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).

M36 Liberty Ale Yeast in an NEIPA

This "NEW" style is all the rage in the US, and it's starting to creep in over here in New Zealand. From Garage Projects Part & Bullshit to The New Deep Creek New England IPA, there is a range of this style emerging into the craft beer scene, so given I've made a couple of these (I haven't posted about all of them) I figured it was time to test out a new yeast.

The most common yeast in the style appear to be the Conan yeast and WY1318. Low Flocculating british style ale yeasts, with some fruit driven ester formation.  The beers tend to be Hazy (some even Murky) It seems to be a combination of low flocculation of yeast, flaked oats, hop bio-transformation and general amount of hops thrown at it from a distance.

But what about Dry Yeast? We all know S-04 is one that is used in the style, sometimes to good effect. But outside of that, people tend to use or stick with the tried and true WY1318 or Conan type yeasts. (we're talking about clean beer, rather Trois here)

Anyway - Living in New Zealand has its own set of challenges; 1 of which is the cost of and availability (at times) of liquid yeasts, specifically conan (only the local shop here gets it in, and that not a steady stock stream.) So I wondered about using one of the Mangrove Jacks Craft Series Yeasts for this, and came up with M36 Liberty Bell. formerly known as M79 burton Union, it exhibits fruit ester formation and is considered a good yeast for hoppy british beers. 
Great; but just one problem..... It tends to flocculate relatively well in British Stock Ales. but hey why the hell not, right?

So I brewed it up, and you'll see the rest below. Fun Times are back in full swing with a brand new knee.

North Canterbury IPA

Batch Size: 21 Litres

Est OG: 1.064

IBU: 45

EBC: 6

Efficiency: 70%

Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Grain:

     Pilsner: 4.8kg

     Wheat: 1kg

     Flaked Oats: 750g

     Acidulated:  200g

Hops:
     First Wort: 25g Columbus prior to GF Sparge

     05 Minutes: 30g Columbus

     Flameout: 45g Columbus
     
     Dry hop: 40g Citra / 40g Mosaic / 40g Galaxy

Yeast:

     M36 Liberty Bell (Mangrove Jacks) (3x Packs rehydrated)

Brewing Notes: 

     3 June 2017: Brewed on Grainfather. Good extraction, hit 1.063 (pretty close). Pitched yeast at 17 Deg C. Set at 18 for natural rise Overnight.

     4 June 2017: 16 hours after pitching set temp to 19 Deg C. 
    
     7 June 2017: Ramped temp to 21 deg C (Morning). Ramped 12 hours later (Evening) to 22 Deg C

     12 June 2017: Dryhopped with 40g each of Citra/Mosaic/Galaxy

     14 June 2017: (Evening) temps dropped for cold crashing

     16 June 2017: Gravity 1.014, kegged and put into fridge for force carbonation at 30PSI. (first time in awhile I haven't added gelatin to the keg.)

     18 June 2017: First Taste - Lovely beer, no off flavors, hops are a little muted with a the yeast character more prominent than I'd like.

Tasting Notes - 

     Appearance: Golden Straw - Hazy as expected. Force carbed has done a good job, with nice lacing and slightly low carbonation. but good so far. Should improve. At least its not murky, like some of these I see.

     Aroma: Fruity Hops, resin from columbus, but citra/galaxy and mosaic takes over. some yeast character too. not too sure on this. Needs more hops. Something I noticed at the CHBA meet over the weekend, (DIY Dog Brewcomp) was that massive dryhops can actually work, I always thought that that amount of hop saturation would make a beer come out grazzy, but it doesn't seem to be the case. so I probably under-did the dryhop based on what the forums are talking

     Flavour: Similar, Hops are a little underwhelming, should be packed with flavour, there is a distinct yeast character, pear ester type thing from the yeast that detracts from teh beer. It's a nice tasting beer, and I get plenty of hop flavour, it just hides a little bit of it. Bitterness is spot on, its present, but not tongue stripping. more APA bittering, which is what the style asks for.

     Mouthfeel: Nice coating beer, thick and creamy as it should be. malt flavor is there. Needs more hops.

     Overall: Very good beer, I'm impressed with this, I think if you use this yeast, you have to add more dryhops, as the yeast takes away from of the impact. I think S-04 as a dry yeast is probably more appropriate for the style, but at a push its definitely a good yeast to use.
Columbus is a good choice in the boil, gives the hop character as extra note, that I really enjoy.
Change for next time? more hops, especially if I leave the yeast strain alone. I attenuated well and fermented brilliantly. Even had a blow out at day 3.

