Bière de Réserve

Bière de Garde is a strange style: it's considered a farmhouse ale like saison but is actually very different and is actually lagered. Aside from the lagering aspect, and a balance towards malt, there doesn't seem to be any set definition or ingredients that make something a bière de garde. It can be gold, amber, or brown; moderately alcoholic to very strong; use European or English hops; use lager yeast, fairly neutral ale yeast, or characterful Belgian yeast, and in some cases can even have brettanomyces. I've only had 2 beers labeled as Bière de Gardes: Flying Dog's Garde Dog, knocked as not being within the style parameters by most reviews, and Right Proper's Baron Corvo, a mixed fermentation bière de garde.

In coming up with my recipe I focused on the 2 things that definitely define the style (malt forward and lagered) and looked at homebrew recipes from Michael Tonsmeire and Gus Addkinson to get a ballpark idea of ingredients and decided to use an array of toasted and crystal malts to compliment the German pilsner base.

Part of my desire to brew a beer in this style is my love for "farmhouse" ales and "wild" ales. With this in mind I planned to add BKYeast C2 (and possibly other yeast or bacteria) to part of this batch to give it some more farmhouse "rustic" character, instead of just being a toasty/malty kolsch. I chose this Brett strain after tasting a 100% C2 beer recently and thought that the mild earthy/fruity/dusty/"wild strawberry" characteristics would go well with this style.

I made one big mistake when designing this beer and wrote the recipe for 5 gallons for the ingredients but 6 gallons for the water profile, leaving the beer with a much lower gravity (1.052) than I aimed for (1.062). I ended up adding 4 oz. of sugar and 8 oz. of malt extract to bump up the gravity a touch.

Brett version pictured on the left with the plain version on the right.

12/27/17 Side by Side Tasting:
Appearance:
Plain: Heavily carbonated with a massive white head that lasts as a thin layer with thick foamy lacing left behind. Coppery amber in color with decent clarity, just a little haze.
Brett: Much less heavily carbonated with a quickly fading head that leaves no lacing. Similar coppery color with a touch less haze due to the lower carbonation not shaking up as much sediment.

Smell:
Plain: Mild fruitiness with a strange sour, vegetal and earthy squash like character. Light caramel malt aromas and a touch of phenolic smoke.
Brett: Overripe fruit up front with some peppercorn, clove, and green pepper. Slightly vinous and caramelly.

Taste/Mouthfeel:
Plain: Light berry fruitness mingles with moderate peppery phenolics that lead into sweet lightly caramel malt followed by more spiciness and a low bitterness with lingering spice and vegetal character. High carbonation makes the phenolic character even more prickly but it calms down with some time and warmth. Some astringency from an unknown source. Fuller bodied than the brett version but doesn't feel thick despite 1.016 FG.
Brett: Medium earth and fruit mingle with a lingering spicy bitterness. Seems less phenolic and the low carbonation and thin body adds to the vinous character.

Overall:
I'm really not crazy about this one and almost ditched the tasting and the whole post. That said, the brett version does seem a little better despite only mild changes and I could see this strain working great in a slightly better base bière de garde. In terms of how to get to a better base bière de garde I'm not sure what I would change to avoid the phenolic character other than a change in yeast and maybe cutting some of the toasted malts. I also wonder if the hop choices contributed at all to the earthy/vegetal character that is a little too strong for my tastes. Overall, not the beer I wanted it to be but not undrinkable.

Fermentables

Amount	Fermentable	Maltster	%	Use	PPG	Color
9.0 lb	Pilsner (DE)	Avangard	79 %	Mash	36	1 °L
1.0 lb	White Wheat (US)	Briess	9 %	Mash	40	2 °L
12 oz	Victory	Briess	7 %	Mash	34	28 °L
4.35 oz	Honey Malt	Gambrinus	2 %	Mash	37	25 °L
3.25 oz	Caraamber	Weyermann	2 %	Mash	34	23 °L
2.0 oz	Crystal 150L	Great Western	1 %	Mash	33	150 °L

Hops

Amount	Hop	Time	Use	Form	AA
1.0 oz	Fuggle (UK)	60 min	Boil	Pellet	4.1%
0.5 oz	WGV (UK)	60 min	Boil	Pellet	6.0%
0.25 oz	WGV (UK)	15 min	Boil	Pellet	6.0%

Yeasts

Name	Lab/Product	Attenuation
Kolsch	Wyeast	75%

Brewed 6/17/17
Cooled to room temperature and placed in 6 gallon fermenter with Wyeast 2565 Kolsch.

