Oktoberfest!

Brewed up a Märzen on Thursday, the recipe is here. Roughly half and half Munich malt and Pilsner malt, and a dash of CaraMunich.

I pitched a pint of W 34/70 yeast slurry which took of like a rocket, even at 9 degrees C. The beer has to be ready by the 3rd of Oktober for a party, which precludes any long lagering time. So, I will chill proof this one by using polyclar at 0C then filtering.

No photos for this one, but more details to follow.

Sierra Nevada “Clone”, Side by Side

So, I had the chance to try my Sierra Nevada Pale Ale clone side by side with a friend at the weekend. The image at the top, while not the best photo in the world, shows the homebrew version on the left.

I should point out that I bought my bottle of SNPA from the largest supermarket in the UK. It seems to be that whenever I buy a bottle from said supermarket, it doesn’t seem to be particularly fresh, even though it is well within date. Could it be they are storing them warm, or they are just sitting on the shelf for a long time?

Appearance wise, the homebrew version is a few shades darker. Not a million miles off, but easily noticeable. Both had a slight yeast haze, perhaps a little chill haze. Head retention and lacing were good on both, slightly better on the homebrew version.

Aroma, this was probably the most surprising part for me. Neither had the big Cascade, lychee aroma I know and expect from this beer. My beer did have this aroma about two weeks ago, but it has rapidly faded since. The commercial version had a malty aroma, more than anything; like a freshly milled sack of pilsner malt. The homebrew version had a slight rose-like, alcohol aroma (phenylethanol?), along with a slight grassiness.

Flavour, I was delighted that the two beers matched up very well here. The commercial beer had a slightly cleaner, lager-like character, while the homebrew version had more of the rose-like alcohol along with a slight alcohol warmth. Both had a similar, Cascade hop flavour, and both finished with the same amount of bitterness. Also, the homebrew version had more caramel/toffee. The mouthfeel was very similar, however the commercial version had slightly more carbonation.

Overall, I am pleased with my first proper attempt at recreating this great beer. I have a couple of changes I want to make:

• Use less 120 EBC crystal in the next attempt. I will either half this or replace it completely with a lighter crystal.
• Alter the fermentation peramaters.  I was very surprised to find some higher alcohols in my version despite pitching a large amount of yeast and keeping the ferment temperature at a strict 19C. I will switch to a smaller batch size next time, perhaps pitch the liquid Chico yeast instead of the dried version, and build up a large starter. I will also note the pitching temperature and the amount of oxygen I use. The commercial beer had a clean lager-like character while mine was much more like an ale.

Oh yeah. I think this beer went great with Surf ‘n’ Turf. We have here some peppered steak, scallops, calzone, asparagus and corn on the cob. Delicious!

Hoppy Beers, Soft Water & A Batch of Brown Ale

I brewed a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale clone on the 3rd of August (I will post a side by side comparison in a few days). It has only now reached the stage where it is drinkable, and is rather a nice pint. Let me restate that: it is an excellent beer, however the hop aroma and flavour has faded slightly. Before now, the beer had a very harsh, mouth filling astringency, that I am attributing to hop tannins. Am I just drinking ‘green’ beer before it is mature? Perhaps, but I’m convinced that my water chemistry, and in particular my boil pH, has something to do with it. The water here is practically distilled, with Calcium under 30 mg/L and other ions even less. I don’t have a figure for the Bicarbonate level but I would be surprised if it were much over 10 mg/L, and certainly no more than 20. To get to the bottom of this I have ordered an alkalinity testing kit. I should add, that most beers turn out very well with my water, wheat beers and lagers in particular turn out magnificent. Dark beers and hoppy beers, not so great.

Taking a suggestion from Chris (the JBK forum brewing sensei), I cut my brewing liquor with some high bicarbonate spring water (2L in a 23L batch) to see if I the hop character is less harsh in the resulting beer. Todays brew was a brown ale with Glacier hops. I see it as halfway between an English and American brown, with the yeast character of the former and the robust malt and hop character of the latter. The recipe is here. It is the first time i’ve used the White Labs British Ale yeast and also Glacier hops, so i’m excited to see what they bring to the party. Below you can see a brief clip of the sparge in process.

