Festbier season

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The weather is slowly matching the season, which means none other than festbier season! Bavarian Oktoberfest has just ended but America has a bunch of events all over the place. 

This year I was determined to brew better than the two Oktoberfest beers I made last year, that I consider utter failures. For starters I needed to take better notes, but I think last year's batches had some yeast issues. The festbier concept this year was to modify our recipe to fit our current system numbers, no starter, and detailed notes of the brew day. 

Festbier 2016

4 lbs pils

3lbs Vienna 5l ovibond

3lbs Munich 10 lovibond

.4lbs caramunich (6.4oz) 53-60 lovibond

1 German Hallertau 2.5%

1 tettnang 2%

.5oz hersbrucker 2%

2 pure pitch souther german lager WLP 838

Campden tablet per 5 gal, no other water adjustments

 

Brew day breakdown:

Brewed 8/7/16

1145: 9 gal water  heating

1204: water at 146ish, dough in

1209: 4 gal of water, mash at 138 which is a little high. Pulling the 5th gal to cool before mixing and pulling the first decoction

1216: evened out to 136.9, covered for the remaining rest period

1236: pulled thick mash for first decoction

1250: nice rolling boil on decoction 1, added 3 scoops to hit 147. 30 min rest

124: pulling second thick mash

142: decoction 2 nice rolling boil, killed the heat. Added scoop by scoop to hit 154

243: pulled about 8 quarts of thin mash to decoct

258: added thin decoction to mash, hit 163. Started heating 4 gal sparge water

310: vorlof then draining before sparging

319: netted a little over 2 gal wort before sparging

323: 15 min batch sparge at 165

338: drain sparge

342: added half of sparge to 5 gal in kettle. Lit burner and continued draining the mash.

345: second half of sparge brought the kettle volume to over 6.5 gal. 

401: hit rolling boil

432: hop addition for last 60 min

518: inserted immersion chiller to sanitize for the last 15

532: boil done. Starting chiller

542: in 10min down from boiling to 95

609: everything is chilled or rinsed off and inside within half an hour of flameout. 

1026: Pitched yeast and put in lager fridge. Read 15 brix or OG 1.061.

8/29: diacetyl rest 5 days before cold crash/lager.

9/19: kegged. Reading FG 1.013

ABV: 6.3%

It was perfectly clear going into the keg. Coming out of the keg after carbonating it seems to have a bit of chill haze. The color is fantastic, it looks a little dark but it drinks incredibly light. Smooth light malt with a hint of caramel. It is everything both of my brews from last year weren't. I think my lager yeast that I had stored let me down last year which is why this year I skipped the starter and used 2 packages of yeast. I think the decoction really helped the complexity in the final malt profile. My plan is to brew this again without a decoction to compare a step mash to the decoction.

I do think the Wyeast Oktoberfest lager yeast yields a more crisp end result, but I was very happy with the final product from the White Labs pure pitch. Perhaps later I can do a split batch to compare lager yeasts. 

Until next time, Prost!

A Belated Oktoberfest

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We are well on our way into November at this point and I never got around to posting this article, so without further ado: Oktoberfest 2015. 

Last year we were lucky enough to attend Oktoberfest in Munich. This year being state side we were looking for a nice festbier to pass the time. I feel that American Oktoberfest beers tend to miss the mark. The Germans also had a few years to perfect their lagers before us. 

For a baseline we started with two German beers. Both were 5.8% but very different beers. The Weihenstephaner was very pale with a light sweet finish, a beer you could easily drink a few liters of without much problem. This was not exactly the fest beer we remembered from our trip, but it wasn't a bad beer.

The Ayinger I had not had before. While it had a smooth full malt flavor, it seemed a bit buttery. 

The Victory festbeer was full bodied and malty, almost coffee like. Great amber but not exactly a German Oktoberfest.

The Yuengling was malty but maybe slightly oxidized and a very thin watery mouthfeel. You could probably pound these like normal Yuengling. 

The Widmer Brothers Okto had an assertive bitterness. Great malt backbone but has a solid American hop presence. 

The Sierra Nevada was actually a collaboration brew with Brauhaus Riegele. A crisp lager, while a little dry was just a solid beer. 

The Peak Organic smelled like pumpernickel and drank like an IPA.

The Goose Island was malty but the flavor falls flat then leaves you with a lingering dark roasted flavor. 

I'd call the Sierra Nevada the clear winner of this group. It was definitely the most German of the American brewed beers, which isn't surprising when you have a German brewery in collaboration. 

 

After visiting Oktoberfest in person we came home and developed a recipe of our own. We brewed the first version of it last year and thought it turned out phenomenal and true to the German brewing methods.

This year I brewed it twice in preparation of our own Oktoberfest party. Both had the same measured grains and hops. The first OG was 1.071 while the second OG was 1.078. The second was fermented on the yeast cake of the first and they both finished at 1.015. I think the main difference was how they were milled, I believe I hand cranked the first one while the second was powered with a drill. We seem to be consistently hitting 85+% efficiency which is why our calculations were off from the original recipe. These are also decoction mashed so the efficiency should be a little above the 70% average. (Is that the average? I though that's what most calculators default to)

All that said, we weren't super happy with our Oktoberfest beers. We missed our mark flavor-wise, and they really didn't want to drop clear. I think our yeast was the major defect, aside from milling consistency, and next time I'll spring for a fresh batch of Bavarian Lager yeast. Mistakes were made but I stand by this recipe and will continue to try and perfect it.

