Belgian Dubbel

[RIT_Warrior]

www.candisyrup.com. They had a free giveaway for their dark and I happened to stumble upon it.

I feel like this forum could benefit from user-created groups, like some other forums have. That way someone could make a Belgian beers group, where we could all compile info and experience. I initially was very reluctant to try brewing Belgian styles because they take so long to mature and I think it really takes trial and error, i.e. time and money, to get better at brewing certain styles. At least, to make one that you yourself like.

That's a good idea, it would be cool to have different groups based around various beer styles. Would make for a nice compendium of information.

I'm going to add mine with 10 minutes lift in the boil. I opened it up last night and tasted it. WOW, tons of flavor, kind of tasted like chocolate and carmel mixed with a little dark fruit. Might be a bit overwhelming for a dubbel but I am rolling with it. I can always brew another one with the 80 SRM and do a side by side.

I added mine with 15 left. Personally I am kind of regretting that at this moment...I kind of wished I had waited on all the sugar and added it at full Krauzen. Basically, I was shooting to have a nice underpitch by just making an activator with no starter...but I see now that I sort of too-much underpitched by doing that. A nice pitch rate would be adding the non-startered 1214 to the recipe sans sugar and adding the sugar to the primary at high krauzen, or whipping up a 1.5 liter starer and add the sugar during the boil.

Speaking of candi syrup, when should it be added to the wort? I feel like adding it to the boil at the beginning would cause it to lose some/most of its flavor and aroma properties, so I was considering adding it in the last 10-15 minutes. Another possibility is adding it after the boil, during the cooling stage, but I'm worried about it not being sanitized and propagating unwanted microbes.

I added mine with 15 minutes left. That was probably unnecessary...an easier way would be to add it after flameout, like you would Malt Extract.

This happened to mine too bro, Belgian Golden Strong. Wife did laundry with hose detached (by accident) and warmed the basement up to 74, beer was at 73-74 when measured, but scheduled to be at only 63-64. Cooled it back down, yeast went dormant. Roused them back up, 7 hours later, they were actively fermenting again. My Hyrdo sample tasted so good I finished it. Finished at the exact same gravity as my prior BGSA batch, 1.011. The spike didn't hurt a thing so hang in there man!

I'm slowely cooling mine down and it is still going strong. It was at 74 when measured....but I'll definitely try stirring them up if they go teamster on me.

I'm not actually too worried about it, I had it pegged at 64 during the growth phase.

 

[jlpred55]

I added mine with 15 left. Personally I am kind of regretting that at this moment...I kind of wished I had waited on all the sugar and added it at full Krauzen. Basically, I was shooting to have a nice underpitch by just making an activator with no starter...but I see now that I sort of too-much underpitched by doing that. A nice pitch rate would be adding the non-startered 1214 to the recipe sans sugar and adding the sugar to the primary at high krauzen, or whipping up a 1.5 liter starer and add the sugar during the boil.


Shouldn't be a issue with mine I am using a large pitch of slurry (16oz)- hell I could even top crop right now off my tripel that is going strong if I wanted to. Now I am thinking of top cropping....geez...LOL

 

[RIT_Warrior]

Shouldn't be a issue with mine I am using a large pitch of slurry (16oz)- hell I could even top crop right now off my tripel that is going strong if I wanted to. Now I am thinking of top cropping....geez...LOL

Can you just repitch a large slurry? I've never done it before, so I wouldn't know. But I thought it was advisable to make a starter with the yeast you got with the slurry instead of just using it as-is.

I'm actually thinking about washing the yeast I use for this guy because, lets face it, 1214 isn't free. And repitching directly is interesting for me, as I am always finding new ways to screw up my brews and avoiding starters when possible is an attractive prospect for me.

 

[Bob]

Yes, you can repitch without washing. Commercial breweries repitch daily.

Cheers,

Bob

 

[RIT_Warrior]

Just put this in bottles. It tastes great! It both looks and tastes like Chimay Red. This is slightly odd, as the recipe is most likely quite different than Chimay's, but I suppose the 1214 yeast contributes so much to the flavor that it really stands out in the final product. FG was around 1.011.

I also tried washing the yeast. Not really sure how well it is going...right now I have a 1L ikea bottle filled with what appears to be chocolate milk. I can't really see any separation...but maybe I'm just blind?

 

[bknifefight]

The separation may be hard to see if there is a lot of gunk in there. 15 - 20 minutes in the fridge should do it. If it is still hard to see a defined line, still dump the top, thinner layer into another container. Do that another time or two and you should have pretty good clean yeast.

 

[RIT_Warrior]

If it is still hard to see a defined line, still dump the top, thinner layer into another container.

I did just that, actually. Although I really should get a larger container for the "big" jar you initially decant into.

I checked it in the fridge today, though, and it looks pretty good. I'm planning on brewing in the next couple of weeks, so I'll make a starter out of one and see how that does. If I get some sediment I'm not too concerned.

 

[bknifefight]

Sounds like a plan!