columbus 2009 Whole 15.20 0.0 Dry Hop

Yeast

—–

Safeale US-5 US-5

Yeah, but what is it like?

A dense white head sits atop a slightly hazy (chill haze?) body.  The lacing is decent, but not killer.  Everything comes together nicely in the aroma – dank & citrus from the hops, some caramel and a small amount of rye spiciness.  No alcohol is apparent despite being 7% ABV.  Flavor is fruity orange & dank (imagine un-sweet orange liqueur, without the alcohol) some restrained mango, a bunch of piney bitterness.  There is a little bit of roast there – not out of place but I think I would skip the chocolate malt next time.  It has a nice lingering bittersweet character which reminds me a bit of fresh Hop Devil.

Overall assessment: pretty good.  I want to increase the dry hop next time, use a bit of crystal rye in addition to the malted rye and drop the chocolate (maybe use some sort of debittered black malt?)

We opened the last bottle of this batch tonight.  The original idea with this brew was to create something between a Belgian Golden Strong (think Duvel) and a porter.

I think it eventually turned out pretty well.  It was rough when young, but my higher ABV beers tended to be so at that point.  I don’t know if it was a problem with my technique or what, but a lot of my beers in those days needed to sit in the bottle for quite a while before they were right.  It probably hit it’s peak after a year in the bottle.

At this point it has some really nice cocoa and yeast notes, with a bit of oxidation (hey – its over 2 years old – I’m happy there isn’t more).  There is some alcohol there, but it isn’t overwhelming.  Flavor wise we’re talking cocoa, yeast, and some cheap red wine.  Far from the best, but that red wine aspect wasn’t there when it was younger – I seem to recall dark fruitiness.

This would have been better had I done a few things differently:

- Better Yeast Management.  This is something I think I’ve taken care of since then.  Having better control here would have greatly reduced the amount of time it took for this batch to hit it’s stride.

- A more complex grain bill.  The chocolate malt added some nice enough notes, but if I had gone more along the lines of a stout grain bill this would have been better.  Roastiness and some melanoidins would really help

- Higher carbonation.  It could use some more *pop*.

It was an interesting enough idea.  One that I’m going to re-explore sometime this fall.

Contrary to what the Starks of Winterfell might say, summer is coming.  At least, that was the theory when I decided to brew a moderate strength pale ale in the middle of February.

This is the first time in a few years that I’ve brewed a pale ale.  The hoppy beers I brew usually fall into the stronger IPA or Double IPA category.  Something lower in alcohol seemed like a good way to test out a new (to me) variety of hops, Citra.  Beernews has this to say about the profile of Citra:

“This hop has a crazy strange flavor profile, leaning toward pineapple, mango, papaya and other tropical fruit flavors and aromas.”

Sounds good, right?

So I came up with a recipe, the guys over at the Ratebeer homebrew forum helped me tweak it, and it came to be.

Malt:
11 lbs Optic
0.5 lbs Vienna

Hops:
0.66 oz Magnum (60)
3.0 oz Citra (5)
2 oz Citra (0)
1.5 oz Citra (Dry, 10 days)

Brew Notes:

I really tightened down the gap on the mill for this one. I’m interested to see what kind of efficiency I get with it.  Mash came in a bit high, around 158 but I let it go.  Pulled 6.7 gallons pre-boil @ 1.045. Promash says I should have had 6.64 @ 1.045. Pretty much spot on there.  Boiled 60 minutes, Ended up pulling 5 gallons into fermenter, leaving behind ~0.25 gallons in the hops. I had calculated .35 gallons left behind – again, close enough.  Starting gravity was 1.056. It had calculated to 1.054 – again, close enough.  Seems like what promash is calculating is basically spot on with what I got this batch. Pitched 1 packet US-05, which Mr Malty says is enough.

Fermented for 1 week at 67 degrees, transferred to secondary and added the dry hop charge.  Let the dry hops do their thing for 10 days.

Bottled with 4.1 oz of corn sugar for 2.5 atmospheres.

The problem

Dry hops need to be put in a bag and weighted down for greatest effectiveness.  Lots of people recommend using stainless steel hardware as a weight.  Its a great idea, except when you’re sold hardware that claims to be stainless and isn’t.  When I removed the hardware from the hop bag I saw that there was a bit of rust.  A sample confirmed that the beer tasted like metal.  Crap.  God knows what was actually in that hardware.  So this entire batch is going down the drain.  There isn’t any need to potentially poison anyone.  Still….

The (very small) tasting

A few ounces probably won’t kill me, so I decided to take a few sips to critique what lies behind the metallic twang.

It pours super cloudy.  Like, still in the process of fermenting cloudy.  I don’t know if the metal somehow kept yeast & proteins in suspension or what.  If this was a Belgian wit it would be spot on.  There is a very nice white head that fades from an initial big billowing cap to a thin but persistent layer of foam.

