Hoppy French Saison

Yeast-tastic

This French Saison will be my first attempt at pitching yeast saved from a previous brew. After racking the saison I made in January to secondary I saved two pints of yeast slurry in two mason jars in the back of the fridge for 4 1/2 months. I almost forgot about it until I came across this recipe by the Mad Fermentationist, Michael Tonsmeire. The wife and I had the opportunity to meet Michael at the AHA conference last weekend during his book signing. Since he's a DC local I can't wait to run into him soon at a BURP meeting.

I made a yeast starter to wake the yeast back up from its prolonged slumber. I boiled 100g of pilsen DME in 600mL of water for 5 minutes, cooled the wort down to 75F, then pitched the top of both of the mason jars until I had 1000mL in the flask. I put the flask on the stir bar thing-y over night.

Recipe Notes
Style: Saison

Batch Volume: 5 gal.
Color: 3 SRM
Target Bitterness: 38 IBU
Target OG: 1.044

Just pilsner and wheat malt

Grist
6 lb. 4 oz. Pilsner Malt
1 lb. 12 oz. Wheat Malt

0.6 oz. Nugget 13.9% (FWH)
1.5 oz. Saaz 3.5% (10 min.)
1.5 oz. Saaz (0 min.)

0.2 oz Black Pepper Corn (0 min.)

French Saison Yeast (Wyeast 3711)
- 1 L yeast starter

Brew Notes
Brew Date: 6/21/14
Mash Temp: 155F
Mash Time: 75 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 4.75 gal
Measured OG: 1.039 @ 80F (1.040 corrected)
Brewhouse Efficiency: 62%

Mashed for a little longer than usual just because I wasn't paying attention. Didn't stir the grain at all during the mash. I even forgot to after the mash. Retain 155F mash temp throughout the 75 min. mash with just a sleeping bag wrapped around the kettle.

During the mash I decided to add some pepper corn I had left over from the previous saison. It was completely unnoticeable last time. I decided to add a little more this time and to measure by weight. I don't think 0.2 oz. is too much. I'm reading about people using 0.5-4.0 oz. online. Don't mind it much if it isn't peppery but it would be horrible to use too much. I gave the pepper corn a few pulses in the coffee grinder to bust it up before adding it to the kettle.

Well it looks like I did something wrong because I missed the target gravity by 10% and my efficiency dropped to 62%. Maybe I should have stirred more throughout the mash and just before pulling the grain bag. I poured the cooled wort through a strainer to pull out most of the hop material. I thought maybe the hop junk was artificially raising my gravity on previous brews. I added a bunch of hop crap to the hydrometer tube and that didn't change the gravity reading at all.

With the wort chiller running full steam I could only get the wort down to 80F. Decided to pour the wort into the fermenter at that temp and put it in my new keezer which is set at 45F. After four hours the temp dropped to 72 so I pitched the yeast starter, aerated, and went to bed.

6/22/14 - By 10AM (9 hours later) the fermenter temperature has reached 82F and fermentation is vigorous. Debated putting the fermenter back into the keezer but decided to let it ride.

6/23/14 - Temperature is down to 80 and fermentation is slightly less vigorous.

6/24/14 - Temp is down to 79

6/25/14 - Temp is at 78. Gravity reading is all the way down to 1.004. No more visible signs of fermentation. Beer tastes great. Has a lot of warm farmhouse/belgian aroma and is very light. Will go down very easy. No real fusel alcohol aroma detected and feel no alcohol burn when drinking despite high ferm temps. A little buttery/oily taste persists after swallowing and lasts only a second or two. Obviously young but a sign of good things to come.

6/29/14 - Racked to secondary. Gravity reading is still 1.004. Smells very Belgian-y with a strong bubble gum aroma and flavor. Saved two pint jars of trub/yeast to reuse for a Gen #3 saison brew. Trub was much cleaner this time after filtering out all the hop matter while transferring to primary. Left the mason jar lids on loose this time to prevent pressure build up from continued fermentation. Labeled the jars with strain, generation, and harvest date.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.004
ABV: 4.6%
Calories: 125
Carbonation: 2.5 volumes

Bitter American Clone

Next up on my list of session brews is the Bitter American by 21st Amendment brewery. I love this ale for contributing a big malt character in a class of otherwise thinner 'hop water' ales. I'd love to nail down *my* perfect session ale and always have some variation of it on tap. Bitter American, it's your turn to shine. Show me what you're workin' with.

Recipe Notes
Style: American Pale
Batch Volume: 5 gal.
Color: 8 SRM
Target Bitterness: 41 IBU
Target OG: 1.042

Grist
3 lb. Golden Promise
3 lb. 2-Row
1 lb. Munich
1 lb. Crystal 20L

0.5 oz. Warrior 15% (60 min.)
1.0 oz. Cascade 6.6% (15 min.)
1.0 oz. Centennial (Dry Hop)
1.0 oz. Simcoe (Dry Hop)

1 pkg. US-05

Brew Notes
Brew Date: 5/26/14
Mash Temp: 154 °F
Mash Time: 60 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 5.0 gal
Measured OG: 1.042
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72%

Today was a 'quad brew' day with the wife and two close friends. All together we made 17 gallons of beer! Used my propane tank that read 'empty' with the intention of finishing it off and swapping it out with the tank on my friend's grill. Well I'll be damned if the tank didn't last through the whole brew day! I can't recall how many brew days I've gotten out of this tank but it's far more than I expected. Had a little bit of a boil over because I wasn't paying attention but it was an otherwise flawless brew day. Nailed my target OG which always makes you feel good.

6/8/14 - Racked 4.3 gallons to secondary. Gravity reading was 1.008 for an ABV of 4.5%. Looks pretty dark for a pale ale just like Bitter American. Kind of tastes like generic beer and has only faint hop aroma. These should both change w/a 2 oz. dry hop addition.

6/17/14 - Dry hopped with simcoe and centennial in two sanitized hop bags weighed down with a couple of shot glasses each. Hopefully they can give this bland beer some character.

6/20/14 - Kegged today because impatience. Transferred the two hop bags from secondary into the keg to get the 'keg hopped' flavor. Put it in the kegerator at 45F under 10psi.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.008
ABV: 4.5%
Calories: 137
Carbonation: 2.1 volumes

6/21/14 - Let the keg chill for a day under pressure then shook it back and forth for five minutes in attempt to speed up carbonation and to increase beer contact/flow through the two hop bags. Excited to see if/how this changes the flavor and aroma.