Irish Red Whiskey Barrel Aged

My Irish Red Ale (recipe at bottom) which I've been making unmodified since 2011 was the obvious candidate for aging in a Rye Whiskey barrel. I was just hoping that the beer was strong enough in malt flavours to complement the whiskey flavours. Spoiler alert. (It was!)

The barrel arrived with a bit of whiskey swishing around. That was exciting. I was glad that the barrel was not dry. Well five days past before I filled her up. She was moist at this stage.The first week the angels took about 700 ml. My ale aged three weeks and I emptied it into kegs for carbonation. I did fill the barrel with an Ale when this beer was drained from the barrel.

The barrel has added significant oak, char, and whiskey. Being a small barrel (8 gallons) the ratio of surface area to beer is very high so aging goes faster then large barrels. I'm not a fan of cherry beers however this beer can best be described as a warm malty cherry tone with whiskey after flavours. The ABV has gone up at least 2  to 3 percent. 

Aroma is whiskey and light malty. Taste is like dark cherry malt. Light on the palette with a warm glow of whiskey. The after taste is slightly bitter with a persistent whiskey flavour. The ale is estimated to be about 10 to 11% ABV with no burn.  I would expect this to be served in small portions since drinking a pint may put you under the table. The combination of cherry, oak and malts together create a nice Irish Whiskey Ale.

Many people opt for a stout when doing their whiskey barrel aging. I would consider a Red Irish Ale an equal alternative and maybe even a better alternative when it comes to the complex flavours whiskey can offer.

Over time this beer has changed. It started out with warm cherry flavours that a beer that would hit you with the whiskey flavours. This got a wow from everyone who drank it. At 3 months is mellowed and smoothed out. between 7 to 8 months it was smooth and the cherry disappeared and you are left with  a more malty beer with whiskey over tones. The oak rounded the beer out nicely. At 10 months it's magical. The mouth feel has significantly lighten and the flavours have merged.

Next time I would consider aging for 5 weeks in a fresh barrel and mashing at 153F to pull out more grain flavour.

May 5 2014 - This has been a fantastically successful beer. A favorite among many. Lagering in keg change the beer profile considerably over time. Down to my last few pints.

1 - 3 mths  - Strong Rye flavour and malt flavours were distinct. Tastes of dark red cherry (good) and a real after kick of rye on the palette.

4 - 5 mths - Flavours blending together. Improved. Cleared some. Still a strong rye flavour.

6 -8 mths - Tamed beers. Rye is getting more mellow but still very distinct.

9 - 11 mths - Maybe reached it's peak - smooth ruby red - amazing.

12-15 mths - not much changed. Slight improvements.

Irish Red - 10 Gallon
Malts	Weight
Maris Otter	18 lbs
Black Roasted Barley	5 oz	normally just 2 oz per 5 gallons
Cara Red	2 lbs
40 L	1 lbs
60 L	1 lbs
British 70/80	2 lbs
The Boil
Minutes	oz	Description
60	4	Fuggles
15	2	First Golding UK	Normally not added
15	1	Golding US
15	NA	Coil, Tablet
Saf 04 Yeast at 68 for 7 days
Mash 152F
FG 1.024
OG 1.070?
ABV 5.5%		keg pushed this way up in ABV

Boddingtons' Clone

Boddingtons' Clone (Recipe here)

Update - July 15/2013 - This beer although nice and creamy is very similar to the real thing. Which in this case is nothing interesting. Like many others out there, I find this beer has little taste and weak mouth feel. Nitro adds a nice creaminess but without malt flavour why bother. With everything I know about hops, it might be a waste to add hops as the aroma would get clobbered when pouring. 

When I made Guinness I was expecting that it would be difficult to clone. Who hasn't heard about how the Irish water and secret recipe makes something you just can't duplicate. What a load of sh*t. Guinness is one of the simplest beers I've made and I plan to make it again soon.  Boddingtons another popular nitrogen charged beers which I enjoy so guess what?

The recipe for Boddington's is just two malts. A british base malt and a little 55 Crystal for body and flavour. The hops are the same as many British Bitters and Guinness. This beer is that it is aiming for about 3.5% ABV. I achieved 3.1 with 6 pounds of base malt. The  beer final gravity (FG) is a very low 1.008. This means it low in calories. 

