Name subject to change…
Happy East-over to everyone. That should cover both our Christian and Jewish friends and relatives, as both holidays coincided this year (again).
Now that that is out of the way… Rochester, NY, was blessed with some unreal beautiful weather this weekend. Seriously, 86 in the first week of April for any city right on the Great Lakes is quite literally a Godsend. I just couldn’t resist finally pulling the trigger on brewing that Flanders Red style ale.
I am undecided on the name at this point. On the one hand, I want to name this Kick the Ginger. Let’s face it, this beer is going to have just about every brewing-related microbiota thrown at it. It is the red-headed step child… the one that does not belong.
On the other hand, I kind of want to tip my hat to the Flanders region of France (formerly Belgian territory), as that is the particular terroir for this beer. Being that there is a Flanders region in what is now France, I think a toast to my ancestral roots is in order… and the fact that the only war the French ever had a chance of winning was against themselves. In this instance, perhaps “Waterloo”, or “Where’s your Head, Joan d’Arc?”…
I’m open to suggestions on this one. Really, I have time. This beer won’t be ready to drink for nearly 2 years. Here is what we did for this one:
The recipe, for 5.25 gallons (brewed on 4/4/2010):
- 10lbs Munton’s Pale Malt
- 3lb Weyermann Vienna Malt
- 2lb Weyermann Light Munich Malt
- 1/2lb Weyerman Dark Munich malt
- 1/2lb Cara-Munich II
- 1/2 lb Flaked Barley
- 1/2lb Malted Wheat
- 1/4 lb Aromatic Malt
- 1 oz Hallertau Mittelfrau (1.31%AA) Added at 60 minutes
- 2 oz Czech Saaz (1.31%AA) added at 60 minutes
- WYeast 3763 Roeselare Blend yeast in a 1/3 gallon starter
There are few notes to the recipe and the batch.
- The recipe is loosely based on Jamil Zaneisheff’s Flander’s recipe as listed on the Brewing Network site http://beerdujour.com/Recipes/Jamil/The_Jamil_Show_-_Flanders_Red_Ale.html
- Changes to grains and the primary yeast strain were based on what I have available to me locally, as well as notes from other brewers regarding having better success with the sourness of the Roeselare blend being the primary strain.
- Both of the hops used were aged for approximately 2.5 years. I’ve had them in the freezer since 2007, and just have not had the opportunity to use them until now. The Alpha Acid contents listed above were calculated in my trial version of Promash.
- I threw a couple of handfuls of homegrown Nugget hops into the mash, as I have heard that doing so will help to keep grain dough-balls to a minimum. FWIW, these hops have been left on the drying rack in my garage since last year’s harvest, and I only added them for the hop oils to break up the grains a little. I did not add enough to promote bittering or flavor (though the mash did have a nice fruity hop aroma to it)
- I missed the mash temperature by a few degrees. We wanted to mash at 154*F to promote mouthfeel to combat the drying action of the wild yeasts. Instead, the mash stabilized at 150*F, so I added an additional 1/2 gallon of boiling water to the mash to bring the temperature into range.
- MAKE SURE YOU CHECK YOUR PROPANE LEVELS!!!! I was damned sure I had enough propane to eke out this brew. I turned the gas on, light the match, and barely had flame. I turned the sparge off, ran to the store, then had to run to the ATM because the store’s network was not accepting cards, then busted ass home before I lost too much heat in the boil kettle.
- The color ended up being darker than I expected at probably around 20 SRM instead of the calculated 16 SRM. It is a beautiful red color, at least.
- Throughout the boil, I added an additional 0.6 gallons of wort into the kettle to compensate for excess boil-off. This affected our brewhouse efficiency negatively, and I ended up with an original gravity of only 1.073 rather than the expected 1.085. It does work out in the end, though, as I ended up with 5.75 Gallons in the primary (plus the 1/3 gallon starter), so I hope to end up with more final product than was originally planned for. Overall efficiency for the day was 66% vs. our normal 70 – 74%.
In all, it was a great Easter for us. I got to brew beer. I got to be outside. I got to spend quality time with the kids, and kiss boo-boos and clean up driveway rash from bike spills.
