Taste Test - Angry Dwarf Holiday Ale

Christmas has come and gone.  I was sick but found enough time to go to the family gathering and do a taste test of the Angry Dwarf next to some Mad Elf.

First up was the 2013 Mad Elf - Cherry flavor was more in the background.  Pretty sweet flavor overall.  String alcohol taste though.

Next was the 2012 Mad Elf - The cherry flavor really came out in the older version. This one tasted more like booze though.

Finally was my Angry Dwarf. You know what I think of it based on my previous post. So here is what the general thoughts from the rest of the family are.  Everyone thought the cherry flavor - both tart and sweet - was more prominent and made it something a bit more special than the Mad Elf.  The reduced ABV due to the BIAB method was a happy accident.  Coming in at 9.5% its still a big beer but it does not taste boozy like the Mad Elf.

Overall this was huge success.  My friend Speedy is the one I brewed this for so we will see what he says this weekend.

Looks like this will be the new holiday brew.

On another note, I got a lot of gift certificates and the new Dark Star Burner.  It's time to brew.

Tasting Day: Angry Dwarf Holiday Ale

I cracked open a taster bottle for the Angry Dwarf Holiday ale last week when we were trapped in our new house due to the ice storm.

What better time to enjoy a holiday ale with a big punch to help combat cabin fever?

It will head out to the Vorp holiday party tomorrow to see how the crowd likes it.

Appearance - Deep ruby red with a thin beige head.

Smell - Sweet Cherries, hint of the honey may be some of that sweetness smell. Alcohol. Clove. Banana. Maybe even "cough medicine" could be used to describe the smell. No hops.

Mouthfeel - Medium mouth and medium carbonation. Seems to be right for the type of beer.

Taste -Big strong cherry and honey flavor with the traditional trappist yeast flavors in the background. Very easy drinking.  As it warms the alcohol flavor shows up and the Belgian yeast flavors start to take over.

Overall -  I tasted this on Saturday and then a Mad Elf on the following Tuesday. They are clearly different as mine has more sweetness fruit flavor than the Mad Elf.  I find it to be just as good - if not better - though.  I don't know if I would really change anything.  I think it's a great beer.  We will do some side by side tasting tomorrow.  Maybe I will post the results.

Ho. Ho. Ho.

Wood Barrel Sours - Updates

Last weekend I found some time to transfer beer out of the wooden barrels into some plastic buckets to age with some fruit.  Here is a rundown of what happened.  This first batch of sours was a quick soured wort and then aged for 4 months with some Roeselare Yeast/Bugs.  Dregs from other bottles where added along the way all in an attempt to inoculate my barrel for future long-aged sours.

I collected 5 gallons from the barrel.  0.3 gallons must of been lost to the angels share or soaked up by the oak - or both.  Here is how I broke it all down.

1 Gallon - Straight
2 Gallons - On 2.5 lbs of tart cherries to create my version of a kriek
2 Gallons - On 2 lbs of Zante Currants.  Copying the idea of Consecration by Russian River

Another thing to know is that this is the same wooden barrel that stored one batch of Cab Sauv.

All three vessels got one last shot of Brett with White Labs Brett Trois and some more Lacto to hopefully add a bit more of a punch in the sour department.

If you go back and read some of my other quick sour experiments a lot of the times the beers seemed to be coming up a bit short in the complexity department.  This is why I decided to add the majority of the beer with fruit.  I hope this will create that next layer of depth it has been lacking - not to mention aging in a used wine barrel for 4 months vs a glass jug for 3 months.

I will let this age another month an begin to take gravity readings. I want to be at 1.008 or lower.  I was at 1.010 when i moved it over so hopefully the fruit and added Brett will stir up another round of fermentation and take it down a few more notches.  Once I read the desired level I will bottle with some red wine yeast and age for at least another month.


Meanwhile, after the barrel was emptied I transferred the batch that has been aging since the creation of my blog.  Back in November 2012 I created a batch of a Red Flanders ale and it has been aging ever since.  It is now taking some time in the barrel while it ages some more and picks up some of that oak flavor while hopefully getting hints of the Cab Sauv.  I will also add some more bottle dregs as I finish a few sours I have been saving for this sole purpose. 

I just added dregs from a Hill Farmstead Brewery Elaborative #1 bottle from last night.  I have a few sours from The Bruery that will also have the dregs saved and added to the barrel.

This beer was already down to 1.007 which is in the target range but I may let this sit for 3-4 more months and dose it with more Brett.  I will sample some in a month and see where it is at.

Next up - Angry Dwarf tasting...

Wyeast Labs - French Saison Yeast - Farmhouse Saison Ale Update

So back in late April or early June I brewed a traditional Saison from the Farmhouse Ale book.  See previous post here.

