As Ian alluded to a few days ago, the blizzard of 2016 (Snowzilla, to some) has provided plenty of time at home to mess with beer. Kathy and I took advantage of our snow days by bottling two recent brews.
The first is our saison, which I detailed in an earlier post. We bottled three of the four varieties, not including the one with Tiarna dregs. I want to let the Brett continue working in that one. The others were in secondary for eight days.
The base beer had a ton of bubble gum on the nose, an intriguing bouquet on the palette, and a long, medium-dry finish. The dry-hopped version, for which we used Mosaic hops, had almost none of the bubble gum aroma. Instead it was much more floral, though a hint of candy remained. The finish was equally long and slightly more bitter.
Then we came to the version with rose hips and lemongrass. Talk about variety! I would've hardly recognized this as the same beer. The rose hips dominate the flavor profile both on the nose and on the palette. The ratio of rose hips to lemongrass likely needs tweaking next time, but we'll see how it changes in the bottle. There are also hints of bubble gum on the nose, and the palette has some fruity esters. Kathy says it tastes like a pastry.
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| Pictured: Kathy with recently bottled beers and a very apropos tablecloth. |
Next we bottled our most recent attempt at a Mosaic IPA. This version was tweaked based on the results of a single-hop experiment that lacked complexity. We added Cascade hops and upped the grain bill by about a pound, plus switched to a different yeast. We've had success with Safale S-05 in the past, particularly when the goal is a clean ale with few, if any, esters.
The brite beer had far more hop complexity than the last version, thankfully. The malt was a little underwhelming, but the beer isn't especially hoppy, so it wasn't out of balance. There was just enough of a backbone to keep the beer in check while allowing the hops to shine through. Hopefully, we're getting closer to our goal: An aromatic, hop-forward beer with a relatively low ABV that's only mildly bitter.
I'll check back in a few weeks with some tasting notes from all of the newly bottled beers. In the meantime, check out the recipe below for the Mosaic IPA.
Recipe Specifics
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Batch Size (Gal): 5
Total Grain (Lbs): 12
OG: 1.053
SRM (estimated): 8
IBU (estimated): 68
Brewhouse Efficiency: 62%
Wort Boil Time: 60 Minutes
Grain
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83.4% - 10 lbs. Pale Malt (U.S. 2-Row)
8.3% - 1 lbs. Vienna Malt
8.3% - 1 lbs. Caramel/Crystal 40L
Hops
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1 oz. Mosaic (Pellet, 12.7% AA) @ 60 min.
1 oz. Mosaic (Pellet, 12.7% AA) @ 15 min.
1 oz. Cascade (Pellet, 5.5% AA) @ 15 min.
1 oz. Mosaic (Pellet, 12.7% AA) @ Flameout
1 oz. Cascade (Pellet, 5.5% AA) @ Flameout
1 oz. Cascade (Pellet, 5.5% AA) @ Dry hop (8 days)
Yeast
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Safale S-05 American Ale Yeast
Water Profile
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Profile: Carroll County, MD
Mash Schedule
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Sacch I - 60 min @ 150F
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