Nemesis Quad

We all have beers that have flat out beaten us. I'm not talking just slightly less than great beers. Beers that have truly failed, even on a singular component. Just a completely fatal and unrecoverable (as far as initial intentions go) flaw that just gnaws at you at the swing and ...whiff... miss of the initial concept.

These are usually higher gravity beers the beer that has been me certainly falls in that camp: A quad with a very large portion of D2 syrup that resulted in an underattenuated mess. Great fermentation character, bready malty with that complexly stewed prune, almost roasty figginess. And a beer-ruining cloying ~1.035ish sweetness.

Jason tried the same recipe at home, with nearly identical technique and pulled up lame in the same FG ballpark. Thankfully, he didn't chuck his either, and it has spent the better part of the summer and fall making amends with the now available year round Wyeast Roselare blend. Tasted it a week ago, and its got the makings of a sour beast, I can't wait to see where this one ends up. It was so damn delicious, we just forgot to stick it in the hydrometer jar for a reading before it disappeared from our glasses. I've been ultra patient, trusting that its just too early now to even think about it, now that it has the grapes on it.

Anyhow, Jason, Luc and I set out one early morning in October to make right what went oh-so-wrong a few years ago.

That recipe was based on an approximation of the St. Bernadus Abt 12, which purportedly has a very heavy dose of this specialty dark candi syrup, which I'm trying to figure out a way to cook up at home. That cooked sugar, combined with some refined beet sugar combined for ~20% of the fermentables, in order to ensure a properly dry finish. um, right.

In that go-around, I made all the now-obvious mistakes that hindered that goal: less than optimal pitching rate, went with aquarium pump + airstone aeration and not oxygenation and lack of fermentation temperature control.

As my shipment of pils malt was late arriving from the recent mail order, and runs to the homebrew shop are really limited as of late with daddy responsibilities, we sacrificed some of that class pils character and went with some American 2 row as the base grain, so we could just brew some ale.

The tube of Chimay yeast had gotten off to a running start in an ample amount of 1.040 starter wort, and had been spinning round in the stirstarter for 36 hours before pitching.

The D2 was unfortunately in that not-quite-there-yet shipment too, so an across the street run to Trader Joe's for some turbinado was the lame duck sub. Before we started, we thumbed through Brew Like a Monk, and found we had now settled on a close approximation of an included classic recipe, so we felt confident while we weren't going to get to see how far down we could attenuate the prior recipe, we would still end up with a solid beer to ponder the true re-brew.

I did want to bump the IBUs up a touch from the prior batch, perhaps as a knee jerk reaction to compensate from the memory-sticky too-sweet finish, so 3oz of whole leaf Willamette made its way in to a hop sack for a 60minute addition.

As we'll often do, while we wait for the wort to come to a boil, J and I popped some solid bottles, but not before we were sure the little man had what he needed.

The first was a 750ml of 2.5 year old chimay grand reserve, in a study of the malt and yeast profile that was intended from this brew day.

And, if you've been around the house at all, you'll know that one nice bottle can sometimes lead to the popping of another.

And perhaps another after that.

Unfortunately, the cooing baby and hubris induced visions of an already vanquished quad brewday convinced me that we had it all under control, until I turned back to the lauter to realize, we had collected too much wort, and diluted a full 20 points below intended gravity! I could only shake my head, foolishly foiled. Oh well, at least that means there'll be just more of this not-quite-quad BSDA.

Fermentation started at 62F, held for 24hours after krausen appeared (sometime that night, pitched late afternoon). Raised to 74F ambient over the next 2 days, then blanketed in fleece to up to 77F for 1 week. Conditioned for an additional 2, then enough cane sugar to bottle to 4 volumes. FG to a respectable 1.016F.

Corked and caged.

