Thursday 2 November 2017

House Blend Saison 2.0 (Lacto Inspired)

Version 1.0 was relatively successful, even though I've been throwing hops, fruit and anything else I can get hold of. This is no different..... Version 2.0 was my first time using Lactobacillius pills (Pro-Biotic Pills) in order to sour it, rathe than my usual method of longterm aging. 

So onto the Beer. This was Soured for 48 Hours, using These Pills. The Beer was mashed and boiled without hops forthe full 90 minsutes prior to souring (I Like to do my full day, and then come back a couple of days later to tidy the little bits and pieces up because of time constraints) A 1 Litre Starter was built for the Laco and 5 Pills pitched in. (Only 36 hours spinning)

The beer was brewed and completed over 2-3 days in order to get good souring, including purging with CO2 and covering with cling film to ensure no Oxygen gets in. Funnily enough the Grainfather is a fantastic tool for kettle souring, you can pump CO2 directly through te outlet pipe forthe pump, cover with foil (Including your lid) and set aside, knowing your all sealed up. not to mention to lovely little temp controller used for mashing. (set and forget at 35 Deg C) I pitched the lacto at 40Deg C and let it go.

Once it was perfectly sour, the temp was brought up to 85Deg C and the hops I'm using added for a 15 min hot steep.

Then standard ferment as usual. Easy!


Hoppy Sour Peach Ale

Batch Size: 21 Litres
Estimated OG: 1.050
IBU: 0
EBC: 5
Efficiency: 72%
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Grain: 
     Pilsner: 2.6 kg
     Wheat: 2.4 kg
     Acidulated Malt: 200 g (Sour Grapes)
     
Hops:
     Boil: No Boil Hops
     Hop Stand: 35g Simcoe / 35g Simcoe

     Dryhop: 60g Amarillo / 60g Simcoe (5 days)

     Fruit: 5kg of white flesh peaches. (Weight is prior to destoning and chopping etc.) Fruit was pre-frozen and had campden tablets added to it to kill nasties 24 hours prior.

Yeast: 
     Lactobacillus Pils x4 (Inner Health Plus) - 1 Litre starter for 24 hours. (48 hours post boil)
     House Saison Culture: TYB Saison / Brett Blend + WLP648.

Mash Schedule: Single Infusion Mash 65 Deg C
Mash out 76 Deg C

Brewing Notes: 
     2017: Brewed on the Grainfather, and boiled for 90 mins (No hops). Lacto Culture added, and all gear purged with CO2.

     2017: no pH meter, taste tested, with plenty of sourness apprent. Brought up to 85 Deg C and hops stand with simcoe/amarillo.

     1 April 2017: Transferred to secondary onto White flesh peaches. Blowout 48 hours later.

     28 May 2017: No gravity check, but tates good. Plenty of peach, nice sourness. Peaches floating on top, looking a bit darker.... time to move it out.

     18 June 2017: Transferred to Teriary onto 60g Simcoe / 60g Amarillo.

     22 June 2017: transferred to keg viz pressurised transfer. (Bag on end of siphon to separate out hops. Fined with Gelatin.     

     28 June 2017: First Taste.

Taste Notes - 

     Appearance: Beautuiful clear golden colour with a little haze not. nice dense head

     Aroma: peaches, funk and a little hop character, the peaches definitely own this beer from start to finish though. Some lacto sour aroma as noirmal - nicely soured.
     
     Flavour: fresh juicy peaches and a little bitterness from the hops. sour as anything around 3.2pH really crushable and enjoyable. hops hit theback of the throat when fresh. not much saison/funk characte to speak of.

     Mouthfeel: fresh and zesty, not thick and cloying - dry at 1.004 for not much to speak of head retention is good, so the ph lowering pre-souring has worked a treat.

     Overall: lovely. really enjoyable, wish id madethis in summertime though. peaches were right, wouldn't lowerthem, the long primary time has not hurt the funk, but it gets lost in the overall beer. i could get away with significantly shortening the primary timeframe and it'd still taste pretty good. especially with a good dose of hops at F/Out. something to do with the competing sourness, peaches and funk is to increase the dryhop (probably double what was used tbh).

sorry for the lack of picture. see you next time, and apologies for the long break between posts (a baby will do that to people).