D-Train
Well-Known Member
Please critique this approach. I have never brewed a beer with anything other than ale/lager yeast and malts. If you told me a month ago that I'd be planning a sour fruit beer I'd tell you no way in hell, but a few weeks ago my wife and I were on a recent trip to SF and were introduced to the world of sour beers at Russian River and Mikkeller Bar. There was one in particular that my wife has been raving about since - La Fiancee Pinot Noir by Swiss brewery Trois Dames.
Here is the description:
I want to make a batch inspired by this beer using ingredients I can get locally at the LHBS. I'm not patient enough to wait 12 months to glass (I know, I know, patience needs to come with the territory, please bear with me and see #5 below). The gameplan would be to:
1. Make my saison wort (Belgian Pils, wheat, aromatic) of around 1.045 and transfer into glass carboy (primary).
2. Pitch a saison yeast (3711 or 3724). Suggestions?
3. Begin to ramp up temp to ~80ish.
4. When krausen seems to have peaked (72 hours approx.), add to primary half a can of Alexander's Pinot Noir concentrate. This stuff is 68 Brix and 46 oz. which if my math/logic is right is 61.5 gravity points per half can or adds 1.011 gravity to a 5.5 gallon batch. This would mean that 20% of the gravity is made up from the concentrate and 80% from grains. I'd add it in a way that minimizes O2.
5. Pitch 3203 PC De Bom Sour Blend (lacto, sacch, brett).
6. Hold temp at ~80ish.
7. Do not touch for 4+ weeks.
8. Sample. If sufficiently low FG and tastes good, go to #9, otherwise go to #7.
9. Bottle (add'l yeast needed?) and cellar.
10. Enjoy over time to see how it develops.
I want the end result to have a blend of sour, saison, and pinot, without any one of these characteristics becoming very dominant.
Is this process likely to achieve a decent beer that would have the characteristics I'm looking for?
Thanks for listening.
Here is the description:
Its thanks to Raphaëls friendship with Nicolas Pittet and Pierre-Alain Dutoit, winemakers from Lavaux/Vaud, that the LAmoureuse beers were born. Theyre real hybrids born of a combination of dry Saison and the freshly-squeezed juice of local grapes, blended and fermented together. The result is a relatively dry beer with a light, fruity, vinous nose. Unfiltered, unpasteurized, and refermented in the bottle, the LAmoureuse will continue to evolve and grow more acidy over time thanks to the wild yeasts that occur naturally on the grape skins
This is the red version of the white Amoureuse, for which we use grapes of the Garanoir variety. This beer can only be brewed once a year, during the harvesting season. For the 2014 version and thereafter, the winegrower will not separate the marc from the must at the outset. He intends to leave it for a few days so that it takes on a more intense colour. The must is added to the beer at the height of the fermentation process, which carries on normally. . As the fruit yeasts are active, they develop a drier finish and the end product is a beer that is more acidy than usual.
I want to make a batch inspired by this beer using ingredients I can get locally at the LHBS. I'm not patient enough to wait 12 months to glass (I know, I know, patience needs to come with the territory, please bear with me and see #5 below). The gameplan would be to:
1. Make my saison wort (Belgian Pils, wheat, aromatic) of around 1.045 and transfer into glass carboy (primary).
2. Pitch a saison yeast (3711 or 3724). Suggestions?
3. Begin to ramp up temp to ~80ish.
4. When krausen seems to have peaked (72 hours approx.), add to primary half a can of Alexander's Pinot Noir concentrate. This stuff is 68 Brix and 46 oz. which if my math/logic is right is 61.5 gravity points per half can or adds 1.011 gravity to a 5.5 gallon batch. This would mean that 20% of the gravity is made up from the concentrate and 80% from grains. I'd add it in a way that minimizes O2.
5. Pitch 3203 PC De Bom Sour Blend (lacto, sacch, brett).
6. Hold temp at ~80ish.
7. Do not touch for 4+ weeks.
8. Sample. If sufficiently low FG and tastes good, go to #9, otherwise go to #7.
9. Bottle (add'l yeast needed?) and cellar.
10. Enjoy over time to see how it develops.
I want the end result to have a blend of sour, saison, and pinot, without any one of these characteristics becoming very dominant.
Is this process likely to achieve a decent beer that would have the characteristics I'm looking for?
Thanks for listening.