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Sunday, May 1, 2016

Wedding Beer - The Failed Recipes

Way back in the end of January,  my only post of this calendar year, I laid out the groundwork for what I wanted to accomplish this brewing year.  I am currently failing miserably.  For most of my brewing career I have been making one-off recipes or beers that are not supposed to be the same year over year (my sours for instance).  This year with the wedding coming up I decided to brew my own beer for the wedding since I had the capabilities and our venue is BYOB.  Perfect, right?

Here is where things went wrong.  My first witbier was an amazing beer.  I think mostly due to the dregs of Jolly Pumpkin adding the delicious tartness and added depth in the flavor. It was a great beer.  It really way.  Fast forward 2.5 years and I want to make something similar.  First attempt was no good.  It was medicinal. Probably from my use of tap water straight from the tap on such a light beer.  So for the next batch I decided to finally purchase a water filter.  The beer turned out OK.  It just was not up to my standards for my "Wedding Wit".  With time running out at this point I turned my attention to a beer that was maybe a bit more sturdy and not as delicate and did not rely on the yeast to bring that added complexion.

I turned my attention to an English Summer Ale.  The recipe from Radical Brewing seemed to be just what I was looking for.  I brewed the "old school" version that used traditional English hops.  I always found English hops to be a bit too earthy – almost dirty - in flavor.  This recipe was great on all fronts except the hop flavor profile.  I just found that the beer was a bit too spicy or earthy for my liking.  The bitterness levels where good and the malt flavor was a nice bread-like crustiness with some mellowness from the wheat.  I think the hop flavor could of been tamed a bit if I used another yeast.  I love dry beers.  When I read the description for this beer in the Radical Brewing book I just thought it would be great to have that bone dry crisp finish.  I think this let the hop flavor push all the way through without a bit of sweetness to balance.

So, now what?

I was brewing my Mango Brett IPA.  This recipe got turned down to more of a Xtra Pale Ale. Too big for a pale ale technically and just a tad too small for an IPA.  So what are we going to do about the other 10 gallons we needed for the wedding.

My cousin-in-law volunteered to brew up these ten gallons.  He brews these types of British beers more than I do so what better way to do this than pass on my recipe and tasting notes to him?

He took my recipe and brewed five gallons.  He used a more malt-flavor-retaining yeast and cleaned up the hop flavor by using Cluster.  The American version of the British hops I am not a fan off.

He then brewed up a 5 gallon recipe of Kentish Ale.  This should just be a really nice light ABV English Pale ale.  Complex but sessionable.

I will recap the festivities and the beers that we all have.  Hopefully come June I will be back on a more regular schedule.

When I get back into my routine of brewing it will be a run of IPA's and the three base sour beers. 

Keep it easy for the first summer of marriage!


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