6-30-17
Split batch between two 3 gallon plastic carboys, adding a starter of C2 Brett to one. These were placed in a chest freezer set to 35F.

7-29-17
Both batches were pulled out of the chest freezer and allowed to rise to room temperature (~66F) for at least one week in order to ensure full attenuation before bottling.

8-5-17
Bottled the clean half with 1.5 oz. sucrose aiming for ~2 volumes of carbonation. Final gravity is higher than expected at 1.016 and quite a bit higher than expected and shows a much lower attenuation than the style calls for. This may be closer to a Marzen but tastes like a nice, if a tad too sweet/caramelly, lager. The "Avec Brett" half will be given more time as the gravity is only down to 1.012 and may be able to fall further.

9-15-17
Brett version bottled as it was still sitting at 1.012. Tasting good with just light fruit/earth/funk from the C2 strain on top of the clean and malty character of the base beer.

9-20-17
The clean half has become surprisingly "Belgian-y" with a spicy phenolic character that gives the impression of Belgian yeast. While some phenols aren't entirely out of style in a bière de garde, the beer seems to have transitioned from a clean, Marzen like beer into something closer to a Belgian blonde. I'm not sure where this yeast character could have come from but have to assume that a Belgian/Saison/Brett/wild yeast strain capable of producing phenols (POF+) was picked up in bottling. A full side by side tasting will be done once the Brett half is carbonated.

Young Bohemian Czech Pilsner

It's been just over 3 years since my first time brewing a lager. The beer was a Bohemian Pilsner that turned out quite tasty despite a little more diacetyl than I would have liked. The beer was inspired by my European trip that included a visit to the Czech Republic (Bohemia is the largest region in the Czech Republic) had me obsessed with all things lager, especially the classic pilsner.

 After moving to San Francisco recently I've seen an abundance of available German style Pilsners (e.g. Sudwerk Northern Pilsner and Trumer Pils) but not many of the Czech variety, which I generally prefer. With my chest freezer essentially empty due to no kegs being on tap I decided to use the availability and try and recreate this previous recipe with just a few tweaks.

In order to minimize diacetyl I switched from the Wyeast 2000 Budvar strain to the Wyeast 2278 Czech Pils. I also switched from Briess carapils to Weyermann Carafoam and had additionally intended to replace the Simpsons CaraMalt with the lighter Weyermann Carahell, but forgot to include it in my order and ended up replacing it as well with the Carafoam. I dumbly decided to drop a half pound of Weyermann Pilsner malt at the last minute due to my recently high efficiency and ended up getting only a 1.046 wort, still in line with the style and a decent efficiency but a touch lower than I had aimed for. The hops were kept the same except for a large Saaz dose replacing the Magnum.

I mashed at 156F (to partially compensate for the omitted carahell malt) with just 3 gallons for a 1.4 quart/pound ratio. I typically do thinner mashes (often over 1.5 qts/lb) and I wonder if my lower than expected efficiency was due to this change, or the high mash temp. The mash was very interesting as it was the foamiest and haziest mash I have seen. I assume this is due to the Carafoam.

The batch also boiled over with extreme vigor, something I had not seen in a long time and was not expecting on the electric stove. After the boil the beer was split between two pots which were each put in an ice bath but due to limited space I was only able to get them down to ~110F. I recombined, transferred to a 6 gallon better bottle and placed it in my chest freezer (set to 45F) in the hopes of getting it down to pitching temps overnight

There was about 4 times this much hop gunk left in the kettle

.

12/8/17
Pitched fully inflated yeast pack into wort at 48F and increased chest freezer temp to 50F
24 hours after pitching, no signs of activity, increased chest freezer temp to 55F.

12/12/17
Increased chest freezer temperature to 63F.

12/14/17
Fermentation slow but still going. Taste is mostly good clean Pilsner malt and Saaz hops with a little too much diacetyl, hopefully that clears up with another few days of warmth.

12/18/17
Surprisingly turbid looking. Pulled out of fridge to try to remove last of diacetyl. Active fermentation seems to have entirely slowed. Smells fairly butterscotchy but diacetyl taste is not as strong and has fallen in the last few days. The rest of the flavor is nicely grainy, grassy, and fairly bitter.

12/19/17
Still looks pretty turbid. Returned to fridge at 32 F.

12/20/17
No noticeable change in looks. Moved to keg still at 32 F.

