Rye beer w/ Juniper...Like Finnish Sahti?

Hey folks, I've been reading about the beer known as sahti in Finland. Michael Jackson wrote a fair amount on it (four or five articles). Here's one:

Michael Jackson's Beer Hunter - Sweating up a suitable thirst

It looks to be a high ABV beer that has rye thrown in, lightly hopped, with plenty of juniper flavor. Interestingly, baker's yeast is used in Finland. Since it is made for the sauna and I sauna every week I can, and my wife and many of my friends are Finnish, I figured this would be a natural brew. I am not looking to replicate the traditional method or anything to a "t".

I would like to make a beer that has a good percentage of rye, enough to give it that spicy rye goodness. I've read up to 20% is a good place to start. I also want to get an ABV% somewhere around 7% In addition I'd like to back off on a standard hop schedule and throw in some juniper berries.

Here's the biggest problem: I am not set up to do all-grain. I could pull of a mini-mash in the stove or something like that (I'm sure the rye will require something along those lines) but the base will have to be malt extract for this guy. Otherwise I have access to a killer LHBS so ingredients shouldn't be an issue.

Anybody have any experience or strong opinions in this matter?

Ive never brewed anything quite like that but I experimented with a juniper beer about 6 months ago my experience is that it takes a lot of juniper berries to impart a gin like spicyness but smaller amounts say 1-2oz add a very nice fruity quality. the beer I made came out really nice, I dont have an exact recipe but I used the second runnings from a bigger beer and boiled for 60 minutes with maybe 1/2oz of chinook hops (approx 15IBUs) and added 1/2oz crushed juniper berries at 15minutes another at 5 and again at flameout.

A minimash is a nice idea but for rye to make up 20% of the total fermentables it would need to make up a lot more of the minimash and rye is known for stuck mashes when used in quantities of only 15% and up. I can't recommend bakers yeast, for the first try use a basic dry ale yeast or something. I dont think bakers yeast will ferment to 7% very easily and it wont leave a crisp finish the way this beer sounds like it should have.

Geeze, pretty cool but it sounds like the whole experience goes hand-in-hand. Sounds like most 75% DME, 25% flaked Rye, steep about a lb. or so of crystal 40 and probably a lb of some darker Crystal and/or possibly even some well roasted malts. You may even wish to steep a small amount of Smoked (not peated) Malt, throw in a good measure of Juniper berries (fresh if you can) at around 5 minutes and ferment with bread yeast. You really have to do a mini-mash to get the Rye in there. Full conversion isn't what you are after but rather the characteristic of the Rye. You could even do like what pjj did and use some Rye bread.

here is a little more info:

Sahti - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The filtering through Juniper branches will be key to this.

This looks really interesting, and I really enjoy rye beers. I may have to give this a try. I'll probably still use a Mash Tun, but I'll skip vorlauf, and make a second Lauter Tun out of a bucket rigged with a quick false bottom, lined with a bunch of juniper twigs/berries and hopefully rye straw, if I can find a source for it. I might do bread yeast, I'm not sure... if I use beer yeast, i might use Ringwood perhaps? WL's Burton Ale is fruity and non-flocculant.. that could work? Maybe a weizen yeast fermented cool? Otherwise there's that "European Ale Yeast" WLP011, that could function too.

My opinion - try one before you brew 5-10 gallons of nastiness.

I went to the craft beer festival in Boston a few months back, one of the beers I had on my "must try early in the evening" list was a Sahti. It was nasty. It smelled bad, and tasted worse. I took 2 sips just to give it a second chance...then dumped it.

It was like sucking on a pine tree...and not in a good sense.

carl spakler said:

My opinion - try one before you brew 5-10 gallons of nastiness.

I went to the craft beer festival in Boston a few months back, one of the beers I had on my "must try early in the evening" list was a Sahti. It was nasty. It smelled bad, and tasted worse. I took 2 sips just to give it a second chance...then dumped it.

It was like sucking on a pine tree...and not in a good sense.

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Like a lot of stuff, I think one person could make one and it would be excellent whereas another brewer might make it like garbage. I would tend to trust Michael Jackson's insight on it. It might not be my 'cup of tea' but in all probability the one you tried may have been just a very bad example.

zoebisch01 said:

Like a lot of stuff, I think one person could make one and it would be excellent whereas another brewer might make it like garbage. I would tend to trust Michael Jackson's insight on it. It might not be my 'cup of tea' but in all probability the one you tried may have been just a very bad example.

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Judging by how many examples of Sahti there are on the market I feel like I am not the only one that thinks this "style" is a dud.

carl spakler said:

Judging by how many examples of Sahti there are on the market I feel like I am not the only one that thinks this "style" is a dud.

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There are tons of styles brewed here for many different reasons, and there are lots of styles not brewed. There are many styles that have a narrow window of appeal, but it has to be judged according to what it is, not merely personal preference. I am not saying you are wrong, I don't think there is a 'wrong' or 'right' about it.

I hope you didn't feel I was digging on you, I was just pointing out that it is often far to easy to dismiss something when one gets a bad example, no matter what it is.





and all that good stuff

'course then again the stuff could taste nasty. Personally I loathe Peated Malt Scotch. It doesn't mean that Peated Malt Scotch is necessarily bad, but rather I find no appeal in it. The mere fact that the OP is intrigued by the style is reason enough to believe he may enjoy it. Then again, oftentimes one thinks something will taste good and it doesn't

I'm rambling now. sorry

So what do you folks think might be an adequate approximation of a recipe from an extract perspective? Six or seven lbs of DME, x-amount of flaked rye, and some sort of hop/juniper combo with one of the yeasts mentioned above?

I've heard excellent things about beers in this style, and terrible things. I'm reserving judgment on it until I can crack one after a good 3 hour saturday night sauna. Then it'll at least be in its own context. Plus a friend and I are going to split a 5 gallon batch so that we only have a case each to deal with if it really doesn't turn out