Sour Beer: 2013 Flanders Red - 4th Annual

Now that I look back on it, Flanders Red is the only beer that I've re-brewed. I guess that says a lot about me as a homebrewer. This batch will be my 4th generation (and still using the same Roeselare blend). I've learned a good bit about this style and sour beers since I've started. I'll try my best to give commentary on my changes over time.

Historically, here have been my changes:

2010 Flanders Red to 2011 Flanders Red

• 30% Pilsner Malt swapped with 25% Maris Otter
• 3% Wheat Malt swapped with 13% Flaked Corn
• San Diego (hard) tap water to Soft Water Profile
• WLP001 +  Roeselare yeast (No Starter) to  Roeselare yeast cake and US-05 after 3 days
• 2 oz of French Oak Medium Toast to 1 oz of French Oak Medium Toast

2011 Flanders Red to 2012 Flanders Red

• 25% Maris Otter scrapped in favor of more Munich and Vienna
• 13% Flaked Corn swapped for 16% Flaked Wheat
• All Specialty Malts increased 2 oz
• Mash Temp from 154 to 158
• Roeselare yeast cake and US-05 after 3 days changed to  Roeselare yeast cake/WLP530

2012 Flanders Red to 2013 Flanders Red

• More Munich Malt (44% to 51%), Less Vienna (28% - 20%)
• All Specialty Malts increased 1%
• Switching from 1 oz oak cubes to 1.5 oz oak cubes added at 6 months

As you can see, I'm narrowing in on my recipe. The only changes were to help the malt bill stand out more. I've found on my system that my actual color is always lower than calculated, so my finished product should still be very much in style. I'm very happy with my fermentation plan of using WLP530 being pitched at the same time as my ongoing Roeselare yeast cake. I like the high mash temp, as it keeps plenty of sugar after the WLP530 yeast does it work and it leaves enough residual sweetness after a year to balance the sourness. (I like most of my sour beers pretty dry, but the Flanders styles (Red and Brown) work very well with some sweetness.)

I also brewed a couple extra gallons this year so I could try some ECY20 that Ed at Ales of the Riverwards sent me.

Recipe: 2013 Flander's Red

Batch Size 8.0 gal        O.G.-1.062              F.G.-TBD      IBU-15                           SRM-18.5               ABV-TBD   

Grain Bill (77% Efficiency):
9 lb  Munich Malt 10L (51%)
3.5 lb Vienna Malt (20%)
2.5 lb Flaked Wheat (14%)
14 oz Aromatic Malt (5%)
14 oz Caramunich I (5%)
14 oz Special B (5%) 
1.5 oz of Hungarian Oak cubes @ 6 months

Hops:1 oz Golding, 5.5%, pellet, 90 min 15.3 IBU

Yeast:4th pitch of Wyeast Rosealare

100 ml White Labs 530 Abbey Ale from Belgian Blond

Brew Day:Brewed: 8/4/13

Mash Details:

Mash Volume: 5 gal 
Sacc Rest. Temp/Time: 158F @ 60min
Sparge Volume: 6.25 gal
Sparge Temp/Time: 170F 

Boil Details:
Boil Volume: 9 gal
Boil Time: 90min

Ferment Details:
O.G.: 1.062
Ferment Temp: 70-75 Water bath in garage
Length: 10 days and then ambient in garage

 Even with the changes I've made over the years, I have still concluded to make a great Flanders Red, you really should do some blending. The last batches have been great on their own, but I can always find an area in the beer that I would like to improve (lactic acid level, oak level, Brett level, acetic acid level, color, malt complexity...)

Homemade Craft Soda from the Tap

I currently have quite a few friends that are pregnant or breast feeding (like my wife). I felt bad that they can no longer fill their glass from my keezer. My solution was to put some water in a keg to make soda water. Then I made soda syrups or concentrates.

This whole process was a lot easier than I thought. The carbonated water is pretty basic, just add filtered water to a keg. I was worried that the carbonation wouldn't be high enough for a soda. My keezer settings are on the high side around 2.75 CO2 volumes (fridge at 40 F, Pressure 15 psi)  because of the styles I normally have on tap. And I actually like this level as it not spritzy on your nose, but is still obviously carbonated. If you have a fancy setup then by all means crank up the pressure.

