Maisonette ‘23 - Mosaic Grisette

Appearance: Fairly hazy light gold color with a nice fluffy white head of small bubbles with good retention. Pretty much exactly what I’d expect in a saison.

Smell: Earth, spice, pine, citrus. Slightly more herbal (oregano/sage) and earthy/grassy than the floral and fruity chamomile and juicy-fruit gum I would ideally get. There are light elements of those fruit/flower components and enough white pepper to clearly be a saison though.

Taste: Leads with a moderately grainy malt flavor that then segues into some light juicy-fruit and pear like fruitiness with some grassy and herbal hop bitterness and moderate peppery phenols at the finish.

Mouthfeel: Moderate body and carbonation, surprising how full it feels given the low finishing gravity, though the yeast may have produced some glycerol that gives that effect. The carbonation being less than very high also doesn’t help the body and may be the biggest fault this beer has as far as a saison.

Overall: I’m not surprised this beer didn’t do well in one competition - while it’s a beer I like a lot, the mosaic hops always seem to cause confusion when this is entered as a saison. That said, I’m happy with the beer and find it to be similar to a lot of previous batches I’ve made, though not the best examples. There was a short period when the hop aromas had just started to fade where this beer seemed to be at the edge of what I’m aiming for but I now have to search hard for the floral and fruity characters I’d like to see pop here.

Notes for the future: I’ll likely go back to a Pilsner or Pale Ale Malt base for future batches and won’t necessarily go back for spelt over malted or unmalted wheat, I also think dialing back the wheat/spelt percentage would probably be a good idea. The Napolean and Rustic yeasts seemed to work really well here and I wouldn’t hesitate to use them again, although I might aim for a slightly higher fermentation temperature to increase the fruity esters. I also don’t think the higher hop load was a bad change, though doing a longer hop steep at moderate temperatures might be better than the flameout hop addition and I’m not sure the extra ounce+ of hops made much of an impact so I’ll likely go back to the 4 oz version in the future.

2/20/23: Brewday

Grain Bill: 5 pounds 6 row (Rahr), 1 pound Pilsner (Sugar Creek), 2 pounds spelt malt (Best Malz)

Hops: 5.35 oz Mosaic

Mashed at 152 for 30 minutes, which fell to 145 over that time before adding additional water to bring to 158 for another 30 minutes. Batch sparged at 170F.

.35 oz mosaic added at first wort and boiled for 60 minutes, 1 oz flameout hops added when cutting flame and immediately rapidly chilled. After reaching 170 the chiller was stopped and 2 oz mosaic added and let sit for 10 minutes. Temperature fell to near 150 during this time and chiller was started briefly to bring to 140. 2 more oz of hops were added and let sit for 10 more minutes before slowly chilling to 80F. Ran off wort into carboy, collected 5 gallons at 1.042 and pitched a pack of Imperial Rustic. Because the wort was under intended volume and over intended gravity, I boiled, chilled, and added another half gallon to reach 5.5 gallons at 1.038.

2/21/23: yeast is fermenting strong less than 24 hours after pitching with a decent sized krausen and plenty of airlock activity.

2/23/23: Krausen has fallen and the beer is no longer showing any signs of active fermentation. Sample shows 1.008. Smells terrific with juicy fruit gum and a touch of pine aroma but weirdly the sample is thin, not very flavorful, and roughly bitter, hopefully it just needs some time. Added Napolean yeast harvested from Hoppy Black Saison to attempt to dry it out further and do what it does.

2/24/23: No signs of activity, moved to a warmer area in the basement near a vent.

2/26/23: Gravity sample shows the beer has dropped slightly to 1.006 and is also tasting much better and fuller at this point, may have just needed more time but the Napolean may also be adding some slight character that improves the overall impression.

3/1/23: Kegged.

3/17/23: Tasting (notes were somehow lost, will need to redo, but photos below)

4/2/2023: This beer did not place in it's category at the DC Homebrewers’ Cherry Blossom competition receiving a 27 (which seems harsh in my opinion). One judge commented that everything in the beer seemed too subtle (I wouldn't agree with that) while the other knocked it for being too fruity and tropical (that's probably accurate). This beer isn't brewed "to style" for a saison so while other variations of Maisonette have been received well in competitions that use audience favorite style judging or when entered in specialty categories, I don't think it's worth entering in any more BJCP style competitions as a saison (other than the one that I've already sent it too).

4/4/23: Tasting, notes above.

5/1/23: This beer surprisingly placed second out of twelve entries in the Belgian Ale & German Wheat category at the BURP Spirit of Free Beer competition. The beer scored a 34 and was only beat out in the category by another saison that went on to win Best of Show for the entire competition.

StarTropics ‘22

My dog enjoying play time during the brew day

Yet another rebrew of a recipe that I’ve enjoyed in the past. As with my last brew (Breakfast Stout) I attempted to aim for my favorite of the versions I had previously made but there’s no guarantee I’ll get the same results. This hazy/New England style IPA recipe has changed a lot over time but for this attempt I’m going back to the version that was co-crowd favorite at the DCHB BBQ at 3 Stars brewing many years ago. While I did make a blog post about that beer and have what seems to be the recipe (it was only labeled as StarTropics and I've lost most of my recipes over the years) I don’t have a lot of my notes, including the water profile, mash temperature, and the temperatures for the hop rest. I’m also not sure these were the exact hop additions used, including the ratios being different than I remember and the 60 minute hop addition seeming fairly large. With the hoppy saison I recently brewed already tasting more hoppy and bitter than expected I decided to lean towards a less hoppy recipe for this one and cut the 60 minute hop addition (in this case a first wort hop addition) from 1.5 oz to .5 and used the Comet I have on hand in place of Nugget. I considered cutting the boil hops entirely but did not want to stray too far from the previous recipe and didn't particularly care for the last no boil hop NEIPA I brewed.

