Brewing a Sweet Stout

I don't really know why, but it suddenly occurred to me the other day that I haven't brewed a Stout in a very long time. Looking through my records (yes, I keep homebrewing records), I realized it had been a REALLY long time... the last stout I brewed was a clone recipe of The Portsmouth Brewery's Kate the Great, a Russian Imperial Stout, in November of 2011 (it was actually the first recipe I posted on this blog). I generally don't brew a lot of darker beers; not because I don't really enjoy them, it's just that IPAs, APAs, Ambers, Saisons, etc. are the beers I enjoy the most.

The first Stout style I ever brewed was a Sweet Stout... this was back when I was still brewing with extract and steeping specialty grains. I had just purchased Jamil's "Brewing Classic Styles", and although I had never (to my knowledge) tried a Sweet Stout before, the description in his book really appealed to me. A lot of aspects of the style gel with what your immediate expectation of a Stout would be: flavors and aromas of coffee and chocolate, moderate bitterness in the finish; basically... roasty, with a middle-of-the-road ABV (4-6%). What sets it apart from other Stouts is the presence of a "medium to high sweetness", and a medium-full to full body with a "high residual sweetness".

What makes this style so sweet? It's not a super-high mash temp, or even an extremely high presence of specialty grains... it's usually due to the addition of lactose powder (hence the other known names of this style, "Milk Stout" or "Cream Stout"). Unlike a lot of the other sugars involved in brewing, lactose is completely unfermentable by the yeast we use in homebrewing. So, when you add it during the boil, it bumps up the OG, the sweetness, and the mouthfeel of the beer. Don't get me wrong, it's not an OVERLY sweet beer (lactose has something like 1/6 the sweetness of sucrose); when brewed well, a Sweet Stout can be a really nice beer. As a result of the unfermentable lactose, the FG of a Sweet Stout is generally quite high, ranging from 1.012 to 1.024.

I brewed Jamil's recipe (again, with extract), and was really happy with how it turned out. Since then, I've been able to find a few commercial Sweet Stouts on my travels (the stand-outs were Duck Rabbit Milk Stout and Mikkeller Milk Stout), and I don't think my homebrewed beer was a nice representation. Since it has been over four years since I brewed that beer, I decided to give it another go.

Jamil's recipe has quite a large amount of dark grains... close to 20% of the grist is Black Patent, Crystal 80 L, and Pale Chocolate. At first glance, it may seem like too much, but I can assure you, with the lactose powder addition (pretty high as well: 1 lb), it all evens out in the end. Yes, the beer is roasty and chocolatey, but is nicely balanced by the sweetness. Keep in mind that Pale Chocolate malt is a much milder form compared to your typical Chocolate malt - it's normally about half the SRM, and really adds more chocolate notes to your beer, as opposed to the roasted flavors and aromas of regular Chocolate malt. If you don't have access to Pale Chocolate malt, you can add Chocolate, but go with about half the amount. The mash temp of all this grain isn't too high... aim for about 151 F.

Depending on your water, you may want to add some bicarbonate to make sure your mash pH isn't too low... I encourage you to check out the EZ Water Calculator and enter your water specs, if you know them. My water works fairly well for this style of beer; I added a bit of calcium chloride and gypsum, not to lower the mash pH, but to bump up the calcium levels to an appropriate range.

Normally in my posts, the hop paragraph is the biggest one, but this couldn't be much simpler. Grab an English variety of some sort (Goldings is a popular one), and add enough at 60 minutes to give you about 30 IBUs. I went with WGV, another English variety, since I didn't have Goldings on hand. It doesn't matter, you really don't want any hop character in this beer at all... just keep it to bittering and nothing more.

Jamil's recipe calls for this beer to be fermented with Wyeast 1099 Whitbread Ale. When I first brewed it, I planned ahead and put in a special order from my LHBS. Unfortunately, I didn't have the 3-4 weeks it can take to receive a special-order yeast this time around, so I looked into it a bit more and saw that the 1084 Irish Ale is also recommended for brewing Sweet Stouts (aside: talk about versatile... Wyeast says that 1084 can be used in 16 different beer styles!). The strains definitely have similar characteristics; I think the key is to keep the fermentation temp down in the low 60s if possible, as Wyeast says that higher than 64 F can increase the production of fruity esters. Now that outside temps are finally getting warmer, this may be a bit tricky (especially with temps still getting cool at night), but I'll do my best. My fermentation chamber has been converted into a 4-tap keezer, so for the moment, no more fermentation temperature control for me!

I haven't made a final decision on how to package this beer, yet. While it would be nice to have a Stout like this on tap, I think I'll likely end up bottling it. I seem to recall that the first Sweet Stout I brewed held up quite well with time. Not to mention that I've only got so many kegs, and so many taps! I'm probably going to stick with keeping the hoppy beers in kegs, and the darker, stronger beers in bottles.

Recipe targets: (5.5 gallons, 75% efficiency) OG 1.060, FG ~1.019, IBU 29, SRM 38, ABV ~5.4%

Grains:
4 kg (81.6%) Maris Otter
400 g (8.2%) Black Patent
300 g (6.1%) Crystal 80 L
200 g (4.1%) Pale Chocolate malt

Hops:
WGV - 35 g (6.7% AA) @ 60 min

Misc.: 
454 g Lactose powder @ 15 min 
1/2 tab Irish moss @ 5 min

Yeast: Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale (PD April 11th, with a 1.8 L starter)

Water: Fredericton city water, carbon-filtered; 4 g Gypsum and 6 g calcium chloride added to the mash

- Brewed on May 20th, 2014, by myself. 50-minute mash with 13.5 L of strike water, mashed in at 152 F, slightly above target temp of 151 F. Mashed-out for 10 minutes with 7 L of boiling water. Vorlaufed and drained into kettle. Sparged with ~3.75 gallons of 168 F water for final volume of ~6.75 gallons.