My idea to use syrups to flavor my soda was 3 fold:
1. I am still experimenting with flavor profiles and didn't want to commit to 5 gals of anything
2. With syrups it is much easier to adjust your sweetness or flavor level. I tend to prefer less sweetness than my wife
3. More variety

The syrups are also pretty easy to make. I started by just looking for soda recipes online - I just don't add the water to the recipe. Here are a few to get you started:

Basil Lemonade w Jalapeno (Original Recipe)
2 parts simple syrup (1 part sugar to 1 part water) - heated to dissolve the sugar with 1 cup of basil leaves and allow to seep with the lid on for 30 minutes
1 part lemon juice
1/2 - 1 jalepeno or any pepper of your choice

Mix everything together and allow to cool in the fridge. Stored mine in mason jars in the keezer.

Improvements: I plan to make extra thick syrup (2 cups sugar to 1 cup water) and therefore you would only need 1 part syrup to juice. This just allows you to make more soda with less syrup.



Honey Cream Soda
Honey Simple Syrup (1 part honey to 1 part water) - just heat enough to mix without driving off flavor
2 vanilla beans - I bought the variety pack (it's cheap) and Tahitian taste the best so far - more fruity and less extract tasting. I shopped around and Vanilla Products USA had the best selection and deals.

Split the beans and scrap the goodness and put everything into the heated syrup and allow to cool in the fridge.

Improvements: The honey was a bit over the top, so next time I might substitute half the honey for turbinado sugar.



Ginger Ale (Original Recipe -yeast)
2 cups Simple Syrup
1.5 oz Ginger - Minced or Grated - I used my hand held microplane (like this)
2 Tbls Lemon juice

Take ginger and let it steep for 60 minutes in heated simple syrup. Then pour strainer and cool in fridge

Improvements - This was very nice, but I might add some citrus zest while making the simple syrup.





So all you do is add your syrup to your glass. The amount completely depends on your tastes, but I found that around 4 oz for a 12 oz serving was about right. Then go over to your tap and add your carbonated water. Throw in some ice cubes and stir it up with a straw and enjoy.

Another option which is super easy - is to buy fruit syrups at the store. Our ethnic food stores carry a huge selection. Sour Cherry being one of my favorites - works well in Berliner Weisse, too.

As a sidenote - these also make some great bases for cocktails - just add your spirit of choice.

I'll try to post any new flavor combinations I create (even the bad ones). Please share your experiences also.

Belgian Grand / Petite Cru Based on Candi Sugar

I have been planning to brew a beer where the flavor is almost solely based on candi sugar. In the book, Brew like a Monk, Stan explains that this is how many Belgian brewers create their darker beers. This intrigued me because I really like the taste of candi sugar. The only part missing was that I needed to figure out how to make candi sugar. This is a highly debated subject (almost to the level of plastic vs. glass fermenters) on the ingredients and techniques used to create these syrups.








I have done a huge amount of research over the last couple years and have decided Ryan at Ryan Brews knows what he is talking about (he uses science). I read his article and then re-read it (and all the comments). His flavor tasting chart is pretty awesome and makes it convenient to have a point to aim for. Having made candi sugar a couple times in the past, I know it makes a mess. Here is some advice (if you have a wife like mine), go buy your own pot (I got a non-stick one from a thrift store for $2) or use your brew kettle. Also make sure you are outside or at least in a place you can make a mess. I actually went far enough to buy a cheap ($16-shipped) electric burner  which is also get for boiling starters since my wife is not a fan of the house smelling like wort. Sugar is actually pretty easy to clean with hot water, but it gets everywhere.

The flavors in Ryan's "Lime+Nutrient" batch sounded like what I wanted. As he discusses in the article, this is not a recipe but a guideline. For the first batch, I followed it as a recipe so I had somewhere to start. Well, the first thing I noticed is that the times he lists for flavor development weren't even close for me. After 3 hours of boiling, I got something that was pretty close to his "25 min" syrup. I think my issues had to do with the power of my burner and me adding too much water and not allowing the syrup to get to high enough temperature to create Maillard reactions. My second batch I decided to go for it and do a larger quantity in my old brew kettle on the propane burner. This seemed to develop color and flavors faster, but still much slower than expected. And I did get some slight smoking and burning. The resulting syrup had some burnt bitter astringent flavors. According to Ryan this is probably because I let the pH drop too low without adding more lime. I'm going to keep trying and if anyone has suggestions (or can post a video, I'm a visual learner) please send it my way.

