Great first showings--Sea Symphony Strong Ale and Saison de Potiron

This weekend, I sampled both the recently-bottled Sea Symphony Strong Ale (or Barleywine, but it's a little outside of style guidelines...and deliciously so!) and the young Saison de Potiron, and they were both wonderful and wonderfully surprising.  On Friday night, I tasted my 11.6%ABV behemoth of a beer, the Sea Symphony Strong Ale, hopped with Chinook, Falconer's Flight, and the Falconer's Flight Seven Seas (Cs) blend.  It was very lightly carbonated at this stage, but the taste was wonderful.  The beer had notes of honey, pine, burnt sugar, citrus, flora, apricot, with lots of warming and a beautifully sticky mouthfeel.  I am so excited to enjoy that wonderful beast of a beer over time.  It is probably my favorite beer I've ever brewed.

The Saison de Potiron is showing amazing promise.  The WLP568 yeast RIPPED through this beer.  It is already deliciously dry, in the proper farmhouse ale fashion.  The yeast profile will develop over time, but I am already getting the wonderful peppery notes, with fruity esters in the background.  It already has a delightfully "Belgian" taste to it, so that has me very excited.  There's a nice nutty caramel malt background, with the proper light, spritzy farmhouse ale body.  The pumpkin made it just about the most wonderful color I've ever seen.  Tawny, autumnal orange-amber.  Mmm...just delovely.  The pumpkin added that delightfully earthy, squashy note to the beer as well.

Wow, it is so exciting to be back in the game.  Scarlett the Galway Girl on tap right now...used it to make some ale grilled onions to put on a buffalo chicken pizza tonight...freaking delicious.

Prost!

Category 2: Pilsner

Beer: Victory Prima Pils
Category: Pilsner
Subcategory: German Pilsner (Pils)

No, not the gross "Pilsner" that Budweiser, Miller, Coors all pretend to be. Pilsner is a beer that finds its origins in the Czech Republic, Plzen to be specific. I have already tried and enjoyed some versions of this category (Pilsener Urquell, Sam Adams Noble Pils), so I decided to give a shot to one I had never had before.

Appearance: Poured from bottle into pilsner glass. Clear, very pale yellow/gold with a nice finger of bright foamy white head. Really really nice lacing!

Aroma: bready malts, some biscuity cracker notes and bright, floral Saaz and German noble hops, a little yeast and some definite sweetness on the nose

Taste: definite hop bitterness here, lots of floral and even some citrusy notes (may have some American hops in there?) - hops definitely dominate but there is a nice mild pilsner malt sweetness that lingers in the background. Slightly on the dry side, with a very clean finish.

Mouthfeel: light-medium body with effervescent, fine-bubbled carbonation, very pleasant

Overall: Lots of good impressions on this beer! The German pils style is a bit hoppier than the Bohemian/Czech style which I also really enjoy, but it is still very balanced. In many ways, I feel like this beer had some of what I felt was almost "missing" from the helles...essentially, a nice hop profile to go with the classic German malt flavors.

Personal: It has been a little while since I have had a good pilsner, and this was a nice surprise to me. The Victory Pils was a nicely balanced beer with a good malt profile and great hop flavor. I'm not a really big lager drinker, but I really enjoyed this beer a lot with its interesting flavors and incredibly clean finish. As I look into the future of my homebrewing, I would love to explore the pilsner style (since I already have some lager experience...yes!) and brew at least one of these a year. Basically, I am quite impressed with the style and would love looking into it a little more.

Die Braumeister

RyePA, Stout updates

Hey Friends,

Last night, we dipped into Jeff's homebrew reserves to try the ESB, witbier, and BowThai ales of yore. Also, after sampling a little English mild and putting the remains of the keg into a growler, I proudly tapped the JuniorSenior RyePA, the last Cutts homebrew to be drunk this summer. It is delicious. The hop character is bright and citrusy, and there is a lot of depth to the flavor. If I were to do it again, I would do it without a broken air-conditioner and actually get the fermentation temps down a little lower to mellow out the hoppiness (tehe) a little bit and really bring out the flavor of the malts I used. I used Wyeast American Ale II, which in my opinion didn't do the rye malt enough justice at my forced higher fermentation temps. The beer is still great though, and a perfect close to the summer.

The really exciting thing about my observations on my current brews is that with just one more try, I can turn great beers into revelatory brilliant ones. That, my friends, will be what we see in the coming year as I brew more and more and start to repeat (and slightly tweak to perfection) former recipes. Can't wait.

Stout's going in the keg today to be saved for wintertime. I am really excited to have my first real taste of it today and perhaps even more excited to forget about it for a few months! Haha it should be the perfect welcome home in December.

It's been a great spring and summer of brewing in Massachusetts, and I can't wait to continue my art down in Tennessee.

Prost,
Der Braumeister

In the keg!