THE YEAST: I think it can work in beers like this, but you've got to work harder to hide the yeast character. It would definitely work well, in Stouts/Porters and other English style beers. Might have to give it a crack next time I brew up my favourite Brown Ale.

Still working on a House blend Saison.....

Part of the reason I've been so quiet recently is this......
 (Insert Gross picture of knee scar here)

I had knee surgery to reconstruct the Anterior Cruciate Ligament in my left knee, leaving me crippled for a solid 2-3 months. So we know what that means don't we? No Brewing of any form of beer, and even no drinking for awhile.

so, well before this overly invasive knee surgery I bought some of the following:
     * The Yeast Bay - Saison Brett Blend
     * WLP648 - Brettanomyces Vrai

The intention being to recreated a similar culture to the WLP670 - American farmhouse yeast, that I've enjoyed previously (last batch went all banana like) so after that poor effort,  I decided to try and create some for of house blend, which may or may not change over the course of. time. I'm not entirely sure how I'l feed and keep the culture going etc. but I'm excited to find out.

Anyway, I brewed this particular beer in January of all times, with a simple 3 week primary fermentation. Followed by racking onto 3kg of Mangoes (In hindsight probably a tad too much) and aged on those until April. The harvest for this blend then went straight into a similar style beer, but with peaches and a kettle sour (Lacto Plantarum). Given my knee and everything else that was going on, this got a 6-8 week primary, before the flesh of white peaches were added (Note to Self: Cut the peaches before freezing them, and remove the stones, otherwise it gets pretty messy)

I then dry hopped this beer with Mosaic and Citra for a few days, before adding gelatin and kegging. the second beer receives Simcoe/Amarillo after the fruit explosion is done (I overfilled a little bit I think.....)

Overall, the blend has worked out really nicely, and I'm excited to make more beer with it.

MANGOMANGOMANGO!!!

Batch Size: 21 Litres

Est OG: 1.048

IBU: 20

EBC: 4

Efficiency: 70%

Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Grain:
     Pilsner: 3.2kg
     Vienna: 0.6kg
     Flaked Oats: 0.5kg
     Acidulated Malt: 0.2kg

Hops:
     Pacific Jade: 20g @ 60min
     Dry hop - 60g each of Citra / Mosaic
Yeast:
     WLP648 - Brettanomyces Brux Vrai
     The Yeast Bay - Saison / Brett Blend

2 separate Starters were made - 1: WLP648 1/2 Litre Starter 2: 1 Litre Starter Saison Brett Blend and WLP648 blended into Starter 2. (the idea was to grow up the 648 a little more, to get some extra brettanomyces in there.)
Brewing Notes:

     January 2017: Mashed in at 67 Deg C. Boiled 90 Min's total, missed target OG of 1.050. Full 1 litre starter poured in. 21 degrees C fermentation.

     January 2017: Ramped temp to 23 Deg C

     January 2017: Moved from temp controlled chamber to Spare Room (not temp controlled)

     February 2017: Racked to secondary onto 3kg of Supermarket Frozen Mango

     April 2017: Racked to Tertiary (Purged with Co2) with dry hops as above.

     April 2017: Racked to Keg and standard gelatin addition added.

Taste Notes - MANGOMANGOMANGO!!!

     Appearance: Pale straw/golden colour Carbonation is mid range (all my beers tend to sit around the same level) head retention is pretty non existent, given the mangoes used. looks good. crystal clear from the gelatin addition.

     Aroma: Early on the Mango well and truly dominated. Very green fruit over ripe mango and some hoppy notes to suit. Now its a little older the fruit has fallen away, and the hops are much more prominent. minimal malt character. Some notes from the Brett and farmhouse yeast. Impressive. the starter has done something here I think.

New Brew Club Glasses - Pretty Fancy!

     Flavour: Mangoes again, dominating the beer as per the aroma, the hops are now coming forward and its a nice easy drinker. Prickly carbonation, but not too fizzy.

     Mouth feel:  Surprisingly good. I thought the fruit and lack of speciality malts might kill the mouth feel. Like I said the head retention is non existent, but that's by-the-by. It's come out really well, easy drinking but not thin, the brettanomyces in this beer has really helped to boost the mouth feel, as well as the flaked oats to prevent it from being watery.

     Overall: Really enjoyable, reduce the mango addition. Its just wayyyyy too over the top when its fresh. The Brett is subtle, which is nice, and the farmhouse elements are all there. If I can hit my Target OG's I think its a winner. reduce the fruit, balance it out a bit more with the dry hops, but I'm glad I didn't waste any money on whirlpool/flame out hops.

