Friday, February 18, 2011

Dreg Series: Old Ale with Avery 15 Brett

Since I was just blown away with my results with these Brett strains in the Avery 15 / Drie Bitter I had to do another batch. And also since this is a Brett Only beer with no other bugs, I'm not too concerned with super attenuation. I am still letting these beers sit for a couple months before bottling but not the normal 12 months I would with other sour beers.









I am still waiting for the Bitter to carbonate before I do a review but just from the smell and gravity sample I know this yeast gives off a lot of fruit flavors. So when I was constructing my Old Ale recipe and thinking about how I want the some dark fruit flavors I knew I had to try this yeast on some of the wort. I'm thinking this beer is going to give me a delicious thick FRUIT CAKE beer.

The yeast took off again, with activity within a couple hours even with this higher alcohol content. It appeared to be fully fermented in a week.
 
02.17.11 Gravity at 1.020 (that is 7.2% ABV, and 73% Apparent Attenuation)
The taste is fantastically sour. This beer tastes like a year old beer. It is not quite as complex as I want it and the malt flavor is hidden a bit behind all the sour fruity notes. Has a nice mouthfeel and is not too sweet. But easily one of the better sours I've had and only after a month!
Add .25 oz French Oak cubes and 3 oz Turbinado Sugar (adds 8 pts or 2% alcohol)
07.22.11 Gravity 1.014. Overall beer went from 1.071 + .008(sugar) = 1.079 = 8.6% ABV and 82% Apparent Attenuation. Bottled to 2.5 Volumes. Nice sweet and sour balance. Then carmel and toffee flavor. Also a decent amount of sourness for Brett Only. 

3 comments:

  1. I just saw your review on the White Labs site and that this is one of the beers that you aerated with WLP644. Am doing a sour ipa with it and was wanting some of the tart, sour notes and wondering if you aerated with an oxygen stone or just shaking vigorously? I don't use a stone, but my buddy just got one and wanted to get some of the sourness from aeration, but don't want to go overboard either... Thanks.

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    Replies
    1. I did not use a aeration stone. It should be noted that you probably won't get too much sourness right away, just a slight tartness over time.

      For example we just did a super hoppy Brett Trois/Drie brew - http://jeffreycrane.blogspot.com/search/label/Brett%20Drie
      And it was aerated but we drank it within about a month and there was very little perceived tartness to that beer.

      To get something sour you will need to use a lactic acid bacteria(lacto (faster) or pedio(slow, but more sour over time).If you want to do this and still have a hoppy beer, then give the beer time to develop the sourness and then add a lot of dry hops before kegging/bottling.

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    2. Did you brew this with your Avery 15 dregs sample? So confused. You linked to this page from your WLP644 review, but it seems like the yeast you used is the same as WLP648. How about your other 2 recipes linked from that Same WLP644 review? What yeast were those?

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