Altbier Frühlingstraum (Düsseldorf Altbier)

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JLem

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jan 27, 2009
Messages
3,643
Reaction score
191
Location
Attleboro
Recipe Type
All Grain
Yeast
WLP036
Batch Size (Gallons)
5
Original Gravity
1.047
Final Gravity
1.012
Boiling Time (Minutes)
75
IBU
40ish
Color
10ish SRM
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp)
14 days @ 58°F
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp)
14 days @ 45°F
Tasting Notes
Solid bitterness. Good malt flavors. Very \\"German\\".
This is my 3rd recipe for a Düsseldorf Altbier, a style I was turned onto by a friend whose wife hails from Düsseldorf. Since there aren't many altbiers imported to the US and since, according to my friend and his wife, there aren't really any good American-made versions of the style, I've taken it upon myself to see if I can make something that will satisfy them. The first version, while a fine beer, turned out too dark with a touch of roast character that was out of style. I used less dark malt (chocolate wheat) in the second iteration, which turned out lighter, with less roast, and again was a fine beer. But I used a lot of low-alpha Tettnang for bittering and perhaps too much Hallertauer in the middle of the boil. The result was that I felt like it had too much hop flavor, detracting from the style once gain (not to mention that I strayed from using the traditional altbier hop, Spaltz).

So, I tweaked the recipe once again this time around. I cut back the chocolate wheat even more, used some high-alpha Magnum for bittering, and returned to using Spaltz hop for flavor. I also did a single decoction mash - essentially followin Kai Troester's process for his altbier, mashing in at 150°F and pulling a thin decoction after 45 minutes. I boiled the decoction for about 10 minutes before adding it back to the MLT to hit mash-out @ 168°F. I skipped the protein rest, but I think I would add that step next time to help with the head formation/retention.

This recipe turned out truly excellent. It received high marks from my friend and his Düsseldorfer wife.

(apologies for the strange values - I've scaled this recipe up from a smaller batch size) - for convenience you could probably just increase all the base malts up to 3 lbs each

Grist
2 lbs 14 oz Pilsner malt
2 lbs 14 oz Pale ale malt
2 lbs 14 oz Munich I
3 oz acid malt (for proper mash pH given my water)
1.5 oz Chocolate Wheat

Hops
9 g Magnum - 60 min
20 g Spalter - 60 min
14 g Spalter - 15 min

Mash
Saccharification - 150°F (45 min)
Single Decoction (boiled for 10 min) to mashout @ 165°F

2012alt_tasting.jpg
 
In order to make an extract with grains recipe for 5 gallons of altbier I'd hazard an estimate of the following ingredients:

% Quantity Malt Boil Color PPG Points
37% 2.50 lbs Briess Pilsen Liquid Malt Extract 60 min 2°L 36.0 18.00
47% 3.15 lbs Briess Munich Liquid Malt extract 60 min 9°L 37.0 23.31
11% 12.0 oz. 2-row malt 60 min 2°L 36.0 4.05
3% 3.00 oz Weyermann Acidulated Malt 60 min 2°L 27.0 0.76
2% 2.00 oz Chocolate Wheat Malt 60 min 400°L 33.0 0.62

Hops
0.7 oz. Spalt Pellet 60 min 2.6%
0.32 oz. Magnum Pellet 60 min 14.0%
0.50 oz. Spalt Pellet 15 min 2.6%

Steep grains for 45 minutes at 150 degrees F in 1.4 quarts of 164 degree F water and mash out for 10 minutes at 168 degrees F by adding 0.7 quarts of 210 degree F water.

Now the issues with this is that with the low volume of the steep you're prevented from doing a decoction altogether and with the stated quantity and boil time of hops I don't get a 40 IBU estimate but rather a total IBU of 18.7 which is off style for a Dusseldorf Alt. To achieve the stated 40 IBU for the recipe I'd say the more correct hop quantities would be:

Hops
1.50 oz. Spalt Pellet 60 min 2.6%
0.70 oz. Magnum Pellet 60 min 14.0%
1.00 oz. Spalt Pellet 15 min 2.6%

The above hop schedule would yield a 40.3 IBU result.

A 10 SRM is a shade pale of the alt style also. The BJCP color of an alt ranges from 11 -17 SRM. To get to a 12.5 SRM color, you'd use a total of 3 oz. of Chocolate Wheat Malt. This would still not alter the O.G or F.G. of the altbier.

With the 0.65 lbs. of excess pilsener extract from an initial purchased 3.15 lbs. quantity, you could make a quart yeast starter for the WLP036 yeast 24-36 hours before the brew. This would be the minimum size yeast starter I'd suggest for this recipe and would result in an active ferment within 4-12 hours from pitching. I think an extract recipe like that could get you spot on to a fair representation of the intended Fruhlingstraum Altbier. This would give you a truly pleasurable spring dream of an alt to enjoy. Prost!
 