- SG a bit high at 1.043 (target 1.044... keep in mind this is before the lactose addition). 60-minute boil. Final volume  of slightly under 6 gallons... too high. Propane started to get lower during the last half hour, so the boil wasn't as vigorous as normal. Chilled down to 64 F, then poured into Better Bottle. OG on target at 1.060. Aerated with 75 seconds of pure O2, pitched decanted yeast starter. Placed BB in room with ambient temp at 64 F.

- 21/5/14 - In the AM, already bubbling in the airlock pretty rapidly, about every second, temp about 67 F. Ditto in the evening.

- 22/5/14 - In the PM, airlock activity to every 5 seconds, temp holding at 67 F.

- Tasting notes here... really happy how this came out, lots of roasted character and mild sweetness from the lactose; great beer.

Tasting : Munich Bear (Munich Helles)

The beauty of brewing a lager in the Light Lager category of the BJCP guidelines is that because they have a low OG, you're not talking about a big beer that has to be lagered (cold-aged) for a long time. Certainly, in most cases, the longer you can lager the beer, the better (although I'm sure there must be a tipping point at some time?), but a beer that comes in at under 5% ABV is probably ok being lagered for 4-6 weeks before you start drinking it.

And, with my first time brewing a Munich Helles, this was definitely the case. I'm happy to say this beer came out pretty much exactly how I wanted it to - easy-drinking and light, but with enough malt character to separate it from your typical Lite American Lager. 

What made this beer successful wasn't just simply the recipe, of course. Good temperature control is also very important for any beer, especially lagers, and I used my fermentation chamber as I have with all the lagers I've brewed in the past - pitch low, in the high 40s F, let it rise a few degrees over the first week or so, then bring it up to the mid 60s F for a diacetyl rest for a couple of days. Drop slowly to 50 F for another week or two, then transfer to secondary and slowly drop the temp to ~38 F for lagering.

But, what really set this beer apart from many of my lagers was that I got to the FG range I was aiming for. Most of my previous lagers had FGs that were 4-5 points higher than target. I think this one came out better because it was the first lager I've brewed since buying a William's Oxygen Aeration System (no, they did not entice me to write that... unfortunately). Aerating with pure O2 really is the easiest and most effective way to ensure that your yeast are getting the amount of O2 they need to properly ferment your beer. Building up a big enough starter is important, of course, but if you can't provide enough O2, the yeast still may not be able to do a proper job.

I really recommend this recipe to anyone looking for a nice, light beer style for the warmer months that are HOPEFULLY on the way. I kegged mine and have been enjoying it the last few weeks; I'm going to try to set it away for a while longer, so that I'll have some on hand when it's lawnmowing season...

Appearance: Poured with a moderate-sized, white fluffy head with good retention. Body is a burnished-gold color, with very good clarity.

Aroma: Nice malt character in a bready way, accompanied by a sweet pilsner aroma. No noticeable hop aroma. Maybe a touch of DMS, but ok for the style. No diacetyl.

Taste: Pleasantly sweet from the pilsner malt, with the bready malt character in the background. No hop flavor. Low bitterness in the finish. Very clean and easy-drinking.

Mouthfeel: Medium bodied, moderate carbonation.

Overall: Basically exactly what I was aiming for... light, easy-drinking, but with enough flavor and aroma to set it apart from an American Lite Lager or something similar. Very happy with how it came out.

Brewing a Societe Brewing The Pupil clone

I've gone on (maybe ad nauseam) before about a couple of trips I've taken to San Diego over the past few years, and how fantastic the beer scene is there... of course, this is well known by any beer geek worth his/her salt, but you need SOME sort of opening to a blog post, right? You don't just want me to post a recipe, do you? Ok, maybe you do, but I can write what I want, dammit!

Now, if that didn't grab you, I don't know what will! But seriously, I've brewed several clone recipes of beers from breweries in California, some of which have turned out really great (namely Isles of Fortune, a Modern Times Fortunate Island clone, and two attempts (here and here) of Alpine Beer Company's Duet), and in a lot of cases I've been lucky enough to try the actual commercial beers. But, ever since my most recent trip to SD last September, there's been one beer that I've been more anxious to try to clone than any other... that beer is The Pupil - an American IPA from Societe Brewing Company, a fairly new brewery in San Diego.

Photo credit: Societe Brewing Company

A bit of info on Societe Brewing - the owners/brewers are Travis Smith and Douglas Constantiner, two guys that seem to be extremely passionate about beer, and have a pretty successful resume between the two of them, working/interning at highly-respected breweries such as Russian River, Pizza Port, and The Bruery. I won't regurgitate their story, but I recommend you read about the both of them here. The beers they brew mostly seem to be hoppy beers and Belgian ales; Societe has only been open for close to two years, but when I visited SD in September they already had a really good reputation, as I had heard about them online and knew to seek out whatever beers of theirs I could find.

Luckily, several of the beer bars I visited had Societe beers on tap (unfortunately, a planned trip to their tasting room didn't work out for me... still one of my major disappointments on that trip). I had three: The Apprentice, a really tasty American IPA; The Scrapper, a "San Diego Dark Ale" that you could probably consider as a hoppy American Brown, or maybe a Black IPA; and my favorite of three already-excellent beers, The Pupil. In an area with a seemingly-endless supply of fantastic hoppy beers, The Pupil was hands-down one of the best hoppy beers I had on this trip. Maybe even THE best. Intensely fruity in a tropical way, not overly-bitter, and extremely easy-drinking, this met the definition of a perfect IPA, in my opinion.

