Archives for October 2013

Mole Stout Recipe

October 24, 2013 by 10 Comments
Vanilla, cinnamon, cacao nibs, and ancho chili bring a lot of flavor.

Vanilla, cinnamon, cacao nibs, and ancho chili bring a lot of flavor.

When looking at the name of this beer, don’t think of the nearsighted underground mammal prone to crisscrossing your yard with annoying tunnels. Think of mole (MO-lay) sauce from traditional Mexican cuisine. According to Wikipedia, mole comes in many forms with different ingredients. This beer was inspired by a beer from Andy Coates when he was brewing at West Mountain Brewing in Fayetteville, Arkansas. (Andy now owns Ozark Beer Company in Rogers, Arkansas.) Andy added ingredients to a keg of his stout to bring chocolate, spice, and a bit of heat to the beer. It was delicious.

My first attempt at the beer was on an episode of Basic Brewing Video. Steve Wilkes and I brewed a one-gallon batch as part of a series on small batch all grain beers. On Andy’s advice, we added roasted cacao nibs, a vanilla bean, a cinnamon stick, and an ancho chili pepper to secondary fermentation in a Mr. Beer fermenter for one week. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Brewing Ingredients, Brewing Recipes

Porter: V (Specialty Porters I)

October 23, 2013 by 1 Comment
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The basic flavors in a porter blend well with a variety of other flavors, making for a wide range of specialty porters.

This is part of our series on porter. The series starts with an article on water treatment.

Porter is one of my favorite beer styles, in part because it is so varied. “Regular” porters range from fairly low gravity, chocolate-y beers similar to brown ales, to somewhat stronger beers with an aggressive roast malt character. (This spans the range of what the BJCP would describe as brown porters to robust porters.) The roast character can vary depending on the ratio of chocolate malt to black malt (and perhaps roasted barley) and overall a lot of different beers can legitimately fall under the porter umbrella.

With it’s mixture of roast and caramel flavors, porter can also pair with a variety of other “non-beer” flavors to yield interesting specialty beers. Here is a rundown of some of the most common porter variants and how to brew them at home.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Beer Styles, Brewing Ingredients

Should You Acidify Your Sparge Water?

October 22, 2013 by 16 Comments
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Should you acidify your sparge water? Probably not.

Ideas filter into brewing all the time. Most of the time, new ideas simply fall by the wayside. Others enjoy a brief moment of popularity before fading into obscurity. A very few are tested through the experience of brewers, show that they make a positive difference and become a permanent part of the way we brew. One new idea in homebrewing is that you should acidify your sparge water. I will argue that, for most homebrewers, this is not accomplishing anything worthwhile.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Brewing Techniques

Porter: IV (Dark Grains in the Brewhouse)

October 21, 2013 by 2 Comments

[Note to Beer and Wine Journal daily readers. Sorry for the two-day break from posted articles this weekend. At Beer and Wine Journal, we aim to post at least one update every day. Occasionally, we will skip one weekend day and post two articles on Monday or Tuesday. This weekend, after attending the Dixie Cup on Saturday, I came home to find my house burgled and my computer stolen, so I was unable to post a Sunday update. Back on track now. — Chris]

IMG_1654This is part of our series on porter. The series starts with an article on water treatment.

Once you’ve got your recipe assembled, you can brew your porter as you would any ale. However, you have a couple options related to handling the dark grains.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Beer Styles, Brewing Ingredients

Porter: III (Ingredients)

October 18, 2013 by 3 Comments
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Although the dark grain character is prominent, porter is fundamentally a balanced beer.

This is part of our series on porter. The series starts with an article on water treatment.

The dark grains used in brewing a porter take center stage, but all of your ingredients are important. The idea you sometimes hear that lots of dark grains will cover up for small imperfections in a dark beer is, in my opinion, false. It takes just as much skill and attention to brew a quality dark beer as it does to brew a quality pale beer.

 

Other Malts

Dark grains usually comprise around 7 to 12% of a porter’s grist, and were discussed in a previous post. The remainder of the grain bill is usually pale malt and crystal malt, and perhaps one other malt (two at the most).

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Beer Styles, Brewing Ingredients

Tasting Notes: Rye-Based Session Beers

October 17, 2013 by 7 Comments

Those of you who have been following BWJ for a while know that I’ve been playing with rye as a way to lower the gravity and alcohol of homebrews while maintaining a satisfying level of mouthfeel. In this week’s Basic Brewing Video episode, Steve Wilkes and I sample two of them. Both have been featured here: 100% Rye Pale Ale – Take Two and “Rye Wit.”

In the episode, we walk viewers through the brewing process of each. Brew in a Bag (BIAB) is essential because of the gumminess of the rye wort.

Filed Under: Beer, Brewing Recipes, Brewing Techniques, Homebrewing

Brewing With Special Ingredients: III (Fruits-II)

October 16, 2013 by 1 Comment

[This article is part of a series on brewing with special ingredients. The introduction covered background material and the second installment covered sugars. This is the second part of the installment covering brewing with fruits.]

 

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Fruit should be added in secondary, to best preserve it’s delicate aromas.

You will occasionally see old school homebrew recipes call for adding fruit in the boil, or even in the mash. However, your best bet is to add fruit to your beer after primary fermentation.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Brewing Ingredients

Fruit Composition Table

October 15, 2013 by 1 Comment

To help brewers and winemakers formulate their fruit beers and country wines, here’s a table listing the percentage of water, sugar and acid found in many common fruits. The types of acids in the fruit are also listed.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Brewing Ingredients, Winemaking Ingredients

Brewing With Special Ingredients: III (Fruits-I)

October 15, 2013 by 2 Comments

[This article is part of a series on brewing with special ingredients. The introduction covered background material and the second installment covered sugars. This installment will span two articles and cover fruits.]

 

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Making a fruit beer is easy, especially if you understand your ingredients.

If you have a garden or orchard on your property, or just live near a good farmer’s market, chances are you’ve thought about combining your love of brewing with some of nature’s bounty. In the right kind of beer, fruit can make a nice complement. Sour beers are an especially nice host for fruit flavors; but basically any kind of beer that isn’t too hoppy could be made into a fruit beer. Adding fruit to your beer, in a way that preserves the fresh fruit flavors and aromas, is straightforward. As always, understanding a little about an ingredient will help you

When most people think of fruits, they think of sweet fleshy foods, usually containing seeds, that come from trees, bushes or other plants. These include apples, stone fruits (cherries, peaches), berries (strawberries, raspberries), melons, dates and many others.  The botanical definition of fruits is different, and broader, but for the purpose of this article, we’ll use the “kitchen” definition.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Brewing Ingredients Tagged With: , ,

Porter: II (Dark Grains)

October 14, 2013 by 4 Comments
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Dark malts such as black malt and chocolate malt provide the flavor for most porters.

This is part two of our series on porter. The series starts with an article on water treatment.

The color and roast flavor in a porter comes from darkly roasted grains, most commonly black malt and chocolate malt, but other dark grains can be used as well. Knowing a little bit about these grains and how they are produced can help you decide how to use them in porters and other dark beers.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Beer Styles, Brewing Ingredients
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