Straight Lambic Review

Appearance: Quite clear golden color. A few little bubbles rising through the beer. Billowing white head on initial pour, but dissipates quite rapidly.

Aroma: Light sour funk aroma. Lemony and pithy nose, like lemon rhinds, with some grainy Cheerio-like aroma. No hop aroma.

Taste: Moderate sourness, slight acetic. No bitterness. Grainy quality shows up in the taste too. Very dry. I get no hop flavors. Tannic oak in the aftertaste.


Mouthfeel: Thin body, but oak tannins prevent it from being watery. Not highly carbed, but with the thin body the carbonation has a slight bite.

Overall: Fairly light and refreshing sour beer. The Cheerio quality is sub-optimal. Maybe it will age out. Would like a little more sourness and more lemony / fruity aroma.

Would really like to calibrate this against a few commercial examples to see how it's different and / or how the commercial beers are better.

Solera Pull 1 Review

This is the first pull from a 5-gallon carboy of sour beer, so it's not technically a solera yet. After pulling about 2.5 gallons, I added another 2.5 gallons of freshly fermented clean beer. In any case, the beer today is a bit over a year old, from a single brew, but with a ton of different sour dregs and brett strains, and a pack of Roselare blend.

Appearance: Hazy golden body with thin, white head. Lots of carbonation bubbles on the side of the glass.

Aroma: Fairly clean sour smell. Lemon-rind like. No hop aroma. A hint of acetic acid, maybe a little diacetyl.

Taste: Starts off a with a sharp tartness, maybe some vinegary character. Bretty funk is in there too. Quite dry, with a tannic quality at the end. Malt taste pretty low. Bitterness low to none.

Mouthfeel: Dry, low to moderate combination, sharply sour finish. Light-ish body.

Overall: Not sure. Pretty good, nice lemony and refreshing beer, but should have less vinegar, probably needs a bit more carbonation. Will see how it tastes in a few months.

Split Sour Brew Day

BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: Split Sour 6 Gal
Style: Lambic
TYPE: All Grain

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 8.68 gal
Post Boil Volume: 7.55 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 6.50 gal  
Bottling Volume: 6.00 gal
Estimated OG: 1.055 SG
Estimated Color: 4.0 SRM
Estimated IBU: 5.1 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 65.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 72.5 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU        
6.50 gal              Boston, MA                               Water         1        -            
5.00 g                Calcium Chloride (Mash 60.0 mins)        Water Agent   2        -            
5.00 g                Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash 60.0 mins Water Agent   3        -            
8 lbs                 Pilsner (2 Row) Bel (2.0 SRM)            Grain         4        52.5 %       
5 lbs                 Wheat (BestMälz) (2.0 SRM)               Grain         5        32.8 %       
2 lbs                 Wheat, Flaked (1.6 SRM)                  Grain         6        13.1 %       
4.0 oz                Acid Malt (3.0 SRM)                      Grain         7        1.6 %        
0.50 oz               Saaz [3.75 %] - Boil 60.0 min            Hop           8        5.1 IBUs     
1.0 pkg               Belgian Ale (White Labs #WLP550) [35.49  Yeast         9        -

After primary with WLP550,  split into two batches of ~ 3.25 gallons each, add bugs:           
1.0 pkg               Roselare Belgian Blend (Wyeast Labs #376 Yeast         10       -    

?Other Bugs

Mash Schedule: 154F, Mash Out, Batch Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 15 lbs 4.0 oz
----------------------------
Name                    Description                                          Step Temperat Step Time    
Mash Step               Add 20.06 qt of water at 167.6 F                     154.0 F       60 min       
Mash Step               Add 12.20 qt of water at 195.5 F                     168.0 F       10 min       

Sparge: Batch sparge with 2 steps (Drain mash tun , 2.69gal) of 168.0 F water
Notes:
------

Starter w/ WLP550, 1.6L, on 3/16/17.

Brewed 3/19/17:

Hit my mash temp OK. Mashed in 10gal pot and applied direct heat from stove as needed, while stirring the mash to prevent scorching.

Got slightly less than 9 gallons of 1.048 wort into kettle.

At end of boil about 7.6 gallons of 1.055 wort.

Force chilled to 140F, then let the covered pot sit in 35F ambient weather for a few hours. Racked ~3.25 gallons into two carboys.




3/20/17, 7:30am. Beer was 65F - same temp as ambient air. Shook carboys vigorously for a few minutes,  mixed up starter and poured about half into each carboy.

By that afternoon, one of the beers was fermenting pretty actively, the other seemed just to be getting started. Weird, and I hope the two beers turn out fairly similarly!

Wort looks a little darker than I expected. 

Sour Solera Brew Day

I've recently had a lot of unused capacity in my brewery - i.e. empty carboys. Since I cannot drink beer as fast I can brew it, a long-term project is the obvious solution. A sour would be perfect and I've wanted to do a Lambic style beer for a while. This one isn't quite a Lambic since the choice of yeast is not quite right (more driven by the need to pitch what was in the proliferating Mason jars in the fridge than by stylistic accuracy), but it is a sour, and I hope will resemble a Lambic. I'm also planning to turn it into a solera. In about a year, I'll draw off 3 gallons and fill the rest of the carboy space with 3 gallons of new beer.


BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: Lambic-esque Solera Year 1
Style: Straight (Unblended) Lambic
TYPE: All Grain

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 7.53 gal
Post Boil Volume: 5.88 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.25 gal  
Bottling Volume: 4.85 gal
Estimated OG: 1.054 SG
Estimated Color: 3.6 SRM
Estimated IBU: 8.8 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 75.3 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU        
5 lbs 8.0 oz          Pilsner (2 Row) Ger (2.0 SRM)            Grain         1        50.0 %       
5 lbs 8.0 oz          Wheat, Torrified (1.7 SRM)               Grain         2        50.0 %       
0.50 oz               Tettnang [4.50 %] - Boil 90.0 min        Hop           3        8.8 IBUs     
1.0 pkg              Geuze Tilquin Dregs
1.0 pkg               Brettanomyces Claussenii (White Labs #WL Yeast         5        -            
1.0 pkg               Brettanomyces Lambicus (White Labs #WLP6 Yeast         6        -            
2.00 oz               Oak Cubes, American (Secondary 12.0 week Flavor        7        -            


Mash Schedule: Temperature Mash, 2 Step, Medium Body
Total Grain Weight: 11 lbs
----------------------------
Name                    Description                                          Step Temperat Step Time    
Protein Rest            Add 14.75 qt of water at 118.6 F                     113.0 F       15 min       
Saccharification        Add 0.00 qt of water and heat to 122.0 F over 15 min 122.0 F       30 min       
Mash Step               Heat to 149.0 F over 4 min                           149.0 F       15 min       
Mash Step               Add 0.00 qt of water and heat to 159.0 F over 4 min  159.0 F       45 min       
Mash Out                Heat to 168.0 F over 10 min                          168.0 F       10 min       

Sparge: Batch sparge with 2 steps (Drain mash tun , 5.41gal) of 210.0 F water

Starter: Jan. 22, with re-used Brett. C.; Brett. L. (from an experimental beer that oxidized and became rather vinegary); and dregs from Geuze Tilquin, cultured by a guy in the homebrew club. By Jan. 25 the starter was actively fermenting and smelled pretty strongly like rising bread dough.

Brewed 1/30/16:
The direct heat step mash was a slow and labor intensive process, since I had to constantly stir while applying heat in order to avoid scorching and to distribute the heat throughout the mash. I hit my temps well, but over the course of the 159F step some of the mash may have cooled a bit.

To sparge, I transferred the mash from my 5-gallon kettle into my MLT, and added rice hulls after the sparge became stuck. The 210F sparge water may have extracted some tannins but apparently this is normal for a lambic. The buys will chew some of them away.

Pre-boil OG was 1.044, slightly under volume. Post-Boil OG was 1.060, slightly below volume.

Cooled to 135F, racked to sanitized sour bucket and allowed to cool overnight to pitching temps. I left some trub in the kettle but probably transferred a bit of it into the fermenter. 5.25 gallons into the bucket.

Wort was hazy with protein and / or starch. Good, a starchy wort is desirable for this style.

I am not sure if the long multi-step mash is necessary, but it's traditional, and my wife was away all day. So why not?

1/31/16: Decanted half of starter and stirred up the settled yeast. Pitched into wort without aerating at all. Left at room temp approximate 70F.

2/21/16: Active stages of fermentation were over. Racked to 5 gallon carboy, with 2oz of boiled oak cubes. (Boiling to remove excess tanins.)

Added dregs: Roselare and Wyeast Dabom from previous beers. Also contains some champagne yeast used for bottle-carbing.

2/26/16: Made low gravity starter and added dregs of Boulevard Saison Brett 2015. Will add Roselare dregs as well, and then if I get some fermentation will add to main beer.

Consecration Clone Review

This sour beer, an attempt to replicate a homebrew clone kit that was attempting to replicate a commercial beer, is about 18 months old. Hopefully it is worth the wait.

Appearance: Pretty dark amber-red color, off-white head that doesn't persist long but leaves lacing on the glass.

Aroma: Dark cherries, sourness, plums, some red wine character. No hint of sweetness. No diacetyl, fortunately.

Taste: Moderate sourness upfront, with some sweet cherry like flavor, some maltiness, a little bit of sweetness. Pretty dry though. Tanic quality in the aftertaste. Alcoholic burn is very subdued considering this beer weighs in at around 10%. Mild bretty funk in the finish.

Mouthfeel: Light body. Carbonation does not seem high, but the sourness, dryness, and tannic quality seem to lighten the body, as the alcohol no doubt does.

Overall: A moderately sour dark belgian beer with tastes of dark fruit and a wine like character. Pretty complex and highly alcoholic though the alcohol is hidden very well by a complex set of other flavors. Pleasant, but complex and best savored rather than consumed quickly.

Note: One guy at the club's sour night had traded for a bottle of real Consecration, which was a real treat for which I am grateful. I took only a small sip of it so that it could be shared around the table. Anyway, the consensus was that my beer is a bit harsher and not as sour. I generally agree. When compared to the real thing, mine has more of a harsh and tannic aftertaste, though when consumed on its own I don't mine is overly harsh.

On a side note, it's probably not a good idea to put a 10% beer into 22oz bottles.