Dumped into the keg are fully nitro ready in 3 days with infuser stone. Blight white creamy head with  a very drinkable beer but lacks flavor. A bit tasteless. Reminds me of some of the review the original received. Next time mash at a higher temp to create body and add some flavor malts. 

I think my Irish red would be a treat on nitro. 

Munich Lager

Recipe: click here

I've enjoyed all my lagers and continue to have great success. Up until this lager I've used no flavored malts. I suck to traditional hops and pilsner malts. This lager has two flavored malts each with 8 oz. Not a lot of flavor malts but I wanted to see the difference. These additions darkened the lager and gave it more full body. It reminds me of some of the German Lagers I had last year while in Germany. Definitely darker and more full body the Helles and most of the main stream Pils.

Like all the lagers, this requires about three weeks to ferment and about 5 more weeks to lager into a nice beer. This is all done in a temperature controlled chest freezer.

I've stopped making yeast starter and have had great success pitching yeast into 100F wort. Fermentation is slow as expected but my FG achieves success each time. During fermentation, about 3 weeks into the fermentation, rotten eggs aromas does happen but completely disappears  with additional lagering.

Bitterness is a bit on the sharp side. It goes well with this lager with more body but I would consider using a lower Alpha hop next time of add the bittering hop at 50 minutes. The clarity of the beer is perfect. Notice I don't filter my beer, nor do I need to. This beer clears up nicely with lagering.

Chimay Blue clone

Clone

This is my favorite of the Belgium Chimay's. A bit on the dark side and full of flavour that lingers on the palette. The yeast contributed nicely with that familiar Belgium Ale taste.

I decided to bottle this and although I'm tasting this only two weeks after bottling I plan to age this for at least six months (October).

The flavour seems spot on. Comparing this to the real thing is premature. The Chimay is crisp, clear and dry. My brew still needs to complete bottle conditioning for at least 3 weeks and then lager for a few months.

Jan 19, 2014 - After 9 months this has turned into a nice Belgium Beer. It continues to get smoother. Compared to the original this is much more malty and has more body. I wanted to have a high degree of bubbles but this resulted in over carbonation and each beer is a potential bomb of foam. A cold crash and proper in bottle fermentation would have made this better. I belive that mashing at 149F would have improved this beer too.

Nov 30, 2014 - way over carbonated so pouring this beer a a slow process. Flavor is spot on however it's just to heavy which I would attribute to a too high mash temp. This would be better in a keg so the yeast slury is not an issue. 

Chimay Rouge (Red), 7% abv. In the 75 cl bottle, it is known as Première. It is a dark brown colour and has a sweet, fruity aroma.

Chimay Bleue (Blue), 9% abv darker ale. In the 75 cl bottle, it is known as Grande Réserve. This copper-brown beer has a light creamy head and a slightly bitter taste. Considered to be the "classic" Chimay ale, it exhibits a considerable depth of fruity, peppery character.

Chimay Blanche (White), or Chimay Triple, 8% abv golden tripel. In the 75 cl bottle, it is known as Cinq Cents. This crisp beer bears a light orange colour, and is the most hopped and driest of the three.

