Beer Recipe: “Wacky Wit” Wit with Brett

To be honest, I’m not really sure where I got the idea in my head to brew this beer.  I have been reading a lot about sour beers lately (American Sour Beers is a wonderful book), and I wanted something outside of a normal ale.  But, I wanted to enjoy it relatively quickly, unlike the Flanders Red I have sitting in a closet upstairs until this summer.  So, I just decided to co-pitch some brett and a saison yeast into something like a wit wort and see what happened.

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Beer Recipe: “Merlin” Belgian Pale Ale

The last Belgian pale ale I made was decent, but ended up being too sweet when the hops dropped out.  And, the yeast character ended up being rather tart and muddled.  But, I thought it had potential, and whipped up this batch with lessons learned.  Its more of a “spiritual successor” than a direct descendant with all of the changes made.

Beer Recipe: “Sochi Stout” Russian Imperial Stout

This is one of the big beers I brewed this past winter (I am resigned to brewing with the seasons until I get temperature control) during the Sochi Olympics.  It was disappointing watching the Americans go against the Maple Machine in hockey—and the subsequent implosion against the Finns—but I still thought it was an appropriate beer name.

Beer Recipe: “River Thames” Southern English Brown

I’ve been trying to get some more low alcohol beers into the rotation lately.  For whatever reason, there is sort of a sweet spot of 6.5-8% ABV that I can easily and consistently produce good beer without having to worry about it being too watery or bland on the low end or extreme fermentation issues on the high end.  But, I wanted to be able to drink more beer (and thus brew more beer), which meant pushing ABV lower.

Beer Recipe: “Cantankerous Leprechaun” Dry Stout

This beer was originally supposed to be named “World’s Tallest Leprechaun” after the shirt my brother-in-law got me on his honeymoon to Ireland.  If you’re not yet chuckling, picture a 6’5/ 2 m tall man wearing a tiny green jacket.  I decided to rename it after having one of the more difficult brew days in a while.

Beer Recipe: “Mo’Citra” Hoppy Saison

This beer is the spiritual successor of last season’s “Lawn Dart” Saison. I really enjoyed the high dose of wheat, and decided to up the ante with some rye.  I also wanted to have a bit more of a hop impression without much bitterness, so I used a favorite technique of mine—hop bursting—with my favorite hop pair, Mosiac and Citra.

Beer Recipe: “Meiko” Belgian Pale Ale

About 10 batches ago, I brewed a beer modeled after Flying Dog’s “Raging Bitch” Belgian IPA, mostly following a recipe given on the Jamil Show podcast on The Brewing Network.  It turned out really well; friends claimed it was better than the commercial version, but I suspect they just wanted more free beer.  This summer I thought it would be nice to have an easier-drinking pale ale version.  Its named after our new cat, Meiko, who we got about the time this was bottled (and they are surprisingly similar in color).

Beer Recipe: “Imposter” German Dark ‘Lager’

For this brew, I was targeting something more in line with the German brewing tradition than any of my previous brews.  I didn’t shoot for a particular style, but rather a mix of what I like about schwartzbier, dunkel, and bock to get a full flavored beer, but still drinkable in the warmer months.  I also don’t have any desire to decoction mash or set up for lagering, so I instead chose my ingredients, especially yeast, carefully.  Hence the Imposter moniker: this is an ale in a lager costume.

Beer Recipe: “Eureka” Tripel

This is my first brew I put to use the information I learned from Brew like a Monk and posted about earlier, so named for my various “eureka!” moments while reading.  Its a style I love and have been wanting to brew since I started, but always got pushed off for reasons unknown.

Brew Tips: Brewing Logs

Brewing logs are a dry topic, I know.  Sorry.  But, they are of the utmost importance at all levels of brewing, from beginner to professional.  They let you track not only what you did wrong (which is frequently only remembered if spectacularly wrong), but also what you did right, which is pretty much never remembered.

Reader Question: Beer Recipe Formulation

Off-week bonus post!  A while back I got a reader question in response to my article on How to Build a Beer Recipe.  In a nutshell, Mark was a little fuzzy on how much of each ingredient to actually use, something I glossed over in my more conceptual treatment of recipe building.  I thought I would share my response here:

Open-air Fermentation and a Recipe

Open-air fermentation?  You mean fermentation with no lid?  NO AIRLOCK!?  Yes.  Its time to take the top off.  I know what you’re thinking: the beer will get infected.  You’re also thinking: that’s crazy, why would you even bother with such non-sense?  This is the 21st century, not the dark ages; we use lids in century 21, sir!

Beer Recipe: “Kick in the Mangos” Brett IPA

I have been playing around with the tropical fruit hops like mosaic, simcoe, falconer’s flight (a blend), etc, for my last few batches, and have really enjoyed the result.  This time, I decided to pair these hops with the brett trois yeast strain which is known for anything from tart to mango and pineapple to horse blanket; I tailored the conditions to draw out only the mango and pineapple to complement the hops.  The result was an IPA gushing with tropical fruit flavors layered over smooth bittering.

Beer Recipe: “JuniPA” Juniper Pale Ale

This was a beer born after listening to a podcast or two about brewing sahti, a traditional Finnish beer which frequently uses Juniper or similar evergreen sprigs in the mash to flavor the beer.  I happened to have the much less resinous and more mild juniper berries already in my spice cabinet from some sauerbraten I made a while back, so I decided to use the rest for a beer.  I went with an American pale ale base so the berries could really come out and not get hidden behind too much malt or hops- I really wanted to see what they would do in the beer.  This is one of my older recipes just before I made the transition to all grain and water treatment, so this is a partial mash recipe.  I’ll soon be making an all grain beer based (loosely) on this recipe. [UPDATE: Here is the all-grain JuniPA post.]

Beer Recipe: “Stormy Night” Session Stout

There are many things about spring and summer I love- everything turns green and colorful, the weather is nice (well, for a few weeks until it gets so bloody humid its just oppressive), and its great to finally get outside again.  The beer, however, seems to get far less interesting.  Summer pilsner this, light ale that.  Its understandable- no one wants to sit outside with condensation running down a glass of barleywine.  In an effort to come to a happy medium, I set out to brew something full bodied and flavorful, but clean, drinkable, and lowish alcohol.  I came up with this stout I’ve dubbed Stormy Night.  Corny, I know, but it named itself when the lights started to flicker as I was bottling.

How to Build a Beer Recipe

Building a recipe is a large part of the craft of brewing, which means there will be even more opinions than on the scientific portion of brewing.  And opinions are like, well… lets just say everyone has one.  Here’s mine (my opinion, that is):