Home About Beer Reviews Beer Resources Cloned Beer Home Brew
Twitter
YouTube
RSS

Maker’s Mark Barrel Imperial Stout

By on Friday, September 16th, 2011 | No Comments

Wow, it has been a while.  I guess warm summer months in a northern climate will do that to a blogger.  Since I’ve last posted I’ve been enjoying the Steamin Hot Pils, I couldn’t be happier with how it turned out.  I’ve also brewed two other batches that I’ll do a recipe and/or review of sometime, an American IPA a lot along the lines of Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale and an ESB, very true to style.  The ESB is a lot like Fuller’s ESB, but not necessarily a clone.  Just a few days ago we harvested our 2011 crop of Cascade hops and are drying as I type.

So how does that get me to this subject of this post?  Well another beer I brewed recently is an extra special recipe I’ve been thinking about doing for quite sometime.  It is a Maker’s Mark Barrel Imperial Stout.  This is an extra special brew that will require a long period of aging before it is ready for bottling and enjoying, but will be well worth the wait.

The recipe base is an imperial stout that will be aged on oak cubes that soak in Maker’s Mark Bourbon.  The soaking in Maker’s Mark has two purposes, one is to sanitize the oak cubes and the other is to impart the bourbon flavor into the beer.  Not only will this beer be delicious but a lot of craft breweries have bourbon barrel aged beers in stores and these things are NOT cheap.  $12 to $16 a six pack of bourbon barrel aged beer is a common price.  How much does it cost to make a strong, very flavorful bourbon barrel aged beer at home?  About $8 a six pack……not bad savings, not to mention you can make whatever you like.  Below are some brew day pictures along with the imperial stout recipe.  Down the road I’ll add some posts when the beer is transfered to the seconary with oak cubes and Maker’s Mark Bourbon, when I bottle the beer, and a final writeup come late 2011 or early 2012 with the beer is ready to drink.

Maker’s Mark Barrel Imperial Stout Recipe

Maris Otter Malt – 14 lbs.

Chocolate Malt – 1.25 lbs.

Roasted Barley – 1.25 lbs.

Crystal 40L – 1.0 lbs.

Crystal 120L 1.0 lbs.

Flaked Barley – 2.0 lbs.

Steamin Hot Pils

By on Saturday, July 2nd, 2011 | No Comments

It might have been a warm and humid Saturday two weeks ago, but it is always a good day to be brewing beer.  Today I brewed up a new recipe, I call it Steamin Hot Pils.  Think American Pilsner grains, German Pils hops, and Anchor Steam Beer yeast.  If you want the recipe drop me an email.  The Steamin Hot Pils name was kind of a play on words, since I’m using steam beer yeast and it was hot out, it just came to my mind.  I also use a special technique with this beer known as first wort hopping.  First wort hopping is when you put a flavor addition of hops into the wort as it is drained from the mash tun.  The temperature of wort going up to the boiling locks a lot of flavor components of the hops into beer.  And even though you’re boiling them the full 60 minutes, it only contributes to the bitterness like a 20-25 minute addition of hops would.  I’ve used this before and enjoyed the resultant smooth hop flavor.  As soon as I get the pictures off my camera I’ll be sure to post a few!  Look for a review of the Carty Cascade 2010 beer and this beer as soon as we bottle it and age it.

 

 

Carty Cascade Pale Ale 2010 — Finally

By on Saturday, April 16th, 2011 | No Comments

So all the way back in very late August our Cascade hops were harvested.  It was the third year of growing the three Cascade hop plants and we had a bountiful harvest — about 12oz. dry weight.  The hops were vacuum sealed and stored until brew day.  Over the winter this past year I was hoping to make the 2010 version of Carty Cascade Pale Ale……..well the weather (bitter cold) got in the way a couple times, as did other things,  so it took until April for the brewday to commence.

The inaugural Carty Cascade Pale Ale (the 2009) version was brewed up and the beer was incredible!  Since the inaugural batch was so tasty we decided we’d recreate the recipe with every year’s harvest and use additional hops for whatever beers we wanted to make.  And so the brew day.

The recipe was the same, very simple grainbill and a nice showcase of our backyard grown Cascade hops.

9.0 lbs Maris Otter

1.0 lbs Wheat Malt

1.0 lbs Crystal 40L

Wyeast 1056 American Ale Yeast

1.25 oz Cascades 60 mins

1.20 oz Cascades 15 mins

1.20 oz Cascades 0 mins

The brewday was wonderful weatherwise, in the 50s and 60s.  The brewday from a technical standpoint also went perfectly.  The basement is at annual minimum it achieves by mid-winter and doesn’t warm up until mid-spring……..right around 59F.  But a cold fermentation works nicely for this beer, where we are trying to showcase the flavor and aroma of the hops.  I’ll be sure to post a review once the beer is done, but fermentation has gone well and transfer day will be occurring in the next day or three.  Until then enjoy some pictures of brew day.  Lots of pictures, the hops, the grain, the wort, but by far my favorite ones are of the bittering addition of hops right after being added to the kettle.  I love the green color of the hops against the orange/copper wort with white steam rising.