This house yeast has already been racked off about 3-4 weeks ago (I need to get it running ASAP) from adding my white flesh peaches to the lacto soured version of the same beer. This is Simcoe/Amarillo, the peaches are probably way too much as well, but hey - live and learn right???? I'm hoping to get this kegged up in a few weeks, after dry hopping and gelatin.

**UPDATE**Farmhouse Imperial Stout

Quick update on this one.........

I entered this into a Homebrew Competition, just for some more feedback. then a funny thing happened.......................................

It WON overall Champion Beer, scoring a staggering 45/50, I'm just blown away by this, and because of that, I get a 200 Litre batch of this brewed commercially (hahahahaha, that poor commercial brewer trying to replicate a beer that essentially take 3-4 month to brew...PLUS the additional ageing time.) but I shouldn't laugh, not really.....

Part ofthe reason I'm writing an update, is because Mike Tonsmiere of the Mad Fermentationist recently visited NZ forthe Homebrew conference in Nelson ( I wasn't able to go, because of my knee) He recently tried the beer after he got back to the US, and had this to say (This is straight from his e mail)

"Really enjoyed how it turned out, avoided the biggest issue I have with Belgian stouts being too dry to support heavy roasted flavors despite the low FG (likely thanks to the cold steeped and dehusked dark malts). Brett was pretty subtle. Maybe some dark (Special B-type) crystal malt to up the dark fruit flavor? Otherwise delicious as is!"

I feel quite chuffed that he enjoyed it, as a guy who brews alot of funky interesting beers, with different flavour combinations, its good to see he enjoyed it.

But now thats over, I thought I'd post an update based on my own tastes..... Its been around for a good solid year now, and is really coming into its own. I'll be sure to put more updates on this beer as it progresses along. (A celebratory beer for the birth of my first baby)

FEAR OF THE DARK
Farmhouse Imperial Stout

Nothing like a beer like this, when you doing study...

1.081 - 1.010
Brew Date: 03 February 2016
Tasting Date:  27 May 2017

     Appearance: Jet Black and Mocha head, that is really starting to stick around. carbonation on point.

     Aroma: Subtle Brett, and some phenolics from the farmhouse yeast. dark malts chcoloate, dusty cocoa and so on. Not heavily roasty due to mostly cold steeped dark malts (included the Baking soda additions to help smooth the cold steeped area out.

     Flavour: Much the same, carbonation is perfect, I love the marriage of dusty cocoa and subtle brett. not over powering. 

     Mouthfeel: Despite the low FG, it still tastes nice and thick, nice coating on the mouth,

     Overall: I see where Mike is coming from with the Special B addition. A Little bit of dark fruit flavour could just enhance this enough. Definitely one to savour in the colder months coming (Plus a good celebratory beer for when the little one arrives). I do find it difficult to drink more than one, mostly because of the interesting flavour combinations, so hopefully that little Special B addition will do wonders.

Brown Porter with Brettanomyces...

Historical Beer.....Yep....It's a thing (apparently)

If anyone hasn't seen the blog, check out shutupaboutbarclayperkins. Your source/guide to everything historical and special about beer/brewing.
So, why tackle something a little more historical? REASON: I had a vial of WLP645 (Brettanomyces Clausenaii) to use up and a Brown Ale/Porter to get going for the most recent NHC.

Historically, Porter was a very popular style of beer. It has been said that these beers, tended to have some form of bacteria in them. In the traditional english stlye stock ales, they suggest that Brettanomyces was present. Wild yeast like that was most likely present, as they didn't have the stringent sleaning and sanitation methods of today.

With my ongoing obsession for brewing some sort of porter every year for NHC (November), in an effort to get a medal winning beer in a darker ale category (I really should rethink this hopeless effort *Sigh*). In the past 3-4 years I've had pretty dire results in the category, and to be honest, the base beer was no different, although scoring higher than the previous effort of 9/50 (don't ask). This year was no different, although I changed tact a bit, and going Brown Porter, rather than Robust Porter, and heading in a much more traditional direction than previously. and blow me down if I didnt get an average score of 19/50 (I'm happy based solely on the fact its double digits).

Homebrewing though, is about experimentation and so with a vial of Brettanomyces in hand, I went to work.....

