My One Good Fred Story

Fred_EckhardtHomebrewers today live in a world full of information. There are homebrewing books, magazines, websites, and internet forums. In addition, there are homebrewing clubs to join and contests to enter. But it wasn’t always that way.

In the United States, in the late 1970s, there was nothing. In 1979, Jimmy Carter signed a bill making the homebrewing of beer legal in the US. Home winemaking was already legal, and there was a small community of home winemakers. But home beer brewing was clandestine and not widely practiced, although most people probably “knew a guy who knew a guy.”  [Read more…]

Tripel (II: Recipe)

DSCN2183The recipe for a tripel is simple. You’ll need enough Pilsner malt, and roughly 20% sucrose (table sugar), to reach your target original gravity. The Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) gives this range as OG 1.075–1.085. Plus, noble hops — all added near the beginning of the boil — to reach your target level of IBUs. The BJCP gives this as 20–40 IBUs. And finally, an attenuative yeast, with a moderately  “spicy” Belgian character, to yield a low final gravity (FG). The BJCP gives this as 1.008–1.014 for a corresponding alcohol content of 7.5–9.5%. And that’s it.

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Tripel (I:Water)

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Two tripels, one brewed in the US (Texas) and the other in Belgium.

Tripel is a strong, golden ale that originated in Belgium. It’s very similar, in fact, to Belgian strong golden ales, like Duvel or Delirium Tremens. Westmalle Tripel, Tripel Karmeliet, and Chimay Cinq Cents (Chimay White) are three well-known tripels that are available in the US. Examples of tripels brewed in the US include New Belgium Trippel, Allagash Tripel Reserve, and Victory Golden Monkey. Notice that the spelling isn’t entirely standardized. New Belgium spells their version “trippel,” while some Belgian breweries label theirs as “triples.”

The Westmalle Trappist Brewery made tripels popular and the designation sets their 9.5% ABV Tripel apart from their 7% ABV Dubbel (double) and their 4.8% “single” beer (called Extra, and not generally commercially available). In addition to being an indication of strength, by convention, tripel always designates a pale beer while dubbels are always dark beers.

There are several challenges to brewing a tripel, and this makes it a great brewing experience for homebrewers used to brewing English-style ales who are looking for something new to try. [Read more…]

Maibock (IV: Yeast and Fermentation)

DSCN0062Brewing a Maibock is fairly straightforward. The recipe can be simple and wort production does not have to be complicated. The part of brewing as Maibock that separates the best homebrewed examples from the rest is the fermentation.

 

Yeast Strains

Maibock is a lager, and most lager yeast strains will work well for this type of beer. The best strains, as recommended by their manufacturers, are Wyeast 2124 (Bohemian Lager), Wyeast 2206 (Bavarian Lager), Wyeast 2308 (Munich Lager), White Labs WLP820 (Octoberfest/Märzen Lager), White Labs WLP833 (German Bock Lager), White Labs WLP838 (Southern German Lager), and White Labs WLP920 (Old Bavarian Lager Yeast).

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Maibock (III: Boiling and Hops)

IMG_2091Wort production — mashing and running off the wort — for a Maibock is unlikely to cause most homebrewers any problems. For a 5.0-gallon (19-L) batch, you’ll need 11–16 lbs. (5.0–7.3 kg) of grain — assuming you get an extract efficiency between 65 and 80% — to hit your target original gravity (OG 1.064–1.072). If you have a 10-gallon (38-L) or larger mash tun, you’ll have plenty of room.

For some homebrewers, however, kettle size may be limiting. Fully-sparged, 11–16 lb. of grain should yield 7 to 10 gallons (26 to 38 L) of pre-boil wort at around 11 °Plato (SG 1.044). If your extract efficiency is on the low end, and you’re shooting for a Maibock on the high end of the OG range, a 10-gallon (38-L) kettle will not be large enough.

To calculate how much pre-boil wort your grain bed will yield, assuming it is fully sparged, multiply your weight of your grain bed (in pounds) times 0.65 gallons per pound — this will give you a rough approximation (in gallons) of the volume of pre-boil wort. If this is more than you can comfortably boil in 90 minutes, you can add more grain to your recipe, but collect less wort. (Estimating how much grain to add can be tricky, though.) You could also supplement your all-grain wort with malt extract. You could also reformulate the recipe for a lower starting gravity.

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Maibock (II: Malts and Mashing)

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Adding 5–25% Munich malt to your grist gives a nice malt character that is appropriate in a bockbier.

Most Maibock recipes are very simple. The beer should be pale and better attenuated than other bockbiers, so the grist is usually 100% base malts. Crystal malts are not needed because caramel flavor and the extra body that crystal malts add are not desired. In the same vein, there is no call to add CaraPils (or CaraAnything) to your grist. A simple mix of Pilsner, Vienna, and Munich malt is ideal.

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Maibock (I:Intro)

This is the introductory post for another entry in Beer and Wine Journal’s beer style series. Previous styles profiled are American Hoppy Ales (American Pale Ale, IPA, etc.), Dry Stout, German Wheat Beer, Golden Ale, Porter, and Russian Imperial Stout.

 

Beauty of Spring 5

Spring

With the current wintery blast engulfing most of the US, many homebrewers may be looking forward to Spring. One way to prepare for the annual return of warmer weather is to brew a Maibock (which translates from the German as May Bock). Although commercial Maibocks are often available from late-winter through early summer, they are most strongly associated with Spring. Most Maibocks clock in at around 6–7% ABV. So, if you brew one now (in January), you can lager it for 2–3 months and it will be in great shape by April or May.

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Articles on Brewing Big Beers From Our First Year

birthday-party-suppliesBeer and Wine Journal turned one year old about a month ago. During that time, I’ve posted a couple compilations of articles that ran in our first year, including brewing science stories and articles about all-grain brewing (and, of course, the requisite top 10 list).  Here’s a list of our best articles on brewing strong beers.

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BJCP Comparison Spreadsheet

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Mark Schoppe’s spreadsheet. You can download a copy by clicking the last link in the article.

The proposed new BJCP Guidelines have been released for comment and they contain many changes from the 2008 guidelines. The BJCP site has a spreadsheet mapping the new category numbers to the old, but Mark Schoppe, of the Austin ZEALOTS, has taken that a step further. He has made a spreadsheet that details all the additions and deletions of styles, plus changes in numeric parameters. (You may remember Mark as the 2012 NInkasi winner. I also interviewed him for the “Competitive Brewing Logistics” article.)

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Russian Imperial Stout (IX: Conditioning and Aging)

This is the ninth article in my series on Russian imperial stouts

RISphotoOnce primary fermentation has finished, it’s time to condition — and possibly age — the beer. For the purposes of this article, I’ll define conditioning as the process of aging the beer so it loses its green character and becomes drinkable. I’ll define aging as storing the beer beyond that point, in the hopes of developing characters that can only be acquired over time. Before I discuss conditioning and aging, however, I want to describe one important test that should be done whenever you make a big ale.

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