My candi sugar wasn't bad, but just not exactly what I wanted. Therefore off to my local ethnic food store to pick up some date molasses and carob molasses. The date molasses is gold and when mixed in 50/50 with my candi syrup it tasted great. I added a little carob molasses to give some chocolate notes (maybe).

As explained above, the grain bill was kept simple to provide enough bready flavors, but stay out of the way of the candi sugar. Hops were just to added for bitterness to balance the sweetness. My mash temp was in the mid range because I like my Belgian beers dry, but I wasn't totally sure how fermentable my candi sugar would be.

The next strange part of this brew session is about 2 days before I was going to brew I saw this post from Modern Times. I decided that I could dilute down some of the wort (4 gals wort, 1 gal water) and also not add first runnings to be able to get a session strength version that could be ready in 8 days. For lack of a better name, a Petite Cru or Belgian Dark Session Ale. This also meant that I would now have 1 gal of wort left over. I had a starter of Maredsous dregs going, so that decision was easy.

Grand Cru / petite cru

IBU: GC ~25, PC ~20       SRM: TBD      Batch Size: 10 gal  (5 gal - GC,  5 gal- PC 1 gal - Mared) 

O.G.: GC ~1.070, PC ~1.045, Mared - 1.055              FG: GC- TBD, PC - 1.005, Mared - 1.008 

Fermentables 

Name                            Amount          Color

Pilsner                          15.000 lb         2 L

Munich Malt                    3.000 lb        20 L

Wheat Malt                     3.000 lb          5 L

Sugar:

Grand Cru (5 gals) - 12 oz Date Molasses, 16 oz Homemade Candi Sugar, 2 oz Carob Molasses, All 1st Runnings

Petite Cru (5 gals) - 5 oz Date Molasses, 10 oz Homemade Candi Sugar, 1 oz Carob Molasses

Maredsous (1 gal) - 1.5 oz Date Molasses, 3 oz Homemade Candi Sugar, 1 oz Carob Molasses

Hops 

Name                 Alpha      Amount      Use      Time         IBU

Super Styrian    9.5%        1.25 oz       Boil     60 min      25.4

Yeast

WLP 530  - Slurry from Belgian Blonde in 1 liter starter - split in Petite and Grand Cru
Maredsous dregs - built up 50 mls (3 days) then 100 mls (2 days)

Brewing Process 

Mash at 152 grain for 30 min

Took a gallon of the first runnings and boiled until thick

Boil 60 min

Fermentation

Petite Cru was fermented in glass carboys at 63 degrees for 6 days then raised to 68. Kegged Day 8.

Grand Cru was fermented in glass carboys at ~70 degrees and free rise ~75
Maredsous was fermented in glass jug at ~70 degrees and free rise ~75

Big shocker here, but I did not win the Modern Times competition. That beer just did not turn out like I planned. It was done fermenting, but the flavor profile was just weird. I'm thinking that it may take some time for the flavors to come together. Also to note I did not get nearly as much color contribution as I thought I would. (estimating SRM of homemade candi sugar is tough) My plan for next year is to meet in the middle with a balance of specialty grains and candi sugar.

Update:

Petite Cru - still has a strange flavor profile and I felt like spicing it. I don't do this often, but I was in the mood. I used 3 twigs of cinnamon, 8 oz golden raisins, 1 bourbon vanilla bean, zest from 2 oranges. So far the flavor is pretty nice, but the raisins added too much sugar so I took the keg out of the keezer and I'm going to let it ferment out a bit. Also the orange is a bit over the top - maybe just zest from 1 would have been better. I'll let this mellow for a month and have it back on for the holidays.

Grand Cru - this got an ounce of Hungarian oak cubes and is sitting in a keg.

Maredsous - bottled