Annibeersary 2: Marzen Boogaloo

Wyeast Bavarian lager 2206

7lbs pils

4lbs vienna

2.5lbs munich

.4lbs caramunich

1 Hallertau 2.7AA

1 tettnang 2.4AA

.5oz hersbrucker 4.3AA

 

3 step decoction mash

Dough in 130 for 20min

Pull 12qts thick mash, bring to boil

Add back to main mash to reach 146

Rest 30min at 146, pull 2nd thick mash bring to boil

Add to hit 158 for 60min

Pull thin mash, boil, add to main mash to hit 167+

Add all hops at beginning of boil, boil for 90min. 

 

Target OG: 1.060

Target FG: 1.015

Calculated ABV: 5.8

Use a large starter, Primary for 2 weeks, Diacetyl rest for 3-5 days, cold crash/lager a week before kegging/bottling. 

 

Cherry Blossom lager

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Every year the DC Homebrewers club holds a competition for cherry blossom season. The competition is BJCP sanctioned and structured, but also has a specialty category 40 for Cherry Blossom beers.

The BJCP specialty category (23) says that "If a base style is declared, the style should be recognizable. The beer should be judged by how well the special ingredient or process complements, enhances, and harmonizes with the underlying style." So the DC competition seems to follow that rule even for their cherry blossom category. 

I will admit my beer had flaws when I entered it. It was experimental and young. I based the recipe off a blend of other beers I had on hand with my specialty ingredients. The prototype blend got rave reviews from friends, but there was only one bottle which was freshly blended and mostly flat. My entries were a bit young and didn't stay as clear as I had hoped when bottling. I think I will be kegging competition beers before bottling from here out, if and when I enter another.

My combined reviews were a less than stellar 23 out of 50. 

To take a step back for a moment, I'd like to talk about cherry blossoms and their flavor. I studied abroad in Japan, and landed in the country just as cherry blossom season kicked off. American flavored cherry things are nothing close to cherry blossom flavored things from Japan. Cherry blossom in Japanese is "sakura". Especially in March and early April, sakura flavored everything can be found. From bread and mochi, to kit kats and McDonald's shakes. Sakura flavored things tend to be a pinkish color, where most American cherry flavored things are red. Cherry blossom stuff doesn't taste "red". Cherry Blossoms themselves aren't super fragrant to begin with. Most sakura things have a soft floral and sweet flavor to them, most of which are flavored with sakura extract.

I wanted to do some more research before making my beer for entry, so I ordered some sakura kit kats off amazon. They showed up a little beat up and melted, so they were probably a little on the old side. They lacked a lot of the floral character I remembered, instead had a cinnamon flavor to them. 

Old Dominion Brewing company also makes a Cherry Blossom Lager every year. I have never been a fan of it. The previous two years were overly sweet and syrupy with a big unpleasant cherry flavor. This year was actually a little more balanced between lager and cherry flavoring, but it just isn't a cherry BLOSSOM beer. I consider this the only beer in my competition, regardless of the out come from the DC Hombrewers. I set out to make a floral lager with a cherry blossom sakura edge to it. 

I did a clean lager primary that I flavored when I bottled. It was brewed January 25th and bottled February 24th. My specialty flavoring was from mixing bottling sugar with sakura tea and sakura extract. After two weeks of carbonating they had notes of cinnamon and cherry blossom in the nose. Nice floral cherry blossom flavor leading into a light sweet malt. Well balanced but cloudy from being room temperature and unlagered. The rest of the bottles were put in the fridge on March 3rd and my entries were dropped off on friday the 13th. 

Judging was March 21st while we were in Boston. I tried another bottle before we left and it had lost a bit of that floral character I was after and the cinnamon had become more upfront.  I am not sure if my bottles were kept cool through the week or not, either way with as cloudy as it was I knew it wasn't going to turn out the best in judged results. 

As I write this, I cracked open a bottle for the first time since March. It has been in the keezer lagering, and turned out much clearer as the pictures show. When it's cold it smells a bit malty and tastes malty but a little sweet, with a full and slick mouthfeel. After checking my notes I see I mashed it a little high, the next go around I'm going to mash a little lower to try and dry it out. The beer I am drinking now is not the beer I entered in the competition. 

Both judges knocked my beer for not being "lager-like" and exhibiting more belgian characteristics. They thought all the spice and other flavors came from the yeast, when it was the extract and tea. Since my lager didn't fit in the BJCP "box" it didn't score well. Most of my beers don't fit in a BJCP category, which is why I don't often enter into competitions. It is interesting to note the BJCP has 28 categories of beer, mead, and cider while the Great American Beer Festival (GABF) has 89 categories and even more subcategories. 

I will keep brewing the beer I like to brew, competition or not.

Cherry Blossom Lager

Note: 2 Gallon batch size

2lb pils

2lb maris

.5 flaked wheat

Mashed 148 for 35, 154 for 25

 

90 min boil

.1 apollo for 60

.2 mixed hersbucker and fuggle for 20

bavarian lager yeast 2206

cherry blossom extract at bottling

sakura tea with bottling sugar

3 weeks in primary around 50, one week at 68-70 for diacetyl rest, cold crash and bottle. Lager as needed.

OG: 1.064
FG: 1.014

ABV: 6.6%