Due to the lack of notes from that recipe I decided to take detailed brew day notes this time in case this batch also turns out particularly well (or to have a reference if there’s things to improve upon).

Tasting Notes:

This beer never fully turned around (detailed process notes below) but I'll do a full set of tasting notes anyway.

Appearance: Nice golden hue and substantial, but not offensive to my tastes, levels of haze. Finally pours with a small head though it recedes to a small ring fairly quickly. Looks the part of a hazy IPA in most ways.

Smell: Sweet overripe fruit (melon, papaya) and earthy, hay-like, sweet malt dominate with a light touch of citrus peel and pine.

Taste: Subtle fruity and dank characters lead with a big sweet malt middle finishing with a piney and herbal bitter ending. Touches of lemongrass, pine, earth, and melon throughout but none of the big, bold, tropical fruit character I would expect from the hops used. Adding the acid and calcium chloride seems to have knocked out most of the rough edges but may have also tampered down on the desirable hop characteristics.

Mouthfeel: Relatively low carbonation but moderate body, there's a lingering effect in the mouth that I believe is due to the calcium chloride but may also be from the oats or hops. While it could still probably use a little more carbonation it's not unenjoyable at this level.

Overall: A relatively disappointing beer. Far from the worst I've made but the hops just don't pop with the fruity, juicy, tropical character that they should and instead the overall impression feels a bit green and lackluster. Next time I will likely cut out the sugar and golden naked oats and use all 2-row rather than Maris Otter to keep the malt bill more straightforward (though I might add some wheat), shift to using more of the hops in the boil and late hop stand and filter more of the hops during the transfer to the carboy in order to reduce the grassy/green/polyphenol characteristics, and probably adjust the water chemistry to use less calcium chloride or at least less in proportion to the amount of gypsum. In the end I don't hate this beer and have no plans to dump it but it doesn't excite me like the best versions of my StarTropics recipes have.

3/18/22
Weighed and milled grain in preparation for brewing today. Collected 4 gallons and added 2g CaCl and 1g Gypsum for the mash water. I had planned to use twice as much of each but ran out of gypsum. I also collected another separate 4 gallons for the sparge and added a quarter campden tablet to each.

All grains for the mash bill mixed together

3/19/22
Brewday

Mashed in with 3 gallons of 180F strike water hitting my target 155F.

Hop smells from freshly opened 2021 hop pellet bags from Hops Direct:

Comet: Light pineapple and mango, some other tropical and citrus aromas. Light grassy and earthy aromas.

Citra: more pungent papaya and mango. More lemongrass than grass/earth.

Azacca: again similar with some light pineapple and red papaya. Lighter earth/grass than comet but not really the lemongrass of Citra.

Galaxy: very different. Still some pineapple and tropical fruit smells and lemongrass but with a pungent pine/dank/funk character

All 4 smell enjoyable and carry similar tropical fruit notes. After walking out of the room the hops were in then re-entering I was hit with a huge blast of tropical fruit hop aroma, hopefully some of this makes it into the beer.

After 55 minutes I added about 1 gallon of water at 180F to the mash, stirred and then let sit for 5 more minutes. After vorlauf first runnings were run into kettle with 8 oz Batey’s turbinado sugar and 0.5 oz Comet hops. Stirred occasionally to well mix sugar during run off. Added last 4+ gallons of sparge water to mash and let sit for a 5 minute batch sparge before running off. After about 15 minutes of running off the kettle had reached 6.5 gallons and was put back on the burner to boil.

Preboil gravity of 1.042. As with my last batch this is a touch lower than estimated but shouldn’t be too far off by the end of the boil (estimated 1.050 instead of the expected 1.055). 45 minutes into the boil I added the immersion wort chiller. 15 minutes later I cut the flame and began chilling.

Overshot chilling slightly at got down to 170F before realizing. Cut chiller and added first 3 oz hop dose. Let sit for about 25 minutes before returning. Temperature had fallen to 150F so I added the second hop dose and started the chiller again. Stopped chiller after about 5 minutes and let sit at 120 for another 10 minutes. After chilling to just under 80F wort was transferred to a 6 gallon carboy and a pack of Wyeast London Ale III pitched. OG measured as 1.052, just a touch below expected. I'll need to either tighten my mill or just slightly lower my efficiency expectations going forward. No filter was used when transferring from the kettle so this one has a lot of hop particulate, hopefully this only helps provide additional character and doesn't cause any issues.

3/20/22
Showing active signs of fermentation about 24 hours after pitching. Turbulent and brightly green in appearance, there is plenty of hops moving around in this one.