If I had to pick a single fruit to describe the aroma it would be mango – but there is more going on.  Metal (ARRRRGH!) mingles with some sweeter pineapple juice and sweet malt notes.  It has some citrus pith, but a lot less than a big pale like Lagunitas New Dogtown Pale.

Flavor wise this is a mess.  The metal really comes through.  The metal should never really come through.  It has an interesting grainy malt character along with mango, but mostly it comes off as tannic.  Its a real shame, as I imagine this would have been really tasty had things not gone awry.

There is enough goodness going on that I’ll probably brew this (or something very similar) again in the near future.  I’m essentially out of Citra hops right now, and don’t plan on ordering more until I use up the pounds and pounds of other varieties in the freezer, but this should serve as a good base recipe for future single-hop brews.

Assuming of course I leave out the metal.

Time to look back on what was brewing in 2009.  It was a pretty good year with 19 batches, around 90 gallons.  No drainpours or infections in the lot.  I entered a competition for the first time (and won two awards!).   I built & started using a new copper sparge manifold and increased my efficiency, at least marginally.  I got to know Promash a lot better, which I really think led to improvements in quality.

I finally finished off my huge backlog of 2007 hops brewing a slew of IPAs.   Tim and I brewed a Double IPA in February based on the Pliny The Elder recipe that appeared in the September 04 edition of BYO.  The recipe wasn’t right to begin with and we made a whole bunch of hop substitutions.  It turned out well but super bitter and without the complexity we had hoped.  Still, it got me moving through the freezer full of hops I started the year with.  Starting in June I brewed 3 batches of IPA to get through the last of those hops.  They brews were good but lacked the vibrancy they would have had with fresher hops.

There were a whole bunch of Belgians too. 10 to be exact – yikes!  I made a few Bretty beers – an Orval inspired beer and a Saison brewed with dregs from Fantome Black Ghost.  Neither turned out how I had hoped, though the Orval-esque beer is pretty good.  I had some success brewing an Abbey Single – something I’m going to tweak and brew again for next summer.  I used the yeast cake from the single to make a triple which is still improving, but has a bunch of yeast & pear right now.

I brewed five sours.  One Berliner Weisse, a Flemish Red, a Flemish Pale, a Lambic and a giant monster with 12 or 14 different cultures courtesy of Al Buck over on the Babble Belt.  Nothing but the Berliner was ready to drink this year – the Flemish beers and the one with all the cultures should be drinkable in 2011, the Lambic will be ready in 2012.  Patience patience patience.

Looking forward I want to brew more low alcohol beers & sours.  I’m tired of stuff over 6 or 7%.  I want to be able to have 2 or 3 bottles without feeling it in the morning.  That said, I’m taking full advantage of the huge delivery of hops I got before Christmas and brewing a Pliny-esque beer tomorrow (with an appropriate hop schedule this time!).  I’d also like to explore stouts & porters more.  They are such great styles but so rarely done well.  It wouldn’t hurt to try a lager either.  On the technical side I’d like to get better about fermenting temperature and pitching rates.  These are two relatively simple things that can really improve my brews.

Cheers!

What: Come hang out and learn how beer is made!

When: Sunday, November 8th. Noon – 5ish

Where: Bob and Ang’s place

Details: Come hang out, eat good food, drink good beer & learn a thing or two about brewing to celebrate teach a friend to homebrew day. You’re welcome to just observe or get more involved. I’m not sure what style of beer will be made that day but people who show up get at least a few bottles when they’re ready, which should be around Christmas. I’ll be providing snacks, drinks & all the necessary ingredients – just bring yourself!

Give me a call or send me a message if you think you’ll be there so I can get a rough head count. We’ll be spending time outside and in the garage so dress appropriately.

Wedding stuff:

bobandangela.org is finally up and running, albeit not too attractive & without much content. I’m taking Friday off work to take care of a bunch of stuff – maybe I’ll have a few minutes to pretty it up.  Invites should be put together by Friday night & sent by Monday.  We’ve got totally cool James Mitchner stamps.  I don’t know anything about Mitchner, aside from occasionally seeing his books wedged into the bookcase at Carey’s, but he looks a bit like a cross between The Dude & Dick Cheney.  Scary.

Beer stuff:

I’ve updated the long neglected homebrew section of theneedle so it now lists the stuff I’ve brewed since August.  I switched over to Promash at that point & forgot to enter things on-line.  I need to get better about record keeping.  I’m never going to know how strong that Bretty Cherry Saison is.  Boo.   Other beeriness, I’m headed to a friend’s place for a tasting Saturday night.  Should be fun & it’ll be the public unveiling of the Double IPA Tim & I brewed.

Buffalo stuff:

There is a meeting on Community Gardens at the Science Museum tomorrow.  I’m going to try to make it, assuming my pointless meeting in the ‘burbs doesn’t run too long.  Also, what the hell is up with the Sabres?  Don’t they know that without the playoffs I have no excuse to hang out at a bar, every other night, until sometime in June?

