Sour Blonde Wheat Ale Tasting

Sour Blonde Wheat Ale

Brewed the Sour Wheat Ale a little over two months ago, and it should be ready for a tasting by now. This brew clocks at 4.5% ABV, and unlike the Flanders Red Ale that I fermented with this same yeast concoction, this beer never formed a pellicle; however, it was not nearly exposed to as much oxygen nor did it have a lot of time. Before bottling, when I tasted it out of the fermenter, I was very surprised at how sour it got in such a short amount of time. I also couldn't taste any of the coriander or orange.


Aroma: Clean citrus, esters and mildly sweet--almost like the smell of cotton candy. No funk or barnyard animals in this one. A bit of orange. No spice smell.

Appearance: Cloudy, as a wheat beer should be, and nice golden straw color. Head forms right away, but isn't thick and dissipates quickly. I'd chalk this up to another recipe that doesn't account for head retention but I know that the Berliner Weiss style, which this brew is loosely based upon, has a head that dissipates quickly. So I think it's just the style.

Flavor: Wheat-lactic goodness. A very pleasant, sharp, acid-tang that lasts awhile. A hint of sweetness. Some lingering esters, a bit of the orange, and maybe some spice, but really not much at all. Very clean taste. Cannot detect the alcohol over the tanginess. Lemons too. Maybe just a bit of that hay-like character that Bretts are notorious for. No hop bitterness, although I do wonder what a little more hops would do to this beer. The sour taste may be a little too aggressive for some people, but I like it.

Mouthfeel: Crisp body. Very drinkable. Dry and clean. It needs a little more carbonation for the style, I think, but that will certainly come with more time in the bottle. This beer lacks body. I've had some interesting Berliner Weisses before that had a creamy consistency, and I wonder how the hell the brewer got it that way--I think I'm thinking of the Southampton Berliner.

Overall: This is a great beer and isn't going to last too long around the house. The lack of body is definitely the weakest part. I feel like if there's going to be an aggressive wild-sour taste there needs to be some structure behind it. Otherwise it's like drinking wheat lemonade.  Then again, this may just be the style. Very refreshing beer.

Bugs, Bretts, and all kinds of stuff clinging onto the carboy glass of the Flanders Red Ale

Dry Hopping Hodgepodge IPA

This is the first time I used Chinook in an American IPA recipe. It was recommended by the local homebrew shop as what they use in their IPA. I was reluctant since I really don't like their house IPA, but I figured I'd give it a shot anyway.

I usually use Simcoe hops in my IPA since I love the clean woodsy pine taste, and Simcoe doesn't seem--at least to me--to have all the harsh resiny flavors. Chinook, I came to learn, is the forerunner of the harsh resiny hops, which I suppose is fine for hopheads, but I prefer having a more balanced IPA. With that said, I figured I'd explain a bit about hop usage and scheduling time.

The rule of thumb is that the earlier the hops go into the boil,  the more bitterness and less aroma they will impart. The scale tilts the opposite way as the hop is added toward the end of the boil. So a hop addition at 5 minutes left in the boil will add only those wonderful aromas we love when we pour a glass from the bottle or keg.

Dry hopping is the most effective method to make an aromatic brew. All you do is add fresh hops or hop pellets to the carboy after the fermentation has calmed down and let it sit for a few weeks. Apparently, in the past, dry hopping was used to help preserve beer, too.

I prefer to use whole hops because they impart the best aroma in my opinion, but many homebrewers hate using whole flowers because they're a pain to siphon out of the fermenter when the beer is ready to bottle or keg. Instead, they prefer hop pellets, which of course work well, too. I merely attach a bit of sterilized steel wool around the end of the siphon which acts as a buffer from the whole hop flowers and allows the siphon to flow without obstruction. 

Brew in a Bag--Hodgepodge IPA

This is my first experience with the brewing in a bag technique, and I thought it went well with little complaints. This method is best for people with limited resources who like to have complete control over their grain bill. 


Brewing in a bag gives the versatility of all-grain brewing without having to buy, clean or mess with a mash tun. I found it great for the apartment brewer, although I would recommend having a place to hang it outside as it can get a little messy.




All you need is a bag large and sturdy enough to hold wet grain and wrap it around the top of the pot as shown in the first picture. Then maintain the mash temperature with some towels or a fleece blanket as I did. I brought the water to about 161°F and then added the grain little by little to avoid doughy clusters, constantly stirring. The grain dropped the temp to about 156°F and the blanket worked incredibly well to insulate the mash. At the end of the hour, the temp was about 151°F--not bad for an outside temp of 42°. 




 
After the hour mash I hung it up and let it drain. I squeezed this bad boy as dry as I could, rinsed it with about two more gallons of sparge water at about 167 ° and squeezed it all over again. Then I did a 90 minute boil with the hop schedule as planned. All in all it was pretty simple. I was a little disappointed that both my local homebrew shops had no simcoe hops--terrible I know--so I just used a bunch of left over hops I had lying around in the fridge, hence hodgepodge.

Hodgepodge IPA


Grain Bill
14 lbs 2 row
12 oz. crystal 45
12 oz carapils
10 oz dextrose


Hops
3.5 oz chinook       90
.75 oz chinook       45
1 oz centennial      30
1 oz magnum        flameout
1 oz centennial      flameout


Dry Hop in secondary
1 oz chinook         2 weeks
1 oz centennial      2 weeks
1 oz columbus       2 weeks


.25 oz chinook      5 days at end
.25 oz columbus   5 days
.25 oz amarillo      5 days
.25 oz magnum     5 days


Wyeast 1056 American Ale yeast


OG ----- 1.070  (roughly 7% ABV).
60% efficiency. So the brew in the bag isn't all that efficient of a method. But maybe I am missing something here--it was my first time.

Hail during the boil. Luckily we had a roof over us.