Brewing Dorée Forte

So right now I am sparging my Duvel clone, named Dorée Forte (roughly, "Strong Gold") according to some online translator. The recipe from the BYO 150 Clones magazine is a bit more complicated than I'm used to. There are two options, but both involve applying heat to the mash tun. But I have an Igloo cooler setup...

I chose the one where you mash in at 99 and then slowly raise temp to 168 over 90-180 minutes. My burner doesn't go that slow, and I ended up doing steps at 120, 130, 140, and 150 for 10, 10, 20, and 30 minutes each, then a mash out at 170. Who knows what will happen. The mash water is really cloudy. I will check the gravity and add up to a pound of DME if I need to.

I made a yeast starter again this time. It is cool - I tasted it and it tastes like belgian ale. I know this is what they always say, but it was still amazing to me. Contrast with last week, when the Cali Ale yeast starter tasted sort of like nothing is even more amazing.

Well with any luck I'll pitch my yeast at 4 PM.

Big Slick Update

Fermentation slowed on Big Slick, my Imperial IPA, a few days ago. Yesterday, I sampled the gravity to see where it was. As a bonus I got to taste some.

Well the gravity remains high - 1.030. I'd really like to see it hit 1.015 or even lower, so we'll see what happens. I did learn that I don't really need to hurry it off to secondary. So now I am "rousing the yeast" a few times a day - sort of swirling the carboy to resuspend yeast so it can get back to work. I'll resample again next Monday and see how the gravity is doing.

Oh yes, and the taste. The basement has been about 72 with the recent heat, and the fermentation was making the beer temp around 78 - by all accounts a bit too high. And the alcohol taste (it is already 8.5% ABV) was prevalent to say the least. So I guess it's time to insulate and cool the fermenting beer boxes - even in the basement.

Hey at least it is higher than 3% ABV, which is ultimately what I was after.

Otter Creek Wee Heavy

OK so I thought I wanted to brew a wee heavy. A high alcohol beer with a cool style name. So I got a 22 ounce bottle of Otter Creek's version from their "World Tour" series. I was very optimistic.

First warning sign: screw top. Why?

Okay...past that...it pours with basically no head at all. I just used my mug with a handle (tankard?) for it, so it should have a large head. But nothing... well OK it isn't from Belgium, so maybe no head is OK.

It smells like a scotch ale, which it should. It has that sweet caramel and malt smell. Maybe even an oakey smell. It is also brown - not as dark as my nut brown, but solidly brown - darker than Newcastle.

First taste...blah. Not bad, but not making me super eager for another sip. I can feel some alcohol in it. I assume it is at least 8%, by style, but it doesn't bother telling us how much ABV it has, so it's anyone's guess. I felt pretty good (taste buds notwithstanding) after finishing the 22 ounces, so it can hold it's own in the ABV dept.

It is lightly carbonated, which is fine. It has subtle hops, which is fine. Is is super sweet, which is not so good. My mouth is sticky from all the sweetness. Maybe in style, but not what I like. In the end this is just too sweet for me.

So instead of a Wee Heavy, I am going to make a Fat Tire clone, maybe a double Fat Tire (I guess that would be a Quad ATV)

Duvel Notes

Duvel. Perhaps the most well known Belgian ale. I had a four pack of 11.2 ounce (330 ml) bottles. This is one of them. The bottles came with a fancy glass from which I've been drinking all the other belgians. Duvel is 8.5% ABV and it was in a brown bottle which was capped.

The color is very light golden. It has a big frothy head, which dissolves from the edge of the glass (probably due to dishwasher detergent residue), but stays in the middle (probably due in part to the etched "D" in the bottom of the glass which sprouts forth bubbles while beer is in the glass). I can smell it through the head. It smells fruity, but slightly unfresh.

It tastes tangy, effervescent, peppery, and sweet. It is very nice. It has a great round carbonated feel. The alcohol is secretive - you'd never know if you didn't know. As it moves on, you get a little of mouth and throat warmth from the alcohol.

Damn this is good! I can't wait until I make my own on Wednesday - unfortunately Tuesday it will rain, so I can't brew, since I brew outdoors...

