2014: A year of German beers!

[TrickyDick]

Thanks for the post/recipe.

here is another, similar, but with a decoction schedule. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f59/worlds-best-oktoberfest-123493/
dont' skip the decoction like I did.
Did you REALLY add 5 POUNDS of CaraPils? plus 5 pounds of DME?

anyways, thanks again. Another pseudo-Oktoberfest thread I've been following is the OktoberFAST thread by Biermuncher.

TD

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

TrickyDick,

Lol, no I screwed up alot on that boil and fermentation, but thats .5 (1/2 lb) of each

 

[OldWorld]

For the love of god don't use stupid American hops in your German beers. They'll ruin it.

Use some Tettnanger in abundance but not the American variety.

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

For the love of god don't use stupid American hops in your German beers. They'll ruin it.

Use some Tettnanger in abundance but not the American variety.

Für die Liebe Gottes nicht verwenden dumm amerikanischen Hopfen in Ihrer deutsche Biere. Sie werden ruinieren.

Verwenden Sie einige Tettnanger in Hülle und Fülle, aber nicht die amerikanische Sorte.

I hope this translated correctly. I appreciate the passion in this, but it lacked something in English.

 

[TrickyDick]

Ja!

TD

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Ive decided to use Jamil's Steves Fifty Eisbock recipe. Grains are on order. Hope to brew my mid September.

And, some continuing education:

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Tonight, I enjoyed an Aventinus Weizen-Eisbock Ale at World of Beers in Ft Myers, FL. Amazing!!! Very much looking forward to kickin off 2013 with an Eisbock!!

 

[progmac]

nothing like a good eisbock! awesome

john- i attempted the somewhat unusual but a traditional german style - smoked hefe. it came out pretty awesome. might be worth adding as a small/experimental batch in your mix.

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

That sounds tasty! I made a Loon Lake Smoked Porter last summer. Intense smoke!! It was really good. Jus drank the last one a few weeks ago so Im looking fwd to the Rauchbier!

 

[TrickyDick]

We have a WOB opening soon near me. Hope they carry the weizen eisbock, sounds tasty and good inspiration for your first beer. Are you starting in January?

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

The goal here for my brewery "schedule" is to have the beers listed ready to drink on day 1 of the month listed. Im hoping to brew the Eisbock within the next 4 weeks.

 

[Spartan1979]

IIRC, Weizenbock was traditionally brewed by German brewers as a special holiday brew for their regulars. Something to consider for December?

 

[biertourist]

Love this idea, I've been doing the same myself for my last 3 brews except I'm not completely tied to doing them at certain times of the year.

Brewed a hefe following much of the Schneider Original techniques but held the 4vinylguiacol rest far too long and ended up with a whole lot of clove and not much banana (yes, this SOUNDS like Schneider but I even exceeded Schneider's phenolic clove levels, unfortunately).

Then a Munich Dunkel, and most recently an Oktoberfest. I was shooting for a modern German Oktoberfest recipe like you find at the festival today (1/2 Helles, 1/2 traditional Marzen); it's easily one of the best beers I've made but probably a touch too much hops both early and late. Don't get me wrong it's awesome beer, just a bit too hoppy for the style. Here's my recipe or what it's worth. http://www.beoir.org/community/index.php?f=30&t=9889&rb_v=viewtopic


I'm scheduling all of my lagers back-to-back-to-back so I can keep repropogating the yeast and have plenty of healthy lager yeast.

Next is a North German Pils. (I'm probably not going to do a Helles, at least for a while, because my Oktoberfest is so close to a helles.)
I'll probably go for a doppel sticke version of an alt bier, too for winter. (I've got the long-neck Zum Uringe doppel sticke bottle to put it in too.)


I might even use my HERMS coil to step mash starting with the pils. -I've got an insulated mashtun so modern German step mashes are quite difficult; I have stepped via additional infusions but I'm dying to try out the HERMS coil anyway.

These German styles are all about simple grists and managing the malt via step mashing so I'm trying to go that route on my recipes, too vs. complicated modern American / Jamil-like grists.