Chimay Blue
Recipe Type: All Grain
White Labs 545 (Belgium Strong Ale)
Yeast Starter: no.
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
Batch Size (Gallons): 8 (wort started at 10 gals)
Original Gravity: 1.084 (Clone recipes target 1.090)
Final Gravity: 1.015 (with bottle aging this will be lower)
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 14 @ 65 - 70
ABV 9%
Bottled 44 large bottles and plan to age for 6 months. 2 month at 68F and the remaining time in the fridge
Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 5.00 gal
Boil Size: 6.84 gal
Estimated OG: 1.092 SG
Estimated Color: 25.3 SRM
Estimated IBU: 22.9 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.00 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes
Ingredients:
------------
Gallons	5	8
13.25 lb Pilsner (Weyermann) (1.7 SRM) Grain 77.66 %	13.5	21.60
1.00 lb Wheat, Flaked (1.6 SRM) Grain 5.86 %	1	1.60
0.50 lb Caramunich I (Weyermann) (51.0 SRM) Grain 2.93 %	0.5	0.80
0.38 lb Aromatic Malt (Briess) (20.0 SRM) Grain 2.20 %	0.38	0.61
0.25 lb Special B (Dingemans) (147.5 SRM) Grain 1.47 %	0.25	0.40
0.19 lb Chocolate Malt, Pale (Crisp) (350.0 SRM) Grain 1.10 %	0.19	0.30
0.50 oz Galena [13.00 %] (90 min) Hops 19.3 IBU	0.5	0.80
0.50 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] (15 min) Hops 3.3 IBU	0.5	0.80
0.25 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] (2 min) Hops 0.3 IBU	0.25	0.40
0.13 tsp Seeds of Paradise (Boil 15.0 min) Misc	0.13	0.21
0.13 tsp Seeds of Paradise (Boil 2.0 min) Misc	0.13	0.21
0.50 tsp Orange Peel, Bitter (Boil 5.0 min) Misc	0.5	0.80
1.00 items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 min) Misc	1	1.60
1.50 lb Candi Sugar, Amber (100.0 SRM) Sugar 8.79 %	1.5	2.00
1 Pkgs Belgian Strong Ale (Wyeast Labs #1388) Yeast-Ale
	Total grain	25.312
Mash Schedule: 152F Single Infusion, Light Body, running Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 15.56 lb for 5 gallons
----------------------------
Single Infusion, Light Body, Batch Sparge
Step Time Name Description Step Temp
Notes on Wort: Tasted dry and smooth with caramel. Slight dieletics (butter).
Notes on the size: My 10 gallon mash ton max's out with 26 lbs of grain. The recipe was scaled up to max out my mash tun.

High Temperature Mash Ales

Can you get a great beer if your mash is at 166F? Here is proof that you can however your beer is going to be different.

The Brewers Window is shown to the right at being from 147F to 158F. This would suggest that mashing over 158F gives you less fermentables sugars and going over 166F would give Even less. With 12 lbs of base malt I was able to get 2.4% ABV.

So why did I risk fermenting such a high mash temperature in the first place? My thermometer was not calibrated. I discovered after the mash that I was off by 11 degrees F. So my 155F mash was actually 166F.

Original gravity was 1.053 which is low for 12 lbs of base malt. Most of the sugars here are non-fermentable. My beers (yes I did this a few times) resulted in smooth malty drink that I and my friends enjoyed. The changes in the beer also resulted in low ABV. Final gravity was 1.031. Color was slightly darker. The biggest down side of these high temperature mashes are that beers are very filling. Having more that two in one night is a challenge.

Two lessons learned here. 1) Calibrate your thermometer frequently. 2) High mash temperatures on flavour grains delivers very nice smooth malty flavours.

I will consider doing separate mashes where I separate my base and flavour grain. (160F ish) from my flavour grains (150F ish) when I mash the base. I believe this will deliver better malty smooth beers while still delivering the ABV you expect.

IIPA Rahr 2-Row- July 20, 2012

Ingredients

---

Rahr 2-Row 12 lbs

Carapils ½ lbs

Crystal 40L ½ lbs

Magnum 2 oz

Simcoe 2 oz

Columbus 2 oz

Willimette 2 oz

Mash Schedule

---

Minutes left Gals Temp (F)

65 5 158

25 3.5 161

15 2 166

This produced 9 gals of wort

Hop Schedule

---

90 min boil

Minute left Adjunct

60 Magnum

15 Simcoe, tablet, coil

5 Columbus

FO Simcoe

Yeast Whitelabs 001

OG 1.053 or 13.2 Brix, FG 1.031 or 10.9 Brix, ABV 2.4%

Initial impression. I could let this age for a month and I think it would be a great bitter. This fermented for two weeks in the fridge at 68F.

Aug 4th - Kegged

Aug 12th Tasted this from the keg - plenty of body but still easy to drink. Nice aroma but not strong. Typical of a good FO hops. Very nice and worth doing again.

Sept 7 - All round good ale. Does not have a strong hops aroma nor does the little aroma smell that impressive. Actually a bit grassy. However the ale is smooth and nice to drink. The hops flavour comes through very well.

Sept 18 - This is one of the best IPA ales I’ve ever made. Beautiful malt flavour. Hops has a nice bitterness and nice hop flavour. Very little aroma. Make this again. Again got rid of the grassiness.
It was discovered later that the mash temperature was at 166F rather than 155F based on the calibration issue.