Quad 2010

Belgian Dark Strong Ale

Type: All Grain	Date: 10/11/2010
Batch Size: 5.50 gal	Brewer: Jason
Boil Size: 6.30 gal	Asst Brewer: JC
Boil Time: 60 min	Equipment: My Equipment
Taste Rating(out of 50):35.0	Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00
Taste Notes:
Ingredients
Amount Item Type % or IBU 14 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 63.64 % 3 lbs Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 13.64 % 1 lbs Caramel/Crystal Malt -120L (120.0 SRM) Grain 4.55 % 1 lbs Caravienne Malt (22.0 SRM) Grain 4.55 % 1 lbs Wheat Malt, Bel (2.0 SRM) Grain 4.55 % 8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 75L (75.0 SRM) Grain 2.27 % 3.00 oz Williamette [5.50 %] (60 min) Hops 33.4 IBU 1 lbs 8.0 oz Turbinado (10.0 SRM) Sugar 6.82 % 2 Pkgs Abbey Ale (White Labs #WLP530) Yeast-Ale
Beer Profile
Est Original Gravity: 1.113 SG	Measured Original Gravity: 1.092 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.026 SG	Measured Final Gravity: 1.016 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol:11.52 %	Actual Alcohol by Vol: 9.97 %
Bitterness: 33.4 IBU	Calories: 425 cal/pint
Est Color: 20.5 SRM	Color: Color
Mash Profile
Mash Name: Single Infusion, Light Body	Total Grain Weight: 20.50 lb
Sparge Water: 0.00 gal	Grain Temperature: 72.0 F
Sparge Temperature:168.0 F	TunTemperature: 72.0 F
Adjust Temp for Equipment: FALSE	Mash PH: 5.4 PH
Single Infusion, Light Body Step Time Name Description Step Temp 75 min Mash In Add 25.63 qt of water at 161.4 F 150.0 F 10 min Mash Out Add 16.40 qt of water at 200.2 F 168.0 F
Mash Notes: Simple single infusion mash for use with most modern well modified grains (about 95% of the time).
Notes
collected too much wort.

Quad + Cuvee de Tetreault: Cabernet Sauv grapes in to the mix

A bit earlier this fall, 5 Gallons of frozen grapes arrived from Midwest supplies, just as the Fall2010 winemaking season was in full swing. I was looking for an interesting fruit addition to give some depth to some of my bigger/darker sours, and I found a really cool option with inspiring commercial precedents (such as this and to a lesser degree, this.)

I pulled the trigger, not on freshly harvested grapes or even current season frozen must. I went with the surprisingly still available (as of Dec 2010) $50 deal on 2007 Cabernet grapes from Napa (picked and crushed on my birthday!). These high brix, huge flavor and tannin grapes from the worldclass americal viticultural area were intended for dark sours already slowly churning away. I would normally eschew pre-processed and the downright old for a fresh/recently harvested version, but, given the consideration of cost (at $200+ for fresh equivalent), I wasn't overly concerned about an erosion of quality given the high sugar content (~23.3Brix) and I'm sure they were stably frozen from harvest to delivery.

Popping the lid showed me no overt signs of freezer burn, even though there was a little more headspace in the bucket than I expected. There was a rubber gasket seal and some tear away plastic that ensured this bucket wouldn't leak, but we all know the oxygen permeability of HDPE. But still...5 gallons of whole frozen napa cab grapes for ~$75? A no-brainer. Jump on it, if you haven't yet and its still available. I'd love to compare notes down the road.

Despite my endorsement, I did feel a twinge of guilt (that continues to nag at me) at the extravagance of the cross country shipping, and ridiculous amounts of styrofoam that was needed to keep them frozen.

I'll prefer in the future to focus on and mostly stick to the best of what the new england regional AVAs have to offer, as there's plenty of the more local and equally high quality options to explore. No, this is not laughable. While the long, warm and dry seasons in the west coast valleys drives the best out of the deep and dark reds, the moderation of the Atlantic coastal climes seems to make the much hardier rootstock of the whites (and earthy Cabernet Franc) truly sing. I'll go so far to say that some of the best methode champenoise sparkling wines I've ever had, come from a sleeper winery in Westport, Massachusetts (snap up all of the Maximilian, should you come across it).

So, I quickly discovered that 5 gallons of cab grapes is alot. ALOT.

After 5lbs of the crushed and mostly thawed grapes went in to the quad rescue attempt and 3.5lbs in to 4 gallons of the Cuvee (6 gallons remain without fruit addition, for now), I still have about 4 gallons of fruit left. I guiltily freezer-bagged up the remaining grapes, and hogged even more of the already hops-choked freezer.

The quad has been souring with the bugs for a descent amount of time now and any activity had slowed to a near crawl. I overfilled the carboy, and after a week, the re-activated microbes were pushing CO2, grapes skins and yeast up through the airlock (and continued to do so for ~1.5 months).

The cuvee was still quite young when the grapes were added (pellicle hadn't even fallen yet), so, despite my better judgement, I added the fruit much earlier than is likely optimal (would prefer than multiple brett strains, lacto + pedio would be favored over the sacch, and a later addition achieves that; sacch tends to lose viability faster than the others).

Only (lots) of time will tell, so I'm looking forward to my first tastes of these in about a year.