3/21/22
Still bubbling with a big krausen nearly taking up all the head space. May need to remove the bung temporarily if it gets any bigger. Inspecting the recipe further after brew day I recognized that the recipe shows only a 45 minute boil, so maybe the 1.5 oz of hops were used in the past batch but not boiled for a full hour, if so this beer should be lower in bitterness than that batch.

3/22/22
Bubbling has slowed, may be in part due to the ambient temperature cooling off some. Still a large krausen though not as voluminous as yesterday.

3/24/22
Gravity at 1.017 so it should still have a little ways to go. Taste is a bit harsh and more bitter than expected but not terrible. Hoping the harshness is just due to the amount of yeast and hop particulate in the sample at this point and fades with another week or so of fermenting and some conditioning. Added the first dry hop dose directly to the carboy.

3/28/22
Gravity down to 1.012 which is the expected FG. Taste is alright but more piney and astringent than desired without the level of tropical fruit character intended. I might keg this one sooner than expected to get it off the hop material, although I do plan to add keg hops.

3/29/22
Added 1g CaCl boiled in 100mL of water and 2mL 88% lactic acid. The acid addition was inspired by this post from Scott Janish showing a possible reduction in the grassy and astringent bitterness character when pH is reduced. I'm hoping these additions improve the beer but I intentionally went fairly low on each as I can always add more during or after kegging.

3/30/22
Transferred to keg in 31F keezer with last 3 oz. dose of hops in a stainless steel tube. Taste is a bit muted and overly harsh but not terrible. Hopefully some time at cold temperatures will help it clean up and the keg hops can add some brightness but I don’t think this one is going to fully turn around.

4/2/22
Was able to serve this at a housewarming party. Probably the least popular of the 4 beers on tap and definitely a bit undercarbonated. Not bad but not a particularly good hazy. We'll see what a little more time and carbonation does for it.

4/12/22

Tasting date, tasting notes above.

Munich Melon Hülles Lager

Nelson Version

I took a bit of a break from brewing (and even more of a break from blogging) but got back to it in January with a hoppy lager that is partially inspired by a line from Scott Janish's great book The New IPA. Specifically there's a note that Hüll Melon (sometimes written Huell Melon) is high in the 2MIB (2-methylbutyl isobutyrate) thiol which gives an apricot-like character, and can be enhanced even more with a lager fermentation. Some of these ideas are explored in this blog post by Scott. A fruity, (especialy apricot-y and melon-y) Munich Helles might not be classic but the subtle malt sweetness and graininess should lend balance and space for the hops to shine, without this coming out as a hazy IPA (or IPL). Searching around the internet it seems that a Helles with Hüll Melon has been done before by several breweries, including one of my favorite East Bay brewers, Original Pattern, with their Hella Hüll Helles Lager. I'll have to track down a can to compare with my version.



1/20/2020 Brew Day
Made a vitality starter of 8 oz DME, 1g Fermaid-k, 1800 mL water, 2 moderately old packs of Wyeast 2308 Munich Lager and a blend of lager yeast saved from my SMaSH Pils.

After several recent batches came out with a strange, harsh character I decided to not treat the water for this batch at all. While I'm not sure water chemicals are the cause of my recent issues I've narrowed it down to a few possible factors and this seemed like the easiest one to test. If this batch experiences the same issues I'll try adjusting my mill settings and do a full inspection of my equipment and review of my processes to see if there's another possible culprit. I'm including extra notes on this batch here to be able to pinpoint the cause of the issue if it happens as well too

Measured and milled 7.25 pounds Weyermann Pilsner malt and 9 oz Briess Goldpils Vienna. I planned to use Carahell but forgot I was out, should come out a little crisper and maltier with the Vienna but with a similar color.

Hit 152 on the direct infusion (a few degrees cooler than expected but close enough). Added half an ounce of hops to the first wort and began heating while batch sparging. Hit a combined pre-boil gravity of 1.039, about what was expected for the target 1.047 OG. Boiled for 1 hour then rapidly cooled with immersion chiller (added 45 minutes into boil) to 160. Added the 1.5 ounces of whirlpool hops then continued chilling for about 15 minutes to 68F (room temp). Ran off to plastic carboy through silicon tubing and moved carboy to chest freezer set to 50F. Pitched yeast a few hours later.

1/24/2020
Fermentation still going moderately with a medium sized krausen. Plan to move out of chest freezer to ~65F room temp for a few days once fermentation begins to drop. Smell from fermentation is strong with sulfur stink, hopefully that's being pushed out and won't carry to the final beer.

1/25/2020
Left in chest freezer but adjusted temperature up to 65F. Will likely take a few days to warm that high.

1/31/2020
No noticeable diacetyl on tasting and gravity down to 1.014. Set chest freezer to 32F for quick lagering.

2/6/2020
Split between 2 separate 2.5 gallon kegs, one plain one with an ounce of Nelson Sauvin hops.

2/19/2020

Plain Version

This one has been on tap for a couple of weeks and is a pretty enjoyable helles at this point. While there was a decent amount of fruitiness from the hops in the non-dry hopped version originally that has largely faded into a bready malt forward easy drinking lager. The dry hopped version was terrific early on, then seemed to experience some hop creep and had diacetyl, it was removed from the chest freezer for a few days and seemed to clear up but the hop character mostly faded as well.

3/28/20
Nelson half kicked, it was a really nice easy drinker with just enough fruity hop character to keep it interesting. The un-dryhopped version is much more straight forward, it's extremely easy to drink but is arguably too clean and many craft beer lovers would probably find it boring.