Rice Lager

I brewed up a light lager on the 28th, basically as a starter for an upcoming Oktoberfest style lager. The grist bill was roughly 83% pilsner malt, 10% flaked rice and 7% dextrose. The beer was hopped lightly with Liberty to around 14 IBUs with a dose of about 0.75g per l of Liberty with 1 minute left in the boil, to a gravity of 1.047. The yeast was the dried SafLager W 34/70 from Weihenstephan. This is the first time i’ve used this yeast, so i’ll be able to evaluate the yeast pretty well with such a light beer; any flaws will be fairly evident. It’s alleged to be the same strain as the German Lager strain from White Labs which i’m very familiar with, so i’ll be interested to see how it matches up.

Finally…

Fuggle

The hops have started to arrive!

After another non-summer, I wasn’t expecting much from my 5 plants. During a brief heatwave in May, they were looking ebulient. This year is the year, I thought to myself. Since then, we’ve had slightly above average temperatures but massive amounts of rain. Some powdery mildew developed, along with some downey mildew on the Fuggle.

Challenger

July and onwards, after taking care of the mildew, many of the leaves look on a brown discolouration. I have no idea what this is, possibly some nutrient deficiency, but it has been persistant year on year. I’m right on the outer cusp of the prime hop growing latitude (55.67, roughly the same as Moscow). Nevertheless, it is a fun experiment.

Progress

I’ve heard they grow hops in the Clyde Valley a few miles from where I am, which probably has a more favourable microclimate. I may take a drive out there at some point to see if I can take a few cuttings and maybe pick up a few tips.

Belgian Witbier

The use of wheat helps with the 'Belgian lace'

Witbier is one of my favourite beer styles to brew and drink. My current interpretation has moved away from a straight Hoegaarden clone to a more herbal, peppery, luscious and fuller bodied beer. It is a beer I am constantly rebrewing and the recipe is in constant flux, so this version is by no means definitive. Lets go through some of the key factors.

Wheat

Lots of homebrewers use malted wheat which is much easier to handle, but is not really appropriate for a true version of the style. Using malted wheat will give the beer an orangey hue and slightly maltier flavour – something like Blue Moon rather than the likes of Hoegaarden or St Bernardus. Instead, flaked wheat should be used. This is pre-gelatinised, and the starches are easily available for use in the mash.

The Mash

If we’re using flaked wheat, complex mashes aren’t really necessary, but a protein rest will improve lauterability especially if oats are used. A brief rest at 55C for 10 minutes before infusing boiling water to bring the mash up to 69C is what I recommend. If the protein rest is held for much longer, a very dry, thin bodied beer can result. I like my witbier to have a milkshake-like, luscious mouthfeel, so I mash fairly hot too.

Oats

There is something appealing about using oats in beer, and truely authentic versions of wit include it. I hover between using oats and not using oats. I’ve settled on about 4% of the grist, and i’ve used up to 10%. You can really taste the oats at the 10% level, and they contribute significantly to mouthfeel. Hoegaarden do not use oats. So if you’re going for a straight clone, omit them. They shouldn’t be toasted or even precooked. Quaker oats work straight out of the packet into the mash. The high amount of gummy beta-glucans cause the mash to basically set into a gelatinous mess, so some filtering aid like oat husks should be used. Oat husks should be washed as they make the beer taste quite ‘oaty’.

Yeast

White Labs WLP400 Belgian Wit Ale and Wyeast Belgian Witbier 3944 are both rumoured to be straight from Hoegaarden, and my experience with WLP400 produces very authentic tasting results. The yeast is not particularly easy to handle; it will tend to attenuate half way before stalling, and requires rousing twice daily until terminal gravity. I ferment at 20C with this yeast, much higher tends to emphasis the clove-like, medicinal phenolic character which is not really to my taste. I have yet to try the Wyeast version, which is next on my hitlist. A good dry option is SafBrew T-58, which is much less hassle than the liquid option, however not quite as flavourful.

Spices

This is where you can get creative and really put your own stamp on the beer. But don’t go crazy. The classic additions are Cuacao orange zest (Belgium was a part of the Netherlands when many spice islands, including the orange-growing territory of Curucao, were colanised), and coriander. Randy Mosher in his book ‘Radical Brewing’ suggests using fresh citrus peel, and I think this is a great idea. I’ve been using Seville orange zest, and some lemon zest. Coriander seeds can be bought very cheaply from asian grocers, do not under any circumstances pay through the teeth for tiny jars of insipid powder from the Supermarket! The spice should be crushed before adding it in the final minute of the boil. About half a gram per litre is a good starting point. Rumours abound of a secret ‘third spice’ used in Hoegaarden. Michael Jackson suggests cumin, others suggest chamomile. I tend to stick to just the two.

Hops

Use what you like, just keep the IBUs low (under 20), restrict late hopping (I use only a small amount of Styrian Goldings for flavour), and stay away from assertive citrussy varieties. Noble or English hops are best.

