Don't be bitter - its just a bitter

A pint of bitter, frolicking with
some young hops

Bitters are one of my favourite styles of beer - I find the malt:hop balance more appealing than that of an IPA, they are sessionable, and the variety of malt, hop and yeast flavours which can be incorporated are nearly unlimited. Hop character can span from subtle to IPA-like; malt character from a touch more than an adjunct lager through to meaty and bold. And then there are the yeast - some are nutty, others fruity, and yet others bring out the malt or the hops, but picked correctly the yeast are what make the beer. In the past I always had at least one bitter available, on tap or in bottle, although recent insanity has prevented this frequent brewing of bitter. In fact, to squeeze this brewday in, I ended up brewing at night. I should have named this brew "1AM Bitter", as that is the time when the brewing of this beer was completed...

...or maybe "skunky standoff bitter", because my plan to sit on the deck and watch movies on my laptop while I brewed didn't come to fruition as I instead spent most of the evening trying to keep a skunk out of our yard - a successful attempt as evidenced by the aroma coming off my neighbours dog the next morning (Smelly dog bitter? Angry neighbour bitter? Blackstripe bitter? Damn, naming beers is hard).

Rather than posting separate brew-day and recipe posts, I've put everything together into a single post...we'll see if this becomes my preferred format for the blog.

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Recipe:

Stats:

Brewed late at night...

• OG: 1.046
• FG: 1.010
• ABV: 4.4%
• IBU: 26 IBU

Malts:

• 4.00 kg Marris Otter
• 0.23 kg Aromatic Malt
• 0.23 kg Caramel 120L
• 0.11 kg Special Roast

Hops:

• 34 g (20 IBU) EKG, 60 min
• 14g (5.1 IBU) EKG, 20 minb
• 14g EKG, Flameout

Yeast & Other

• 1 tsp Irish moss, 15 min
• Wyeast 1469 (West Yorkshire Ale)

Brewing

1. Single-infusion mash for 60 min at 66.1C, batch sparge to collect a total of 28L
2. Boil for 60 min, adding hops and Irish moss at the indicated time
3. Cool and oxygenate well, ferment at 18-21 C for 7-14 days
4. Keg & carb, add gelatin to clear

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Tasting Notes:

Appearance: Crystal clear, modestly carbonated, light-brown body with amber highlights. Head pours thick and creamy, and lasts for several minutes.

Aroma: Toasty malt note with some raisin/date-like fruit aroma. Subtle "spicy" note from the aroma hop addition.

Flavour: Strong malt character, mostly toast and stone-fruit, but with a touch of caramel malt sweetness. This is complemented by the yeast, which provides a nut-like ester quality that fits nicely with the toast of the Marris Otter and Special Roast malts. The strong malt note is nicely balanced by a decent hop bitterness, plus some raisin/date-like fruit notes provided by the C120 and yeast. The hop flavour addition is not overt; a subtle spice note is present, but not dominant. Finish is dry, with a lingering hop bitterness and touch of stone-fruit sweetness.

Mouthfeel: Medium-light body, whetting when you drink it but with a dry finish. Carbonation is on the high end for the style, but its the way I prefer it. No astringency or drying sensation.

Overall: A good pint of bitter; sessionable but with a ton of character. This is one of the only recipes I have that makes a frequent return to my brewhouse, and the reason for that is that this recipe makes - to my mind - the ideal bitter. The fact it goes from grain to bottle in 7-10 days doesn't hurt either.

Another Quick Lager

Tasty, but not as clear as it should be

A while ago I experimented with the new warm-fermentation temperature lager methods being promoted by various home brewers and bloggers. My first attempt at this was a home run - a great, Czech-style Pilsner...and as I was drinking this beer I remembered why I don't brew Pilsners - I'm not a huge fan of the style. So this time around I brewed a lager more to my preference, a continental style Vienna lager.

I'm not going to post the recipe because its not my recipe - I stole this one, in its entirety, from Five Blades Brewing - specifically, his Geburstagsparty recipe. The only change I made (aside from fermentation profile) was that I re-pitched some 34/70 yeast I had kept from my Pilsner. Brew day went smoothly, with 22L of 1.047 wort transferred to the fermenter.

Fermentation profile was the same as with my Pilsner - 6 days at ~15C, followed by 9 days at room temperature. After fermentation I kegged the beer, force carbed, and began pouring 3 days later...and that was when I realized that I forgot to gelatin the beer. So even now, half way through the keg, its still cloudy. But it is otherwise excellent, so onto the tasting notes.

Appearance: Light brown with amber hues, pours with a fluffy white head that lasts and lasts and lasts. But its cloudy, thanks to the lack of gelatin.

Aroma: Malty with a touch of bread, with a clear overarching note of Hallertauer hops.