Wheat Beer Split Batch Tastings

I had originally planned to do separate tastings of the two beers that came out of my wheat beer split batch but life has gotten in the way recently and after a few attempts to write about each in half asleep states that ended with half legible notes I decided to use a day off to taste each and get a full description down.

Pink Dream Hibiscus Wit:
Appearance - Medium red in color with great clarity, probably the best I've had in a beer without finings. The head is the palest shade of pink, just off white, and has decent retention for a sour but fades to a small ring after a few minutes. More red than the pink I was aiming for but part of that is the base beers darkness and it's still a really pretty beer. Redder and clearer than the picture above would indicate.

Smell - Fruit (cherry, lychee, mixed berries) with some lower floral character. Light toasty and caramel malt in the presence.

Taste - Moderate tartness washes into sweet raspberry and passionfruit juice character that finishes with just enough sourness to balance the sweetness. Not noticeably salty but with a slight lingering note that might be the sodium.

Mouthfeel - Low to moderate body and carbonation, not as carbonated as I would like. The sweetness could probably be cut by more carbonation but it's not offensive.

Overall - A refreshing beer with no off flavors and plenty of fruitiness but not quite as sour or salty as I would like from a gose. The Lychee and Passionfruit extracts came across extremely strong and artificial in the first few pours but haven't been noticeable in the mix since. Were I to label the beer as having those elements I would need to use more, but with the hibiscus as the focus the subtle fruit approach worked. If I were to brew this again I would probably up the salt by 50-100% and give the lacto another day. I would also like to use a more subtle base (no caravienne) to cut some of the sweetness.



Green Spree Hoppy American Wheat:
Appearance - Deep coppery gold. Moderately cloudy, though some pours are fairly clear. Changing CO2 tanks and re-carbonating seems to have shaken up some hops. White head is small but steady with lots of lacing and small bubbles.

Smell - Green apple, pine, and lime lead the aroma with caramel and toasted malt.

Taste - Leads with citrus and apple that lead to a pine needle, citrus peel, and sweet caramel sugary middle before finishing with peach, pine, and a strange mix of lingering bitterness and sweetness.

Mouthfeel - Medium heavy in body and medium low in carbonation. Could use more carbonation and a lighter body but works okay as is.

Overall - This one doesn't quite work. While each of the elements seem to have given what I had looked for the blend just doesn't come together as well as I anticipated, with the sweetness of the malt and the strong apple and pine characters seeming to drown out the other elements. I can see why this base would work better with more citrus and tropical character of Fortunate Islands. With some time the hop flavors have harmonized some with the citrus coming more into focus but the sweetness of the malt and orchard fruit of the yeast still leave it a little candy like and strange. Not a bad beer but one that I won't brew again without significant adjustments.

Wheat Beer Split Batch (Green Spree Hoppy Wheat and Pink Dream Fruited Gose)

I love doing split batches when I homebrew. It allows me to double (or more than double) the number of beers I'm able to create with almost no increase in effort or time. Another proponent of splitting batches is Michael Tonsmeire who spoke about this very topic on the Experimental Brew's Brew Files podcast. This was perfect timing given that I was making a similar split batch (1/2 hoppy, 1/2 sour) and using the grain bill from one of Mike's recipes (Fortunate Islands) to do it.

Green Spree is inspired by both Mike/Modern Time's Fortunate Islands recipe and Mike's business partner Scott Janish's flavor descriptors for El Dorado hops as tasting like "Green Spree" candy. To up the green (in my mind this means sour apple but also lime, grass, and pine) character I added Warrior (which I found to have pine, grass and lime) and Centennial (resinous and citrusy) hops to the bill. The goal for this recipe is to sit somewhere between the light-to-moderate bitterness and hop character of my Pilsner and the heavily hopped West Coast NEIPA I have on tap, while still giving a chance to explore some new hops that I've been holding onto for a long time.

Pink Dream is a take on the classic Leipziger style featuring salt and a lactobacillus driven sourness but with the twist of orange peel instead of coriander plus an increased sweetness and darker color from the Caravienne malt. I also plan to add a hibiscus tea and possibly lychee or passionfruit to the beer to up the fruitiness and quenchability. The gose formulation (especially in terms of salt levels) and hibiscus addition (in terms of dosing and method) were inspired by Mike's Gose and Hibiscus Wit.

Not surprisingly the two beers appeared very different in the fermenters with the Green Spree half being hazier and having a more vigorous krausen while the Pink Dream half had little foaming even during the peak of fermentation and was much clearer and looked darker due to this.

Green Spree (Hoppy Half):
12/14/17 Brew Day
Expected OG: 1.045
Actual OG: 1.053
Expected Efficiency: 75%
Actual Efficientcy: 85%
Expected FG: 1.012
Actual FG: 1.015

12/18/17
Added dry hops to Green Spree. Gravity down to 1.015 (7.5 Plato refractometer reading). Tastes fairly sweet but also moderately hoppy and tasty.

12/22/17
Transferred to 3 gallon keg. Tasting hoppy but a bit grassier and harsher than expected.


