12 Beers of Christmas 2021 Edition

[j1laskey]

Got mine resting in the cellar. Will be reaching out to @passedpawn and @fourfarthing for their input for cherry additions. Only a few shirt months to go !

 

[grampamark]

The Spiced Bourbon Stout is in the cellar, also. I’m going to try to bottle it in the next week, or so. The gravity sample I took about a week ago was delicious.

 

[passedpawn]

Got mine resting in the cellar. Will be reaching out to @passedpawn and @fourfarthing for their input for cherry additions. Only a few shirt months to go !

Too much cherry is bad. My first batch, I added 15# of sour Montmercy cherries. Don't do that. NOTE: the sweet will ferment and leave only the sour cherry flavor. First batch I made was so much sour cherry that I dumped and re-brewed. Second batch, I just bought cherry juice (see note 17JUN17 below). Note 2: Batch below was a 12g batch, but the cherry juice addition was to just 5g of that batch, for delivering to the group.

Here's my recipe and notes. Good luck.

 

[JAReeves]

The Crabapple Lambicky Ale has been in the secondary with the fruit for about 4 months. I didn't see much of a pellicle, but the fruit kind of dominated the surface and there was no mold, so should be fine, just not sure of the acidity yet. I am planning on a taste-test this weekend. If the sour culture hasn't done its job, I will look at blending with another sour wheat beer I have aging.

 

[Funky Frank]

I have the ingredients for mine. I’ll probably brew any day but I’m having a struggle for how fresh I want the abbey weizen to be vs how much time I want to give myself for a redo if it doesn’t turn out. I’m doing the optional spices and I’m not entirely convinced that it’s not going to be like drinking perfume. Based on the chamomile that I got, I’m kinda wondering what exactly the big brand tea has been trying to pass off as chamomile…lol.

 

[blantonj00]

fruit cake old ale - brewed 5/1/21 - made a ten gallon batch - followed the Mosher recipe for the base - 5 gallons on wlp 028 scottish ale yeast and 5 gallons on wyeast 1450 denny's favorite (also a favorite of mine for brown/dark ales) - added amoretti blood orange and whole cloves to both batches - 028 batch fruited with tart cherries, figs, zante currants, apricots; 1450 batch fruited with raisins, golden berries, tart cherries - plan is to find the right combination of the batches, combine, cold crash - hopefully will be good to go by November

 

[JAReeves]

Tasted the Crabapple Lambicky Ale today. OG: 1:101, FG:1.014 into secondary on the crabapples with house sour culture (6/5/21). Didn't take a gravity reading today, as the sour isn't there yet, I want it to continue to drop points. The Brett character is muted, mostly coming through as peppery-spicy flavor (could be the crabapples), with a heavy Brett aroma (the good kind, not diapers!). Some of the wheat character is taking a backseat to the apple's soft fruitiness. I am tasting a 70F, non-carbonated sample.


To make this more lambicky, I have options:

I can add more sour cultures from some of my other fermentations (I have three different sour cultures rolling along: House from our Muscat grapes, Worldwide Mishmash, and Russian River), and see what happens between now and Thanksgiving, or

I can blend at bottling time with a finished sour beer, or

I suppose I can do both?

Suggestions?

 

[Funky Frank]

If you have good experience with finished beers coming from that culture then I’d say let it ride. Maybe it’ll be perfect the way it is. And if not, you can pull the trigger on blending later.

 

[j1laskey]

Tasted the Crabapple Lambicky Ale today. OG: 1:101, FG:1.014 into secondary on the crabapples with house sour culture (6/5/21). Didn't take a gravity reading today, as the sour isn't there yet, I want it to continue to drop points. The Brett character is muted, mostly coming through as peppery-spicy flavor (could be the crabapples), with a heavy Brett aroma (the good kind, not diapers!). Some of the wheat character is taking a backseat to the apple's soft fruitiness. I am tasting a 70F, non-carbonated sample.