So I felt I needed to do a follow up because after our move I found two bottles of this Saison left.  Cracked one open and didn't even know what it was at first smell and taste.

This beer completely changed.  And it has changed for the better. Way better. I am going to let the other one age another two months to see how that tastes but at 6 months in the bottle this beer is amazing for a Saison.  Crystal clear.  Perfect carbonation and the funky flavor associated with the typical Saison is just so much more refined.

If you are using White Labs French Saison keep a few bottles and let them sit in the bottle 6 months before you crack one open. If you had the success that I did you wont regret it.  If the 8 month version is better I will post some more notes on it.

New Brew Place

It's been over a month without any updates.  That means no tastings, no brew days or bottle days.  The reason for the delay is I have a new brewery... I mean house.

It has been a hectic month and it does not look like it is going to slow down.  I hope to be brewing by mid to late December once the dust settles at our new place.  In the meantime there will be some activity.

1. I will be bottling the Red Sour Ale that is aging in my oak barrel that is currently at my parents house.  This was only supposed to be in the barrel for 3 months as this was supposed to be a "quick" sour.  I soured the wort and then added Roeselare Yeast to the barrel to infect/innoculate my new barrel.  With the purchase of a home getting in the way it is now 4 months in the barrel.  More funk maybe?  This will hopefully happen next weekend so I can crack a bottle for the Vorp family gathering for Christmas.
2. Once the barrel is emptied at my parents place it will get transported back to my new place and the Sour Red that has been aging for 13 months will go in the oak for a month or two.  We will taste and see how it goes before determining a time frame.
3. The Angry Dwarf is in bottles aging away.  These wont be cracked until right before Xmas.
4. The first beer to be brewed will be my Pitchfork Black Stout.  I will brew this once I get time and the sanity for a brew day.  This will go into primary in the standard bucket and then we will age this one in my other oak barrel for 2-3 months.  By the time this is done aging the Tart of Darkness clone - a soured stout - will be ready to take up residency in the barrel.

My new brewing storage and space is unfortunately smaller than where I can from. I now have a nice garage that I can use for brew day but actual climate controlled storage is less.  I will not be able to do as many beers but instead focus on the few recipes that I really enjoy while throwing in a lot more 1-2 gallon sized batches of experimental or "standard" beers.

Update next week on the Sour Red Ale as it goes into the bottle.  Cheers.

Angry Dwarf Christmas Ale - Update

The Angry Dwarf has finished primary fermentation.  It went quick and fast going from Saturday through Thursday morning. It slowed Thursday morning and then by the evening there was no activity in the airlock.  I let it sit Friday and Saturday and just moved it to the secondary carboy.  All looks well.  It smells great too.  If it tastes half as good as it smells we should be in business.

I added another 1.5lb of sweet cherry in the secondary since I was short on brew day.  There should be a short burst of fermentation until the remaining yeast chews through the sugars in the sweet cherries.  

I took a quick taste and it currently is very alcoholic with some honey and cherry flavor really coming though.

I will let it sit for two weeks and then bottle and mature until Christmas.

Tasting Day: Pumpkin Pie Ale

So today it was time to taste the Pumpkin Pie Ale.  I had some serious sparging issues with this one as I outlined in my earlier Brew Day post.  This was also part of the batch that was infected.  It seemed to have done pretty well showing no real signs of infection so I decided to bottle this and at least get a taste.

I knew something was wrong when I got a final gravity reading of 1.004!  It dried up like a cider.  As you can see from the photo to the left it is very light with no real body or head.

After 3 weeks in the bottle I noticed a small white ring on top of the bottles.  Signs of a small infection.  With all of these things telling me it is probably not right I still needed to taste it.

In the end I am glad that I tasted it.  It is not sour yet from the infection so I think I am getting a good taste of what it could be if I had a more successful brew day.

The main thing about this is that the recipe seems to be right on.  Even though it was 1.004 it was still sweet and had the perfect amount of spices (in my opinion).

I can only imagine that my stuck sparge probably caused a chain reaction of how the sugar was converted and thus fermented.  Maybe it resulted in nothing but simple sugars which fermented completely out causing the 1.004 reading.  I dont focus too much on science of brewing and treat brewing more like I do cooking.  I try, taste and adjust while following general rules.

I am pretty confident that my new brew-in-a-bag set up with my cooler mash tun can handle the tricky sparge for this beer and create a quality pumpkin ale.  The sad part is that we will have to wait until next year to find out for sure.  I only have a small window for pumpkin beer and it is quickly closing.  If I brewed a batch today it wouldnt be ready until the end of December.  We should be in full blown stout season by then!  So we will revisit this next August.