Pink Dream (Gose Half):
12/14/17 Brew Day
Expected OG: 1.045
Actual OG: 1.042
Expected Efficiency: 75%
Actual Efficientcy: 70%
Expected FG: 1.013
Actual FG: 1.010

I pulled off 3 gallons for this half just after the combined wort hit a boil. This was then cooled to 100F and Lactobacillus Delbrueckii was added. Prior to pitching the Lacto I pre-acidified the wort with 3 tablespoons of 10% phosphoric acid in hopes to minimize the protein denaturing. After 12 hours I pitched a GoodBelly Straightshot due to concerns with the Lacto Del's souring capacity. 24 hours later I pitched a pack of S-04. I left my pH meter in Maryland so I had to just use taste of the sour wort and other people's experience to determine timing.

12/18/17
Pink Dream half down to 1.010 (5 Plato refractometer reading). Moderately sour with a noticeable but not overwhelming saltiness and some sweetness.

1/2/18
Added hibiscus by adding 1.5 cups of nearly boiling water to 1 oz. hibiscus poured into carboy. 1/2 oz each Amoretti Lychee Compound and Passionfruit Swirl added to keg with the beer then racked on top. Has good color, strong fruitiness, but it comes off slightly artificial. Hopefully the first pour just had more of the extracts than the rest of the batch and with some time the flavor will meld more.

1/16/18
Brought a swing top bottle of this to a San Francisco Homebrewers Guild meeting. Mostly positive response with several noting low salt levels (intended but below style requirements) and a mixed response to the hibiscus levels (some saying too high, others thinking it was a subtle enough touch to not overpower the beer).

Westward On (West Coast NEIPA)

NEIPA has taken the brewing world by storm. It's all at once loved, reviled, overrated, misunderstood, poorly made, perfected, singular, and widely varying. The main rules for making an NEIPA are: it has to be hazy and it has to be hoppy. There are some secondary characteristics including fruity hops, thick mouthfeel, and sweetness/less IBUs than a traditional IPA that are generally, but not always, desired. There are also a wide range of approaches to all of these characteristics

After moving to the West Coast I was strongly considering brewing a classic West Coast style IPA: bitter, dry, aggressive, piney, dank, citrusy. As I started making the grain and hop bill for this recipe I realized I could have a lot of those things but still take the best of NEIPA (less bitterness, less caramel malt, more body) and make a beer that I would truly want to drink.

Another part of my direction in brewing this IPA (and a few other hoppy beers I have planned) is the abundance of hops I have accumulated that made it to San Francisco with me. Over the years I have bought pounds of hops at various times and rarely finished a full bag. For this beer I decided to use the last 1/2 oz of an old bag of Amarillo, and decent amounts of Citra and Nugget that I had bought full pounds of in the past couple years.

A large portion of my hop collection also came from a mix of 2 oz 2015 hop packs from Yakima Valley Hops as a prize for my win in the DC Homebrewers BBQ competition (maybe not surprisingly with an NEIPA). Since then I have only brewed a small handful of hoppy beers, and have not ventured into the world of many of these hops, so I decided to include Comet in this recipe.

With these things in mind I created and brewed my first West Coast IPA (West Coast in brewing location if not style) and I'm really excited about it. Based on recent research by Scott I opted to go light on the oats, moderately heavy on the carafoam, fairly high on the calcium chloride, and high on the mash temperature with just a touch of caramel malt and sulfate to show some classic IPA character. For bonus points I named the beer after a lyric from a Bay Area band.

Westward On IPA Recipe
Expect OG: 1.061
Actual OG: 1.064
Estimated Efficiency: 75%
Actual Efficiency: 79%
Expected FG: 1.014
Actual FG: 1.013
Apparent Attenuation: 79%
ABV: 6.7%

 

Tasting Notes:

Appearance: Bright golden color with moderate haze. Voluminous white head that sticks around for a while and leaves pretty lacing all the way down the glass. A pretty photogenic beer that makes me crave a sip immediately. Probably somewhere between West Coast and NEIPA in terms of haze and color, certainly not milkshake-y but only moderately translucent. Has gotten clearer with time in the cold chest freezer but probably won't get much clearer than this.

Smell: Grapefruit, candied orange peel, Christmas tree pine, fall foliage, light touches of tropical/papaya and apricot yielding a mostly classic IPA hop character. There's some slight malt with caramel/toast mixing in with the leaf character. Not as fruit forward and tropical as I like but a pleasant mix that smells like an IPA.

Taste/Mouthfeel: This one goes down easy with just some light citrus up front followed by a lot of pine, papaya, and orange peel that lingers into a fairly dry and strongly bitter finish that draws me back for more. The carbonation level feels much lower than I expected for the 15 PSI it has been sitting at and the body feels full but not as creamy as an NEIPA and with a dry but refreshing finish. There's both a little bit of a weird onion character and some astringency in the mix but not enough of either to ruin the beer in anyway.

Overall: Sometimes I have a hard time determining whether my beers are good or not. This is especially true of IPAs and this one certainly falls in that category. The beer looks great and I have found myself easily downing a pint (or more) while trying to determine how I feel about it. I think it's probably a pretty solid IPA that just doesn't hit the high notes of my favorite NEIPAs or my favorite hoppy beers in general. That said, it does seem to do a pretty solid job of straddling the line between East Coast and West Coast IPAs with plenty of bitterness but also some haze and body. This yeast blend, and other features of this beer, may not be ideal for really bringing out the sweet and tropical characters I am looking for but they turned out a solid IPA.