Today, I took the SG of the English Mild and saw that it was down to a perfectly planned 1.012...meaning I got to have my first taste of the stuff today. It is wonderful stuff with really nice notes of cocoa, nuttiness, and bready maltiness. I already really enjoy it in its flat, warm form, so I know that it will be wonderful when we tap it from the keg in a week! Kegging was definitely an interesting process, but much quicker and easier than bottling when it comes down to it. The keg is back up in my room for the last week of conditioning. Basically, I cannot wait to taste this stuff and draw it off my very own home faucet. Please feel free to stop by next week for a taste of the first draught (not to mention first all-grain) brew! It will surely be a treat. Just you go and see if you can buy English Mild in your local liquor store...you're likely to be disappointed. I need to map out the rest of my week and see when I can brew again. Tomorrow perhaps?? Hopefully soon, though. The RyePA will need some time to dry-hop condition.

Birthday Wit!

The witbier is done, and it is just fabulous. The result of my efforts was an amazingly refreshing, flavorful brew. The color is a gorgeous wheat gold, and the mouthfeel is just wonderful. Thanks to some oatmeal in the grist, a somewhat unconventional ingredient in witbiers, the beer has nice head retention, excellent lacing, and a creamy yet crisply dry and refreshing mouthfeel. The carbonation is wonderful, for the beer is wholly effervescent but the bubbles are finer and incredibly pleasant. As for flavor, this guy is delish. It carries all of the usual notes of a witbier, a nice subtle fruity profile with clove and banana esters complimented by coriander and fresh citrus. The ginger added more depth to the flavor, with a dry, unsweetened ginger ale-like finish. So, while this beer is definitely totally within the conventions of witbiers, it offers lots of interest to the palate, much of which is reminiscent of more complex Belgian-style ales. The particular strain of Wyeast that I used for the recipe may have something to do with this as well, as it is often used for Belgian specialty ales. I am so proud right now, for this is my FIRST ORIGINAL RECIPE. Come by and taste some, and if you don't catch it now, it is VERY likely that I will be brewing it again this summer.

As for a couple of other quick updates, the lager has now been cold conditioning for about 3 weeks, and I feel I might need to do something about that. I need only to acquire some more bottles and get that thing carbonated and ready for drinking. It will certainly be refreshing and offer an option to those who care more about carbs than they do about living life...but I digest. Right now, my next adventure is to develop a recipe for the Sam Adams Longshot competition. The category for is specialty beers, so I will really be able to get those creative juices flowing! More to come on that soon...I keep that contest in mind as I look forward to my next trip to the homebrew store. It's going to be about time to make the trip soon! I already have a shopping list going for it. Perhaps I will venture there tomorrow, since I am off work :)

Prost. Sunny's Ginger Wit (aka Jeff's Birthday Wit) ftw.

Weekend update:

Today, I did some sampling of my stuff. I tasted the witbier, which is now ready to bottle. Wow was it good. The stuff is really balanced, spicy clovey ginger coriander goodness combined with a bright yet mellow citrusy flavor. I have a feeling this stuff is going to be gone fast. What awesomeness for my first original recipe!

I also went out on a limb and tasted the mead today. It has been almost crystal clear for about a week and a half, so I decided to just check it out. It is showing some ridiculous promise. The flavor is wonderful. It is a sweet mead, but I think some more of the residual sugar will mellow out in the next month to give it lots of great balance. I have a feeling I will be making more.

Recap: the mead and the witbier are both delicious and beautiful, and I will be bottling the wit either tonight or tomorrow depending on how effectively I can get off my ass and do it. They will compliment this lovely summery weather perfectly, though :). Sunny's Ginger Wit will probably reappear sometime this summer.

Best,
Sunny the Brewgod

Well I'll be an even bigger sonofagun!!

Just took the specific gravity of the Youzaho Light Lager to yield a couple of BIG surprises. One surprise that is only slightly big is that it seems to be completely done with primary fermentation. I got a SG reading of about 1.011, which means that it is definitely in range. The BIGGEST surprise, though, was the taste! I should begin by saying that I'm pretty much a huge snob when it comes to beer, and I am not the biggest fan of "Lite" beers. This one however might be, dare I say, one of the best light beers I've ever had? This made me pretty excited, especially this early in the game. The flavor is, well, light, but it is far from absent and it certainly does not taste like piss (a lot of them do). I can't wait for it to smooth/balance out in secondary cold conditioning (lagering), too! I'm glad that even after selling out, I've developed something of which I can be very proud. I'm sure it will be an instant classic with the "masses." This also means that other lagers are well within reach for me, now that I have the lager methodology down. Look out for that Oktoberfest in the fall!

First Taste!

The brew has been fermenting for 6 days and has cleared considerably in the carboy, with very slow bubble action, so I took a hydrometer reading today just to see how it was coming. Obviously, if the reading is the same tomorrow, it is time to bottle! I baked the bottles in the oven for sanitation today (this was a really good way to make sure they are sanitized, in fact, it sterilizes them!) and hope to fill them up tomorrow.

The specific gravity was a little high, but it was even a little high when I first racked it, so we'll see tomorrow if it's right or not. BUT IT ACTUALLY TASTED GOOD!!! Even though it was flat and not yet aged, there was a nice hoppy fresh floral bitterness to it with a great sweet maltiness that balanced it out REALLY WELL. I can't wait to see how this finishes up.

SO. EXCITED.