12/21/17
Shockingly cloudy after 48 hours at 32 F. Taste is pretty good, a slightly aggressive spicy hop character and bitterness that lingers nicely and low to moderate diacetyl (maybe a touch higher than I'd like but not overpowering). The look and thick creamy mouthfeel are the most surprising aspects of the beer to me. I assume the high mash temperature and Carafoam likely created a lot of dextrins that left this beer looking like a NEIPA but it's hard to complain about a beer that otherwise tastes pretty good. I guess I'll call this a kellerbier now, or a New England Pilsner.

San Francisco Brew Setup and Brew Day (Maisonette 9.1)

A little backstory on this brewday: In late November I moved from the D.C. area to San Francisco. A few months prior to my move my wife Alyssa headed out to the west coast without me. Her company paid for a moving truck to take everything from her apartment in Charlottesville. To take advantage of this I moved all of my kegging equipment (and most of my other possessions) and had them shipped to sunny California. 

I kept my brewing equipment in the D.C. area (3+ months without brewing seemed unbearable) and rediscovered my dislike for bottling. Moving to San Francisco presented me with a chance to either ship my brewing system or start anew. After assessing the shipping costs I decided to gave away my fermenters, kettles, grain, and just about everything else that didn't easily fit in my checked bag which was already carrying the rest of my life. In the end I brought my yeast bank, hops stash, grain mill + drill, thermometer, refractometer, and campden tabs (to treat chlorinated water). Unfortunately my kegging setup got fairly ruined from being in the chest freezer and ended up with everything covered in rust and mold. A few PBW soaks and lots of elbow grease later I was able to save the chest freezer and temperature controller but had to replace the disconnects, tubing, regulator, manifold. Note to self: don't do that again!

Starting anew with your brewing setup has its downsides (like spending ~$1000 to replace everything) but also plenty of positives:

1. A chance to review your setup and determine what you like and what you don't: pretty happy overall with my system but it had lots of lifting, would like to minimize that
2. A chance to buy shiny new toys that you've always wanted: I bought a nice small weight scale and got a mash tun with a thermometer
3. A chance to get past those little breaks, defects, and missing components that you've just been working around: my old false bottom was loose and missing a nut, some of my old bucket fermenters were infecting everything that touched them

In many ways starting anew made me realize how happy I was with my setup: 1 boil kettle with thermometer + a 5 gallon stock pot, plastic cooler with false bottom mash tun, and plastic carboys. Pretty basic but simple to operate and capable of doing anything I've ever needed.

Some changes to my setup:

1. Switch from the propane burner I've enjoyed to an electric stovetop, fortunately I'm able to get 5 gallons of mash water to 160 in under 25 minutes and 7 gallons at 160 to boiling in under 35. This adds a little more time on brew day but not too much and can't really be avoided in an apartment.
2. My new mash tun has a thermometer. I went back and forth on adding this and ultimately feel like it was unnecessary but for only $10 more (it was on sale) than one without one its no big loss. While measuring mash temperature is hugely important and this should be convenient, it is inserted so high in the tun that I have to do a very thin mash (or a very large grain bill) to get it fully submerged.
3. Fermenting in kegs. This isn't something I plan to permanently/regularly do but the plastic carboys I ordered are arriving later than most of my other supplies so rather than delay brewing I thoroughly cleaned and sanitized the kegs. Rather than use a blow-off tube or drill into a keg lid to fit an airlock I wedged a wine cork into the ring for the pressure relief valve to keep it open during primary fermentation.
4. Immersion chiller: Without a garden hose I wasn't sure how I would be able to hook one up but have been looking at some kitchen converters because not having one is a pain.
5. No grains in bulk: While I plan to buy some bulk bags of grain they aren't cheap to ship. I also had accumulated a lot of various crystal malts and roasted malts that I could grab in a pinch. Now I have to know what's on hand.
6. Lots of small items: There are a lot of things I accumulated over years of brewing that I didn't think about when re-ordering but now regret not having. Some examples include water treatment salts, flasks, DME, mason jars, growlers, small fermenters (e.g. 1 gallon jugs).
7. Not being able to compost: Throwing spent grains and hops/trub in a compost pile and rinsing out with a garden hose has been such a convenient way to dispose of brew day waste. Now I have to move all waste into a bag and throw in the trash. I also don't have a garbage disposal so I have to be very careful about what goes down the drain.

