THE PLAN:The gameplan for this one was top secret for awhile... our friends Rob & Kristina were getting married in August, and had asked my good friend Dave to cater the wedding. He came to me with the idea of brewing a beer for the wedding, not for the whole wedding, but for the bride, groom, wedding party, and cooks. Additionally, I suggested we cook with the beer too. He went through his projected menu and I thought the best style for the event & menu & time of year would be a traditional french/belgian saison. I also thought it would be a great chance to try corking some 750mL belgian beer bottles too. The biggest obstacle I knew we were facing was time. That style is known for a tricky yeast that usually take 4-6 weeks to finish fermenting, and needs super high temperatures too. I also knew that we would need 2-4 weeks of conditioning time for those bottles to carbonate properly. Well, to my great pleasure, everything turned out great.
THE RECIPE:
9# Belgian Pilsner 2 Row Malt
2# Vienna Malt
1# German Wheat Malt
1# Rye Malt
1/2# Flaked Wheat
1/2# Flaked Oats
1/2# Light Brown Sugar (wasn't planned, added it on a whim)
1/2# White Sugar (whim again)
1 oz. Perle (60 minutes)
1 oz. Styrian (10 minutes)
1 oz Styrian (5 minutes)
1/4 oz fresh grated ginger
1/8 tsp paradise seeds
Wyeast 3724 - Belgian Saison (1 L starter for 12 hours on stir plate)
6/11 BREWDAY:
Planned a low & slow mash for this one... 90 minutes @ 148-150F. 90 Boil as well.
17.5 qts @ 162F --> doughed in, temp adjusted to between 146 & 150. Covered up and checked at 3 x 30minutes intervals, temp was right on the money the whole time... I love this mash tun (48 qt. igloo cooler).
Tried to mashout with 11 qts of 200F water... temp only raised to about 165F. Let go for 10 minutes, then started sparging with 1/2 gallon of 180F water... didn't raise the bed temp up at all... and it all pretty much got absorbed. Collected about 5.5 - 6 gallons, Brix @ 12/1.048... target was 1.054. Sparged another gallon, collected 1/2 gallon to get 6.5 total gallons.
Added 1/2# light brown sugar and 1/2# white sugar to raise gravity. Brix now @ 14/1.057.
Boiled for 90 minutes, with hop & spice additions.
Cooled with IWC, Brix @ 18.25/1.075, target was originally 1.065. I went back and added the sugar into the program and now it gave me SG as 1.074, so still right on the money.
Cooled to 75, pitched yeast slurry, put to bed, and cleaned up.
I'm planning on fermenting this one out for about a month, in an upper bedroom where the temps get nice and toasty - usually in the 80's during the day, and stays in the 70's at night. It's not constant, but it's the best I can do for now.
7/10 GRAVITY CHECK:
It's been a month, so I thought I'd check in to see where the gravity is. 13 Brix/1.039... damn. This really didn't get far. After some discussions on the BA Homebrew board, I decided to put this puppy out in the garage for another week of hot and steamy temps that will hopefully kick it back in enough to finish it off. I also sanitized my hands and shook the carboy for a couple minutes to get the yeast stirred up. The people on the boards said give it another 2 weeks... but I'm running out of time, so we'll see.
7/16 GRAVITY CHECK:
10.5/1.022 - Still not where I want it, but getting closer. I have to source some corks and hoods for the 750mL bottles I plan to use, so I'll let it go a little longer.
7/20 GRAVITY CHECK:
10/1.019... it might be under 10 a bit... but it's getting close now. I think the estimated FG was supposed to be around 1.016, so if it dropped 3 points in 4 days, then hopefully it will finish off by Friday (the 23rd), and if not, I really need to bottle these to have them ready in time for what their original purpose was - a wedding gift!
7/21 CORK CHECK:
I had decided that I wanted to bottle this batch in 750mL Belgian Beer bottles that would also need to be corked. With some quick research, I saw that a bag of 30 corks was about $8, wire hoods to tie down the corks were about $15 per 60, and I would need a floor corker in order to make this happen. Shit. That's about $25 extra bucks plus I'd have to find a floor corker. It was a little unreasonable to try and buy a floor corker just for this batch... they run anywhere between $75 & $150. I did some searching and was able to borrow an Italian floor corker from a guy in the Green Mountain Mashers. There was still a little finagling on how to position the corker right so that only half of the cork got inserted. Ended up just putting the metal disc to the bottom of the bolt, then adding a #6.5 holed-stopper on the end. It took about 6 tries to get the depth correct though. I also ended up driving out to Plainsfield to visit Local Potion, since they had the right type of corks and VT Homebrew did not. While I was there, I also discovered they had some used Portuguese floor corkers from a local winery that they were selling for $20. The Portuguese corkers are a little smaller than the Italian ones, and seem like they are really only for wine bottles/corks. We tested a few with no
luck, but I still got it hoping I could make it work somehow. Turns out, after about an hour of hankering, the hole that's between the cork and the bottle is sized for a wine cork. It looks like I could drill a larger hole, enabling it to work for the bigger belgian corks. But, for this batch, I'll use the larger Italian floor corker and mess with the other one later... or trade it back in towards an Italian corker they have there as well.7/23 CORKING:
Even with all the trials and tribulations with the corkers, the actual corking process went fast & smooth. I had Dave helping fill the bottles, I would put the corks in, and our friend Amy was putting the wire baskets or hoods on. We got about 19 bottles corked, they looked awesome! So now we wait.
8/6 FIRST TASTE:
The wedding is tomorrow, so I decided to bust one out and see what it was like. I had it chilling in the fridge for about 4 or 5 hours. It poured beautifully! And the taste was spot on! Doin the happy dance :-)
8/7 THE WEDDING:
I was excited to give this to the happy couple, and what a day it was. Perfect weather, amazingly beautiful scenery overlooking Lake Champlain on the historic Shelburne Farms Brickhouse. Dave decided to use the beer with the mussels, and I opened a few bottles for the bride & groom. They loved it! I stashed one away for them to open on their anniversary next year, it will be exquisite.
