Bourbon "Barrel" Imperial Stout

THE PLAN:

Last summer, I had the pleasure of visiting Minnesota. One of the great places I visited was the Happy Gnome, a cool little pub in St. Paul. While I was there, I asked for a glass of an imperial stout they had on the menu from Goose Island called Bourbon County Stout. When I said to the bartender "I'll try the BCS" he said "yes you will..." Holy mole, it knocked my socks off. Since then I've tried as many bourbon stouts and baltic porters that I can, and I am now taking a stab at my own creation.

Since I'm only brewing 5 or 6 gallons at a time, and actual wine or bourbon barrels are typically 59 gallons... I'm using oak spirals and will be soaking them in bourbon first, then adding to the secondary fermenter for 100 days.

The result will be a 13% monster.  Expected to be ready early summer, which isn't the greatest of times for an imperial stout... I'd rather be enjoying it in the fall or even dead of winter, but that's how it worked out, so whatever. This will be one that will be even better at this time next year!

THE RECIPE:
22# Pale Malt
4# Munich
1# Crystal 60L
1/2# Chocolate Malt
1/2# Roasted Barley
1/2# Black Patent Malt
8 oz Willamette
2 oz oak spirals
16 oz bourbon (tbd)
Yeast cake from oatmeal brown ale (wyeast 1028)

1/30? BREWDAY:
Hoping to get this brewed before the end of the month!

Patersbier

THE PLAN:

3 samples from brew day:
first runnings (left), second runnings,
and pre-boil (front)

Last summer I learned about a type of Belgian beer called Patersbier, brewed by monks, that never makes it to the public.  When I think of Trappist beers, I think of styles like tripels, dubbels, and strongs - both dark and gold.  Apparently the monks would make a "father's beer" that was like a tripel, just low in alcohol, usually around 4%, and keep it to themselves.  It sounded interesting, so I did as much digging as I could find, and put together a pretty easy recipe.  Goal is to have an easy drinking table beer, clean, clear, and still have that belgian quality to it.

RECIPE:
9# Pils (Franco-Belg)
1 oz Hallertau (60)
1/2 oz Goldings (10)
Irish Moss (10)
Wyeast 1214

1/17 BREWDAY:
Single infusion 90 minute mash w/ mashout & batch sparge.
Target temp: 148F
Target pre-boil gravity: 1.035
Target strike water: 11.25 qts @ 168 (5 degrees for cooler absorption, 15 degrees for grain absorption)
Target mashout water: 9.4 qts @ 200 (target temp = 168=170)
Target sparge water: ~2-2.5 gallons @ 168-170
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Strike: 11.25 qts @ 168, 163 after added to cooler (preheated), 147-150 after dough in, avg = 148
At this point, the mash went longer because we had left and came back, temp down to 142/143F.
Mashout: 10 qts @ 200, added to mash, overall temp now 165-168... avg 165/166.
First runnings: collected 4.25 gallons @ 13.4 (Brix)/1.054
Sparge: added 2 gallons @ 186, added to grains, overall temp now 165/166 - still short of 168/170 target.
Second runnings: collected 2 gallons @ 6.75 (Brix)/1.027
Pre-boil totals: 6 gallons @ 11(Brix)/1.044
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Boil for 60 minutes, additions are Hallertau @ 60 minutes, Goldings @ 10 minutes
------------------------------------------
Chilled to 64 degrees, pitched Activator pack of 1214
SG: 5 gallons @ 13(Brix)/1.052

More later!

NOTES:
1/17 - This is a very simple, straightforward recipe, with the yeast being the star of the show.  I'd like to brew this again... even at this early stage, and split it up and ferment with different strains of belgian yeasts.
1/17 - Eventhough the single malt grain bill was simple to put together, I put much thought into the hops.  I norrowed it down to three: goldings, hallertau, and saaz.  I definitely did not want this smelling or tasting anything like a pilsner, and I happened to have both an ounce of hallertau and a 1/2 ounce of goldings, so that's what I used!

And a review from Mr. Don Osborn

Oatmeal Brown Ale

The Plan:

When I was visiting Minneapolis in June this past summer, I snagged a can of Surly Bender and Coffee Bender to bring back to VT.  It wasn't until November that I opened the Bender at a beer tasting.  I honestly didn't even look to see what the style was.  I think I must have looked at some point, but was pleasantly surprised to find out that it was an oatmeal brown ale.  It... was... amazing.  The aroma alone was enough to make my eyes roll into my head.  Extremely tasty.  Since I don't have access to it, I am going to try to make something similar.  This my take the place of the Third Stone Brown I do each year, which is a clone of Empyrean Ales' beer.