Photo credit: Societe Brewing Company

When I arrived home, it wasn't long before I was emailing Societe to ask them for help with a homebrew recipe for this beer. I didn't take my usual approach, where I try to do some research on my own to build up my own idea of a clone attempt, and then ask the brewer(s) for suggestions... no, I blatantly contacted them and told them how much I loved their beers, and asked if they'd help me out with a recipe for The Pupil in particular. Shameful!

Luckily for me, the people at Societe seem to be as nice as their beer is tasty... Douglas Constantiner responded very quickly, with a very-detailed recipe. Here was his full response:

Hey Shawn,

Thanks for the kind words.  Please see below for some notes and tips for The Pupil...

O.G.: 1.062

F.G.: 1.006
20% Malted Wheat
75% North American 2-Row
5% Carapils
Single infusion mash - 150degF (or whatever will get you about 90% attenuation or finish at 1.006).
I'm not sure about your water source but i suggest using CaSO4 and CaCl to your desired levels.
90 minute boil.
Bitter to about 30 BUs (Rager calculation will get you close to what ours is) with first addition - Magnum or other high AA hop or extract.
Bitter 20 BUs at the 20 minute mark - Citra and Nelson at a 1:2 ratio.
Go crazy at flameout with Centennial:Citra:Nelson at a ratio of approx. 1:2:4 - try to get 10-15 BUs from this phase. We whirlpool in our kettle so the hops are in contact with the wort for about another 40 minutes once we kill the steam.
Chill and ferment at 65degF with California Ale (White Labs 001 or Wyeast 1056).
When fermentation is complete, crash beer to 60 to drop yeast out of suspension and rack to a new vessel.
Dry hop #1 Centennial, Citra, and Nelson with the focus on nelson with about 3-5 days contact time.
Transfer beer again to get it off the dry hops and repeat the same process. Hold the beer at 65degF throughout the dry hopping phase.
Carbonate to 2.5 vol. of CO2.
I think that should cover it!  If you're not happy with 2 dry hops, do a 3rd.

Let me know if you have any questions.

What do you think... detailed enough? I would have been more than happy to put some work into this beer on my own, but hey, I'll gladly give this recipe that came straight from the brewer a try, first!

For the grist, I pretty much followed Doug's recipe, with two minor changes. First, I aimed for an OG of 1.066... I know my system, and have a good amount of experience with California Ale/US-05 yeast, and I've never had a beer drop as low as 1.006, even with very low mash temps. So, I bumped up everything to 1.066, and mashed a bit lower at 148 F to get a very fermentable wort. I also took away a bit of the 2-row and replaced it with a small percentage of Acid malt to bring my mash pH into a more desirable range (~5.5).

Lots of hop sludge...

The first couple of hop additions were easy. I used hop extract at 60 minutes to get to 30 IBUs as directed, and then enough Citra and Nelson at 20 minutes to 20 IBUs. For the flameout addition, I went with the ratios that Doug suggested, except I divided the total addition into two - half at flameout for a 15-minute steep (I didn't think 40 minutes was necessary for my small system, and I was actually brewing with limited time anyway), then I turned on the chiller and added the other half when the wort temp was just below 180 F (above which hop isomerization occurs). On further thought, I actually wish I added MORE flameout hops; if I brewed it again, I would probably increase the total amount by 25-33%. I plan on doing two dry-hop additions as indicated below; I'll rack the beer into a keg when fermentation is complete, and keg-hop twice.

*Side-note: I love the smell of Citra and Nelson in the morning. Seriously, it's been a while since I've brewed with these hops, and I had forgotten how fantastic they are; they're definitely my two favorite hop varieties right now.

The rest of the recipe is pretty straight-forward... fermented with a neutral American yeast (US-05 in this case), in the mid-60s F if possible. Hopefully two dry-hop additions will do the trick; I've had success with this approach in the past. As long as fermentation takes off and stays strong, I don't think there will be any issue getting the beer down to a FG of 1.010... this is important with any good American IPA, but is especially essential for this beer, since The Pupil finishes nice and dry, and really allows the hops to shine. As you can probably tell from the grist, this is a light-colored IPA that doesn't involve a lot of Crystal malts... a result of the brewers' time at Russian River and Pizza Port perhaps?

I'll be sure to post tasting notes on this beer as soon as it's ready. Thanks again to everyone at Societe Brewing; from the initial email from Doug, to chatting with Mike about using some of their photos in the post, they've all been extremely friendly and helpful. I'll absolutely be dropping by their brewery and tasting room on my next trip to San Diego, and strongly encourage anyone else visiting the area to do the same!

UPDATE: After publishing this post, Doug got back to me and made a small suggestion... he feels that a final gravity of 1.006 or close is very important, so if you think you can't get down that low (as I did), replace some of the 2-row with table sugar. I had considered that, but eventually decided to leave it out. If you're brewing this recipe, however, I encourage you to follow his advice.

