Whoa! Belgian Dubbel/Strong Dark is doing great!

I've been learning stuff from this forum for a while, but this is my first post. Just thought I'd post about this Belgian Dubbel/Strong Belgian that I started about a week ago. I took what I learned from all kinds of different recipes, and wanted to make a delicious, strong (about 9%) hybrid of a belgian dubbel and a dark strong. Here's the recipe:

12.00 Belgian Pale Malt
2.00 Munich
0.50 Biscuit
0.25 Caravienne
0.20 Special B

2.0 Belgian medium candi sugar (from solid flakes from the store)

2 oz. bittering hops
1 oz. 5 minute hops

I used White Labs Belgian Strong Ale Yeast, and did a starter.

The color is awesome, it's a bright golden color. It tastes like a dessert beer so far, with a very sweet finish, but not over the top. Of course that will only mellow out.

It started off at 1.082 OG, and after 7 days it's at 1.02, so already 8%-ish.

I'm going to ferment it for another 2-3 weeks, then transfer and condition it for....well possibly for 2 months until my wedding, as I think I finally might have made a beer worth bringing.

Any thoughts on this recipe? So far I think it's working great.

Fermentation temp is very important for Belgians! To help bring the gravity down further I'd warm it up and wait another couple weeks as you planned. A lot of Belgian yeasts like to be started in the mid/upper 60s then slowly ramped into the low 70s.

Sounds great and will be a good wedding present for yourself and your guests. Like the above poster said, ramp those temps up!

Will do. I started at 68 or so, bumped to 70 a few days ago, and yesterday went to 72. I may bump to 75 in a few days.

I know this is a large debate, but would you recommend a secondary, or just keep it in the primary for the full fermentation? I have it in a corny keg for primary fermentation, and I'll eventually transfer to another of the same for conditioning and/or secondary.

For me I leave big beers on the cake for the whole fermentation. Small beers I secondary just to clarify it quicker (and drink it faster).

I'd leave it in primary for 3-4 weeks total then throw in bottles to condition. Trappist breweries do "secondary" but it's more like lagering, and afterwards they dose with fresh yeast and priming sugar. With a big beer like this you can consider adding a little yeast in the bottling bucket, I didn't for my Belgian Dark Strong and 4 months later I'm still waiting for it to carb. Keep the bottles warm for the first few weeks! I'd recommend buying Brew Like a Monk if you haven't already, a very enjoyable read.

When adding yeast to the bottling bucket with Belgian recipes, does it matter what kind of yeast it is. Seems to me that it can't matter that much,but that's pure conjecture. I'm in the middle of brewing some kriek, and the instructions suggest doing this pre-bottling but the kit didn't provide any extra yeast. I've got a bunch of Safale 02 dry yeast. Would that work at this stage? Alternatively, I could recover some yeast when the batch gets racked to the secondary, but messing with old yeast is kind of tedious. Which route do you suggest?

Cool thanks for the tips.

One thing I forgot to mention, is I broke my thermometer shortly after confirming that I had hit my mash temp! Arg. But doing some calculations I found that using 3 parts boiling water to 1 part tap water (at least at 5k here in Colorado) gives a darn close approximation of 170 degrees for sparge water. And it's easy to remember. I think in the future I'll just keep doing this instead of measuring the temp.

Here's a shot of the color at 1.02 gravity. Awesome bright golden/grapefruit color.

Well after about 1.5 weeks it's still bubbling at about a bubble every 2-3 seconds. I'm betting I'm going to reach close to 1.010, or in that range. It's the first time I've reached my intended OG, and looks like I may even get a good FG....awesome.

So at 3 weeks it appears that fermentation activity has finally stopped. At last check my FG was at 1.010.

From here, I know most people like to bottle their Belgians, but I am kegging it.

I took it out of my temp controlled kegerator, because I really needed to get my stout in there to cool and carbonate. My plan is to transfer to another keg (I've been fermenting in a corny keg), and let it condition at room temperature in my house, which this time of year will be around 75-78. My thought was that to simulate bottle conditioning as much as I can, I'd prime with a little corn sugar in the keg, and just let it carbonate naturally for a few weeks at that temp, then put back in the kegerator, cool, and carbonate with c02 as needed. Is there anything wrong with this plan? Thanks for any tips, as this is my first big beer, and first Belgian.

That's a really strange color for a dubbel or a BSDA. Just guessing, but the candi sugar you used might have been of the light variety.

Oh, and you might want to age that for like 6 months if it's high in alcohol. Belgians tend to hide their alcohol content well because they mellow over the aging process.

Well I only used a little bit of Special B, and the candi sugar was medium amber flakes. I was going for a lighter than usual color, and I'm actually really happy with that.

Unfortunately it only gets 2 months to age, as that's when my wedding is. Unless it doesn't taste good, in which case of course it will keep aging.

GuitarGumption said:

Well I only used a little bit of Special B, and the candi sugar was medium amber flakes. I was going for a lighter than usual color, and I'm actually really happy with that.

Unfortunately it only gets 2 months to age, as that's when my wedding is. Unless it doesn't taste good, in which case of course it will keep aging.

Click to expand...

Well, if it tastes good, that's the most important part!

I really hope that works out for you. I also aim to have wonderful Belgian-style homebrews when I get married. That's the way to do it :rockin:

+1 on aging as long as you can. I have two Dubbels that are only 6-7 weeks old right now and they're just not enjoyable yet. Sweet, juicyfruit, but a bit hot and not easy to drink yet. I'm thinking of bottling from the kegs and letting them age at room temp until winter.

Hm, well so far I'll have an IPA ready by Oct 1st. I was thinking of doing an oatmeal stout or a saison next week. Could either of those be drinkable by Oct 1st?

I'm also a little hesitant when I really think about it, to have 10% beer on tap the nights before my wedding with best friends I haven't seen in a while....haha. They might not know what hit them.

GuitarGumption said:

Hm, well so far I'll have an IPA ready by Oct 1st. I was thinking of doing an oatmeal stout or a saison next week. Could either of those be drinkable by Oct 1st?

I'm also a little hesitant when I really think about it, to have 10% beer on tap the nights before my wedding with best friends I haven't seen in a while....haha. They might not know what hit them.

Click to expand...

I bottled my dubbels off the kegs tonight. They just need more time. Sure, some friends like them, but they're not even close to peak yet.

Its ultimately up to you. Bigger beers (IIPAs notwithstanding) do better with age.

I can definitely see that. My latest taster, I can tell there's all kinds of interesting flavors in there, but they aren't very harmonious. And very hazy so far. Is that normal? Do these just take a long time to clear up as well?

Sorry just one more question. I was thinking I'm better off conditioning/aging for a while at room temp, vs. cooling down to 40 or so in the kegerator and then ageing. Is this correct?

GuitarGumption said:

Sorry just one more question. I was thinking I'm better off conditioning/aging for a while at room temp, vs. cooling down to 40 or so in the kegerator and then ageing. Is this correct?

Click to expand...

Yes. These aren't lagers so cold conditioning isn't going to do much for you here. I would recommend putting them in the fridge for a week, maybe two, before the wedding though. Let them settle out and absorb that Co2 fully.

I think they'll turn out great, I hope mine do too!