Motueka Plus Three - American IPA (Updated 2013/4/22)

Recipe here: Click here

Here's another one of my favorite Ales. A hoppy aroma and smooth full body beer. This beer is the first beer that I'm using viles of hop extract to replace the bittering hops I normally use. These viles are about the same price but without the debris in the boil and need for a hop bag.  Read below on how this turned out for bittering the beer.

The Boil and Fermentation  
With the low mash rate of 148 F the Carared and Crystal 15L added little. To minimize the trub from hops I've choosen to use hop extract from a syringe. I'm told that each syringe is equal to 2 oz of bittering hops at the 60 minute boil mark.  These cost about $1.50 each at BrewBros. The star of the show here are the hops. I've chosen four hops  toward the end of the boil for a more aroma and some flavour. Columbus, Simcoe, Centennial and NZ Motueka. These hops should deliver a full spectrum of fruit, pine and herbal qualities.

Dry hopped starting on April 14. 2 oz each of Simcoe, Citra and Columbus in primary. I choose these hops based on the experiment in the previous blog post. All were placed in a hop bags and hung using dental floss for 5 days. This was done after fermentation completed yet still in primary. I'm aiming for lots of pine and fruit aromas. I'm doing this for a shorter time period to hopefully get the qualities I want and not pick up any grassy quality. I've never had issues with 7 days of dry hopping before but if I can get all the good news I want in 5 days this will be my new method.

The Results

Hop Bitterness - mild bitterness. Adds to the smoothness with the hoppy beer. These viles present a neutral bitterness suitable for beers not know for their bitterness. This would work well in Ales and Guinness for example.
   

Hop Flavour - loads of flavour that fills the pallet. Grapefruit and hoppy flavours dominate.  

Hop Aroma - Wow! Soft citrus abounds. The Citra hop dominates but the combination of hops rounds this out nicely.   

Dry Hopping vertical tasting

13 hopped beer

Picking 13 varietals of hops we dry hopped them for a week in Corona. 4 to 5 pellets were placed in a Corona at 65F for 5 days and shaken daily then chilled to 41F for the final two days prior to tasting. I choose Corona based on its neutral flavour. I would love to report to you that I could rate the fruitiness, herbalness etc in an accurate table but the fact of the matter is that hops are complex in how they present there aromas and flavours. If two hops are piney, the type of pineyness and the many other flavours could all be different. That being said there are some interesting lessons I learned. Here are my impressions of the hops.

1. Zythos - Bitter medicine, not much happening
2. Citra- Abundance of lemons and some fruitiness
3. Falcon Flight - Pine, vanilla with lots of fruit
4. Sothern Cross (NZ) - Lemon, reminiscent of a German Pils 
5. Saaz (CZ) - Smells like Pilsner Urquel
6. Pacifica (NZ) - Dry crisp taste, very mellow
7. Motueka - Lemon Citris with herbal overtones.
8. Warrior - Hoppy smooth complex
9. Centennial  - Sweet fruit with herbal finish, grapefruit
10. *Chinook - BAM! Lots of aroma, Lime 
11. *Simcoe - Pine clean flavour
12. Amarillo - Puckering hoppiness
13. *Columbus - Pine with lots of fruit.

* - Top Aroma hops

Hop flavours are complex. To break down the flavours into fruitiness  herbalness etc is watering down what the hops have to offer. My ah-ha moment is that these hops have pairings that start to make sense. For example. I think the fruitiness of a Columbus and the Lemon of Citra may go well together. Falcon Flight may pair with Chinook to give a more balanced flavour.

Based on this experiment I'm now dry hopping a 10 gallon IPA with 2 oz of Citra (Fruit, Lemon), Simcoe (Pine) and Columbus (Pine and Fruit). I'm hopping that the Pine and Fruit balance nicely. More on this later in my next post.

I plan to do this again and will change three things. Add more hops (10 pellets per bottle) to get more of what the hops have to offer, secondly focus on a style of hops for a certain beer category and, not use beer but vodka cut with water to make it 5% ABV. 

The chart below is nice but note the exceptions. Like I said hops are complex.