Recipe targets: (6 gallons, 72% efficiency) OG 1.066, FG ~1.010, IBU ~60, SRM 4.7, ABV ~7.3%

Grains:
5 kg (73.3%) Canadian 2-row

1.36 kg (19.9%) Wheat malt

340 g (5%) Carapils

125 g (1.8%) Acid malt

Hops:
Hop extract - 5 mL @ 60 min (or 28 g of a 10% AA hop)

Citra - 10 g (12.7% AA) @ 20 min

Nelson Sauvin - 20 g (12% AA) @ 20 min

Centennial - 14 g (10.9% AA) @ 0 min

Citra - 28 g @ 0 min                                             *Half flame-out hops have a 15-minute steep; the other half

Nelson Sauvin - 56 g @ 0 min                                added after chilling starts, when wort temp below 180 F

Centennial - 14 g dry-hop for 3 days
Citra - 14 g dry-hop for 3 days
Nelson Sauvin - 28 g dry-hop for 3 days
Centennial - 14 g dry-hop for 3 more days
Citra - 14 g dry-hop for 3 more days
Nelson Sauvin - 28 g dry-hop for 3 more days

Misc.: 1/2 tab Irish moss @ 5 min

Yeast: US-05 Safale, ~1 & 1/4 packs, rehydrated

Water: Fredericton city water, carbon-filtered; 7 g Gypsum and 4 g calcium chloride added to the mash

- Brewed on April 29th, 2014, by myself. 60-minute mash with 20.5 L of strike water, mashed in at 149 F, slightly above target temp of 148 F. Sparged with ~4.75 gallons of 168 F water for final volume of ~7.25 gallons.

- SG a bit low at 1.053 (target 1.055). 60-minute boil (my fault; I had misread the email which clearly indicates a 90-minute boil). Added last hops at flameout and let them steep for 15 minutes. Turned on chiller; temp of wort was below 180 F within a few minutes, added second half of flameout hops. Final volume ~6 gallons. Chilled down to 64 F, then poured/filtered into Better Bottle. OG on target at 1.066. Aerated with 90 seconds of pure O2, pitched rehydrated yeast. Placed BB in room with ambient temp at 68 F.

- Vigorous fermentation over a 4-5 day period. After 10 days or so, FG measured at 1.011.

- 8/5/14 - Racked beer to CO2-purged keg, added dry hops in a mesh bag. Each addition for 3 days, then removed hops and hooked up to CO2 to carbonate.

- 16/6/14 - Tasting notes posted. This beer came out delicious, full of tropical fruit and citrus... the only change I'd make is to follow Doug Constantiner's later recommendation of adding table sugar to dry the beer out more.

Brewing a Hill Farmstead James clone - Version 2.0

This year, I'm taking a slightly different approach to deciding what beers to brew. Over the past 4&1/2 years of homebrewing, I've rarely brewed the same beer twice. For quite awhile, I was usually even brewing a different style almost every time, except for when I'd return to an APA, IPA or American Amber, but even then the recipes were always quite different than before. It's great doing this, because it opens you to styles of beer you weren't really into before, and in a lot of cases, allows you to brew a beer style that you can't even find commercially in your area.

The downside? What about those beers that you've brewed and really enjoyed? Aside from wanting to have that beer bottled or on tap again, maybe rebrewing it is a good opportunity to see just how consistent your brewing practices are. It can be difficult to make a delicious beer; I think it may be even harder to brew the same beer and have it come out just as tasty as before. This is why I plan on rebrewing several of my favorite beers that I've brewed in the past, with maybe some slight tweaking to the recipes to try and improve on the previous attempt.

That's what I did earlier this year when I rebrewed my clone of Alpine Duet. I made a couple of small changes to the hop schedule, but that was basically it. The beer came out quite tasty... the same as it was two years ago? No idea. I'm not going to pretend to be able to remember specific details from that far back, but the tasting notes for both looked pretty similar. I really enjoyed it again, which is what's important, I guess.

Another beer I brewed recently (about a year ago) was a Hill Farmstead James clone, a Black IPA from one of the highest-rated breweries in the world. The recipe was based on one included in Mitch Steele's IPA book, with some adjustments that I made based on some conflicting things I had read online, and due to ingredients that I did/didn't have available to me. I was very pleased with the results; the beer had a bit of roast character, but like most Black IPAs, really let the hops shine through. The combination of Columbus and Centennial worked perfectly.

That was the first and last time I had brewed a Black IPA, and I've been anxious to give the style another try. While I had thrown around a lot of ideas on my next Black IPA to brew (including completely original recipes, and a clone attempt of Lawson's Finest Liquids Toast), I decided to come back to the James clone, due to the reasons mentioned above... I wanted to see if I could equal, or even improve on, the results of my first attempt.

So, there were very few changes that I made to the original recipe (check out the original blog post for my first try, as it details what I changed from the recipe in Steele's book). I kept the grist virtually identical, except I had to use all Carafa Special I based on what I had in my inventory (my LHBS doesn't sell any Carafa Special at all, so I was lucky to have what I did). The hop schedule? Also identical; I didn't feel the need to change varieties, increase/decrease additions... I felt the first time worked perfectly. I even kept the minor changes to my mash water the same, with a small addition of both calcium chloride and Gypsum.

What I DID change was the yeast. The first time around, I used Wyeast 1098 British Ale, which I've used several times before and liked; it's an English Ale yeast, but one that is more neutral than others. It's well-known that Hill Farmstead uses an English yeast, but I'm not sure that anyone has really determined what strain it is, or what commercially-available strain is closest. But I've heard speculation as to what may approach it, so I tried something different - Wyeast 1275 Thames Valley Ale. Wyeast describes it as having a "light malt character, low fruitiness, low esters and is clean and well balanced". I'm not sure if the difference between the 1275 and 1098 will be noticeable in a style like Black IPA, but I'm willing to give it a shot.

So, I brewed the beer pretty much like last time. I'll ferment it in the 68-72 F range for the most part, and likely rack it to a keg and dry-hop in there. I decided to go with a smaller batch (4 gallons) which I coincidentally did with the first James clone. I regretted it then, because it came out so tasty, but I've been brewing a fair amount lately, and have to be realistic about how much beer I can consume and share, and still have it be fresh. You may see me taking that approach more often in the coming months, especially with bigger-ABV beers.