The Recipe

Here’s my favourite recipe for the beer. It goes great with Indian and Thai food. A good Thai curry and a witbier is perfect. Another favourite use of the beer is to cook mussels, along with some cream, parsley and pancetta.

Back with a Pale Ale

Wort

Hello readers! Well, the blog had to go into cold storage for a brief hiatus while I was studying for exams, and the brewing along with it. The brewery has been ploughed back into action this last fortnight for a nice, hoppy pale “ale”, brewed with a lager yeast at lager temperatures. Why? well, it’s all I had. The beer was kegged today and tastes great, if a little green. There are prodigious amounts of Amarillo hops in this recipe, and they really shine through with the simple grist bill.

The recipe is simple:

Type: All Grain
Date: 17/06/2009
Batch Size: 12.00 gal
Brewer: Geoff
Boil Size: 13.74 gal Asst Brewer: 
Boil Time: 90 min Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 

Ingredients

Amount Item Type % or IBU 
6.00 kg Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC) Grain 57.14 % 
4.00 kg Pilsner (2 Row) UK (2.0 EBC) Grain 38.10 % 
0.50 kg Biscuit Malt (45.3 EBC) Grain 4.76 % 
180.00 gm Amarillo [4.00 %] (60 min) Hops 37.5 IBU 
40.00 gm Amarillo [4.00 %] (10 min) Hops 2.7 IBU 
70.00 gm Amarillo [4.00 %] (0 min) Hops - 

Saflager S-23 Yeast

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.054 SG
Measured Original Gravity: 1.010 SG 
Est Final Gravity: 1.014 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 5.18 %
Bitterness: 40.2 IBU Calories: 43 cal/pint 
Est Color: 10.2 EBC Color: Color 

Mash Profile

Mash PH: 5.4 PH 
My Mash Step Time Name Description Step Temp 
60 min Step Add 27.30 L of water at 74.7 C 68.0 C

The final gravity came out around 1.011. The bitterness is pronounced, but balanced by a little residual sweetness. After a little conditioning, this will be a good quaffer.

Manifold modification

I finally got a March pump delivered so it was time for some brewery modifications. First up, the manifold. I’ll be returning to fly sparging after a brief flirtation with batch sparging. Fly sparging, in my opinion, is more efficient – with an important caveat: the manifold has to have several collection points at the bottom of the mash tun, or channeling will occcur.

Cool visual effect, eh? I think this design should do the job, although if anyone thinks otherwise, please leave a comment. All in all, this is a fairly cheap job, under £10 including a pipe cutter, however it is a bit fiddly and takes a few hours. Next up is the hop filter, after the arduous task of hacksawing holes in the manifold, then hopefully i’m ready to brew on Friday – Dunkelweizen. I can’t wait to test out the pumped system.

Flanders Red Ale & Red Snapper

On holiday last year, one of the things that surprised me was how pervasive British brewing techniques still are in some parts of Europe. In Cologne, Kolsch beer was being brewed in square, open fermenters with top-cropping yeast; indeed, some have suggested commercial relations with London during Cologne’s formative years may have influenced its brewing practices. A little further along the Rhine, the fruity, copper coloured alts of Dusseldorf are remarkably similar to English bitters, and still served via gravity – the way good ale should be. And the sour red ales of West Flanders, matured in oak with Brettanomyces (literally ‘British funghi’), arguably wouldn’t exist were it not for the old Porter brewers of London.

Eugene Rodenbach learned the job of brewer in England in the 19th Century, and brought back what he learned to the famous brewery in Roeselare, south of Brugges. At the time, British pubs were buying beer from breweries and aging it themselves, charging more for the old ales, and often blended with the younger mild ale to the customer’s preference. Brewers soon realised they could make the extra profit themselves, and produced a beer called “entire”, so called because it combined the characteristics of the young and old ales in a single beer. Entire was soon to become Porter, and the first industrially produced beer in the world.

These techniques are unheard of in Britain today, and modern old ales, milds and porters have little in common with their predecessors. In brewery Rodenbach, however, they are alive and well. The kiln design, the huge oak vats, the blending with soured old ale with new has survived for over a century. Apart from the likely smoky, roasty flavours from the kilning, Rodenbach Grand Cru probably has more in common with old-style London Porter in terms of sourness. And Rodenbach’s Old Ale is sour – acetic, balsamic, vinous and eminently drinkable.

