The Brew Blog Forum

Tips and Guides :: Re: Maple Beer

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 19:53:31 -0400

By: Bob

Thanks Rick,
I have a week until I bottle and then another two weeks before I can try it but I will let you know.
Bob

Tips and Guides ::

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 20:44:31 -0400

Hi Bob,

Interesting question. Since I've never used maple syrup for priming sugar, I wasn't sure what to tell you. I asked a few friends, and here's one suggestion:

To figure out how much to use to prime with, you can compare it to corn sugar. Corn sugar has about 45 points per pound per gallon (ppg), while maple syrup has about 35 ppg. 45 divided by 35 is 1.29, so multiply that by the amount of priming sugar you usually use.

I hope that helps, and please let me know how it turns out.

Tips and Guides :: Maple Beer

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 13:31:31 -0400

By: Bob

Rick, Maybe you can help me.
I brewed an October fest and added a quart of pure maple syrup to the boil. Now I would like to add syrup when I bottle instead of corn sugar. This is supposed to give the beer a nice maple flavor but I can't find anywhere where it tells me how much syrup to add for a 5 gallon batch.
Do you have an idea?
Thanks
Bob

For Sale/Wanted :: Pin-Lock Kegs for Sale

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 22:12:57 -0400

By: Rick+Rodriguez

I have 4 pin-lock kegs that I would like to sell. I'm asking $100 for all four. I decided that having a mixture of ball-lock and pin-lock kegs are too inconvenient, so I'll also take ball-lock kegs in trade.

Also, I have two 5 gal glass carboys I'd like to sell. Make me an offer for them.

If you have registered as a member, you can reply to this post. If not, you can email me by clicking on my name and click where it says "Send Email".

Recipes :: Re: Interesting Ingredients

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 18:22:33 -0400

By: Rick+Rodriguez

Hi John,

I moved your article to the forums, I think it'll get read more here.

As far as interesting ingredients goes, I made a pumpkin ale, a Christmas ale and an oatmeal maple porter. The pumpkin had pumpkin (duh), cinnamon, nutmeg, and orange peels. The Christmas ale had ground clove, vanilla bean, ground ginger, honey, cinnamon, and nutmeg. The oatmeal maple porter had flaked oats and maple syrup.

And no, the Dawg Slobber Ale doesn't have dog slobber. The two dogs like to go take a nap while I'm brewing, so they weren't around to get any in it.

Reviews :: Phat Stout Taste Test

Thu, 07 Feb 2008 20:47:51 -0500

By: Rick+Rodriguez

It's been way too long to do this review, but I hope that later is better than never. My Phat Stout was a very good beer, one of - if not the - best brew to date. I found that letting it bottle condition for a couple more weeks made a big difference, and I saved (reluctantly) six bottles to age until next year. Actually, they may not last that long, but my intentions are to open one again next January. I've read in a few places that aging can round out the flavors, and the last few bottles that I drank seemed to confirm that.

I did save one for this review, and being a week into February, it's had that much longer to condition. For this review, I looked hard for some stouts from local breweries, but apparently, stouts aren't very popular. Or maybe I didn't look hard enough. Whatever the case may be, I found one from Clipper City Brewing in Baltimore, MD, and one from Mendocino Brewing, who has a brewery in Saratoga Springs, NY and one in Ukiah, CA. The Clipper City's offering is called Peg Leg Stout, and the Mendocino Brewing's offering is called Black Hawk Stout.

For starters, pouring into the mugs proved to be a little messy. I have three 16 oz. beer mugs, and poured a 12 oz. bottle into each. Both mine and the Peg Leg developed a head that over flowed the mugs, and the Black Hawk just peaked at the top, letting just a drop run down the outside. The Black Hawk's head quickly dissipated, followed soon after by the Peg Leg. I poured the three just before writing this paragraph, and mine still has about 3/4 of an inch of foam sitting on the top.

All three are very dark, too dark to see through the glass, so I don't know how clear they actually are. I held each up to the light, and no light passes through. I'm not an expert on stouts - or any beer for that matter - so I believe that they are supposed to be that way. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

The taste of the three are very similar, with a small exception for the Peg Leg. Mine and the Black Hawk almost taste the same, and could possibly contain the same ingredients. But looking at their website, they don't. They used Cluster hops, and I used Chinook, while we both used Cascade. The Peg Leg has a sweeter taste to it. It's not a big sweetness, but definitely a sweetness. It almost tastes like it could have some honey, but their site doesn't mention that. They do, however, suggest molasses and caramel, so maybe that's it. The Black Hawk, as well as mine, has a hint of roasted malts. I used roasted barley in mine, and that definitely shows itself. Mine also seems to be a little heavier than the Black Hawk, but not too much. Their website states that the Black Hawk has 5 % ABV, and the Peg Leg website says that it has 8 % ABV. I have no idea what mine has, but for anyone who knows the formula for calculating ABV, the OG was 1.068, and the FG was 1.018.

I have to say that my Phat Stout turned out very nice. I will be brewing this one again, and I hope to achieve the same results next time.

Ok, I need to go let the alcohol work out of my system. After drinking three beers at once, all within the time it took to write this review, I'm feeling very tipsy.

Recipes :: Mead - First batch underway

Sat, 12 Jan 2008 15:03:24 -0500

By: Jason+Colby

Mixed up (can't really say "brewed" ) my first mead last night using honey from the group brew last year. ~80% blueberry blossom honey, 20% wildflower.