Flavour: Malt flavour is upfront; not the sweetness of caramel malt, but rather a slightly sweet, rich flavour. There is a subtle, almost nutty note in the background. A subtle hop bitterness balances out the sweetness, but the balance remains malt-forward. The balance is near-perfect; not as sweet as a bock, but not as dry as a Pilsner. It's easy to drink, highly digestable, but has enough flavour and body to be interesting. As with the warm-fermented Pilsner, the yeast character on this beer is lager-clean, despite the lack of long-term cold aging. Aftertaste is very mild, just a lingering malt sweetness and subtle bitterness.

Mouthfeel: Whetting, medium bodied and highly effervescent. There is no astringency or drying sensation what-so-ever.

Overall: A damned good beer. Easy to drink, great flavour and nice balance between malt and hops. Aside from the clarity issue, the beer is nearly perfect. A great session lager, but with enough body and character to keep things interesting. The only thing I would change is to remember to add gelatin next time!

That moment when you realize you've been doing it all wrong

Hops in 2013

I've been growing my own hops for just over 4 years now, and while my last few harvests were pretty good, they were not even close to what other home hop farmers achieve. To try and figure out where I've gone wrong I've read almost every guide, watched nearly every youtube video, and listened to a mass of podcasts...so far to no avail.

My problems are pretty straight forward - the growth I get is somewhat weak and thin, I don't get a lot of sidearms (which is where hops form), my cones form too early and tend to dry out by early August.

I'll admit that I've somewhat given up hope on finding a solution to my hop-growing woes, but last week James over at Basic Brewing released a podcast in which he interviews a hop farmer - James Altwies of Gorst Valley Hops. As I listened to the podcast I came to realize that my poor yields are likely due to one simple factor - I was doing every last thing wrong.

So what is the magical fix...well short of firing myself that is? There isn't any one thing, but rather several, and the first steps need to start in the next few weeks. As always, the meat is below the fold.

Tasting Notes: Uncle Mikes Pilsner

A few weeks ago I brewed a Pilsner-style beer using some of the techniques home brewers have been developing for fermenting these beers at ale temperatures. In my case I brewed a classical Bohemian-style Pils, pitched W34/70, fermented it at low-ale temperatures (16C) for five days, followed by 9 days at room temperature (about 20C). Two weeks later Uncle Mikes potion was gelatined and kegged (mine had to wait an extra week due to a lack of kegorator space), a week after that it was bottled and sampled - and was pretty damned good.

I kegged, but forgot to gelatin, my half of the beer 3 weeks after brew-day. The lack of gelatin is apparent, but otherwise this is a really, really good lager...er ale...er lale?

Appearance: Pours with a thick white head that lasts forever. Beer is a medium-amber in colour with a very slight chill haze. A bit of gelatin next time should solve that little problem. Mikes portion, which was gelatined, was crystal clear.

Aroma: Its a pils! Bready malt note, clear aroma of Sazz,and otherwise free of yeast-derived esters, sulphur or diacetyl.

Flavour: This is a very tasty beer. Modest bitterness balanced by that bread-like flavour only pils malt can create. The spicy/herbal note of Sazz is apparent in both flavour and aroma. Body is medium, just as you'd expect of a Bohemian Pils, with a crisp finish. About the only flaw I can note is that the hops are not quite as crisp as they should be - probably because I didn't dilute out my towns mineral content to get a Pilsn-like ion content. Aftertaste is a lingering hop bitterness and a slight bread character. Of most importance, no yeast-derived esters are present, confirming that lager-like finishes can be achieved at ale fermentation temperatures.

Mouthfeel: Effervescent, medium bodied, but dry in the finish. Thirst quenching and easily digestible.

Overall: A surprising and delightful success. I'm sure a more serious lager brewer would find a few more flaws, but for a brewer who only occasionally drinks pilsners. I tried this side-by-side with a Pilsner Uriquel, and while my beer was not intended to be a clone, the flavour profile and aroma are surprisingly similar. Not identical, but the differences are likely due to recipe formulation and the higher gravity of my beer, rather than due to flaws. The biggest difference is that the Uriquel's hops "pop" more than mine - likely due to the softer water used in Uriquel.

Tasting notes & a recipe - Kitchen Sink Stout (for St. Paddies day)

I don't always blog all the beers I brew, but seeing as it is St. Paddies day I thought I'd do a quick post one one such batch - my "Kitchen Sink Stout". As the name suggests, this beer was brewed by taking all of my odd-and-end grains & hops and trying to formulate a recipe that used them all up. What I ended up with was 40L (~10 US gallons) of a dry-style "stout" (stout in quoted because this is too dark/roasty for porter but has no roast barley). While this beer was brewed back in mid-November, I've managed to hold onto a few bottles until now.

The recipe is complex, not because I wanted it to be but rather because of the large number of malts I was trying to rid myself of:

• 8kg marris otter
• 0.7kg Carafa Special II
• 0.67kg flaked oats
• 0.45kg victory malt
• 0.2kg black patent
• 0.18kg carawheat
• 0.1kg carafa special III
• mashed for 60 min at 68.3C

Hopping was also done kitchen-sink style:

• 100g (50 IBU) Northern Brewer, 60 min
• 30g EKG + 30g Fuggels, 15 min

Fermented with 2 packs of Safale S-04 (English ale).