In closing, I have a small confession to make... in the post on my first attempt at cloning this beer, I mentioned that I had had the real James on a trip to Vermont in 2011. I realized only recently that I HAVEN'T actually tried this beer! The Hill Farmstead Black IPA that I had on tap in Burlington was actually Foster, which they actually refer to as a "Black Wheat IPA". Anyway, it was delicious!

Recipe targets: (4 gallons, 75% efficiency) OG 1.065, FG ~1.013, IBU ~100, SRM 26, ABV ~6.9%

Grains:
3.76 kg (85.7%) Canadian 2-row
300 g (6.8%) Carafa Special I
175 g (4%) Carapils
86 g (2%) Flaked Oats
66 g (1.5%) Crystal 150 L

Hops:
CTZ - 7 g (10.5% AA) FWH
CTZ - 28 g @ 60 min
Centennial (8.5% AA) - 24 g @ 45 min
Centennial - 25 g @ 10 min
CTZ - 58 g @ 0 min
Centennial - 31 g @ 0 min
CTZ - 28 g dry-hop for 7 days
Centennial - 28 g dry-hop for 7 days

Misc.: 1/2 tab Irish moss @ 5 min

Yeast: Wyeast 1275 Thames Valley Ale (slurry, cultured last month, "woken up" with 500 mL starter)

Water: Fredericton city water, carbon-filtered; 3 g Gypsum and 3 g calcium chloride added to the mash

- Brewed on April 9th, 2014, by myself. 50-minute mash with 13 L of strike water, mashed in at 153 F, slightly above target temp of 152 F. Mashed-out for 10 minutes with 6.25 L of boiling water, resulting temp 166 F. Sparged with ~2.5 gallons of 168 F water for final volume of ~5.25 gallons.

- SG a bit low at 1.050 (target 1.051). 60-minute boil. Added last hops at flameout and began chilling immediately. Final volume ~4 gallons. Chilled down to 64 F, then poured/filtered into Better Bottle. OG on target at 1.065. Aerated with 75 seconds of pure O2, pitched yeast starter. Placed BB in room with ambient temp at 68 F.

- Over the first few days, the temp stayed around 65 F, airlock bubbling every few seconds. I turned up the temp in the room a bit, and by the third day the temp had climbed to 70 F and the airlock was bubbling more frequently. Active fermention appeared complete by day 5.

- 22/4/14 - FG high at 1.018. Racked to keg, added dry hops in mesh bag with sanitized marbles, purged keg and set back in room with temp ~68 F.

- 27/4/14 - Removed dry hops, set keg in back room of garage where ambient temp is ~50 F. Will start carbonating tomorrow with CO2 to ~2.3 vol. 

- 4/5/14 - Tasting notes posted. A very tasty Black IPA, but sadly not quite as good as my first attempt.

Brewing a Flanders Brown Ale

I typically follow your standard beer-geek cravings when it comes to beer; that is, I love really hoppy beers, and I love sour beers. I honestly do not do this to purposefully follow a trend, but they are, generally, the styles of beer I enjoy the most. What are ya gonna do? As a result of this, a lot of the beers I brew are hoppy, as anyone who regularly reads this blog will know.

But when it comes to sours, I really haven't brewed many at all, mainly because when brewed using the standard methods, they take a really long time to come out sour enough, and tasty on top of that. I brewed a Flanders Red Ale in early 2011; half plain, the other half aged on cherries, and it took over 15 months for the plain portion to be tasting good. The cherry portion was an additional several months. I also brewed a Berliner Weisse (again, half plain and half on cherries) in 2012, and unfortunately that beer never got sour enough to my liking, and hasn't really improved much, even with time.

Anyway, if you want to have sour beers on hand of your own, this is obviously NOT the correct approach. Whether you're using a faster method of souring, or a classic method that involves bacteria and time, you should really brew a sour ale every 3 months or so. After awhile, you'll start accumulating some inventory, and won't have to wait 1-2 years before you have something sour to drink. I'd like to think I'll stick to this method, but we'll see; maybe even every 6 months is something realistic I can aim for. In the meantime, I've finally decided to tackle another sour beer; this time, a Flanders Brown Ale (aka Oud Bruin).

Have you ever had a good example of a Flanders Brown? It really is a great style, especially if you're a fan of Belgian and sour beers. Yes, there IS a sourness to the beer, but the style is generally maltier and less acetic than a Flanders Red (a style which I also love, by the way). The BJCP describes the malt character of a Flanders Brown as being "deeper" than in a Flanders Red; generally, this character includes "caramel, toffee, orange, treacle or chocolate", together with a dark fruit character. Throw in some sourness and a medium-body, and you've got a great beer. I've been lucky enough to have actually tried some great examples of the style (such as New Belgium Lips of Faith - La Folie, Liefmans Goudenband, and Gulpener Mestreechs Aajt, to name a few) thanks to the great beer bar, Novare Res Bier Cafe in Portland, Maine.

So, on to the recipe. As usual, with a first-time style for me, I went to Brewing Classic Styles for ideas. The recipe that Jamil published for Flanders Brown is VERY similar to the recipe in the same book for Flanders Red (minus the addition of oak, of course). It's made up of Pilsner malt for the base malt, with a healthy amount of Munich malt for a toasty, bready character, some Caramunich and Special B for toffee and dark fruit, respectively, and some Wheat malt and Aromatic thrown in as well. On top of all that... just a touch of Black Patent, to (I assume) bring the beer into a brown color. I ended up changing the recipe slightly for my own use:

• I cut down on the percentage of Pilsner malt and increased the Munich slightly, because I had less Pilsner on hand than I thought.
• I decreased everything to an OG of approximately 1.056. The OG range for Flanders Brown is pretty wide (1.040-1.074), and I was more interested in having a beer with an ABV of ~6% vs 8%.