THE RECIPE:
SG: 1.057
FG: 1.014
ABV: 5.24%
IBU: 56.3 (this is a little higher than what they say on the surly website, but I'm ok with that)
srm: 22.6
---
7# pale malt
1# aromatic
2# flaked oats - kind of high on the oats, but whatever :-\
3/4# crystal 60L
3/4# crystal 90L
1/2# chocolate
1 oz zeus 14% (60)
1 oz willamette 5.5% (5)
Wyeast 1028 London ale (going to pitch an imperial stout on this yeast cake next batch)
---
mash @ 152
90 minute boil
ferment @ 67

I've been wanting to brew this for a month now, but this is the first real time I've had to get it done.  Was trying to rock this out Friday night (12/3) or Saturday AM, but it didn't happen... and then was shooting for Sat. night/Sunday AM... but our little dude puked a few times, so my focus was diverted.  Then I started getting sick, so it's been pushed back again. 

1/7 BREWDAY: (first batch of 2011!)
Single infusion mash, batch sparge:
Estimates:
15.2 qts @ 172 --> 167 (when added to cooler) --> 152 (after dough in) for 60 minutes
Actual:
15.2 qts @ 176 added to cooler (preheated with kettle of boiling water) --> 168.5 (after 10 minutes)
After dough in --> 149-153, mostly around 152.
After an hour, temps still between 148-152, most around 150.
Added 8.7 quarts boiling water for mashout --> temp up to 172, added tray of ice, temp now at 161 :-( (should have just added a couple ice cubes, not a full tray)
First runnings - Brix 14.2, collected 4 gallons.
Added 2.5 gallons sparge water @ 175.
Second runnings - Brix 7.4
Pre-boil gravity: 10.8/1.043
Decided to do a 90 minutes boil, hop addtions at 60 and flame out.
Collected 4.75 gallons, starting gravity: 13.6/1.055

1/10 FERMENTATION CONTROL:
I had made a starter about a month ago... kept it in the fridge, decanted it, and let it warm up to room temp before pitching in this.  A day went by and nothing happened, so I decided to get an Activator pack of the same yeast and add that.  The next morning, it was bubblin away.  I'm pretty sure that the original yeast would have kicked in at some point, but I didn't really feel like waiting to see.  Initial starting fermentation temp was around 64, which is a little low.  I checked it last night (1/10) after roughly 36 hours and it was 70.  I wrapped in a towel soaked in cold water, and it brought it back down to about 66.  My target was 67.  I think the fact that it got a little hotter than I wanted will probably just give it a few more fruity esters... not a big deal.  Now we wait for it to finish fermentation, go for a week of secondary, and then this puppy will get kegged.

1/17 SECONDARY:
Decided to brew today... got the whole way to the last 15 minutes of the boil and realized I didn't have my main carboy empty.  Time to rack this thing to 2nd to make room for the patersbier.  One somewhat tricky thing I have to do is sterlize some equipment to collect the yeast from this batch.  I'm intending on using it on an imperial stout I plan to make next.

I ended up collecting about 4.5 gallons... pretty cloudy still, very dark... smells of coffee and chocolate, tastes the same with some bitter from the choc malt.  Hopefully I can clear it up a bit, but this will definitely be a good one.

As far as the yeast... I left a little beer in the bottom to swish up the yeast with.  Seems like I didn't leave quite enough... but I did manage to get about a growler's worth, maybe a little less.  I'll put this in the fridge for now and kick it in a starter a few days before the imperial stout is brewed. 

1/30 CHECK IN:
I really wanted to keg this beast this weekend, but just didn't get around to it.   I did manage to pull a sample to add to the line up of beers I had that night - Smuttynose Old Brown Dog and Wolavers Oatmeal Stout.  I was a little disappointed in what I found... more hop aroma than I would like, and more roasty/bitter notes from the dark malts.  Damn.  Hardly any oat aroma or flavor.  Double damn.  And when compared to the Wolavers, it was very close to the same color.  Triple damn.  I could live with it being darker than I projected, especially since Bender is on the dark side... but I really wanted the oat aromatics to be overwhelminly great.  

Next up... bottling/kegging