So how did this beer turn out... tasting notes can be found below the fold.

Belgian Candi Sugar Part III

Yesterday, Brulosophy published a post where they compared "my" candi sugar recipe side-by-side with a commercial candi syrup. The much more rigorous testing conducted by Brulosophy mirrored my own less scientific experience - i.e. namely that in beer the differences between them are hard to detect, but there are differences. The ability to find these differences appears to vary between people, as in the Brulosophy the majority were not able to tell the differences, but the minority that could tell the difference could do so consistently.

Since my previous posts on the topic (1, 2 and "3", #2 is the primary resource) I've refined my method further. In the discussions following the Brulosophy post its become apparent that I should share these changes as a fair number of people are using my old posts as a starting point in their own sugar experiments (hello, Reddit homebrewers).

The changes I have made seem to address the issues others (and I) have noted - namely an occasional acrid/burnt character. An issue was also brought up by one commenter which I think is worth addressing here.

The changes I've made to my method:

1. I've greatly reduced the amount of DME used, as the amount of protein in previous batches was excessive. For 1 kg of sugar (2.2 lbs), I am currently using 5 ml (~1 tsp) of DME. Previously I was using 1 tbs (~15 ml)
2. I avoid mixing the sugar as much as possible - I mix to dissolve the sugar into water, and I mix when adding the lye, but I do not otherwise mix.
3. I am much more careful and slow with my temperature changes. Most of the mixing I did previously was to add cold water to cool the sugar if I overshot the desired temperature.
4. I now usually add corn sugar (fructose) at a rate of 1% volume/mass (i.e. 1 ml corn sugar per 100g sugar). This does not change the flavour of the final candi, but does reduce crystallization. It is easier to then blend the mix into a syrup or cast rocks with the non-crystallized sugar.

These changes have led to a candi which is much closer (to my palate) to commercial candis, one without the unpleasant flavours some of the previous batches had. Others on the thread have mentioned using pressure cookers and other methods with great success. Hopefully, as a collective we will be able to formulate a better method of producing a consistent and flavourful candi sugar for home brewing.

The "Issue":

An issue brought up the commenter 'Chino' in the Brulosophy thread was that the 30 minute inversion time that I recommend is insufficient to completely invert the sugar, with individuals over a Reddit working on ways to get improved inversions. I partially agree with what Chino states - given the rate of the reaction and the fact that it is an equilibrium reaction, a 30 minute inversion period without the addition of something to accelerate the process (e.g. acid) will only invert 8-10% of the sugar. Where I disagree with Chino is that I don't think this matters. Mallard products comprise a pretty small portion of the final sugar - assuming 100% of the protein added via the DME is converted to Mallard products, the Mallard products would comprise about 0.07% of the final candi by weight. Although multi-step reactions, the formation of most Mallard products requires only one sugar molecule per amino acid, meaning that you need "only" 0.07% inverted sugar to be able to (in theory) produce the full array of Mallard products. The 8-10% inverted sugar is a huge excess compared to what is required - this does offer an advantage in terms of reaction rates, but its hard to imagine that increasing inversion to 25% (theoretical maximum using heat alone) or 50-75% (theoretical maximum using acid) would offer further improvements.

Tasting Notes - Back Mamba the Third

Last month I brewed my traditional beer to use up my home-grown cascade hops. Black Mamba (the third) is a black rye imperial IPA that I have formulated (and reformulated) to emphasize my home grown hops in a beer that also fulfills my winter desire for something a little more meaty. Past attempts at this beer have not quite lived upto expectations - the first version was an unsuccessful brew day that was lacking in the imperial department. The second version had the imperial down pat, but had too many roast notes and too much body, hiding much of the hop character. A few additional tweaks gives us this years batch - Black Mamba the III - reduced the dark malts and used sugar to dry out the beer...and it worked!

Appearance: Black as a politicians soul with an off-brown head. Shades of garnet can be seen on the edges if caught in the right light. Head is corse, and falls quickly into a layer of bubbles that persists for the rest of the pint.

Aroma: Mix of hop resin and hop herbalness. Hints of chocolate appear in the background and become more apparent as the pint warms.

Flavour: The malt note is a mild chocolate note with minimal roastiness. The rye adds a spice character is present but not overwhelming. The big flavour is a bold hop resin note, with herbal hop notes in the background. The citrus character cascade is known for is missing - but this seems to be a terroir "issue" as other local brewers have also mentioned their cascades skew towards resin and herbal, rather than citrus. After taste is a lingering hop bitterness and a resin note that sticks to the back of the mouth.

Mouthfeel: Pretty unique. The beer is dry, but the rye imparts its own thickness to the beer that counteracts this somewhat. Upfront the beer is whetting, but it leaves a modest dryness in the aftertaste.

Overall: I'm getting pretty close to my original vision for this beer. My home grown hops are in the fore, but are backed by a nice black IPA and rye character that is great in the winter months. The only thing I could see changing is adding a very slight touch of a mid-rage crystal malt to ad a touch of sweetness.