Hops, of course, are minimal for a Flanders Brown... a small addition of a noble variety at 60 minutes to provide a bit of counter-balance to all that sweetness. The range of 20-25 IBUs for the style is actually pretty high for a sour beer - some bacteria (such as certain species of Lactobacillus) don't work well with hops at all.

The fact that a Flanders Brown is usually maltier and less acetic than a Flanders Red, but still has an overall similar grist, would make me think that the deciding factor/ingredient is the yeast and bacteria used to ferment the beer. However, the yeast/bacteria culture recommended by Jamil for this beer is the Wyeast 3763 Roeselare Ale Blend, which I have used before... in the Flanders Red I brewed. Check out what a smackpack of this contains:

• A Belgian-style ale strain
• A sherry strain
• Two Brettanomyces strains
• A Pediococcus culture
• A Lactobacillus culture

That's four different yeast strains (two of them wild yeast) and two bacteria cultures. It's always a little intimidating working with something like this; infection to equipment/other beers aside, do you make a starter? Do you aerate, or not (some bacteria work better in anaerobic environments)? On top of that, Jamil recommends pitching a neutral ale strain (e.g. 1056, WLP001, or US-05) for the first few days, and THEN the Roeselare blend, if you don't want your beer too sour. I'll summarize my recommendations, which are based on what I've read, heard, and practiced (opinions may differ; feel free to speak up in the comments!):

1) Don't pitch a neutral ale strain first - Well, at least don't if you really do want a beer with some sourness to it. Pitching a neutral strain before the bugs would take care of most of the sugars in the wort; that's not saying that pitching the bacteria and wild yeast afterwards wouldn't develop SOME sour and funky flavors, but most seem to feel it would be pretty minimal, and definitely not to style. In fact, I've had several seasoned homebrewers say that their experience with the Roeselare Blend doesn't result in a sour-enough beer, even when pitched on its own. It DOES take time for sourness to develop with this method, but my Flanders Red didn't really start getting sour until I began pitching bottle dregs of other commercial sour beers, even after waiting for almost a year. So, that being said...

2) Don't make a yeast starter - With that many organisms all in one yeast pack, it's not recommended to make a starter, even by Wyeast, as it can "result in a change of the proportions of the individual components". Lots of homebrewers will save the slurry after racking to secondary, however, and brew another sour beer with it... I'm sure the proportions have definitely changed by then; just be aware that this will continue to happen with each generation, and going too far probably isn't a good idea.

3) Aerate your wort - The only organism in the 3763 that prefers an anaerobic environment is the Pediococcus (although, Lactobacillus can work with or without the presence of oxygen). With the ale yeasts preferring an aerobic environment (especially at the beginning, as they use the oxygen to increase their numbers), aerating your wort is a good idea. After the oxygen is taken up by the yeasts, the Pediococcus will be able to start working with the Lactobacillus.

4) Pitch bottle dregs - Doing so will obviously, for the most part, give you a different beer in the end, every time. Even if you pitched the same brand of beer at the same time for every batch, would your beer turn out EXACTLY the same? Probably not. But if you want to increase the sourness of your beer, this can be an effective method (assuming there's sugars left in your beer for the bacteria to work on, of course).

5) Rack to secondary - In Jamil's book, there is no mention for the Flanders Brown or Red to do this; it seems he's recommending that you leave the beer in primary for a year or two. I actually did this with my Flanders Red (other than racking to secondary for the fruit addition), but found out later on that Brettanomyces will continue to feed on the dead Saccharomyces yeast. This is great in a beer where you want more funk character (like a Lambic), but not really appropriate for a Flanders.

Again, these are just some basic guidelines. I'm not going to re-invent the wheel when it comes to sour beers... there's more than enough great sources out there (The Mad Fermentationist, for example, who coincidentally has a book on sour beers coming out soon), and I'm not nearly knowledgeable enough.

So, the beer has been brewed, and now the waiting begins. My recommendation here is to tuck the beer away and try to forget about it. Keep it in an area where temps won't fluctuate too much, and where it's preferably a bit on the warmer side (again, if you're looking for a more-sour beer). Check the gravity and taste the beer every 3-6 months. If you're bottling, do not bottle the beer until the FG has rested at its number for some time - these wild yeasts and bacteria work slowly and often continuously... you don't want bottle bombs on your hands, especially after waiting so long for the beer to finish. Flanders Brown is a great style for blending with other beers, aging on fruit, etc., so I plan on taking at least a portion of the beer and doing something different with it.

Recipe targets: (5.5 gallons, 75% efficiency) OG 1.056, FG ~1.010, IBU 21, SRM 19, ABV ~6.1%

Grains:
2.7 kg (52.8%) Pilsner malt
1.5 kg (29.3%) Munich malt
227 g (4.4%) Special B
227 g (4.4%) Wheat malt
200 g (3.9%) Aromatic malt
200 g (3.9%) Caramunich II (45 L)
57 g (1.1%) Black Patent

Hops:
Tettnang - 35 g (4.75% AA) @ 60 min

Misc.: 1/2 tab Irish moss @ 5 min

Yeast: Wyeast 3763 Roeselare Blend (PD Feb 24, 2014)

Water: Fredericton city water, carbon-filtered; 3 g Gypsum and 3 g calcium chloride added to the mash

- Brewed on March 26th, 2014, by myself. 50-minute mash with 13.5 L of strike water, mashed in at target temp of 152 F. Mashed-out for 10 minutes with 6.5 L of boiling water, resulting temp 165 F. Sparged with ~4.5 gallons of 168 F water for final volume of ~7.25 gallons.

