It's getting warm now so it's saison time!
Recipe:
4.5kg Dingemans Pilsner
500g Dingemans Wheat Malt
200g Caramunich
200g Flaked Oats
50g East Kent Goldings pellets @ 60 mins
340g Acacia Honey @ 10 mins
0.5g Grains of Paradise @ 5 mins
50g East Kent Goldings leaf @ 0 mins
Yeast - WLP550
Estimated OG - 1.057
Actual OG - 1.055
IBU - 40
This is loosely based on a popular recipe from HBT that I've done a few times but I've subbed French Saison for WLP550 which is the yeast from La Chouffe. It's still dry but not as much as French Saison and a lot more fruity. I like it a lot more so thought I'd try it out.
I've upped the bitterness a bit to 40 IBU to match Westvleteren and Bink Blond. They're both similar to saisons and awesome beers so it can't hurt!
The brew largely went well. I mashed at 66C and boiled a litre of wort down while sparging as this has worked really nicely in the last four brews to get a little more malt complexity in there.
When mashing I overdid it a bit with the acid and ended up with pH 5.2. It's the first time I've done that so not sure what it'll mean but I didn't bother acidifying my sparge water after in an effort to compensate so hopefully that'll sort things out. I forgot to measure pH after the boil and have done that every single brew so wouldn't have had anything to compare it to anyhow. I hit my pre boil gravity and the wort tasted alright so can't have been that bad.
I usually find bru-n-water ends up above target rather than below but then again this is the lightest coloured grain bill I've done since I started testing. I'll do a similar brew next time and see how I get on.
I also nearly forgot to put my aroma hops in! I only noticed just as I started the wort chiller.
Here are a few pics:
Next up will be a spiced saison with the same yeast.
Recipe:
4.5kg Dingemans Pilsner
500g Dingemans Wheat Malt
200g Caramunich
200g Flaked Oats
50g East Kent Goldings pellets @ 60 mins
340g Acacia Honey @ 10 mins
0.5g Grains of Paradise @ 5 mins
50g East Kent Goldings leaf @ 0 mins
Yeast - WLP550
Estimated OG - 1.057
Actual OG - 1.055
IBU - 40
This is loosely based on a popular recipe from HBT that I've done a few times but I've subbed French Saison for WLP550 which is the yeast from La Chouffe. It's still dry but not as much as French Saison and a lot more fruity. I like it a lot more so thought I'd try it out.
I've upped the bitterness a bit to 40 IBU to match Westvleteren and Bink Blond. They're both similar to saisons and awesome beers so it can't hurt!
The brew largely went well. I mashed at 66C and boiled a litre of wort down while sparging as this has worked really nicely in the last four brews to get a little more malt complexity in there.
When mashing I overdid it a bit with the acid and ended up with pH 5.2. It's the first time I've done that so not sure what it'll mean but I didn't bother acidifying my sparge water after in an effort to compensate so hopefully that'll sort things out. I forgot to measure pH after the boil and have done that every single brew so wouldn't have had anything to compare it to anyhow. I hit my pre boil gravity and the wort tasted alright so can't have been that bad.
I usually find bru-n-water ends up above target rather than below but then again this is the lightest coloured grain bill I've done since I started testing. I'll do a similar brew next time and see how I get on.
I also nearly forgot to put my aroma hops in! I only noticed just as I started the wort chiller.
Here are a few pics:
Next up will be a spiced saison with the same yeast.