Beer and brew day: In order to break in the new system and keep things somewhat simple I went with another iteration of my tried and true Maisonette. This should also ensure that I have a delicious beer on tap in no time. The brew day went pretty well with no real difficulties although I omitted the usual turbinado sugar since I didn't have any on hand, leading to a slightly lower gravity than usual. I split the wort between 2 kegs (3 gallons in each 5 gallon keg) and pitched my Maisonette blend from the last batch in one and a fresh pitch of Wyeast Belgian Saison in the other. I also collected about 1.5 gallons of second runnings which was pitched with dregs from the DCHB Blend #5 in order to build up the culture.

4 ounces of hops in six gallons of a 1.035 beer

Updates:
Belgian Saison:
After 12 hours: light bubbles, but no real krausen
After 24 hours: Large krausen
After 96 hours: Fermentation still noticeably active. Gravity down to ~1.018 based on refractometer reading of 1.025. Tasting good but a little too sweet and worty at this early stage.
After 120 hours: Pressure relief valve closed to minimize oxygen.
Transferred to serving keg set to PSI. I came back two hours later to find my kegerator full of a brown liquid. The picnic tap had fallen to a spot where it was being compressed by the roof of the chest freezer and had managed to all leak out :-(. Three gallons of amazing beer down the drain.

Maisonette Blend:
After 12 hours: No real activity
After 24 hours: Still no real activity, Wallonian Farmhouse II from TYB added in case other yeast was completely dead.
After 36 hours: Still no real activity
After 48 hours: Finally bubbling away with a small krausen
After 72 hours: Still active bubbling in krausen
After 96 hours: Fermentation seriously slowed. Gravity down to ~1.003 based on refractometer reading of 1.015. Tasting okay but there's a little of the bubblegum from the Wallonian II that I don't love. Pressure relief valve closed to minimize oxygen.
Transferred to serving keg and set to 20 PSI. Taste is mostly nice hops and a bit of fruity yeast character with just a very slight tartness and weird gym sock funk.
Update: This keg kicked pretty quickly but was a tasty beer similar to many other batches. Not the best batch I've made but not far off with the funky character fading a bit to give way to more of the fruity hops and yeast.

Second Runnings Beer (1.015 OG):
After 12 hours: No real activity
After 24 hours: Still no real activity, my Sour Blend #1 (Roeselare+dregs) added
After 36 hours: Small krausen
After 72 hours: Krausen activity very slow, pressure relief valve closed to minimize oxygen.
After 96 hours: Gravity down to 1.003 based on refractometer reading of 1.015. Taste is fine, fairly clean and bland at this point. Reminds me of an under-soured Berliner.
Transferred about 1 gallon to a water bottle and caught a jar of the yeast slurry. Taste is similar to before, thin, bland, under-soured, and pretty uninteresting.

Citrusy Farmhouse

When someone asks me what my favorite beer is I often have a tough time answering. My mind goes back to the great beers I've enjoyed and the fun experiences I have had around them: the time I had St. Bernardus 12 with friends shortly after turning 21, and the Westvleteren 12 I brought back from Belgium a few years later; the unfiltered Pilsner Urquell I was lucky enough to enjoy in Prague and the truly terrific bock I stumbled upon at Devil's Backbone; the first Russian River Sanctification I had when my brother introduced me to sour beers and the Cantillon gueuze I consumed after touring their spiderweb filled brewery.  Along with these commercial favorites there are homebrewed beers that come to mind: Scott's NEIPA, Sean's Rye IPA, and Mike's Anna dreg Saison. While all of these beers have been revolutionary, eye-opening experiences for me, Mike's beer was the first one to make me angry: angry that someone had already brewed the perfect mixed fermentation saison.

Knowing very little about the beer, Mike's blog post was not up yet at the time I brewed this beer and his responses my question on ingredients was: "some pale malts, some low alpha hops, some dregs from Hill Farmstead Anna" which wasn't enough to design a clone, especially when I didn't have access to Anna bottles. Still, I set out to brew something similar: a citrusy mixed fermentation farmhouse ale with mild-to-moderate tartness and mild-to-moderate funk.

While my End of a Spark citrusy farmhouse ale didn't give the exact flavors of Mike's it nailed the high citrus, moderate funk, and moderate tartness qualities I was chasing, while also using entirely different ingredients than his.

I took about a case of bottles of this beer to DC Homebrewers annual BBQ and competition hosted at 3 Stars Brewing. The beer was generally well received and even got an honorable mention from the judges!

Note: I had planned to take some pictures of this beer and do a full write up but accidentally took the last few to a blending session (post on that possibly to come). In all, this was an enjoyable beer that I would happily make again.