Quad rescue attempt: gratuitous funk pics

After the WLP655 didn't seem to do much beyond an initial restart on what appeared to be a sacch type of krausen, I pitched ~600ml of stepped up mixed dregs starter (including oro de calabaza, fantome printemps and consecration) in to the quad rescue ~22 days ago.

This is what I'm looking at today, including one very strange slimy (pedio?) bubble that has taller-than-it-is-wide straight sides.

Quad rescue attempt

Ok. Its been nearly 6 months since I've determined the quad just wasn't anywhere near a beer that I'd drink, nor offer to a guest. I decided at that point that I'd take this very underattenuated beer (~1.035), and try a sour rescue. Well, I'm just getting around to it now. But first, I'm guessing that I made one critical mistake...too small of a pitching rate. I don't have adequate notes, but I remember making maybe a 1liter starter (non stir plate). Not even close to enough, per the mrmalty.com pitching rate calculator. The beer seemed to ferment fairly aggressively to start, but it just stalled well before the target FG was reached.

Jump ahead now to earlier this week, I made a 1.040 100g DME/ 1000ml starter of wlp655 and let it ferment out for four days. As you can see by clicking through the link, this blend of microbes includes the usual ale yeast Saccharomyces, as well as what is considered a 'beer spoilage' organism in non-wild beers: Brettanomyces. I'm not sure if its a single strain of Brett, but I'm leaving some faith that the White Labs folks know their stuff. The blend also contains some souring microbes that will add organic acids, among other critical aromatic compounds that round out the complexities commonly found in these types of sours. From the recommendation of the mad fermentationist, I didn't use the stir plate beyond some initial aeration, as the pedio + lacto bacteria thrive in a anaerobic environment, and I really want these guys to contribute a significant sourness to this beer. If you are looking for a book that can help form a basis for understanding wild ales, and their related culture, take a look at Wild Brews. My sister Chelynn actually gave this fantastic book to me last Christmas, and has been read in regular intervals since. Really, the only thing that has kept me from going wild until now has been the extended aging that is required to properly develop the flavors of these beers, which...now several years later since I first had the inclination to brew wild, seems like I made a poor choice. I could have a healthy stash of some of my favorite beer styles really starting to come in to their own. Oh well. 2011 looks to be a good beer year for me.

So, the (purported to be wlp001 cali) ale yeast took off in ~12 hours, and the krausen fell in ~2 days. I took a sniff at that point, and I already am getting some musty, barny type smells from the brett, completely unlike what I get from a typical starter. Hmmmm, I have a feeling my carboy fleet is about to grow significantly in size...these wild ales really chew up conditioning capacity due to the extended secondary required for the relatively slow growing bugs to do their thing.

I took the next step with the sour mix starter...I uncorked three of the corked and caged quad 750s and added them to a one gallon jug with the starter. The next AM, the airlock was active...a definite krausen had reformed, and CO2 bubbling up through the beer could be seen in the jug. I suspect the hardy Cali sacch yeast had restarted on the residual sugars left behind by the inadequate primary ferment.

Tonight, I went through the painful task of slowly pouring the rest of the bottles in to my bottling bucket, doing my best to not aerate the beer too much.

This beer smells phenomenal, and its really a shame that the fermentation was sub par underattenuated mess...figs, prunes, dark caramelized sugars all over the place. faint whiff of warming alcohol, rich sherry and port notes, perhaps giving the impression of brandy soaked sour cherries...this all without the aid of volatilization from CO2 fizz. I'm hoping that these aged aromatics aren't driven off by this restarted ferment and are minimally oxidized by all this less than ideal handling of the beer.

So, now I'm hoping to wake up to the krausen reformed in the carboy, as I saw in the 1 gallon jug, but the true test of patience will be holding off taking samples until the pellicle drops which may be as long as 6-12 months (photo from madfermentationist.blogspot.com...I hope to have my own image soon.)

Almost forgot to mention...after primary krausen falls, I will soon add ~1.5 oz of boiled sanitized medium toast french oak 1. to (theoretically) give the bugs at least some square footage to set up camp (they also are said to metabolize some of the sugars in the oak, though this must be a very, very small percentage of fermentables, but more importantly, 2. to add a background barrel character. If I can get anywhere in the neighborhood of Stille Nacht, I'll be exceedingly pleased.

4/8/10 - 600ml of cultured up dregs oro de calabaza, consecration and fantome printemp added.

4/24/10 - positive pressure on S-shaped airlock is obvious. random bubbly film forming on surface. pellicle formation finally starting. I need to add some oak to this beer.