Simcoe Pale Ale Brew Day

By on Friday, July 2nd, 2010 | No Comments

Mmmmmm….pale ale.  It’s been a while since I’ve posted about a brew day, but I had to share my Simcoe Pale Ale brew day.  I bought some Simcoe hops, a hop I have enjoyed from commercial beers but had not brewed with.  So I crafted a super hoppy pale ale recipe, quite bitter, and extremely hoppy.  I paired the Simcoe with a little bit of Amarillo.

The hop schedule looked this:

0.50 oz Galena 13.2% AA – 60 minutes

0.25 oz Simcoe 12.2% AA – 60 minutes

0.50 oz Simcoe 12.2% AA – 20 minutes

I blended 1.5 oz each of Simcoe 12.2% AA and Amarillo 7.5% AA, for a total of 3 oz or 84 grams.  I added 7 grams of the hop blend every minute from the 12 minute mark to the end of the boil.

After the primary fermentation is drawing a close, I will dry hop with 0.5 oz each of Simcoe and Amarillo.

I’m thinking maybe the name of this recipe should be ‘Can You Handle It? Pale Ale’ because the hop flavor and aroma will be off the charts.  A solid 61 IBUs will provide a firm bitterness in what will be a mid 5% ABV brew.

I’ve included a few pictures from today’s Simcoe Pale Ale brew day.  I can’t wait for this one to finish up!

Northern English Brown

By on Friday, February 12th, 2010 | No Comments

Here is a beer I brewed up back in the fall that I hadn’t shared up this point.  Northern English Browns are malty beers with just enough hop bitterness to keep the beer from being overly sweet.  Commonly malt flavors include nutty and biscuit.  Northern English Browns typically are a bit drier on the finish and a little more hop oriented than their Southern English brethren, which tend to be a bit sweet on the finish.  The picture is a bit darker than what the beer really looks, the color is more medium brown with some amber hues when held to a light.

NorthernEnglishBrown_001_2

Here’s the recipe for this brew, it’s quite tasty!

  • 8.00 lb Maris Otter
  • 0.50 lb English Crystal 55L
  • 0.75 lb Biscuit Malt
  • 0.25 lb British Chocolate
  • 1.00 lb Flaked Barley
  • 1.5 oz Kent Goldings – Bittering, 60 minutes
  • 0.5 oz Kent Goldings – Aroma/Flavor, 5 minutes
  • Wyeast 1968 Extra Special Bitter Yeast

Maibock Pale Ale Review

By on Monday, January 18th, 2010 | No Comments

If you’re wondering how the marriage of Maibock grains and and a healthy helping of German hops turned out, keep reading.  I’m quite pleased with the appearance of this brew, a nice golden color with a frothy white head.  Here take a look:

MaibockPaleAle

More importantly is the aroma and flavor.  The aroma is moderately malty, quite bready and a bit sweet, the hops also shine as well, spicy and a bit floral.  I wish the hop aroma would have come through a bit more, but I’m not complaining, this beer is very inviting.  The flavor is malty upfront and remarkably smooth.  At the swallow the moderate hop bitterness and spicy German hop flavor cleanse the palate.  I very much enjoy how both the malty flavors and hops shine in this beer, it really captures what I was intending.  German malt flavors akin with Maibocks and a hoppiness typically seen with American Pale Ales (albeit a German hop flavor/aroma).

Would I do anything different next time?  Yes.  The hops just don’t come through quite as much as I wanted.  I’d prefer the hop flavor and aroma both to be a bit more noticeable, but not too much more.  The bitterness is about right.  The thing I like most about this beer is the exceptional smoothness and the fact the malt and hop flavors are both quite evident.

Brew this one up today!  Let me know how it turns out!

Justin

Carty’s Cascade Pale Ale – Vintage 2009

By on Saturday, December 5th, 2009 | 2 Comments

What better to do on a cold December morning?  Brew!  Today I brewed an American Pale Ale, using the Cascade hops grown in my buddy’s backyard this summer. The recipe I crafted was quite simple, I wanted to showcase the hops.  I’m curious to how these Cascade hops will compare to Cascade hops grown in the Pacific Northwest.  They smelled quite similar, maybe a bit more spicy and little less citrusy, but overall quite similar.

So the brew day started at a chilly 23F.  But no worries, I had my winter jacket and hat on.  The brew day went well despite the cold temperature, although running the hose to the wort chiller was kind of a pain, the hose was quite stiff.  Some of the water froze in the hose while I was cleaning, but no big deal, I’ll let it melt in the garage.  Also using so many whole hops I knew siphoning the wort might be a challenge, so I tried something new, using a copper scrubber attached to the racking cane to act as a filter, I got the idea from another brewer on the web.  It worked very well, no clogged racking cane.  Although I’ll say this, no more brewing outside in subfreezing weather…back to the kitchen until spring or maybe a mild spell.