 

[biertourist]

IIRC, Weizenbock was traditionally brewed by German brewers as a special holiday brew for their regulars. Something to consider for December?

Wasn't weizenbock invented at the Schneider brewery?

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Love this idea, I've been doing the same myself for my last 3 brews except I'm not completely tied to doing them at certain times of the year.

Brewed a hefe following much of the Schneider Original techniques but held the 4vinylguiacol rest far too long and ended up with a whole lot of clove and not much banana (yes, this SOUNDS like Schneider but I even exceeded Schneider's phenolic clove levels, unfortunately).

Then a Munich Dunkel, and most recently an Oktoberfest. I was shooting for a modern German Oktoberfest recipe like you find at the festival today (1/2 Helles, 1/2 traditional Marzen); it's easily one of the best beers I've made but probably a touch too much hops both early and late. Don't get me wrong it's awesome beer, just a bit too hoppy for the style. Here's my recipe or what it's worth. http://www.beoir.org/community/index.php?f=30&t=9889&rb_v=viewtopic

I'm scheduling all of my lagers back-to-back-to-back so I can keep repropogating the yeast and have plenty of healthy lager yeast.

Next is a North German Pils. (I'm probably not going to do a Helles, at least for a while, because my Oktoberfest is so close to a helles.)
I'll probably go for a doppel sticke version of an alt bier, too for winter. (I've got the long-neck Zum Uringe doppel sticke bottle to put it in too.)

I might even use my HERMS coil to step mash starting with the pils. -I've got an insulated mashtun so modern German step mashes are quite difficult; I have stepped via additional infusions but I'm dying to try out the HERMS coil anyway.

These German styles are all about simple grists and managing the malt via step mashing so I'm trying to go that route on my recipes, too vs. complicated modern American / Jamil-like grists.

Where can I find out more about the Schneider brewery and their techniques??

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Well, I bottled my 11 gallons of Oktoberfest this past weekend. FG hit 1.009, and I think the estimated FG was 1.012. It had required a mash at 154, and I think I mashed at 152 (unintentionally). It is a lil bit light in body, but still very good!! Crystal clear and I drank 2 glasses straight from the bottling bucket lol. Cant wait til it conditions.

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Ive been enjoying my Oktoberfest and have been distracted from brewing to a large degree lately. But, I have the grains and hops for the Eisbock and a batch of 1.040 german pilsner wort on hand. My Wyeast Bohemian lager is on the stirplate. Im gonna cold crash it and step it up to a 1 gallon 1.060 starter and cold crash before I brew. Should brew it 10 days from now!

 

[ScootersAle]

This is a cool idea. I was thinking about doing something similar, although I was going to expand it to all Lagers, once I get a real lager setup, and I was just going to use Jamil's book. I've made about 10 or so recipes from the book so far, and they've all turned out great.

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

So, to prepare for my first 2 brews, I picked up a Wyeast 2124 Bohemian Lager while on a roadtrip to Chicago on Nov 2nd. I live in east central Illinois and usually have to get my specialty stuff from Indianapolis. This is the yeast for my Eisbock, the Steves 50 recipe from Brewing Classic styles. When I go to make the starter on the 3rd, Im writing down the info in the yeast from the packet, and see the manufacturing date is.... 3/13/13!!??! I'm thinking, this cant be good. Checked Mr Malty, it says viability is 10% lol. I pitched the yeast into 2 qts of 1.040 2-row wort on a stirplate and let it do its thing. Cold crashed it on Wed, Nov 6. On Sun, Nov 10, i poured off the "beer" and pitched the slurry into 3 qts of 1.060 2 row wort and had active and aggressive fermentation in 1 hour!!! With 1" of Krausen and constant airlock activity. It will get cold crashed soon and shud be ready by this weekend.
I also picked up a Wyeast 2308 Munich Lager on 11/9/13 and pitched it into 2 quarts of 1.040 dark DME (all I had around) wort on a stirplate. This is for my February Munich Dunkel from the same book. So, I WILL be brewing both my January Eisbock and February Munich Dunkel this weekend! Planning a decoction mash on both. Should be interesting. Thoughts anyone?

