Designing my first Belgian, am I on the right track?

Hi All. I know another recipe question but I am a Belgian noob and I know there are alot of great belgian brewers out there.

I am shooting for a light to medium body belgian pale ale with noble hops. I am pretty sure I am ok with the hops. I am more concerned with the malt bill. I have heard you can use table sugar to replace candi sugar. Also I have heard that because of the pilsner malts you should boil 90 minutes. Is that true? I am thinking about mashing at 150 for 60 minutes then batch sparge.
Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

Amt Name Type # %/IBU
7 lbs Pilsner (2 Row) Bel (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 70.0 %
1 lbs Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 2 10.0 %
8.0 oz Aromatic Malt (26.0 SRM) Grain 3 5.0 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 4 5.0 %
1 lbs Sugar, Table (Sucrose) (1.0 SRM) Sugar 5 10.0 %
2.00 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 6 25.9 IBUs
1.00 oz Styrian Goldings [5.40 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 7 2.9 IBUs
1.0 pkg Belgian Ardennes (Wyeast Labs #3522) [124.21 ml] Yeast 8 -

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.055 SG Measured Original Gravity: 1.053 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.008 SG Measured Final Gravity: 1.011 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 6.2 % Actual Alcohol by Vol: 5.5 %
Bitterness: 28.8 IBUs Calories: 175.9 kcal/12oz
Est Color: 8.7 SRM

My suggestion is to drop the C40 and replace it with Munich. It will be a little more to style. Cut the aromatic back to 4-6 oz. It can be a little much on a brew that light. Table sugar is fine. Sometimes I use turbinado for a little more complex flavor.

The IBU's are just slightly too high for an OG of 1.055. I would cut them back some.

3522 is a nice yeast. Pitch it in the low 60's and slowly let it rise up. When the fermentation starts to slow try to keep the temp from dropping. Give it plenty of time to finish. Belgian yeast can take some time to get the last few points. After bottling let them condition for longer than normal. I usuallly set aside half of the batch to age. You will be amazed just how much a good Belgian changes with age.

Enjoy.

With a pound of crystal 40, I'd drop the carapils. More crystal malt really isn't necessary. Table sugar is fine, and will not adversely affect your beer at this level, or even double what you have. A 90 minute boil would be good, but isn't absolutely necessary. Everything else looks fine.

Hey, thanks alot for you input, it is much appreciated!

I took advice from both of you and have decided to go with this recipe if you guys think its good.

Amt Name Type # %/IBU
7 lbs Pilsner (2 Row) Bel (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 65.1 %
1 lbs Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 2 9.3 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 3 4.7 %
4.0 oz Aromatic Malt (26.0 SRM) Grain 4 2.3 %
2 lbs Sugar, Table (Sucrose) (1.0 SRM) Sugar 5 18.6 %
2.00 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 6 23.3 IBUs
1.00 oz Styrian Goldings [5.40 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 7 2.6 IBUs
1.0 pkg Belgian Ardennes (Wyeast Labs #3522) [124.21 ml] Yeast 8 -

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.063 SG Measured Original Gravity: 1.053 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.006 SG Measured Final Gravity: 1.011 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 7.5 % Actual Alcohol by Vol: 5.5 %
Bitterness: 25.9 IBUs Calories: 175.9 kcal/12oz
Est Color: 5.2 SRM

Looks good....

If you like Belgian beers I would recommend getting a copy of Brew Like a Monk. I probably have read it 7 or 8 times and always pick up some little tidbit of info for my next brew.

beergolf said:

Looks good....

If you like Belgian beers I would recommend getting a copy of Brew Like a Monk. I probably have read it 7 or 8 times and always pick up some little tidbit of info for my next brew.

Click to expand...

Thank you for your input with my recipe and thanks for the tip on the book. Looks like a must to add to my library. Thanks again!

It looks like you're doing a tripel roughly?

The table sugar and carapils are canceling each other's contributions out. Why not drop the carapils and adjust residual dextrines with mash temps? That amount of sugar at that mash temp (150) is going to end up at probably at close to 1 plato or lower. Also, the Munich and the Aromatic are adding the almost identical qualities. I'd use one or the other, preferably aromatic if you're sticking closer to style.

I have designed a lot of recipes myself from scratch and after tasting the results of many I think there is a lot to be said for simplifying grain bills, especially wen you're just starting to formulate your own. That's just my opinion but I feel like it is very helpful here.

I'd go:

86% Belgian Pilsner (it has lower protein than others)
10% Sucrose (table sugar)
4% Aromatic

Mashing at 153

Simplify it and you'll be surprised just how damn complex it is without having a muddled mess of flavors in your brew.

If you do want to tweak the result you'll at least be able to pinpoint what you want and not have to guess what was contributing to phenomenon x when looking to change things up in the recipe.

Agree with everything said, although I would actually mash at 148-150. Biggest thing though, is add your sugar to the fermenter after the main ferment is slowing. Just boil it in a small amount of water, boil the solution for about 5-10 mins, cool it off (or don't, it won't matter) and chuck it in. This lets the yeast eat the more complex sugars first before it eats the simple sugars. This will insure that you get complete ferment, lower FG and a dryer beer.

Also, I can't confirm this but I believe that the Wyeast Belgian Ardennes is the same as WLP545 which got me super low FGs and really clean beers. They weren't like the strong fruity, bubblegummy Belgians. More of a cleaner dark fruit like a dubbel or xmas beer.

+1 on using turbinado, although the Belgians use straight table sugar. The differences would be subtle.

DannPM said:

It looks like you're doing a tripel roughly?

The table sugar and carapils are canceling each other's contributions out. Why not drop the carapils and adjust residual dextrines with mash temps? That amount of sugar at that mash temp (150) is going to end up at probably at close to 1 plato or lower. Also, the Munich and the Aromatic are adding the almost identical qualities. I'd use one or the other, preferably aromatic if you're sticking closer to style.

I have designed a lot of recipes myself from scratch and after tasting the results of many I think there is a lot to be said for simplifying grain bills, especially wen you're just starting to formulate your own. That's just my opinion but I feel like it is very helpful here.

I'd go:

86% Belgian Pilsner (it has lower protein than others)
10% Sucrose (table sugar)
4% Aromatic

Mashing at 153

Simplify it and you'll be surprised just how damn complex it is without having a muddled mess of flavors in your brew.

If you do want to tweak the result you'll at least be able to pinpoint what you want and not have to guess what was contributing to phenomenon x when looking to change things up in the recipe.

Click to expand...

If I understand you correctly, you are saying that with all the table sugar if I mash at 150 that it will end up dryer and more acolohol than I intend? Mashing at 153 will increase the amount of unfermentable sugars keeping me closer to my intended final gravity and a little sweeter beer?

I appreciate what you say about simplicity. Would it be better to use grain instead of the sugar or am I on the right track with sugar?

Komodo suggests mashing at 148-150 and adding the sugar late in fermentation. If I understand him correctly then he is more for a dryer highly attenuated beer. So is this just really a matter of taste or style or both?

Thank you Komodo and Dannpm for your input. It never ceases to amaze me how many different ways you can make a beer!