 

12/11/17 Brew day notes: Did not hit the high mash temperature I was going for, as I forgot to correct the calculator's strike temp for my system (I always hit ~5 degrees less than expected) and only mashed in at 154. I did a fairly thin mash and a hybrid fly sparge.

1/4 oz. Columbus hops were added during the sparge, with 1/2 oz. Amarillo added 30 minutes after the boil, 1 oz. Nugget added 15 minutes later, 10 minutes later I turned off the electric stove and added the Citra and left on the same burner for 5 minutes at a near boil. Whirlpool hops were added in several additions in the middle of chilling, from around 200 F to around 160 F.

Chilling in multiple ice baths for 3 hours was only able to bring temperature down to 75. Pitched 800mL starter of my current "Inglés" yeast blend and an old, but not yet expired, pack of Nottingham dry yeast.

12 hours later the beer is fermenting heavily and airlock was replaced with a blowoff tube. Surprisingly not a ton of hop aromas coming off. Beer temp down to 69 F.




12/18/17
Added dry hops. Gravity down to 1.013 (7.5 plato refractometer reading). Smells a bit solventy and harsh but taste is more of a classic Pale Ale/IPA piney hoppiness.

12/22/17
Racked to 5 gallon keg with 2 more ounces of Citra and my stainless steel filter over the out tube. Less volume than I planned (noticeably less than 5 gallons) given the 5.5 gallon recipe size and relative volume in the fermenter but a decent amount was lost to trub and hops as expected. Tastes strongly hoppy but the balance isn't quite right. Hopefully a little time on the keg hops will help.

1/5/18

Tasting notes above.

StarTropics 3.0

What makes a beer a beer? I don't mean to ask what beer is so much as what makes a particular brand of beer that brand.The bottle of beer in my hand is, at some level, chemically different than any other beer with the same label even if from the same six pack. At the professional level brewers work hard to have quality control so that every Budweiser tastes like a Budweiser and every Heady Topper tastes like a Heady Topper, but even then there is an acceptable level of variability.

When I first set out with the goal of making StarTropics I envisioned it as a cross between a red IPA and a Brettanomyces saison. The goal was to get a beer that had a gorgeous red color, tons of tropical fruit hop character, fruit and slight funk character from the brettanomyces, with a finish that was dry, slightly spicy, and refreshing. Over time the goal has been somewhat pared down, first transitioning to a 100% brettanomyces beer to reduce some of the funky and spicy character, then to dropping the brettanomyces all together. Today I am brewing a beer that has little in common with my original design: it is no longer intended to be red, or have a large amount of yeast derived characteristics. So is this still StarTropics or just a New England IPA that uses a hopping bill that I liked? Does any of this matter? Not really, but it's fun to think about the recipe creation process from all angles and sometimes the branding can be one part of what shapes a recipe.

This beer came out almost exactly how I had hoped for: light colored and fairly cloudy with huge hop aroma and flavor and only moderately high bitterness. The beer won (well tied) for crowd favorite at the DC Homebrewers annual BBQ competition where I got lots of great feedback. I likely won't change much about this recipe the next time I brew it except possibly to increase the dry hopping rate.

Doing a tasting after over a month in the keg, the cloudiness and hop aromas have faded some but still an enjoyable beer.

Appearance- Deep gold, moderately hazy, some hop particulate noticeable. Head is large and pillowy

Smell- Tropical fruit and pine lead the way giving - mango, papaya, resin, grapefruit. A little more typical American IPA and less complex than when fresh but still a nice mix.

Taste- Hop flavor - again tropical, light pine, citrus fruit - lead the way, some malt sweetness - not caramelly or malty as just a light sugar sweetness, followed by a moderate bitterness that builds slightly in the finish to fully balance and then overtake the sweetness.

Mouthfeel- Super smooth and silky medium body. Hard to tell how much the oats contribute versus yeast and other grains but the balance works great regardless. Carbonation is medium - the beer has been at 10 PSI in the mid 30s for a while now.

Overall - Even over a month old this beer is drinking very nicely. It's not the best NEIPA I've had (we can't all be Scott Janish) but it's one of the best hop dominated beers I have brewed.

Imperial IPA Tasting

When I first racked my Imperial IPA to the keg I felt that, despite 6 oz. of dry hops and 6 oz. of hops divided between the late boil and the hop steep, the beer still underwhelmed in hop flavor so I decided to add 4 oz. of keg hops split between the 4 varieties (Amarillo, Cascade, Chinook, and Nugget) already used in the brew.

When I next attempted to taste this beer about a week later I found that the keg (new to me but very much a "used" keg) was leaking gas and that the beer was only marginally carbonated, the results were so underwhelming that I decided not to review and wait until either I was able to fix the issue or could rack to an empty keg.  With my oatmeal stout finally kicking I had a spare keg that could hold pressure and racked from the old keg (and off of the keg hop) into the "new" keg that had housed the stout.  While one day in this keg isn't going to be enough to fix the carbonation issues, and the extended time spent in a semi-closed environment (both due to oxygen and the sheer amount of time) may have already ruined some of the hop aromatics of this beer, but I decided to do a tasting now that I could come back and re-review should this beer turn around.