Half and Half, Plain base and Brettanomyces aged (No Oak). with a twist of some Tart Cherries when racking onto the brett for extended aging. I hit 4 months before kegging it and giving inital tastes (I seemd to get a bit of almond and some cherry pie funk, and actual cherry taste. Its hard to decide how good this beer really is, because the base beer turned out so poorly (it was good enough in general, but maybe a bit too toasty) but now there'ssome age to it, because of my general lack of actually brewing beer (and drinking itfor that matter) its starting to take some real shape.

THE FATHERS OF LIBERTY

Batch Size: 21 Litres

Est OG: 1.052

IBU: 30

EBC:

Efficiency: 74%

Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Grain:

     4.2kg Maris Otter

     0.5kg Gladfields Brown Malt
     0.1kg Dark Crystal (90)
     0.25kg Dark Chocolate (Gladfields)

Hops:
     45g East Kent Goldings @ 60min
     25g East Kent Goldings @ 10min

Yeast:
     WY1469 (2.5Lt Starter)

Brewing Notes:
     28 August 2016 - Mashed with 17 Litres. Mash Temp 67 Deg C. Added 1/2 tsp Baking soda, and 1/4 tsp CaCl. OG 1.050 (2 shy of target) Pitched yeast at 15 Deg C Temp set to 18.8 DegC

     31 August 2016 - Temp Raised to 21 Degrees. for remaining fermentation.

       11 September 2016 - Half Racked onto Vial of WLP645 & 1 kg of Frozen Tart Cherries.
Remaining half, bottled with enough Priming sugar to 2.1 volumes CO2

     11 February 2017 - FG on Brett section 1.004. Racked to Bottling bucket primed to 2.1 volumes also, using XXg Priming Sugar.

     21 April 2017 - Side by Side Tasting (The base beer is pretty old at this stage)

Clean Version - 
     Appearance: Dark Brown Appearance - a little too light to be a porter, nice clear appearance through the glass. carbonation is getting high now its a little older, so it kept a good head on it
     Aroma:  Musty Brown malts, chocolate, and british yeast esters (gotta lovethe WY1469 yeast) relatively non-descript
     Flavour: Same as the aroma, but with some astringency in it. It turned out a little thin for what i was looking for. the carbonation being a little higher takes away from the beer
     Mouthfeel: Thin, but ok, considering, not going to win any awards. Again, carbonation takes away from it.
     Overall: Needs to be thicker, higher mash temp and  more specialty malts should help.

Brett Version -
     Appearance: similar appearance as the other (as you can see), although the head as a slight pink tinge to it, from the cherries. carbonation is lower, and more pleasant
     Aroma: Tart cherries lead the way, with a little almond note as well. still plenty of chocolate and coffee to keep thing in perspective
     Flavour: Cherries again, not in your face, but there, the beer seems to be somewhat balance between malt and frit, which is nice, but still some of that astringency pokes through. The almond note is there again.
     Mouthfeel: Surprisingly thicker than that tandard version. Cherries lead again, so its still thinner than I'd like but its nice.
     Overall: Same as the base beer, but some additional cherries would be nice, to eliminate that almond note (maybe?) and thicken it up a bit.

The recipe is still not as good as my normal English Brown ale, so I think next time, I';d go with that recipe and adjust from there.
Definitely worth a go on a full size batch, but providing I get the base beer right in the first place of course....

Hoppy Brett Saison (Simcoe/Amarillo - Dryhopped with Galaxy)

After the last version Nelson Sauvin. I threw this yeast straight into another beer similar, trying to play with different hops in the dryhop. 

So to continue the theme, I opted to bew with Simcoe & Amarillo.... Until I ended up with 100g of Galaxy waiting to be used, and a Pale Ale that just needed S/A as part of it. (Call it the classic American Pale ale if you will - Centennial, Simcoe, Amarillo, Cascade, Citra)

So with my supply of those hops depleted , I figured why the hell not? so, in they went. all 100grams.....

Ther beer is slightly larger than the previous versions, to ramp the alcohol up to around 7%ABV, I also wanted to get rid of the Rye in the beer, so swapped with Oats. Same time-frame for fermentation/ageing - because its what's been done previously.

so, this beer turned out very very similar ot the previous one, with a little extra oomph to it. I've realized recently, that the yeast used, has an under-pitching issue, caused by the original Nelson beer. 
HOW DO I KNOW THIS?: Well I got critically panned on the beer when entered into the NHC recently, and once I saw the notes, I picked it out straight away..... Banana (more Specifically Banana lollies)

This has caused me to re-evaluate my yeast pitching rates and yeast selections, for this beer. So I will be going back to a similar recipe as the last one (1.052) and getting the yeast in good shape prior to fermentation. I will also be playing with racking off the yeast after the first month, so I can get the culture and use it again on something a little more special....hopefully.