Trillium Brewing Fall/Winter Schedule: Sneak Peek

Now that the wedding has come and gone, and the coffers are woefully under stocked, it’s time to ramp up brewhouse production.

First on the docket is a west coast double IPA, based on from the Nov 2008 BYO ‘Hop Hammer’ recipe, as originally conceived by Vinnie Cilurzo at Russian River. It is a slightly higher ABV version of oh-so-popular (but, as yet, unavailable in the Boston area) Pliny the Elder.

Best man Jason and I are looking to co-brew this one in the coming weeks, so it will be peaking for a soon-to-be planned November Leon pig roast.

The hops used will be mostly with fresh 2009 harvest, so I really hope this will be as fresh of a DIPA I could ever hope for at home, using commercial acquired hops. Just put in the order under the group buy deadline with the Boston Worts. The Simcoe will need to be ordered through freshops.com, as the much less expensive Peterbaugh Farms run hopsdirect.com website doesn’t have any available. Prices have PLUMMETTED since last year, and availability is driving us all to pull the trigger on these hop bombs that we’ve been craving, but may have been putting off for other comparatively hop-light styles.

Speaking of Russian River, I’m finally looking to take my first foray in to the bugs w/ a harvest from the dregs of a bottle of RR’s Temptation. I’ll slowly build up a healthy starter, and then dump my under carbed and woefully under attenuated quad, which will hopefully drive the level of complexity up and the gravity down from the nosebleed 1.035 section. This is strictly a research and rescue mission, not pinning too much hope on anything fantastic.

Other planned brews involve an Orval’d Belgian pale ale that have asian pears . My three trees have been pushing out more and more fruit every year, so I’d naturally love to experiment with a few pounds of these in a beer. They have been infinitely more flavorful, juicy and complex than the expensive and limited grocery store selections, and I'd love to see what they lend to a crisp Belgian pale ale.

Also, I’ve got a Temptation influenced hybrid wine/wild ale in development. This beer will feature fresh chardonnay grapes from a hands-on harvest effort that will occur next month at Saltwater Farm in Stonington, CT. Toasted French oak will be employed, of course. More details on these experimental and other beers to follow in the weeks and months ahead.

Lastly, I've got some grand plans for a more detailed series of blog posts in the works, involving collaborative efforts with Boston/New England area folks who pride themselves on local and artisan foods. It may take a little while to develop the content, but once it starts, look out!

Belgian Quad

12.05.09 Souring

12.27.08 Bottling


Racked the imperial stout for secondary conditioning today, figured it wouldn't hurt to bottle the quad now...its been a few months. Finished pretty high. not sure why. FG of 1.035ish. Puttyman's came in high too. He was around 1.040. dammit. it still tastes great, just will not be particularly adherant to style. dammit. I carbed w/ a relatively large amount of priming sugar, hoping to get a crisp mouthfeel, that might enhance the perception of dryness. If you click on the pic, you'll see the nice russet/red color of the beer through the autosiphon. nice.









figured I'd post a bit how I cork and cage the belgian bottles...i use the colonna corker/capper.




















It can be used to cork regular wine bottles, and I've found that with a few extra steps, it can cork belgian bottles nicely. I tried the slightly larger/more rigid champagne corks...not sure if you'd want to risk forcing the cork through the plastic iris. I think it would break. thankfully, belgian corks are also sufficient for corking champagne bottles. But today, I corked Belgians.

You start with sanitized belgian bottles, I prefer the dishwasher heat cycle for this, just need to plan a bit ahead, the full cycle time takes about 2hrs from the time I press the start button.

I get the belgian corks and cages from morebeer.com. I think the last time I did the math, this enclosure method costs about 40cents/bottle. so, several times more pricey than capping. The colonna capper contains a bell housing that fits the larger euro caps, so that's an option for most champagne bottles (not belgian bottles). A nice finishing touch would be a champagne foil...I've searched for black foils, but they just don't seem to be available to the homebrewer.

You set the adjustable level bottom plate to appropriate height (just underneath the spring loaded corking iris) and depress the lever until the cork is maybe 1/3 in to the neck of the bottle.














Here's the rigged part...remove the bottom plate, and continue pushing the cork all the way through. this method leads to a bit of variability in the depth of the cork, but with the cage eventually in place, I think it looks just fine.