Maybe a bit simpler than above, I'd give the following a try (note: this may not recreate my all grain recipe, but it will give you something close)

Extract:
4.5 lbs Munich LME (most Munich liquid extract is actually 50% Munich, 50% Pilsner)
2.25 lbs Light or Pilsner LME (or 2 lbs Light DME)
(you could also probably just go with 6-7 lbs of Munich LME for added simplicity)

Steeping grains:
2 oz Chocolate Wheat (or other chocolate malt...just avoid anything overly roasty)
(you don't need the acid malt if you are not mashing)

Hops
I'd stick with the original schedule, except to adjust the 60 minute Magnum addition to account for lower hop utilization if you are doing a partial boil. I wouldn't change the 15 minute addition since a lowered hop utilization really only impacts IBUs and not the aroma/flavor compounds. Increasing late hops will give you too much aroma and flavor.

I think this is a good start, but you may need to crunch some numbers or play around with some recipe software/calculators to see how it looks.
 
fuznutz04 said:
Are you familiar with brew in a bag? Do you have any suggestions for mash schedule for brew in a bag?

I have never done BIAB, but I understand the concept. A simple infusion to hit 150-152F would work for this. If you wanted to get fancy you could do a two step mash. First infusion for a protein rest at 131-133F for 10 minutes and then add enough boiling water to get you to 150-152F. There are some good online step mash calculators to help figure out volumes and temps.
 
mdtwnj said:
Awesome! Thanks for all the input. This is now on my calendar.

I'd love to hear how the extract version turns out. Keep us posted.
 
Is the relatively low fermentation temp critical to the outcome of the Altbier? I might be able to bring my chamber temp to the low 60's but not 45? What is the pH of your water? Also, if using a pH stabilizer, would the Acid malt be needed? For the decoction step, do you take the first runnings 45 minutes into the mash? What yeast was used?
 
Is the relatively low fermentation temp critical to the outcome of the Altbier? I might be able to bring my chamber temp to the low 60's but not 45? What is the pH of your water? Also, if using a pH stabilizer, would the Acid malt be needed? For the decoction step, do you take the first runnings 45 minutes into the mash? What yeast was used?

Yes, a low fermentation temp is critical to this style. Alts are ales fermented on the cool side - not quite lager temps, but lower than most ales. So, getting it down to 60 is important. Once primary fermentation is done, alts are usually cold conditioned - almost lagered - to help smooth them out and clear them up. However, this cold conditioning is not completely necessary, so if you cannot go lower than 60, don't worry too much about it. However, in that case, I would leave it in primary a little longer.

You should think of altbier (and kolsch) as occupying the style-space between true lagers and ales.
 
Is the relatively low fermentation temp critical to the outcome? I might be able to bring my chamber temp to the low 60's but not 45? What is the pH of your water? Also, if using a pH stabilizer, would the Acid malt be needed?
 
RRBrewer said:
Is the relatively low fermentation temp critical to the outcome? I might be able to bring my chamber temp to the low 60's but not 45? What is the pH of your water? Also, if using a pH stabilizer, would the Acid malt be needed?

I don't know the pH of my water...what matters is the pH of the mash. I've never used pH stabilizer, but if it helps you get the proper mash pH then use it instead of the acid malt. The acid malt works for my setup.
 
I've been looking at your recipe & bamarooster's for a way to do this beer PB/PM BIAB style. I'd replace some of the malt with 3lb of plain extract. But it's a lil tougher with yours,due to the smaller amounts of different grains.
 
unionrdr said:
I've been looking at your recipe & bamarooster's for a way to do this beer PB/PM BIAB style. I'd replace some of the malt with 3lb of plain extract. But it's a lil tougher with yours,due to the smaller amounts of different grains.

You could just sub out the pale malt for the extract, but keep the pilsner, Munich, and chocolate wheat. How much grain can you mash?
 
Your recipe was my first all grain brewing experience and had a question about the fermentation temperature and visible signs of fermentation. We pitched the yeast around 75 degrees and took it down to 60-65 degrees were it had visible signs of fermentation but have since halted.

Should there be a good amount of activity in the fermentation lock as well as inside the carboy?
 
That is one delicious looking beer! (and that statement comes from a German whose best friend lives in Düsseldorf). Great name too!

Thanks! I'm really happy with this beer. Unfortunately, this year's version got an infection - I was stupid and used the same fermenter I used for a Brett-based beer earlier. Can't wait to try it again this winter. :mug:
 
Your recipe was my first all grain brewing experience and had a question about the fermentation temperature and visible signs of fermentation. We pitched the yeast around 75 degrees and took it down to 60-65 degrees were it had visible signs of fermentation but have since halted.

Should there be a good amount of activity in the fermentation lock as well as inside the carboy?