What yeast will I be using? I've changed tack a little bit, and so ,after discussion on the fantastic Milk the Funk Facebook page. I'll be adding a pitch of WLP648 (Brettanomyces Bruxellensis Vrai). My local shop is also re-stocking the Yeast bay as well, so Saison/Brett blend will be used in place of WLP670 - only because I'm not sure how long they will continue to stock the yeasts.

But, I'm rambling, so heres the Galaxy/Simcoe/Amarillo Recipe:

GAS Saison

Batch Size: 21 Litres

OG: 1.056

FG: 1.004

Brewhouse Efficiency: 74%

IBU: 22

EBC: 7.6

Boil Time: 90 Min

GRAINS:

     Pilsner

     Wheat

     Flaked Oats

HOPS:

     FWH: 14g Chinook

     00min: 40g Amarillo

     00min: 40g Simcoe

     Dryhop: 100g Galaxy

Yeast: WLP670 Repitch

Mash: 67 DegC

Sparge 76Deg C

Brewing Notes:

M84 - Bohemian Lager Yeast

Well, my first pilsner (circa 2 years ago) was a bomb.
Full of Diacetyl, hazy and I struggled to drink it. but it got drunk at my birthday, and funnily enough was the first keg to kick.....

Anyway, with a long weekend coming up, and some time away organised, I figured it would be a good time, to brew another pilsner.
A Nice simple recipe, as I've been trying to simplify my recipes a bit more recently.
A Base of Pilsner and no specialties. NZ Hops at F/O and dryhop.

I figured it might be time to review another MJ yeast. M84 Bohemian Lager.
3 Packs in 1.050 wort. rehydrated and added.

the idea was to brew something Pivo pils like (READ: Firestone Walker), but without access to hops like spalt or Saphir in this copuntry, I made the decision to turn it into something more "Kiwi"

so, here it is:

EMPTY SHELL PILSNER

Batch Size: 21 Litres

Estimated OG: 1.052

IBU: 35

EBC: 6.4EBC

Efficiency: 74%

Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Grain:
     3.2kg Pilsner
     0.2kg Acidulated

     

Hops:

     60min - 17g Pacific Jade

     00min - 30g Wakatu

     00min - 25g Wai-iti

Dryhop:  30g Each of Wakatu / Wai-iti

Yeast: 
     M84 Bohemian Lager (3 Packs R-hydrated in 200ml Water)

Mash Schedule: Single Infusion Mash 66 Deg C
Mash out 76 Deg C

Brewing Notes: 

29 October 2016: Brewed aiming for 1.052, 22 litres of wort at 1.050 got. 10 min hop steep at flameout.

4 November 2016: FG Reading 1.038 - ramped temp as per brulosophy fast lager method.

Temp raised by Deg C every 12 hours until 20 degrees is reached.

8 November 2016: 20 degrees reached, and held for 7 Days - Dryhopped 3 days prior to cold crash.

15 November 2016: set for lagering/cold crash for 2 days

17 November 2016: Kegged with gelatin, and force carbonated

Left for 2 weeks in keg prior to tasting (Giving it a bit more time to "Lager")

Notes - 

     Appearance: Crystal clear - typical Pilsner coliurs. not alot of head to speak of.

     Aroma: Crisp pilsner malts, and plenty of flowery tropical hop character. I think I also get a touch of apples (which is a shame, as its a nice easy drinker)

     Flavor: The hop flavor dominates here, with a nice crispness to the boy, sweeter than I expected, but nice. A Little green apple again.

     Mouthfeel: sweetness keeps this from being dry, but nice body. head retention is an issue.

     Overall: its nice, I think this particular lager yeast (dry) is not  overly suited to the faster lagering mathods detailed in Brulosophy, the beer was 1.050 and went to 1.011 i pitched 3 packs to be safe on pitching rates, and to gt enough cells for clean fermentation.

YEAST INFO:
This yeast is slow and took forever to take off. at 5 days, the FG had dropped from 1.050 to 1.038, i ramped the temp at day 8 (FG 1.026) and ramp 3 degrees every 12 hours to get to 20 deg C. This was left for 10 days to clean itself up, then kegged/gelatined/carbonated.

Next Lager will be a Baltic Porter, for a special occasion. mostlikely brewed early in the new year.