 

[Whippy]

I think I'd like to copy you, john.

Here's my schedule:

Jan: Dunkel
Feb: Dunkel
Mar: Dunkel
Apr: Dunkel
May: ... oh, you get the point

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

I think I'd like to copy you, john.

Here's my schedule:

Jan: Dunkel
Feb: Dunkel
Mar: Dunkel
Apr: Dunkel
May: ... oh, you get the point

Lol!! And a dunkel is really a cheap beer to brew. Buy one pkg of yeast, jus keep washing it. Buy munich II malt in bulk (150 lbs for 12 batches and 4 lbs of Carafa 2 for 12 batches in a year). Low hop bill! Excellent idea!

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Maybe 6 10 gallon batches in a year? Nail the water profile and perfect the decoction mash... Perfect

 

[Whippy]

My caveat is that I am not very experienced in brewing German beers, but I feel that the water along with the decoction is the key to making them great. Kidding from my former post aside, I do intend to also have a year of German brewing, being proud of my heritage as well My grain run usually coincides with Daytona 500 weekend, so it's a little early for me to start planning. I do know that the Dunkel will feature strongly, though lol ..love that beer!

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

So, planning these first two brews, I will be doing a decoction mash. Is there any reason, at all, to dough in at 127 deg. Arent all modern malts fully modified? And with no adjuncts, why can I dough in at 149, rest, pull a decoction, raise to 162, then boil and return to raise the whole mash to 162. Rest, then mash out?

 

[mlakota]

http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/Decoction_Mashing

This is a great resource for German brewing and decoctions. A protein rest is not needed with modern malts unless using a lot of wheat or other high protein grains (probably not even then).

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Thanks mlakota! That was a great read!

I jus doughed-in my Eishbock grain at 122. Let the decoction begin! Its pretty clear im going to change/alter my mash tun/HLT setup to do decoctions without losin it!

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Im deciocting in my boil keg, and the learning curve for temp control is high!

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Lessons learned on the decoction:

My goal was to dough in at 122, rest for 30, then pull 40% grist for the first decoction
Raise to 147 for 20 min, raise to 156 for 20 min, boil and return to raise the whole mash to 147.
Pull the second decoction of 40%, raise it to 156 for 20 min, boil it and return to raise it all to 156. Then mash out.

Well, the whole first decoction went as planned, then when I return it, I hit about 132!?! Had to pull 2 gallons of grist off and drain off 2 more gallons and boil each and put them back in.
Then the second decoction, I pulled 66%, and before I returned it after the boil, I drained off 2 gallons from the mash tun, and added all back in. I hit 157 no problem!!

Time to vorlauf!

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Final verdict:

I jus transferred 4.5 gallons into the primary with a F.G. Of 1.102!!! If this ferments out to the estimated F.G. of 1.022, it has a potential of 10.3% ABV BEFORE freeze concentration!!! I couldnt be happier!

 

[TrustyOlJohnson]

Despite the tornados that moved thrpugh central Illinois on Sunday, I started brewing my Munich Dunkel at about 6 pm. The decoction process went much more smoothly the second time. Because I cant heat the mash in my cooler, I have found that pulling 50-60% of the grist for the decoction and then when going from my final step of 156 to boiling, pulling 1-2 gallons of wort and adding it to the grist and boiling it too, allows me to raise the whole mash to the next step. This is especially required when raising the mash temp from 122 to 147, and less so when going from 147 to 156.
Also, I need to set up a prechiller arrangement to drop the wort to lager temps of 48 so I can pitch the yeast quicker. Right now my immersion chiller can get the wort to 70, but then I have to put it in the temp controlled freezer to get it to 48.
In the past my all grain beers with a single infusion mash take 5 hours. 2 decoction mash, 8 hours total.
Both the Eisbock and Munich Dunkel have airlock activity with 12 hours of pitching yeast.