Sorry strayer - I failed to see your question here. I imagine, by now, you have figured it out, but I'll add my two cents anyway.

Active fermentation may only last 3-5 days. The warmer the temps, the faster the fermentation - so, if your beer was up at 75°F for any length of time, you may have sped things up considerably. That said, the airlock activity isn't really a great measure of your fermentation - all it does is tell you that gas is being released from the beer. An active airlock is usually a good indicator that fermentation is going, but an inactive airlock doesn't mean it is not fermenting. The only way to really know is to check the gravity.

Any updates?
 
well the first all grain experience went very poorly and hopefully wont discourage us. The OG was a little low to begin with only around 1.036 but i am going to attribute that to how we sparged and the quickness of it. we wanted to fly sparge and it ended up being more like a batch sparge while we were draining it too quickly leading to less sugars/enzymes than we wanted. It is a little low on the alcohol level but i will turn out to be okay in the long run.

We let it sit for a little longer in the primary and will switch it to the secondary this week. or after the fermentation is done. I plan on trying it again so hopefully it will be better next time
 
strayer24 said:
well the first all grain experience went very poorly and hopefully wont discourage us. The OG was a little low to begin with only around 1.036 but i am going to attribute that to how we sparged and the quickness of it. we wanted to fly sparge and it ended up being more like a batch sparge while we were draining it too quickly leading to less sugars/enzymes than we wanted. It is a little low on the alcohol level but i will turn out to be okay in the long run.

We let it sit for a little longer in the primary and will switch it to the secondary this week. or after the fermentation is done. I plan on trying it again so hopefully it will be better next time

Hopefully it will all work out in the end. You definitely want to slow down if you're fly sparging. However, if you are batch sparging you should be able to get away with a faster lautering rate. I batch sparge and happily get 70-75% efficiency.
 
Since my next beer is going to be my first beer with a fermentation fridge, I was thinking of making a derivation of this (extract based). I love the simplicity and the fact that I can get in the ballpark with extracts that my LHBS carries:

3.3lbs Briess Munich LME (50% Munich, 50% "Base Malt")
3lbs Briess Pilsen DME (Pilsen+Carapils (probably something like 95% Pilsen/5% Carapils).

I was also thinking about trying this as my first partial mash, with maybe 4 or 5 pounds of Munich LME and doing a partial mash with Pilsner/etc.

I'm sure that's close enough, but it got me thinking:

1) With the reduced Munich, I was thinking of adjusting the hops a bit and making this a "Northern German" style alt.

My adjustments would be to shoot for ~30IBU, and maybe go with just a single hop addition at 60 minutes (Magnum or Warrior) and drop the late hop addition.

2) I'm assuming you avoided adding any crystal/caramel malts to keep the beer as crisp and malty as possible. The reason I'm asking is that with the reduced Munich, I'm struggling to get the color up without going over ~2oz of Chocolate Wheat.

Rather than adding more Chocolate Wheat, I was thinking of adding a small amount of a darker caramel malt, maybe something like 4-6oz of Caraaroma (130L) to get the color up a bit while staying pretty malty.

I know I'm bordering on "this isn't even the same recipe" territory here, but I'd love to hear your thoughts here. Thanks in advance!
 
Since my next beer is going to be my first beer with a fermentation fridge, I was thinking of making a derivation of this (extract based). I love the simplicity and the fact that I can get in the ballpark with extracts that my LHBS carries:

3.3lbs Briess Munich LME (50% Munich, 50% "Base Malt")
3lbs Briess Pilsen DME (Pilsen+Carapils (probably something like 95% Pilsen/5% Carapils).

I was also thinking about trying this as my first partial mash, with maybe 4 or 5 pounds of Munich LME and doing a partial mash with Pilsner/etc.

I'm sure that's close enough, but it got me thinking:

1) With the reduced Munich, I was thinking of adjusting the hops a bit and making this a "Northern German" style alt.

My adjustments would be to shoot for ~30IBU, and maybe go with just a single hop addition at 60 minutes (Magnum or Warrior) and drop the late hop addition.

2) I'm assuming you avoided adding any crystal/caramel malts to keep the beer as crisp and malty as possible. The reason I'm asking is that with the reduced Munich, I'm struggling to get the color up without going over ~2oz of Chocolate Wheat.

Rather than adding more Chocolate Wheat, I was thinking of adding a small amount of a darker caramel malt, maybe something like 4-6oz of Caraaroma (130L) to get the color up a bit while staying pretty malty.

I know I'm bordering on "this isn't even the same recipe" territory here, but I'd love to hear your thoughts here. Thanks in advance!

Sorry for the delayed response...

I think your ideas sound fine. No worries about it not "being the same recipe" - I have often started with someone else's recipe and then tweaked it to make it "my own". I think 99% of homebrewers do that.