Duvel

I tasted and noted Duvel tonight, but I can't quite find it in myself to post it right now. But I did do it. I know it was good stuff. Sweet and Belgian...light and high ABV. Just how I like it right now.

But at the bar, they had a lot of Irish stuff. Smithwicks (say "schmidicks") is good, Guiness is good, but Stella was my fave tonight (I know it's not Irish). Can't wait to brew my Duvel clone, named "Dorée Forte" (Strong Golden) on Tuesday, or maybe Wednesday depending on the weather.

I also would like to include my wife tonight. Aimée tasted the Duvel and declared it the best of the Belgians that I've had the past few weeks. I trust her pallette more than mine. She tasted subtleties in other French and Belgian ales that I initially missed. Where would I be without her? Probably still at the bar getting in a LOT of trouble. 143!

Brewing News

I felt that I should create a separate entry for brewing news. I made a few liquid malt extract kit brews. Then I did a few dried malt extract clone brews. Then I jumped into all grain. My system has terrible efficiency. I don't know if my thermometer is inaccurate, or maybe I am sparging/running off too fast, or what, but it is like 60%. Well it has been until this past batch.

I had been getting kits or grains from www.northernbrewer.com for my first 5 or 6 all grain batches. But now with the hot weather, I am scared for the viability of the yeast over 4+ days in transit in a UPS truck. So now I go to my "local" homebrew shop 30 minutes away. They don't have everything, but the yeast is in the fridge, and I am comfortable with that.

It seems that northern brewer doesn't grind their grains that finely, whereas the mill at Rob's (the homebrew shop) (www.robshomebrew.com) is set a little more fine. My first grains I got at Rob's were for "Big Slick", which turned out to be an Imperial IPA. I just knew I wanted to make a big beer with a gravity of at least 80. Well I got 1.095! I haven't run the numbers yet, but my efficiency is higher now! Only thing is I had to hand crank grind 20 pounds of base malts.

The recipe for Big Slick isn't fancy... it is 10lbs of 2-row and 10lbs of Maris Otter plus some American hops adding up to about 80 IBU (oh yeah, and about 3 ounces of crystal malt to get the color into the style range), but I'm excited to have some hitest in bottles around here. My other all grain batches are all 4% or less, due to my previously low efficiency. I have a wheat beer ("Stonington Memorial Summer Ale")where my hydrometer broke, but I think it's like 3.6%, then the nut brown which is 3.8%, the Stout which is 1.8%, an American pale ale which is 3.7%, and an ESB which had a starting gravity of 1.046 and should end up at <4%. So I need to balance 10 cases of session beers with at least one solid knock-your-socks-off hitest beer. I made a yeast starter for Big Slick, and the primary is just now slowing down (brewed on Tuesday), so I'm happy. I will transfer when it's totally dormant looking (hopefully Monday) and take a gravity reading then, but even if it's at 1.020, that's over 9% from what I can remember... Sam Calagione watch out! Plus the Duvel clone has a scaled up grain bill to compensate for the historically low efficiency, so it should end up over 8%. Then I'll make the Wee Heavy, which will be at least 7% (what's the range on Wee Heavy's?), so I'll be in good shape. Hope my fridges can handle the stock!

That's it for now. Hopefully one day someone will find this thing and I'll get a comment! That will be fun!!

Slacking off

OK so I started this thing and now haven't posted. Well I've been tasting my own brewed beers.

I bottled "Honey Nut Beerios" on the 21st. It's a Southern British nut brown with honey added to it. It is almost ready. Two weeks in the bottle is generally when I put it into the fridge.

I also bottled "Oatquake Stout Ale" on the 24th. It's an oatmeal stout that had some fermentation difficulties, and has a whopping 1.8% ABV, but it's still pretty good. Those yeast were eager for some fermentables, and it's almost ready already. But, two weeks till it's official.

Anyway, I've been on those the past few days. All I really have left to taste anyway is a couple of Duvels (I already tasted two, but didn't take any notes) and a domestic Wee Heavy.

I'm going to brew a Duvel clone next, on Tuesday, and a Wee Heavy after that, on the Tuesday after next. I guess I should probably do official tastings of my own beers... after all if you want to read about what commercially available beers taste like, that's what www.beeradvocate.com is for!