A- Cloudy copper with a small but sticky white head.  This beer was not nearly as cloudy previously, but did seem to have some noticeable hop particles.  I probably should have added some gelatin while I was moving it to the new keg.

Not a good photo of a not very good beer.  Yes, my desk is very crowded right now.

S- Pine, caramel, dank, pineapple, all fairly light in presence for the style but not unappealing.

T- Sweet and fruity up front fades quickly to a moderately strong and resinous bitterness.  The sugar seems to have given both some rummy alcohol presence and burnt marshmallow characteristics while the hop character is low for the style and pretty underwhelming.  The alcohol is just short of burning, it certainly seems much more alcoholic than the 8.7% estimated ABV would imply.

M- Alcohol presence seems to make this one feel even thinner and less carbonated than it is.  Lack of carbonation certainly doesn't help.

O- Not sure what went so wrong with this one.  The beer is not terrible as a beer, but is extremely off the mark for an imperial IPA (or an IPA of any kind for that matter) with the bitterness being a touch too low, the alcohol a touch too strong, and the hop aromatics and flavor being extremely lacking. I'm pretty disappointed in how this one stands now, one of my lesser "hoppy" beers and certainly not matching up with the better than average results I've had recently across the board.

One factor that certainly contributed to the issues: the yeast extremely overshot the expected attenuation (85% vs. the average of 69%, giving an FG of 1.012 instead of the expected 1.024). I could see a few factors contributing to this including the very large pitch of yeast, the fact that the yeast was a second generation, and the large amount of very fermentable sugar, but it was still a bit surprising and certainly seems to have made this one more alcohol forward than expected or desired.

Side by Side Black Saison Tasting - #41 and #41B

Finally getting around to tasting my second iteration of black Saisons. A few weeks in the bottle seem to have settled these down to the point where much of the flavors I noticed at bottling- earthy funk, orange, grassy hops - have become much more subdued. The white pepper however is still bracingly strong and I would cut the amount used by half were I to do this again.

Appearance(both)- The white pepper version appeared to have a little more dregs in the bottom but both beers appear identical in the glass, with a very dark mahogany color with garnet highlights and an off white one finger head that fades slowly leaving patchy lacing. So far so good.

Straight

Smell- orange, cocoa, apple, light nuttiness, black pepper, grass/hay earthiness

Taste- surprisingly light in flavor, lightly fruity (raspberry), some earthiness, a very small appearance from the dark malts with touch of coffee when I search for it. Finishes with a bit of piney bitterness that just beats out some slight caramel/sugar sweetness and flavors on the end.

Mouthfeel- feels higher in body than would be expected for the low FG and yeast strain. Carbonation is moderate. Pretty good mouthfeel all around.

Overall- a bit lacking. The orange character seems subdued and calling this "hoppy" is a misnomer...the hops really have to be searched for. Maybe the most surprising element of the beer is the subtlety of the roasted malts, with only the occasional glimpse of ash, cocoa, coffee, etc. I had feared this beer might be dominated by these characteristics but the even moderate amounts seem underwhelming. All of that said, the beer goes down smooth with nothing too off putting, I could see those who dislike "dark beers", "hoppy beers", "Belgian beers" or "craft beers in general" finding this one fairly drinkable.

#41B White Pepper Version (with a touch of clove and ginger)

Smell- huge white pepper (somewhat herbal and very peppery) with only a touch of clove able to compete at all. As it warms some of the fruity berry character makes its way into the mix.

Taste- like the nose the pepper dominates. While only lightly spicy on the palate the flavor dominates most of the subtle characters present in the base beer with only the burnt sugar presence in the finish seeming to off a complementary element.

Mouthfeel- again, surprisingly moderate in body and carbonation. Doesn't overemphasize the pepper, in a beer where pepper is already overdone.

Overall- with the base beer coming out a little underwhelming in the flavor profile this beer is easily dominated by the high level of pepper. While white pepper may not have been a bad addition to the overall character, it should have been much more restrained to keep this from being a purely pepper flavored beer. The ginger and clove also seem lost in the mix, though they were never intended to be major components. Fans of white pepper like myself can find some enjoyment and novelty in this, and it certainly isn't undrinkable, but it really does miss the mark.

#40 - Nelson Saison Tasting

While the Brett version of this beer is still in secondary and nearing its bottling date, the straight version of this beer is running down to its last few bottles just about a month after bottling and less than two months since the brew day.  I'm hoping there will be some of this version left once the Brett version is ready, so that I can compare the two side by side, but it's hard to guarantee that with a beer that goes down this well in the summer.

A- Hazy light gold with a very small but very stable half finger head that leaves a little lace.  I likely poured a bit too much of this one out of the bottle as others I've had have had quite a bit less haze and sediment.

S- Up front is definite melon, pine, white wine, French Saison yeast funk, and just a touch of onion.  The hops are definitely the centerpiece, though the yeast seems to add to the overall spiciness and funkiness.

T- The taste is much more subdued than the nose, while still being very flavorful. Smooth kiwi/Sauvignon Blanc and moderate pine lead the way with a touch of melon, some earthiness, and light fruitiness mixing in. The onion and melon from the nose don't seem to have as much presence in the taste, making the flavor much less "dank" than the aroma.  The finish is very dry and leaves a piney bitterness that seems to hang around on the back of the throat and build in presence moments after the finish.