- SG a bit high at 1.044 (target 1.043). 90-minute boil. Final volume ~5.5 gallons. Chilled down to 64 F, then poured into Better Bottle. OG high at 1.060. Aerated with 75 seconds of pure O2, pitched smackpack. Placed BB in room with ambient temp at 68 F.

- Good activity for the first few days, then quickly settled down. About 10 day later, gravity was only down to 1.013.

- 23/3/15 - Over 8 months later, gravity still at 1.013. Started pitching bottled dregs over the next several months (should have started earlier); for a full list of what was pitched, check out the tasting notes (link coming).

- 29/9/15 - FG 1.009, tasting quite sour now. pH reading of 3.38. 

- 31/8/17 - Gulp. FINALLY got around to posting the tasting notes... sorry about that!

Tasting : Alpine Duet clone, Version 2.0

Post #100! And what better topic to have for this occasion then one talking about the results of my second attempt at brewing a clone of Alpine Duet, one of the best American IPAs I've ever had?

This beer was brewed a mere 6 days after another very hoppy beer, my clone of Maine Beer Company's MO (an American Pale Ale). Both beers were dry-hopped twice in a secondary carboy, and both beers were then kegged. I didn't dry-hop IN the keg because I didn't receive my kegging equipment until afterwards. If you check out the tasting notes for the MO clone, you'll see that while the beer was very tasty, I was a bit disappointed that the hop aroma and flavor wasn't quite as big as I had hoped.

The hopping schedules for these two beers were very similar; Simcoe and Falconer's Flight for the MO clone, Simcoe and Amarillo for the Duet clone. The only difference in amounts was an additional 1/2 oz of each hop in the dry-hop (over two additions). Not exactly a big difference, but there was also a difference in technique: I had my CO2 tank and some tubing when I racked the Duet clone to secondary, so I was able to flush the carboy with CO2 before racking, and then again after adding the dry-hops. I wasn't sure if this would make a difference at all, but I wanted to do what I could to cut down on oxidation.

Well, I'm not sure what exactly the reason is, but this beer definitely has more hop character than the MO clone. Is it as hoppy as the real Duet (a beer I haven't been able to try for 2&1/2 years, I might add)? No. Even though it's been a long time, I know that that beer was hoppier. I think that dry-hopping in the keg would bump it up a bit for me, but realistically I'll probably never be able to replicate that amount of hop goodness... but it doesn't mean I'm going to stop trying! The beer also has a very low, soft bitterness for an IPA, as is expected since the IBUs are only at about 45 or so. It finished nice and dry; there's a bit of malt character, but it's most tropical, fruity hops, and the pine begins to come through as the beer warms. Smooth mouthfeel.

Most of this beer was kegged; however, I did bottle about 4 L of it in case I wanted to enter any competitions, and to give to friends since I don't yet have an expensive or cheap way of bottling from the keg. I shared a couple of bottles with some friends the other night, and while pretty good, they definitely can't compare to the kegged version.

Glad I tried brewing this beer again. Will there be a third version in the future? Probably. I'd likely keep the grist as-is... the change to Crystal 30 L from Victory probably wasn't necessary, though; I think I'd be tempted to go with the grist from the first version, and the hop schedule from this one. Either way, I'm pretty happy with how this came out... if I could bump up the hop character a bit more, it'd be a great IPA.

Appearance: Pours with a moderate-large, white, fluffy and thick head that shows excellent retention, leaving nice sticky lacing on the glass as it gradually fades. Body is a light golden color with some slight haziness.

Aroma: Lots of tropical fruit aroma coming through; maybe a bit of pine, but the fruitiness definitely dominates. A bit of slight sweet malt character, but mostly hops. As the beer warms, the pine comes through stronger.

Taste: Pretty big hop flavor coming through, again a tropical fruit quality is strongest, here. The pine does start to come on a bit stronger towards the end, and as the beer warms. Moderate-low bitterness in the finish, very smooth.

Mouthfeel: Medium-light bodied, moderate to moderate-low carbonation.

Overall: I’m pretty happy with how this one came out. I like the soft bitterness of the beer, similar to how I remember Duet being. I still don’t think the hop flavor and aroma is quite as big as it should be; with better dry-hopping technique and fresher hops, I think the recipe will get it there.

EDIT: This wasn't post #100... it was #97... oops!

Brewing a Classic American Pilsner

Going by my usual method/approach to brewing lagers, I'm following up my Munich Helles that I brewed in late January with another lager, to re-use the Wyeast 2124 Bohemian Lager yeast. This time, it's back to something a bit hoppier: a Classic American Pilsner (CAP).

I'm not sure if there's another beer style out there that is harder to find from craft breweries and brewpubs. I know that living in this area of Canada greatly inhibits how much good beer you can find, but I've been lucky enough to have been on a fair amount of trips in the U.S., all of which involved beer to some degree. And I don't think I've EVER had a CAP; at least, not one that was identified as such. I mean, check out the above link to the BJCP description of this style... under "Commercial Examples", they can't even come up with a specific one, only listing "Occasional brewpub and microbrewery specials".

This really is (from what I can tell) more of a pre-Prohibition Pilsner. It basically came about when German immigrants to the U.S. were forced to brew their beloved Pilsner style with the ingredients they had available to them in their new country. For example, using 2-row or 6-row pale malt instead of Pilsner, local hops like Cluster instead of Saaz, Hallertau or Tettnang. More on the style in the discussion below.

