Making Celebrator!

Yeah I said it! I want to make Celebrator!

I had this beer just this last weekend, and I have to say I love this beer. It covered the high's and the lows. It's got a fruit hint flavor, with some caramel, malt, toffey, coffee, smidgen of nut maybe?, and a non-overpowering hope flavor which compliments the malt.


I did a search and found this thread https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f38/ayinger-celebrator-58060/index2.html. It's the only one with celebrator in it's title.

Some descriptions of this beer by others:

Rich dark and Munich malt with mild toasty and caramel notes and even milder dark chocolate.

Prune flavors moderate, with bitter chocolate evident later.

Bitterness is present, but only balancing the malt through most of the flavor. However, the bitterness does dominate the finish, which is fairly dry and clean.

Another Description of this beer:
“Almost black with a very slight red tone, a sensational, festive foam and truly extraordinary fragrance that at first summons up visions of greaves lard. The first taste is of mild fullness with an accompanying coffee tone, which becomes more dominant with the aftertaste. There is very little of the sweetness that is frequently to be tasted with doppelbock beer.”

I have some ideas of what to put in this recipe, but all thoughts to make this work are welcomed!

I'll have to post a reply this this with what I think it needs. Blah I have to boot from windows Xp to load the recipe I think is close to it, and post it up in a reply. =)

Doppelbocks are awesome. I also like the tradition of naming doppelbocks with latinate names, all ending in -ator. (I just brewed this year's doppelbock about a month ago; called it "Ululator" --howler).

A good db should have all the flavor characteristics you cite. Build up a malt base with pilsner malt and Munich. I add some CaraMunich III, CaraRed, pale chocolate malt, and a little bit of Carapils. You can "dry out" the sweetness without losing the malty backbone by increasing your portion of CaraMunich III, or the like, or go with chocolate malt instead of pale chocolate. But it is still a bock-family beer: it should have some sweetness to it and not be just a "lager stout."

Typical hops for bock-style are in order. This style is all about showcasing the malt, so I like to keep the bitterness on the low end for the style, i.e. <20 IBUs.

Brew it soon if you want to have it ready for holiday parties!

Well, this is what I was thinking. I put this into my notes in word procesor:

"ME30B 4 LB Dark Malt Extract Bag

GR562 Crystal 120L


GR591 Caramunich


GR593 Special B


GR420 Victory



GR435 Honey Malt



GR452 Malt - CaraRed



Hbkg2 Kent (British) Goldings Pellets (2 oz)



Find chocolate malt!"


These are what I originally suspected for the ingredient. I looked online and put this together in word processor. I just copied and pasted from my notes lol.


As mentioned in other threads, Prunes? Prunes possibly give this beer its flavor?

As well you said, a pilsner extract?

I figured the darkness would come from a dark extract. I am not too familiar with making bocks.

Is it uncommon to do 50/50 of a dark extract with some sort of pilsner extract? Or would that botch it all up? I thin kit might work.


It could maybe do without the honey? Or maybe less honey...

and add some prunes, coffee, and pilsner extract?

I think some munich is used for this as well

I'm no bock expert, but I can tell you that the prunes, honey and coffee taste come from the malt, not the actual ingredients.

I'm not sure how to do an extract bock- maybe we have one in the database? The other poster was talking about pilsner malt, not extract. Carafa III is a very dark malt, so you'd get color from the darker malts.

Yeah, I was talking about an AG recipe. (I'll post my Ululator db below.--maybe someone can convert it to extract.)

As Yooper said: do not add anything other than malt to this. No prunes, no honey, no coffee. The flavors need to come form the combination of carefully chosen malts.

You need a pilsner malt base with some Munich to give it some backbone.

The prune/plumb/coffee/chocolate flavors come from the added malts: CaraMunich III, CaraRed, pale chocolate malt. The sweetness will come from the pale chocolate malt (you'd be surprised) and the CaraRed, as well as the Munich. The coffee flavors will come form the combination of CaraMunich III and pale chocolate malt.

DO NOT add Special B or Victory. Victory will bulk up the malt base but make it bready, not malty-sweet, which is what a bock needs. Special B will impart a lot of the flavors you are looking for, but in a way and proportion that will not complement the rest of the recipe. And it's easy to overdo Special B and get a strong raisin-y flavor. (I made last year's doppelbock with Special B--ask me how I know about the raisin-y flavor ) I tried to get the typical bock flavor in that recipe from Crystal 60 and Special B. It was sweet and fruity, alright! But nothing like a well-balanced doppelbock.

And hops: use hops more appropriate for lagers/bocks.

Bock family beers are fairly traditional. It works.

Here's my AG Ululator Doppelbock, just so you can see the ingredients. Hope it helps. (I started with a basic doppelbock recipe I found online, and tweaked from there.)

10 lb Pilsner malt
3 lb Munich malt
2 lb CaraMunich III (57 SRM; if you use Carafa, adjust!)
1.5 lb CaraRed (to give you some sweetness and the classic bock hue)
12 oz UK pale chocolate malt (200 SRM)
8 oz Carapils

5.5 AAU Perle @ 60 mins.
3.5-4 AAU Hallertauer Hersbrucker @ 10 mins.

WLP883 German Bock Lager yeast (or S-23 Saflager)

SG 1.080
FG 1.021

I got most of the grain bill from Northern Brewer, since they have a lot of those hard-to-find German malts.

I don't now how to convert to extract (you need extract to replace the pilsner and Munich, I know that much), but I hope it helps you figure out your specialty grains and hops.

Good luck!

From the BYO archives, an extract-based recipe. I'd suggest toning down the pale chocolate malt and to add some CaraRed, maybe 12-16 oz.
...
Doppelbock
(5 gallons, extract with grain)

Ingredients:

10 lbs. light malt syrup
1 lb. cara-pils or dextrin malt
1.25 lbs. crystal malt, 60° Lovibond
1 lb. pale chocolate malt, 170° Lovibond
1 oz. Perle (7.3% alpha acid) for 60 min.
1 oz. Hallertauer hops (3.7% alpha acid): 0.5 oz. for 30 min., 0.5 oz. at end of boil
Wyeast 2206 (Bavarian lager)
2/3 cup corn sugar for priming

Step by Step:

Start with 5 gal. of water. Crush grains and steep in water at 150° F for 30 min. Rinse the grain with enough water to make 5.5 gal.
Total boil is 60 min. Heat to a boil and add Perle hops. Boil 30 min. Add 0.5 oz. Hallertauer hops. Boil 30 min. more and add 0.5 oz. Hallertauer hops. Chill to 45° F and pitch yeast in a starter.
Ferment at 45° F for three days. Raise to 50° F for three days. Raise to 55°. Rack into secondary when gravity reaches less than 1.020. Age at 40° F until clear (seven to 14 days). Bottle and prime. Condition in the bottle as long as desired (30 to 60 days)

This is awesome.

I am going to put together a kit for my friend for his birthday
He is the one that had the Beer Fest at which I had the celebrator


Should this be done as an ALL-grain brew you think?
Or perhaps an extract would be of some help?
I gots some work to do

If you're capable of AG brewing, you don't need extract. If you're an extract or PM brewer, then you need some extract.


I'd use the first recipe, I think, and replace some of the base malts with extract if needed. How many pounds of grain can you mash?

One other thing- how are your lagering temps? That beer is pretty big, and needs a decent lagering period.