It was going to be all blueberry, but I goofed up and put too much water into the fermenter to start with and. So, when I went to add the heated water and dissolved honey to the fermenter, I found that A) it wasn't all going to fit, and 2) it was going to be of lower gravity than I had planned on. (The underlying problem was that I forgot to take into account that adding honey adds volume as well as gravity points.) So, I brought some of the must back into a pot, heated it gently, and added some of the wildflower honey to get the total amount of fermentables up. I mixed this all up with the original must to homogenize and then moved about a gallon of it over into a separate container. A nice bonus is that the second container is clear, so that I can keep an eye on what's happening.

This morning I'm already seeing some activity on the surface of the smaller container, as well as bubbles in the airlock of the big guy.

I'm using Lalvin D-47 dry yeast and following the staggered nutrient schedule I found on this webpage: http://home.comcast.net/~mzapx1/ ("Hightest's Honey Haven" )

I know there are some very experienced mead-makers in the group. What kinds of yeast and nutrients do you usually use?

Recipes :: Belgian Pomegranate Pale

Tue, 08 Jan 2008 15:09:46 -0500

By: Jason

Rick -

Hey, I'm finally remembering to post that pomegranate recipe we talked about at the Christmas party. The first time I did it I used a standard Belgian Pale Ale recipe - I think it was originally a Jamil one. I thought that the pomegranate clashed a bit with some of the hop and specialty malt notes, so I toned those down a bit on my next batch, which is the one that took a second in the SS Brew Off in the Fruit Beer category. Here's the recipe:

PHP Formatted Code
Belgian Pomegranate Pale II

5-gallon batch

OG 1.051

FG 1.012

6 lb Pilsner Malt
0.38 lb Munich Malt
0.38 lb Caramunich 
1.5 lb Extra Light DME (used because of the limitations of my mini-mash system)

All Saaz hops:
60 minutes - 0.5 oz
30 minutes - 0.25 oz
15 minutes - 0.25 oz

added 8 oz of Pomegranate Molasses at flameout

WLP 550

(mini-)mashed at 152F

boiled for90 minutes (concerned about DMS)

fermented on the cooler side for this yeast, ~68F-70F (didn't want the esters to dominate)

The resulting beer showed what I found to be a nice balance between the tartness and fruitiness of the pomegranate and the "fruitiness" derived from the yeast. A drinker not knowing that the pomegranate was in there would certainly have tasted something different going on in there, but would probably not have been able to pick it out as pomegranate without a hint or two.

The judges' comments, as I recall, were along the lines that it was a nice beer, but that it wasn't really strong enough on the fruit side for the fruit beer category. That was fine with me, as I was more interested in a fruit BEER than a FRUIT beer. But someone desiring a more prominent fruit character could easily ramp up the amount of molasses by 50% or more without it becoming overpowering.

This is the molasses I used. It's a common ingredient in some styles of Middle Eastern cooking. It's often used in tomato-based sauces for stews, including a stringbean-lamb "chili" that was a particular specialty of my grandmother. I buy it at a middle-eastern grocery on Mineral Spring Ave. in North Providence. It's likely available at other ethnic shops, maybe even in large grocery stores.

Recipes :: Re: Holiday Spiced Ale

Thu, 03 Jan 2008 15:27:47 -0500

By: Rick+Rodriguez

Hi Wade,

Thanks for posting your recipe. Next year, I'll take your advise and add the spices at flame out.

This was a very good beer.

Rick

Recipes :: Holiday Spiced Ale

Thu, 03 Jan 2008 15:15:00 -0500

By: whicks

Hey Rick! Here's the recipe I used to make the Holiday Spiced Ale you got from me at the South Shore Christmas beer swap. It's not actually my recipe, though. I got this recipe from the Jamil Show on the Brewing Network. I liked how the spices came though on this one. I think the trick to retaining the spice character is to use fresh spices and to add them right at flameout so you don't drive off the spicey goodness in the boil. Anyway, enjoy the recipe! Cheers - Wade

BeerSmith Recipe Printout - www.beersmith.com

Recipe: Winter Spiced Ale

Brewer: Wade Hicks

Asst Brewer:

Style: Christmas/Winter Specialty Spice Beer

TYPE: All Grain

Taste: (35.0)

Recipe Specifications

--------------------------

Batch Size: 6.00 gal

Boil Size: 7.94 gal

OG: 1.088 SG

FG: 1.022 SG

ABV: 8.65%

Estimated Color: 18.9 SRM

Estimated IBU: 43.1 IBU

Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %

Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:

------------

Amount        Item                                      Type         % or IBU

19.50 lb      Pale Malt (2 Row) UK (3.0 SRM)            Grain        95.12 %

0.75 lb       Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM)     Grain        3.66 %

0.25 lb       Black (Patent) Malt (500.0 SRM)           Grain        1.22 %

1.00 oz       Simcoe [13.00 %] (60 min)               Hops         43.1 IBU

0.13 tsp      Allspice (Boil 1.0 min)                   Misc

0.13 tsp      Nutmeg (Boil 1.0 min)                     Misc

0.25 tsp      Ginger Root (Boil 1.0 min)                Misc

0.50 tsp      Cinnamon (ground dry) (Boil 1.0 min)      Misc

1.00 tsp      Irish Moss (Boil 15.0 min)                Misc

1 Pkgs        London Ale (White Labs #WLP013) [Starter 1Yeast-Ale

Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Medium Body

Total Grain Weight: 20.50 lb

----------------------------

Single Infusion, Medium Body

Step Time     Name               Description                         Step Temp

60 min        Step               Add 26.65 qt of water at 164.6 F    152.0 F

Notes:

------

If necessary, tweek spices in secondary or before bottling.

I carbonated with 4.9 oz corn sugar to get 2.5 CO2 volumes.