To make this more lambicky, I have options:

I can add more sour cultures from some of my other fermentations (I have three different sour cultures rolling along: House from our Muscat grapes, Worldwide Mishmash, and Russian River), and see what happens between now and Thanksgiving, or

I can blend at bottling time with a finished sour beer, or

I suppose I can do both?

Suggestions?

View attachment 740719

I say let it ride. But it’s your beer and I’ll be very happy to drink it !!!

 

[yoop89]

Ill be rebrewing the Juniper Rye Bock this week sometime . Should have plenty of time to mature still.

First batch is going to live its life as a higher proof beverage. Has an odd off-flavor that is a blend between sour and metallic with a weird bite after swallowing. Ill keep it around to see if it changes(not hopeful but also never experienced anything like this) but figured I better get going on another to be safe. Either way ill be ready to ship something in December

 

[jack13]

Just checking in! How is everyone making out. It will be here before you know it. I’ve acquired everything for my brew. I’m off until next Friday so I plan on brewing a Double NEIPA and the Spiced Dunkel Weizenbock Next week.

if for some reason you can’t commit let me know.

1) Caramel Quadruple @jack13
2) Spiced Cherry Dubbel @j1laskey
3) Spiced Dunkel Weizenbock @TBC
4) Juniper Rye Bock @yoop89
5) Fruitcake Old Ale @blantonj00
6) Saffron Tripel @rsquared
7) Christmas Gruit @calandryll
8) Honey Ginger IPA @jerbrew
9) Crabapple Lambicky Ale @JAReeves
10) Gingerbread Ale @theothermillion
11) Spiced Bourbon Stout @grampamark
12) Abbey Weizen @Funky Frank

Bottled the Caramel Quad last night. Talked to calandryll; he's on track for the Gruit.

 

[j1laskey]

Spiced Cherry Dubble racked to secondary tonight. Looks like this “dubbel” is going to finish round 9.5%. Merry Christmas everyone !

 

[grampamark]

HB Mosaic SMaSH after changing oil in an SUV, repairing a bent tie rod on a tractor, responding to a combine fire, and having really good pizza for supper. I’ll be pouring another glass of something soon.

Edit: Posted in wrong thread.
The Spiced Bourbon Stout is in secondary and I‘m pleased with how the flavors have come together.

 

[j1laskey]

Sample of the spiced cherry dubble. The addition of cherry juice dropped this even lower! OG 1.084. FG (today) 1.006. Whoops!

 

[grampamark]

Well, I guess I know what I’ll be doing tomorrow-brewing the Spiced Bourbon Stout again.

First infection in 10+ years and 160+ batches. I racked this to a 5 gallon bucket, that I only use occasionally as a fermenter, to cellar for awhile. Apparently there was something nasty hiding in there. I pulled a sample a couple of weeks ago, before we went to the city house, and it tasted great. I had planned to bottle it after we got back to the farm. I opened the bucket a little while ago and was greeted by a hot, alcohol, smell and the pellicle pictured here. I pulled a sample, which tasted really hot, as well. The flavors of the spices and bourbon were gone. The SG hadn’t dropped; still at .012 which is where it finished after primary.

I’ve got almost two months before shipping, so there will be beer at Christmas. There’s a first time for everything but I would have rather my first infected batch had been just another pipeline filler instead of one intended for a beer exchange.

 

[passedpawn]

Well, I guess I know what I’ll be doing tomorrow-brewing the Spiced Bourbon Stout again.

View attachment 744953
First infection in 10+ years and 160+ batches. I racked this to a 5 gallon bucket, that I only use occasionally as a fermenter, to cellar for awhile. Apparently there was something nasty hiding in there. I pulled a sample a couple of weeks ago, before we went to the city house, and it tasted great. I had planned to bottle it after we got back to the farm. I opened the bucket a little while ago and was greeted by a hot, alcohol, smell and the pellicle pictured here. I pulled a sample, which tasted really hot, as well. The flavors of the spices and bourbon were gone. The SG hadn’t dropped; still at .012 which is where it finished after primary.