I have no experience with the Northern German style, but from what I've read of the style, you have a good plan. As you deduced, I kept caramel malts out of the original recipe to avoid the heaviness that they can bring. I wanted to keep this crisp. That said, Kai Troester, someone I would trust implicitly with anything to do with German brewing, has a recipe on his website for an altbier that includes 10% Caramunich. I will probably try his recipe this Spring.

http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=Kaiser_Alt

I think you are correct to limit the amount of chocolate wheat (or other roasted malt)...it can come out too roasty...which will still taste good, but just not quite to style.

Good luck with the brew. Let me know what you decide(d) to do and how it turns out!
 
Thanks for taking the time to reply. I've since gotten the equipment for a partial mash so I'll likely be doing that. I still have a week or two before I brew, so I'm still throwing around recipe ideas. I'll probably either start with 3lbs Pilsen DME or 3.3lbs Munich LME (50/50 Munich)+ 1lb of Pilsen or Amber DME and go from there.

I have considered doing a version of Kai's recipe for sure; I like the idea of keeping it simple the first time. It's not really possible to do a 100% munich base with a partial mash, but I could get in the ballpark for sure.

I hear you on trying to keep it crisp. I had a brown ale recently that had a pretty strong Caramunich component and I can't say I was much of a fan of the taste it brought. It was one tasting and I don't know much about the rest of the recipe, but since then I've been leaning towards keeping the Caramunich low or excluding it altogether.

But, I have little experience with Alts so any tweaks I make are mostly based on things people have said on the Internet and my own gut instinct :). That's part of the fun of brewing for sure, but I'd like to try and stick relatively close to a proven recipe the first time around.

Thanks again for the reply.
 
Thanks for taking the time to reply. I've since gotten the equipment for a partial mash so I'll likely be doing that. I still have a week or two before I brew, so I'm still throwing around recipe ideas. I'll probably either start with 3lbs Pilsen DME or 3.3lbs Munich LME (50/50 Munich)+ 1lb of Pilsen or Amber DME and go from there.

I have considered doing a version of Kai's recipe for sure; I like the idea of keeping it simple the first time. It's not really possible to do a 100% munich base with a partial mash, but I could get in the ballpark for sure.

I hear you on trying to keep it crisp. I had a brown ale recently that had a pretty strong Caramunich component and I can't say I was much of a fan of the taste it brought. It was one tasting and I don't know much about the rest of the recipe, but since then I've been leaning towards keeping the Caramunich low or excluding it altogether.

But, I have little experience with Alts so any tweaks I make are mostly based on things people have said on the Internet and my own gut instinct :). That's part of the fun of brewing for sure, but I'd like to try and stick relatively close to a proven recipe the first time around.

Thanks again for the reply.

Good luck with the brew. Sounds like you have thought things out. Whatever you decide to go with I'm sure it will turn out great. :mug:
 
At the risk of derailing the original recipe thread, here's an update:

Here's what I ended up brewing. I ended up kind of going middle of the road on it:

partial mash, 4.8 gallon batch into the fermenter:

3lbs Briess Pilsen DME (Late addition)

Mash (@153):

3lbs Best Malz Munich (~6.5L)
8oz Dingemans Caramunich (~45L)
6oz Weyermann Melanoidin (~23.5L)
2oz Briess Midnight Wheat (550L)

.5oz Warrior hops @ 60 min (16%AA)

IBU: ~32
SRM: ~14.6
OG 1.047

US-05 Slurry pitched and fermented @~60 degrees for 14 days. I cold conditioned for about 2.5 weeks in my new fridge, ~40deg F

FG: 1.012

Bottled it 10 days ago and popped one open today:

COEVWwa.jpg


Really happy with how this turned out, it was pretty much exactly what I expected given that I've never had a true alt. It's definitely balanced bitter but with a lot of maltiness. I definitely see how people can go either way on these beers (all munich/lots of caramunich, vs lots of pilsner, little or no caramel malts).

It'll be interesting to see if the flavor changes in the next few weeks, but my first impressions are that next time I brew it i'll lean in the "thinner" direction. Getting it up to a full 5.5gal batch with a little more DME would probably strike a nice balance, maybe mash it lower and try to get the FG a little lower, etc.

Anyway, thanks again for the help earlier, figured you'd like to know how this turned out :)
 
Presumably for more malt character.

I did a pretty similar brew recently and used:

35% 2-row pale
20% Munich
20% Vienna
17% Pilsner
4% Caramunich
2% Crystal 150L (Bairds)
2% Pale Chocolate

w/ Hallertau Mittelfruh and Loral hops to ~38 IBU.

That's a more complicated grain bill than most true examples would use. I also used Voss kveik, which is obviously untraditional, but it came out tasting quite close to the alts I had in Germany. There are lots of ways to skin this particular cat.
 
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