Belgian Golden Strong Ale Pink Elephant (Delirium Tremens clone)

ill have to give this one a go

Will keep you updated as things ferment. The actual brew session went very smoothly as the step up mash worked better then expected. We BIAB and have only done 6 beers so far this after extract brewing for the better half of a year. Very excited to see how this tastes and smells next week.

Beer is going AWESOME. Tasted it when we took a gravity reading after only 8 days and it's almost dead on to the original. G down to 1014 in 8 days! Going to rack to secondary this weekend and lager outside in the very cold NYC. (it's been in the high 20's to low 30's here) Plan on 3 weeks or so in the cold and then will bottle it up.

Will report G and more notes soon.
If you're thinking about brewing this, do it.

CORRECTION: gravity down to 1012 after 8 days.

On the ginger, is the weight of 2.4 grams if using dried ginger root or the weight of a fresh ginger root?

KCBrewer said:

On the ginger, is the weight of 2.4 grams if using dried ginger root or the weight of a fresh ginger root?

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Fresh grated.

Thanks jkarp.
I was going to pick up some dried ginger since thats what the lhbs has and I'm going there today. From my understanding the dried ginger is a little more potent. I plan to do a 10 gallon batch so I would need 8 grams of fresh grated. Does 6 grams of the dry sound about right?

Man, I don't know. I definitely agree the dried would be stronger but I have no clue on the conversion. Maybe the LHBS can offer advice.

Thanks again, I went ahead and picked up some fresh ginger from Nature's Pantry.

The lhbs didn't have paradise so I went there to see if they did, no luck. I also checked another natural foods store with no luck. What else is paradise used for? Both stores asked me and I had no clue. I need to order a few other things from NB so I'll probably get it there, but I was surprised that it wasn't available anywhere local. I've never heard of it before this recipe, so I don't know where else to look.

I had to look hard to find Seeds of Paradise.
Not a common ingredient at my LHBS, I ended up going to Brooklyn Home Brew instead of The Brooklyn Kitchen.

Racking 6 gallons to secondary and lagering today!

Grains of paradise is a pretty common spice for Belgian beers. If your LHBS doesn't carry it, they should be able to order it for you. Whole Foods can order them too.

I went ahead and ordered it from NB. I needed some more kegging stuff and the lhbs didn't have wlp570 either, so it's all good. I can't wait to brew this one next weekend. I love delirium, but it's so freakin expensive! I don't think I've been this stoked to brew a beer since my first batch. I can't believe I didn't see this recipe or search for one before. Thanks a bunch for posting it. Now I need to stock up on Pilsen since I only picked up 1 sack.

We racked out a 1010 and put it in the basement where it's 40 degrees! It's a cold winter in NYC! Had to sample the beautiful yellow ale and no joke, it's almost exactly like the real DT. I highly recommend this recipe to anyone who loves this beer. Thanks for sharing this with all of us! 6 weeks till it will be ready and I can't wait.

I finally brewed this one a few weeks ago (had the ingredients sitting around for a while) and bottled it last Tuesday. Hit 75% efficiency for an OG of 1.076. It fermented the way down to 1.005! It's going to be a beast coming in at around 9.3% ABV!

I pitched a large decanted starter of the WLP570 as well as a single rehydrated pack of S-04 and it took off in less than 2 hours.

The one mistake I made was wrapping a blanket around the beer after the first 12 hours or so. The temp briefly shot up to 91 degrees! It was only for a few hours though, hopefully it's not ruined.

With the yeast activity I was seeing it would have hit 82-84 on its own with no extra insulation. Live and learn I guess.

My 10 gallon batch is bubbling furiously right now. I hit the same numbers as you, 75% efficiency & 1.076 OG. I did a Blonde the day before for my wife that came in at 1.035 and used Nottingham on it. The Delirium airlocks are pumping at about 5 times the rate of the Blonde.

I wonder how long 10 gallons is going to last me?

My 30th birthday was the 24th of February, and I decided I'd give this a shot.

I couldn't tell you why, but I decided to jump straight at a 10 gallon version of this. At 100 bucks, this was the most pricey batch I've ever attempted.

Since I was just shopping at the local homebrew place (hopsandberries.com is a great place to have), I had a to make a couple adjustments.

Fermentables:
22lbs of German Pilsner
5lbs of Beet Sugar (Eastern Colorado still grows sugar beets )

Hops and Spices:
2 ounces of Styrian Goldings for 60 minutes
4 ounces of Saaz for 15 minutes

23g of Coriander @ 10 mins
8g of Fresh Grated Ginger @10 mins (I squeezed the juice out the ginger before weighing)
8g of Paradise Grains @10 mins (crazy expensive locally)


Yeast:
2 packs of S-04 and 2 packs of WLP570 dumped into a growler half full of 1.040 strenght DME wort. Stirred throughout the brew day and pitched six hours later.


The Experimental Mash:
I have a cooler with a SS braid at the bottom and I've never had a problem until this brew.