I’ve got almost two months before shipping, so there will be beer at Christmas. There’s a first time for everything but I would have rather my first infected batch had been just another pipeline filler instead of one intended for a beer exchange.

Dude, ouch. It's also been a LONG time for me to have an infected batch. But I had them back when I was getting started. Good luck with the next batch. Maybe go nuclear on that bucket.

 

[j1laskey]

Well, I guess I know what I’ll be doing tomorrow-brewing the Spiced Bourbon Stout again.

View attachment 744953
First infection in 10+ years and 160+ batches. I racked this to a 5 gallon bucket, that I only use occasionally as a fermenter, to cellar for awhile. Apparently there was something nasty hiding in there. I pulled a sample a couple of weeks ago, before we went to the city house, and it tasted great. I had planned to bottle it after we got back to the farm. I opened the bucket a little while ago and was greeted by a hot, alcohol, smell and the pellicle pictured here. I pulled a sample, which tasted really hot, as well. The flavors of the spices and bourbon were gone. The SG hadn’t dropped; still at .012 which is where it finished after primary.

I’ve got almost two months before shipping, so there will be beer at Christmas. There’s a first time for everything but I would have rather my first infected batch had been just another pipeline filler instead of one intended for a beer exchange.

If it’s not vinegar I’ll be happy to drink it !

 

[grampamark]

If it’s not vinegar I’ll be happy to drink it !

Well, version 2.0 is in the fermenter. It should be an improvement. Vinegar might have been an improvement over the one that got dumped.

 

[theothermillion]

The Gingerbread Brown Ale is in the fermenter! Excited to be part of my first beer exchange.

Went with a somewhat unique yeast... Safale S-33. You can see 15min in and it was already starting to work!

 

[calandryll]

Christmas Gruit all bottled up. I forgot how much I hate bottling, let's hope the carbonation drops get them to a good carbonation level.

 

[j1laskey]

Just giving this a bump to see how everyone is progressing along?

I will be packaging the Spiced Cherry Dubble either right before or right after Thanksgiving for early December shipping.

Is the group still intact or did we lose some people over the course of the year?

 

[yoop89]

Im still here! My second batch is lagering and will be for another 2 weeks at which time ill keg off half and play with the other half. Ill be set to ship the week after Thanksgiving as well.

 

[JAReeves]

I blended the Crabapple Lambic with another sour wheat beer into a keg for carbonation. Tasted a sample last night, and the complexity blows my mind. The tannins from the crabapples are strong, but that just means this a beer for long term aging. The alcohol level of 10-13% doesn’t hurt either.

 

[TBC]

I’ve been slacking on this site lately because I’ve been busy. That said the spiced dunkel is bulk aging. I will bottle it this weekend. I also ordered the labels but had to use a different site because the site I normally used had a 6-8 week lead time.

I will reach out to everyone this week via PM to collect everyone’s address and then send them out to the group. I will most likely ship after the thanksgiving holiday.

 

[rsquared]

I didn't want to have to do this, especially so late, but I'm going to have to drop out for this year. I've been sitting on the ingredients for a few months, but due to an injury I've physically been unable to do the work of actually brewing yet. I keep thinking I'll be back to brewing "any day now", but for this brew that day isn't coming as quick as I'd hoped and I think I've missed my window. So sorry everyone!

 

[Funky Frank]

I’m still here! I’ll get some pics up soon. I guess I need to get on the labels….nothing says Merry Christmas like painters tape and sharpie!

 

[calandryll]

I will reach out to everyone this week via PM to collect everyone’s address and then send them out to the group. I will most likely ship after the thanksgiving holiday.

@jack13 and myself will be using the same address, so it'll be easier for everyone for shipping.

 

[theothermillion]

Bottled the Gingerbread Brown yesterday! Debating when I want to ship these out. Going to shoot for the week after next (week of the 15th) otherwise it will likely not make out until around Dec 10th. I'll keep ya'll updated

 

[grampamark]

Bottling the Spiced Bourbon Stout (V 2.0) today. Will ship first week in December.

Here’s the label

 

[jack13]

Belgian Quad Label