Music:

New Dalek – Meh.  Newish Mogwai – Meh.  Newish Animal Collective – not as shiny after a few listens. New Fire On Fire – good, but it makes me feel dirty, like I’m listening to something I shouldn’t.  New Black Dice Tracks – Reallllly good.  New Pan*American – meh.  It seems that I want to listen to either minimal stuff or wacked out early Butthole Surfers stuff these days.  What does that say about my mental state?

Best of 2008:

Records:
Girl Talk – Feed the Animals
Firewater – The Golden Hour
Gutter Twins – Saturnalia
The New Year – The New Year
Earth – The Bees Made Honey In The Lion’s Skull
23 Skidoo – Seven Songs (re-release)
Matmos – Supreme Balloon
Weedeater – God Luck and Good Speed

Concert:
Firewater – Cleveland, OH 5/28

Books:
Neal Stephenson – Zodiac
Michael Pollan – The Omnivore’s Dilemma
Nikolai Gogol – Dead Souls

Beers:
3 Fonteinen Oude Geuze Blauw
3 Fonteinen Millennium Geuze
Leelanau Good Harbor Golden
Boulevard Saison w. Brett
Ithaca Ten

Food:
Dinner at 1 Caroline Bistro in Saratoga Springs, NY
BBQ Pork sandwich at Pho 99 in Buffalo, NY
Everything at Fatty Crab in NYC, NY

I couldn’t wait any longer to open a bottle of the Flanders Red I brewed with Tim and Jacob back in June.  It was bottled three weeks ago and I was curious to see how it was progressing.

It pours nicely.  The photo to the left is a little cloudy, as it includes the sediment from the bottom of the bottle, but before that sediment hit the glass the body was glowing red with a hint of brown.  The head was a bit of a deeper tan than expected, but not too out of place.

The best aspect of this beer right now is the nose.  It lacks the acidity of Rodenbach Grand Cru, but I wouldn’t hesitate to compare it to Rodenbach Classic.  There is some very nice cherry-like acidity and a bit of lemon.  The malt balances that out nicely, with notes of caramel and lighter toffee.  It has what I’ve previously thought of as a woody character, but this beer didn’t spend any time on wood..  So what the heck is that?  It it just a combination of brett & malt?

Flavor wise.. well, we knew it wasn’t going to be too complex, since we went for the ‘quick’ 8-week method rather than the 2-year aging period.  The acidity is somewhat overpowered by the malt (this guy ended up at 1.018! BJCP guidelines put the upper limit at 1.016) and it ends up being too sweet for my liking.  The recipe doesn’t have much in the way of hops; the acid and low expected final gravity are supposed to balance it out.   Its not bad by any stretch (if pressed to compare it to something commercial I guess I’d say Bios vlaamse Bourgogne AKA Monk’s Cafe Flemish Sour) but not as great as it could be.  I’m curious to see how this changes over time.  I’ll probably open a bottle every few weeks to check it’s progress.  For a first time using wild yeasts I can’t complain.  Besides, a lot of the joy of homebrewing is the experiments… and I’ve got 2 more packs of this yeast in the fridge..

-rudy

Another “I should have paid more attention in Chemistry class” post…

Tonight I bottled my second batch of Berliner Weisse.  Its a simple (albeit odd) recipe that yields a low alcohol, slightly tart beer.  The oddness comes from two distinct sources.  First, unlike other beers you don’t boil Berliner Weisse.  You extract the sugars from the malt, cool & add yeast.  Second, you conduct a sour mash.

The sour mash is what I’m contemplating.  The procedure involves taking about a quarter of the sweet wort you collect from the grain and adding half a pound of malted (but unmashed) grains.  The grains soak in the liquid for about a week before being strained out.  That 25% is added back to the remaining 75%, you wait a few days & then bottle.  The grains you add to that 25% inoculate the mixture with Lactobacillus that resides on the husks.

When I brewed my first Berliner Weisse I stored the bucket of grains & liquid in the cellar which stays somewhere around 65 degrees.  That batch was good but like any proud sourhead I wanted more.  For this second batch I brought the sour mash bucket up to the attic.  I didn’t keep track of the temperature but I’m going to guess that the average temperature was at least in the mid 70s.

Lacto’s optimum temperature is 98 (so says Sparrow’s Wild Brews) and while I’m sure the attic didn’t reach that temperature, what I bottled tonight was noticably more acidic than the first batch.  I think I’m going to try and do a few more batches this summer, monitoring the temperature in the attic, to determine what temperature sour mash I feel produces the best beer.  There was such a difference between the first batch at 65F and (an assumed) 75F that I can’t imagine a sour mash conducted at 98 being good.  Still, I think it can be pushed further.  Its just a question of how much…