I tried to mash at 144 with half the usual mash water, then I was going to add warmer water and bring the temp up to 154 for the second half of the 90 minute mash.

I hit my temps ok but the mash was as thick as oatmeal at first and I had to stir a bunch to get the temps right. Instead of pretty grains floating in water, it just looked like sludge.


The Disasterous Sparge:
This was my first stuck sparge ever and it was a pain in the butt. An hour of struggling and blowing hot tap water back into the mash I finally got the bed floating again and drained off 15 gallons of work.


Boil, Cool and Pitch:
I usually only do 12, but I knew my effeciency was going to be weak. I did a 90 minute boil instead of my usual 60 and ended with a gravity of 1.065 which wasn't great but I've missed by more. I cooled to 80 degrees, pitched, and showed up late to my surprise party. I used some Fermcap to keep it from blowing over.

Hot Ferment:
When I got back five hours later, both carboys were bubbling so hard I thought they were going to push the blowoff hoses out of the airlock bucket. Since it is February in Colorado, I locked them in the bathroom with a space heater. They have been sitting at 78 - 82 ever since then. 48 hours and they are still bubbling strong. I've got my fingers crossed, I'm hoping this works out well.



Thanks for the recipe. I was enjoying Tremens while brewing this, I've got a few of the ceramic painted bottles here and I'm going to attempt bottling in them and then waxing the tops rather than foil.

Just brewed this on Saturday. Question on the cold conditioning: From reading the entire thread, I gathered that the cold condition is to clarify the beer, and I would assume it is best to do this before bottling to reduce the sediment per bottle. is this correct? I'm low on cold spaces, so I had thought I may do the cold conditioning in bottles. If the idea is to keep sediment out of bottles, I may just use gowlers or maybe gallon jugs, and then bottle from those. Does that make sense? Should I keep the containers unsealed?

Just transferred mine to secondaries (only because I needed to free up the bigger carboys for this weekends brew) and into the fridge for lagering. OG 1.074, FG 1.008.

I fermented a little cooler than recommended, since I've yet to complete my ferm chamber. 70-72 ambient. It still had some action at day 7, so I checked back on day 9 and it was at 1.008. Today, day 11, still at 1.008 so it went into lagering.

Strong sulfur smell during transfer. My wife couldn't even stay in the bar while I did it. The sample tasted like grapefruit with a shot of vodka. Not very tasty especially with the sulfur aroma. It still has a long way to go, but so far so good.

I'm sure you know, but the sulfur is a result of the cool ferment and it ages out quite quickly. Should turn out great.

jkarp said:

I'm sure you know, but the sulfur is a result of the cool ferment and it ages out quite quickly. Should turn out great.

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This is my first Belgian, but from reading this thread I was prepared for the sulfur.

One question, I keg, so do you think it will need the full 3 weeks conditioning like it does when bottling? Or just the regular 7-10 for carbing in a keg? I'm sure I'll at least taste it at 7 days just to see. Just curious of others experience with kegging this beer.

Underway for 9 days now: 7 in primary, 2 on freezing porch. Its been consistently cold, and about the right temp outside for fermentation, so it's been outside wrapped in Garbage bags to protect from the wind and sun. I just hope it stays this cold for a little longer.

Gravity is just a bit higher than I anticipated (1.014, but it has only been 9 days out of about 45, so it's got a while. It's og was high, at around 1.076. Admitedly, I fell asleep during what should have been the first part of the boil (or enough time to account for 2 boils as it turned out), so it simmered at about 190'F for some time. Dunno if any of you have experience with that sort of figure, as it seems pretty bone headed, brewing at 11pm, but any idea how that would affect the final result?

Also thinking about how to reduce the gravity. Ideas anyone? Though of reviving some of the yeast and repitching it. Would that make a difference?

PS: no sulfer smell or taste yet. A bit funky, sure, but is that normal NOT to have that smell at this point?

KCBrewer said:

One question, I keg, so do you think it will need the full 3 weeks conditioning like it does when bottling? Or just the regular 7-10 for carbing in a keg? I'm sure I'll at least taste it at 7 days just to see. Just curious of others experience with kegging this beer.

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Many (most?) Belgians are warm conditioned and the flavors change dramatically during this time. I keg and keep it in the laundry room for a few weeks prior to moving to the kegerator.

I fermented and bottle conditioned my version of this at about 75-80F and it turned out amazing. (about the avg temp of my kitchen in the summer).

Yeast was recultured from DT bottles.

In fact, it was the most popular beer I've brewed to date.

I got busy and didn't get to keg this until the 23rd, so it lagered for almost 3 weeks. I didn't see your response until just now jkarp , so I didn't warm condition and went straight to the keezer with it.

It's been on the gas and in the keezer for 8 days now and is pretty well carbed. The grapefruit and hot alcohol flavors have already mellowed a lot, but still there. Now that I've seen your recommendation on warm conditioning, I'll pull these 2 cornies out and let them sit for a couple weeks at room temp.

