Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Fruit Beer?

Some brewers/drinkers feel that fruit beers are not beers, or are girly, or all suck. In a lot of cases I would agree (Sam Adams Cherry Wheat....ewwww). But there are some really good ones, especially the sour fruit beers were only real fruit is usually used and in a high amount during secondary fermentation. This makes the fruit flavor really taste fresh and like the real fruit. In Brussels I had my first real strawberry lambic, smelling the beer was exactly like smelling strawberry jam, it was amazing (the flavor was not as intense, but it was still and excellent beer).
Anyway, I have a couple fruit beers in progress and a couple planned, just wanted to document:

Fermenting:

- Quad/Old Ale w/cherries in barrel souring
- Quad/Old Ale w/cherries in carboy (unsour) - added three more pounds of cherries last night, tasted before this and was excellent but needed more cherry flavor to be a real 'fruit beer'

Planned:

-Mango Tripel - Sunday I spent about an hour and a half peeling mangoes from Tyler, Matt M, and my neighbor. The mangoes were almost all small, but yielded three pounds of flesh. I have one pound of frozen from the grocer and will buy one more pound for a total of 5 pounds for 5 gallons of beer (1lb/gallon). I really like using locals fruit and want the name of the beer to reflect that, something like Neighborhood Terroir Tripel, or something).

- Blueberry Sour - Inspired by the current #8 beer on beeradvocate, which I have not tried despite visiting the brewery in Brussels, Cantillon's Blabaer (Blueberry), I will be brewing three gallons (I have three pounds of blueberries) of a Sour Blueberry Ale (60%pils,40%wheat) with Cantillon yeast.

Saturday, July 17, 2010

The State of My Cellar


Hard to see the second barrel, but it's under the visible one and behind the dark cherry beer. The two gallon jugs are mead, one will get raspberry and be carbonated, the other plain and still. The rack in the back is about 2/3rds commercial beer I am aging, the rest is homebrew.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Update

Bottled four batches the other night:

- Oktoberfest (once carbed will continue lagering, ended up a little dry for the style, brewing
again will mash higher)
- Wee Heavy (tasted AWESOME!)
- Flanders Red from barrel
- Dark Sour Saison (brewed with Adam, Adam you bottled yet?)

Into the barrels went my pLambic and the Dark Cherry Quad/OldAle blend. Brewing more pLambic as soon as possible, have the ingredients on hand.

Lastly, my English brown ale is going over so well with everyone that it will become my first "house" recipe and maybe even brewed when I start my brewery. The only thing I am changing on this batch is to mash a little lower so it finishes a little drier and hopefully more 'drinkable'.