The recipe today was quite simple:

9.0 lbs Maris Otter

1.0 lbs Wheat Malt

1.0 lbs Crystal 40L

Wyeast 1056 American Ale Yeast

1.25 oz Cascades 60 mins

1.20 oz Cascades 15 mins

1.20 oz Cascades 0 mins

I will ferment this batch cool, in the low 60s.  With the simple grain bill, clean yeast and cool fermentation temperatures this beer will showcase the entire 2009 harvest of our Cascade hops.  I’ve attached some pictures of brew day if you’re interested.  If I have time I’ll also post a few things about two of my other latest brews, a Northern English Brown, which tastes fantastic and an update on the Maibock Pale Ale which I’m enjoying as I write this.

The pictures:  1) a cold start!  2) the grains, toward the ‘top’ of the bag you can see the crushed wheat malt atop the other grains 3) the mash after doughing-in 4) the bittering addition 5) wort before the boil got going 6) wort with the bittering hops added

Maibock Pale Ale

By on Sunday, October 18th, 2009 | 1 Comment

So the title of this post is a bit confusing, is it a maibock is it a pale ale?  But trust me, it makes sense.  My buddy and I brewed up a batch on Saturday, we wanted something with nice malt presence and a good amount of hop flavor and aroma.  Instead of the typical American citrus hop we decided to change it up and went with the spicy German hop Tettnanger.

The recipe I came up with used a lot of German pilsner and German munich malt and a bit of caramel malt, hence the maibock part of the beer recipe, basically similar malts I would use in a maibock recipe.  We bittered with Perle and made a 15 minute, 5 minute and zero minute addition of Tettnanger hops.  For yeast we went with Wyeast 1007 German Ale yeast, as this should give a rather clean fermentation, allowing the hops and malt to shine.  If you want the recipe, give me a shout, otherwise here are a few pictures of the fermentation that is going strong in my basement.

2009 Cascade Hop Harvest!

By on Saturday, September 12th, 2009 | 1 Comment

So a few weeks back I ventured into the hop garden at my friend’s house.  We harvested the hop cones from the 2 year-old Cascade plants we have growing along a fence in their backyard.  Last year we got very little hops, not even enough to really use, but good bine growth.  This year the bines were longer on June 1 than they got the entire first year.  As the summer continued the hop bines became littered with flowers and eventually plump hop cones.

Sunday, August 30 we harvested the Cascade hop cones.  We harvested 15 5/8 oz wet (444g) of luscious hops!  Below are some images of our hop harvest.   After I got the hops home I set them out on some non-fiberglass furnace filters and bungee corded them to a box fan for drying.  I can’t accept credit for this drying method, I got the idea from Alton Brown’s Beef Jerky Good Eats episode on the Food Network.  Below are some pictures of my drying rig.  I blasted them with the box fan for 4 days, I’m sure they were plenty dry after about 2 days, but wanted to be sure.  After drying, the hop’s weight had decreased by nearly a factor of 5!  The 15 5/8oz (444g) of wet hops now tipped the scale at 3 5/8 oz (106g).  Finally I put all the dried hops into a vacuum seal bag and sealed them up for storage in the freezer until brew day.  You can seem them sealed up in a bag not much longer than an average size banana.

Now the brainstorming begins for a recipe using these hops.  Although it shouldn’t take too much brainstorming.  We want to showcase our hops in an American Pale Ale, so the recipe will be rather simple with a clean yeast and we will use only these hops.  Look for the recipe sometime soon!  Until then, enjoy the hops pictures!

So how’s that IPA?

By on Wednesday, June 17th, 2009 | No Comments

So a couple months ago I posted about my 1120 IPA recipe I crafted.  I know the world is eagerly awaiting the report, so how was it?  Ok, no one is dying to know, but if you were curious here’s the report.  Enjoy!

Like I said in my previous reports, my racking cane got clogged so my volume was a bit light and my efficiency was a bit off being my first batch with my new water supply, so this is a high end APA or a low-end IPA, either way a damn tasty beer!

I was a bit concerned about the slow performance of the Nottingham yeast, but like I said I was fermenting this rather cool, in the 56/57F range.  Well the beer turned out great, this was the first time I used Amarillo hops and really enjoy them, I prefer this Amarillo/Cascade blend over soley Cascade.  I’ll stop rambling about the beer, here’s my review with a picture of the beer!  Try the recipe out, if you like hops, you’ll love this!

At a couple months age (and even at just over one month) this beer is fantastic. It pours fairly clear golden-orange color with a moderate white head. The aroma is quite hoppy, lemon-citrus qualities from Amarillo and Cascade hops. The flavor is moderately hoppy with a noticeable, yet not tongue splitting hop bitterness. The beer finishes with a nice linger of hop flavor and a bit of sweet, nutty malt. The carbonation is moderate and body medium.This beer turned out wonderful, a refreshing, very flavorful pale ale!

1120apa-001

« Older Entries