The cage is placed over the top of the cork, pressing down initially with the palm of your hand and pulling back two of the wires with your thumb and middlefinger, holding the cage down with your forefinger, insert a smooth plastic pen in to the open loop. Holding the wires in place with your left hand, twist the pen with your right, five and 1/2 times. Dont' over tighten, it doesn't add anything, and you'll break the wire. Remove the pen, and fold the loop upward toward the cork. Make sure the wire eventually is seated below the bottom of the second lip of glass on the neck.

A freshly bottled box of quad ready to be stuck in storage and forgotten about for a year or so.

_______________________________________________

I went to a trappist tasting at the brookline wine gallery with my buddy and fellow BA, puttyman.

Kai took us on a tour through the wonderful world, sampling a bevy of the trappist's finest, accompanying the tasting with some information that satisfied the beer nerds among us and did a nice job of keeping the unitiated entertained. We had the 'standards' and they surprise me every time. As a homebrewer, tastings like these renew my interest in trying my hand at these styles. I sampled Westy12 for the first time in my life. Unbelievable. Truly. Was it head and shoulders over the other brews we tasted? no, it was maybe a forehead + some eyebrows..definitely better/more enjoyable, but...not incrementally so. Hopefully I'll be able to extend one of my frequent work trips to the Netherlands to go see a trappist brewery or two. I wonder how many bottles I could fit in my return luggage...
So, of course, I bought a few quads with the intention of cellaring.

Kai actually sent me a beermail before the event, asking if I had any belgian style homebrews that I'd like to share with the group, to bring a few along. I was more than happy to grab a few 750Belgian bottles of my 'tripel', (made from another midwest recipe kit)which had spent about 9 months in the bottles at that point. Was happy I had these in the proper cork + cage for a group who'd likely appreciate it (they did).

Side by side with the trappist stuff...well, uh, obviously mine did not achieve monkitude. Gotta say, though, it was still tasty, and all who sampled, had that look on their face all homebrewers hope for (you know, the one where the eyebrows raise up after the first taste, subtle nodding in approvement, the glass gets raised up a bit for closer inspection/sniff). I offered the following critique...too high of a FG (don't have the numbers)/not dry enough for a true tripel, color a bit too dark, which aligned with up front evidence of the caramalized flavors...I attribute both to the fact that it was made with LME in a concentrated boil in my earlier brew days. Not dry/light/'digestible' enough to be considered a proper tripel. This one was fermented with a healthy 500ml starter from yeast cultured and stepped up several times from two 750s of Duvel (thanks Brendan). A recent tasting (on 12/13/08) has this one expressing a little green apple on the nose, along with caramel...again, still a bit too sweet for a true tripel, but delicious in its own right. Only a few bottles of this left, they are out of my arms reach in storage, so I'll revisit these in a year or so. Probably time to brew a proper all grain tripel, use some WLP trappist. but that's still on the to-brew list, there were still other styles that i want to try my hand at before revisiting prior style attempts.


Anyhow, I sought out the D2 (based on recipe from BYO's clone recipe of st. bernadus12). Supply is a bit tough on this, so on the order that was originally placed, the D2 was put on backorder. Delayed the eventual brewing...first attempt was with puttyman, we went in together on an ingredient order. Subsequent brewday was on 09.23.08.

this is the recipe and output from beersmith, sorry I don't have any data on the mash schedule/temps, but I generally do a single mash temp, 1.25quarts/lb. Batch sparged this, as I hadn't received my stainless sparge arm at this point.


Quad
Belgian Dark Strong Ale

Type: All Grain
Date: 9/23/2008
Batch Size: 5.50 gal

10 lbs Pilsner (2 Row) Bel (2.0 SRM) Grain 53.11 %
3 lbs Biscuit Malt (23.0 SRM) Grain 15.93 %
1 lbs Aromatic Malt (26.0 SRM) Grain 5.31 %
8.0 oz Carafa III (525.0 SRM) Grain 2.66 %
5.3 oz Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 1.75 %
0.50 oz Challenger [7.50 %] (60 min) Hops 10.1 IBU
0.25 oz Styrian Goldings [5.40 %] (15 min) Hops 1.8 IBU
3 lbs Candi Sugar, D2 (80.0 SRM) Sugar 15.93 %
1 lbs Sugar, Table (Sucrose) (1.0 SRM) Sugar 5.31 %
1 Pkgs Abbey Ale (White Labs #WLP530) Yeast-Ale

Beer Profile
Est Original Gravity: 1.096 SG
Measured Original Gravity: 1.110 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.022 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.035 SG (ug...really high...)
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 9.71 %
Actual Alcohol by Vol: 9.87 %
Bitterness: 11.9 IBU
Calories: 529 cal/pint
Est Color: 42.8 SRM