For this CAP recipe (my first ever), I again checked Jamil's Brewing Classic Styles. His recipe is quite simple, with the majority of the grist being 2-row; the rest is a healthy amount of flaked corn. This is common for this style; like other American Lagers, a fairly high proportion (up to 30%, according to the BJCP) of flaked corn or flaked rice is used as an adjunct, to cut back on the amount of base grain needed. This provides, of course, a "corn-like or sweet maltiness" in both the aroma and flavor of the beer. Jamil's recipe called for close to the maximum of flaked corn, coming it at about 28% of the grist. I actually changed the base malt to Pilsner; I wasn't too concerned with being completely authentic here, and have a lot of recipes coming up that require 2-row malt, so I thought I'd go with Pilsner malt instead. So, maybe that makes this beer more of a Classic American-German Pilsner? I also added some Acid malt to the grist to bring the mash pH to a proper level (hopefully). The malts and adjuncts are mashed quite low (here, 148 F) to provide a well-attenuated beer with a dry finish.

Lots of flaked corn in there

For the hops, there are several additions in this recipe. Jamil does make a point of mentioning that there are too many hop additions, but that he feels it works well for this style of beer. I've never been one to stray from hop additions, so I followed his recommendation (I see that in his more recent, Brew Your Own recipe, he's toned it down a bit). All of the hop additions are Saaz, which really is a fantastic hop to use in Pilsners; the floral, spicy characters work great in the style. Wait a minute, you're thinking... I thought this style of beer called for American hops that mimic European noble varieties? Yep; but this recipe called for Saaz, and I had a lot of it on hand.

So, yes, this beer is starting to look more like a strict German Pilsner. But wait, it's not just the ingredients that set this style apart from a German or Bohemian Pilsner. It's the higher gravities (up to 1.060) and often-higher hop flavors, due to more late-hopping than you usually see in other Pilsners. Either way, as I'm writing this I'm beginning to understand why the style is often ignored by commercial brewers. It's kind of confusing. If you take away anything about this style, just think of it as a "bigger" Pilsner, with a good amount of hop aroma and flavor, and a firm bitterness. Don't get too hung up by the source of your ingredients.

For the water, I was a bit in the dark. I knew that you didn't want high-mineral water to provide harshness to the beer, but I imagine that a "classic" CAP didn't have really soft water similar to that used in a Bohemian Pilsner. Since I'm obviously not too concerned with being classic here, I decided to simply add some Gypsum to the mash, to bring my calcium up to reasonable levels, and hopefully provide just a touch of extra bitterness to the beer. Nothing major.

As I mentioned, I cultured the slurry of the Wyeast Bohemian Lager from my Munich Helles. I actually washed the yeast to end up with about 200 mL of a thick, mostly-trub-free slurry. Whenever I brew lagers, I always try to brew two that will make good use of the one yeast strain, and pretty much back-to-back so that the yeast slurry is fresh. Also, if you follow this method, of course it usually makes sense to brew the lower-gravity beer first, so that you don't have an even larger yeast starter to make (a 1.058 lager like this would require a whopping 6.5 L starter - or at least several smaller ones - with intermittent shaking... and that's assuming you have a really fresh pack of yeast).

So, yeah, there you have it. I really enjoy a good pilsner, and a slightly-bigger, hoppier one sounds great to me. Hoping to lager this for about 6-8 weeks after fermentation is complete; I'll likely just rack it into a keg and use that as the secondary, and then hopefully have it on tap by the spring.

Recipe targets: (5.5 gallons, 75% efficiency) OG 1.058, FG ~1.012, IBU 35, SRM 3.7, ABV ~6%

Grains:
3.6 kg (69.2%) Pilsner malt
1.45 kg (27.9%) Flaked corn
150 g (2.9%) Acid malt

Hops:
Saaz - 70 g (2.6% AA) @ 60 min
Saaz - 35 g @ 20 min
Saaz - 28 g @ 10 min
Saaz - 28 g @ 5 min
Saaz - 28 g @ 0 min

Misc.: 1/2 tab Irish moss @ 5 min

Yeast: Wyeast 2124 Bohemian Lager (thick slurry cultured yesterday, ~200 mL)

Water: Fredericton city water, carbon-filtered; 8 g Gypsum added to the mash

- Brewed on February 11th, 2014, by myself. 70-minute mash with 13 L of strike water, mashed in at target temp of 148 F. Mashed-out for 10 minutes with 7.8 L of boiling water, resulting temp 165 F. Sparged with ~4.25 gallons of 168 F water for final volume of slightly of ~7.25 gallons.

- SG high at 1.046 (target 1.044). 90-minute boil. Final volume ~5.75 gallons. Chilled down to 55 F, then poured/filtered into Better Bottle. OG a bit high at 1.060. Set BB in fermentation chamber with temp set at 46 F. After about 6 hours, temp had dropped to 46 F. Aerated with 120 seconds of pure O2, pitched yeast slurry. Placed BB back in fermentation chamber with temp set at 50 F.

- 13/2/14 - 17/2/14 - By morning of the 13th, fermentation was pretty active, airlock bubbling every 2 seconds. Stayed this way through to the 17th. Over these few days, I gradually increased the temp to 54 F.

- 18/2/14 - In the AM, activity had slowed to bubbling every 5-6 seconds. Took the BB out of the chamber and left it at ambient to raise the temp for a diacetyl rest. Temp was about 62 F by the evening.

- 20/2/14 - BB back in the chamber, decreased the temp by a few degrees each day until it was back to 50 F. Gravity reading a few days later showed 1.014.

- 26/2/14 - Racked to a keg for secondary, beginning lagering period now. Decreasing temp in chamber by 1-2 F every day until down to 38 F.

- Tasting notes posted; pretty happy with how this came out, grainy and malty, with a really nice hop presence from the Saaz.