It’s one of my favourite beers, so I had to have a go at brewing it at some point. I brewed the recipe from Jamil Zainasheff & John Palmer’s excellent book Brewing Classic Styles a few weeks ago, and racked it into glass for aging a week ago. Such a beer would have been difficult to approximate without the sour yeast blends available today. I’m using Wyeast’s aptly named Roeselare blend, which has been widely tried and tested and is said to produce a similar flavour profile to Rodenbach. The picture above shows the pellicle which forms on top of the beer, the result of the Brettanomyces and Pediococus slowly working away on the longer chained sugars. Oak chips have been added to approximate the oak vats. Of course, this is an aged beer, so I won’t be able to report back on the flavour for at least a year. It is one of a few sour ales I have planned for the year – the next is a lambic with the aged hops I mentioned on a previous post.

Red Snapper in a sauce of Rodenbach Grand Cru

I’d like to share one of my favourite recipes for fish, adapted slightly from Michael Jackson’s book, Beer Companion. Michael Jackson was an early advocate of cooking with beer and pairing it with food, and I raise a glass to him whenever I cook this recipe, which he says is one of his favourites. He uses Red Mullet – which I can never seem to get a hold of – so I will post the recipe verbatim with my alterations in brackets.

Serves 4

6 Fillets of red mullet or ocean perch (I typically use red snapper), 1tbsp olive oil, pinch of grated nutmeg.

For the sauce:

3oz celeriac, 1 stick celery, 1 carrot, 2oz butter, 2oz shallots – finely chopped, 1tbsp finely chopped parsley stalks, 1tbsp brown sugar, 1/4 cup raspberry vinegar, 1/4 cup sherry vinegar (I replaced the vinegars with 1/4 cup of red wine vinegar in total), 1 bottle of Rodenbach Grand Cru, 1+3/4 cups of fish stock, 1 tbsp of well reduced veal stock (I skipped this), sprig of thyme, 1 bay leaf, salt and pepper.

1) Scale the fish fillets, taking care not to tear the skin. Remove any small bones with a pair of tweezers, rinse the fish and pat dry. Rub with olive oil.

2) For the sauce: cut the celeriac, celery and carrot into fine dice. Melt half the butter in a saucepan and saute the shallots, diced vegetables and parsley stalks until they are golden brown. Add the sugar, both vinegars and the beer. Simmer until slightly reduced, about 10 minutes.

3) Add the fish stock and veal stock, thyme, bay leaf, salt and pepper. Reduce to the consistency of a light syrup by simmering gently for 30 minutes.

4) Heat the oven to 350F. Heat a non-stick skillet and cook the fish, skin side down, over high heat for 4 minutes. Finish in the pre-heated oven, this should take no more than 1-2 minutes.

5) To finish the sauce,strain it into a clean pan, reheat and whisk in the remaining butter and nutmeg to taste. Serve the fish surrounded by sauce, with fresh pasta and spinach, or other vegetables. (I have kept it simple with potatoes roasted with rosemary and lemon zest).

Enjoy!

Weißbier #2

My first post in this blog was my first ’serious’ attempt at a Bavarian weißbier, or rather, the first attempt where I took proper notes. It turned out well – it wasnt Weihenstephan, but it was a damn tasty weizen. All 10 gallons were guzzled within two weeks. The flavours were more pronounced than previous attempts, in particular the phenolic, clove-like aromas were to the fore when the beer was fresh. They seemed to fade a little as the beer aged, revealing some vanilla, banana, and coconut. For my tastes, I needed more of the banana flavour which I really associate with this beer.

One thing I noted that the yeast has very low flocculation properties, and likes to stay in suspension, even at cooler temperatures. I found this gave the beer a tart, acidic finish which I originally thought was acetaldehyde, but as I reached the end of the keg and more of the yeast dropped out, the beer became much more pallatable. Although these beers are meant to be drunk mit hefe, in my opinion it should only be a fairly small amount of yeast in suspension – you shouldn’t really be able to see any clinging to the side of the glass. That said, the slight tartness from the yeast did add a refreshing quality to the beer.

I also mentioned in my first post that I would alter only one factor at a time until I reached the flavour I was looking for when re-brewing this beer. I’ll be honest, I couldn’t be bothered with the decoction, acid rest, and crash cooling this time around. To compensate, I added a little extra Munich malt and Cara-munich to add melanoidins and a little caramel flavour. I kept the level of oxygen the same, as well as the pitching rate; but increased the fermentation temperature to 20C, in hope of some more banana esters.

The recipe is here. It’s being brewed for a party, so I’ll be tapping it in two weeks.