M- The carbonation is fairly low, but, surprisingly, this doesn't hurt the beer at all in my opinion with the flavors still fully shining through and hitting all parts of the mouth and nothing about the beer coming off as watery or weak (though it doesn't seem as strong as it's 7+% abv).  The body is nicely dry and smooth, exactly what I would expect from this yeast strain.  It's hard to tell how much the water chemistry (moderate additions of gypsum and phosphoric acid in the mash) plays in but it seems to have helped accentuate the moderate bitterness and hop character. 

O- For a recipe so simple, this beer has a ton of complexity and character.  The combination of the hops and yeast, with the malt tame enough to completely stand out of the way, this beer is a really easy drinker that has me trying to figure out what the flavors are and where they come from.  The bitterness in the finish draws me back for refreshing sip after refreshing sip.  Definitely a good beer that I could see myself brewing again or using as a basis for other beers in the future with additional hops/spices/fermentables in the mix.

#41 - Hoppy Black Saison v2.0

With how successful my first black saison came out, its amazing that it took me this long to brew another.  This recipe takes most of what I liked about the first recipe with a focus on moderation and complexity. The recipe this time, just as the first, calls for moderate amounts of a complex mix of dark roasted grains, moderate crystal malt use, moderate bitterness, moderate late and dry hops, and moderate spicing (orange peel).  The recipe also calls for French Saison and Candi Syrup as it did the first time, which should again give wonderful, complex elements that can't be found in the hops and malt alone.  This is a recipe that worked out surprisingly well the last time and it seemed as though doing lots of things, but doing so in moderation, allowed each component to come through without any dominating.

The major changes between this recipe and the original version are the change from extract to all-grain, using commercial candi syrup instead of homemade, and significant changes to the hop schedule.  The hop schedule was designed to still emphasize both citrusy American hops and spicy European hops while using what I have on hand, and the change to candi syrup is mainly for convenience but also due to how happy I was with the flavors it developed in my dubbel and quad (despite the other issues those beers experienced).

In order to minimize the harshness of the roasted grains the chocolate malt, black patent and roast barley were all added right before mash out.  Because the dark malts were added so late I used a similar water chemistry profile to my last brew (a much paler saison) with 5 grams of gypsum, 1 gram CaCl, and 8 tsp 10% phosphoric acid.

Brew day hit a few snags as the initial mash in only brought the mash to 145F instead of the intended 150F. I decided to turn this into an opportunity for a step infusion mash and after 20 minutes at 145 the temperature was adjusted with boiling water to 152F for 20 minutes, followed by 20 minutes at 160F and a final 10 minute mashout at 170F.

I also forgot to add the Candi Syrup late in the boil and will now wait to add in the next few weeks. The measured OG came in at 1.042, but I realized my hydrometer was off, reading water at only .995 (and was reading my Brett'd Saison at sub 1.000).  Assuming this .005 difference is consistent, that puts my OG closer to 1.047, which is only slightly less than I would expect given the lack of Candi Syrup at this point.

Wort tasted very sweet without much other flavors from the malts, orange peel, or hops showing through at this point.  The plan is to let this ferment to completion (likely around 2 weeks) before 2 short dry hop sessions.  Half the batch may end up receiving brettanomyces or a different twist depending on where the flavors stand, while at least half will likely be bottled as is.

Fermentables 

Efficiency: 67.0% Batch size: 5.0 gal

Fermentable Amount Use PPG Color

 2-Row (US) 9.0 lb 80% Mash 37 1  °L

 Candi Syrup D-90 1.0 lb 8% Late Boil 32 90  °L

 Caramel/Crystal 60(US) 0.5 lb 4% Mash 34 60 °L

 Chocolate (US) 4.0 oz 2 % Mash 34 412  °L

 Roasted Barley (US) 4.0 oz 2 % Mash 33 300  °L

 Black Malt 4.0 oz 2 % Mash 32 500  °L

Hop Amount Time Use Form AA

Palisades (US) 0.5   oz 60  min Boil Pellet 13.0%

Cascade (US) 0.5   oz 15  min Boil Pellet 7.0%

Opal (DE) 1.0   oz 5  min Boil Pellet 6.5%

Strisselspalt (FR) 1.0   oz 4  days Dry Hop Pellet 3.4%

Cascade (US) 0.5   oz 4  days Dry Hop Pellet 7.0%

Palisades (US) 0.5   oz 1  min Whirlpool Pellet 13.0%

Yeasts

Name Lab/Product Average Attenuation

French Saison Wyeast 3711 82.5%

Extras

Name Amount Time Use

Phosphoric Acid 8.0 tsp 60.0 min Mash

Calcium Chloride 1.0 g 60.0 min Mash

Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) 5.0 g 60.0 min Mash

Bitter Orange Peel 0.25 oz 5.0 min Boil

Sweet Orange Peel 0.5 oz 5.0 min Boil

Updates:
7-28-2014
Mixed the 1 lb. of D-90 Candi Syrup with about a quart of water, boiled, cooled and added to the fermentor.  Activity (which had completely died down) picked up again within an hour.

8-5-2014

Bottled with 2.95 oz of sugar. 25 of the 12 oz. bottles were bottled straight, while another 24 were bottled after adding the white pepper and a little bit of the ginger and clove tinctures.