I can already tell this beer is going to condition nicely though. Great recipe. One glass is enough to get you feeling warm.

I tried this one out.

OG: 1.067.
FG: 1.006.
Starte on Jan 19, 2011 an bottled on Feb 10, 2011 with 6 oz light DME.

I had a hard time measuring the ginger correctly, so that could be off. Overall, pretty close to the real Tremens, but the mouth feel in mine is a little thin, and the spice level doesn't seem quite right. Note that this comparison is from memory rather than side-by-side, plus it probably needs to age a bit more, and I know my OG and ginger were off a bit. This is great! I want to make this one again! Thanks for sharing!

Just tasted my first bottle. Amazing. i never knew I had it in me. I really thought I had gotten it all wrong, but it actually tastes pretty close!!! The spice/hop profile is perfect. Someone said that earlier, but I feel I should reiterate. It's perfect. I actually never even put it in secondary, but still observed all the temperature specs. I cold conditioned it for the alotted time, THEN warm conditioned it for about 6 days yet at about 73, THEN chilled it again for 2 days, then bottled. I will be making a batch to the equivalent to 16 lb worth of belge pils soon. This was my 2nd all grain batch, and the original instructions are great.

I'd like to figure Delirium Nocturnes out for myself as a matter of fact. All of them are super tasty.

I took this to my local Home Brew meet up last week and everyone loved it. I only took on 22oz bottle and it went in about 5 minutes. Thanks again for the recipe.

Could a double infusion mash work since I don't have the capability to do a slow rise as mentioned in the original recipe? Thanks.

bmason1623 said:

Could a double infusion mash work since I don't have the capability to do a slow rise as mentioned in the original recipe? Thanks.

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Absolutely. In fact, as I posted in the original recipe, I'm very skeptical that complex mash schedule makes any significant difference. Frankly, I'd just do a 10 min protein rest and a single sac rest at 152ish.

Subscribed!

Proposing this to the homebrew club for a 15 gallon batch. I pushed the ingredients a bit:

Belgian Pilsner: 38 pounds
Beet Sugar: 6 pounds

1 oz Grains of Paridise @ 10 min
1 oz Ginger Root @ 10 min
1.5 oz Coriander Seed @ 10 min

4 oz Styrian Goldings @ 60 min
3 oz Saaz @ 15 min

Yeast:
WLP570
Saf S04
Saf S05

OG: 1.086
FG: 1.019
IBU: 26.5
SRM: 8.0
ABV: 8.6

Thoughts?

Thanks!

jkarp said:

Absolutely. In fact, as I posted in the original recipe, I'm very skeptical that complex mash schedule makes any significant difference. Frankly, I'd just do a 10 min protein rest and a single sac rest at 152ish.

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Thanks. Will brew this one soon as I increase my current summer stash.

jkarp said:

7 day ferment (pitch both yeasts), starting at 67F and allowed to rise as yeast desired. 14 day lager at 30F, followed by a 21 day warm bottle condition at 76F.

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on the 21 day warm bottle condition at 76F, do you mean in the carboy or once it's been bottled? TIA

bmason1623 said:

on the 21 day warm bottle condition at 76F, do you mean in the carboy or once it's been bottled? TIA

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In the bottle.

TheWeeb said:

Proposing this to the homebrew club for a 15 gallon batch. I pushed the ingredients a bit:

Thoughts?

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DOIT! DOIT!

jkarp said:

In the bottle.

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Thank you

bmason1623 said:

on the 21 day warm bottle condition at 76F, do you mean in the carboy or once it's been bottled? TIA

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. . . and for a keg system, 21 days secondary warm, then keg?

Group says "do it" will brew in a couple of weeks

TheWeeb said:

. . . and for a keg system, 21 days secondary warm, then keg?

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Last time I made it I went straight to keg. I just charged the keg with 30 PSI and stashed it in the nice, warm laundry room for a month.

ok. I'm into day 8 of my 21 day warm bottle conditioning. it's not bad. still kind of flat, kind of green and kind of "alcoholy" tasting (8.2% ABV). I hope a full month of conditioning does the trick. will report back soon.

CORRECTION: 8.7% ABV

Ok, brewed this, will put to 32 degrees this sunday, then two weeks later keg and store for another couple of weeks....

Anyone that has successfully made this- do you follow the OP's mashing schedule?

JKarp - do you still follow this mashing schedule when you make it?

bmason1623 said:

ok. I'm into day 8 of my 21 day warm bottle conditioning. it's not bad. still kind of flat, kind of green and kind of "alcoholy" tasting (8.2% ABV). I hope a full month of conditioning does the trick. will report back soon.

CORRECTION: 8.7% ABV

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Tried another bottle at day 15 this morning (I've been working nights) and the boozy, green taste was not as pronounced as last week. Overall, it is conditioning but I think it will take all of the 3 weeks that was mentioned in the recipe if not longer. I'm thinking at least 6 weeks. Will sample another bottle next week. I'll report back again.