Anyone have doppelbock experience?

[smarek82]

Looking to brew this soon so it's ready for christmas when family comes in. I'm looking for suggestions and/or reassurance that it should work as this will be the biggest beer I've ever done. There aren't very many doppelbocks in the recipe database.

8# pilsner malt
8# Weyermann Munich (10L)
6 oz Melanoidin Malt
4 oz De-husked Carafa I

1 oz hallertau 60min
1.5 oz saaz 45 min

Wyeast Bavarian Lager

Est OG: 1.090
FG: 1.020
IBU: 20
SRM: 18
Alc: 9.2%

Single infusion mash holding at 154degF for 75 min
Boiling for 90min to get final vol of 5 gal.

Plan on fermenting low 50's for 3 weeks with diacetyl rest mixed in there, then lagering at 34 until Christmas time.

Thanks

 

[mkling]

I make a doppelbock most years for Christmases (though this year I made a barleywine instead). I think your recipe basically looks fine with the mixture of pils & Munich malts. Hops look fine too. The only thing I'll point out is that I don't suspect you'll get near 1.090 with that grainbill. Keep in mind that the larger your grainbill is, the more your efficiency drops. I batch sparge & usually get ~77% efficiency when I brew average strength brews. However, when I brew high gravity, that drops to ~63% efficiency. I'd either account for that in my recipe or keep a couple pounds of DME around so you can adjust your gravity if it comes out low.

 

[cactusgarrett]

I agree with the comment on 1.090 OG with only 16lbs malt (unless you get crazy good efficiencies).

I like the choice of melanoidin malt, too. Make sure you pitch a HUGE yeast starter.

 

[wildwest450]

This is a zymurgy recipe, it turned out great.



Batch Size: 6.00 gal
Boil Size: 10.16 gal
Estimated OG: 1.072 SG
Estimated Color: 15.1 SRM
Estimated IBU: 25.8 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 80.00 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
9 lbs 4.0 oz Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 61.67 %
5 lbs Munich Malt - 10L (10.0 SRM) Grain 33.33 %
12.0 oz Caramunich Malt (56.0 SRM) Grain 5.00 %
1.80 oz Tettnang [3.80 %] (60 min) Hops 20.6 IBU
0.75 oz Tettnang [3.80 %] (20 min) Hops 5.2 IBU
1.00 items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs German Bock Lager (White Labs #WLP833) Yeast-Lager

 

[smarek82]

I normally get about 75%-80% efficiency with my set up, but I can see that by having so much grain, fermentables getting left behind. I am just using free edition of Beer Tools to come up with my vital stats.

I make a doppelbock most years for Christmases (though this year I made a barleywine instead). I think your recipe basically looks fine with the mixture of pils & Munich malts. Hops look fine too. The only thing I'll point out is that I don't suspect you'll get near 1.090 with that grainbill. Keep in mind that the larger your grainbill is, the more your efficiency drops. I batch sparge & usually get ~77% efficiency when I brew average strength brews. However, when I brew high gravity, that drops to ~63% efficiency. I'd either account for that in my recipe or keep a couple pounds of DME around so you can adjust your gravity if it comes out low.

What exactly would I do with the DME? How much would I need for each gravity point lost?

Thanks for the advice so far.

 

[mkling]

I normally get about 75%-80% efficiency with my set up, but I can see that by having so much grain, fermentables getting left behind. I am just using free edition of Beer Tools to come up with my vital stats.



What exactly would I do with the DME? How much would I need for each gravity point lost?

Thanks for the advice so far.

You could recalculate the recipe with the efficiency changed down to maybe 65% efficiency & see what your OG will be. That will help you decide if you want to add more grain or not.

The DME is just there in case you decide your gravity is too much lower than your target. If you aim for 1.090 & you get 1.075, are you gonna be satisfied? You can just add some DME for your last few minutes of the boil to up the gravity if it's too low. 1 lb of DME will add about 9 points of gravity to a 5 gallon batch (would raise a 1.075 beer up to 1.084).

 

[schristian619]

The recipe looks good to me. I agree that it's most likely not going to yield 1.090, but you could up the pilsner a little. I made my first back in march or so. I opted for a double decoction, also a first, and it turned out great. Well...it's still lagering, I'm planning on kegging it in sept/oct.
+1 on a huge starter. I brewed a schwarzbier and racked on the cake from that. Can't recall the exact recipe or numbers right now though.
Also, look at kaisers webpage. Heres a link to where he talks about doppelbocks...http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php/Imperator

 

[markg388]

I did a paler one, more like Paulaner Salvator rather than Spaten Optimator, and it came out real nice:

6# Pilsner
6# Munich - All malts from Weyermann, very important to use German malt.
6# Vienna
.5# Melanoiden

.96oz Magnum @ 12.5% - 29.6 IBU

Yeast - Entire yeast cake minus 1qt jar of saflager weheinstephan lager from a prior helles batch.

But there's a catch, it was the first brew I did in my new mash tun and I didn't hit my numbers. I had a very hard time stirring all the grain, and I didn't heat enough strike water to begin with so the mash was a total cluster-F. At the end of the day the OG was a lovely 1.068 (60% eff.) and there was a TON of trub, so not only is it weaker and dryer than I wanted it, I only bottled 4.25 gallons of it.

It's a tough beer to make, being both high gravity AND a lager, but it still turned out to be a wonderful helles-bock so I'm a happy camper.

 

[smarek82]

Thanks for the Wiki link, very helpful for what I'm looking at doing. Fortunatly all malt in question is Weyermann. I think I will try to drop my efficiency rating to 65% in order to pull it together the way I want. If I get at least 1.080, I'll be happy.

How big of a starter would I need? I went to Jamil's pitch rate calculator and that said I would need 3.6L starter.

For the starter could I ferment it at room temp to make sure it takes off? Or should I keep it at whatever temp I will be fermenting the doppel at?

Thanks for all the suggestions, criticism, etc.

 

[ShortSnoutBrewing]

I did a similar recipe to WildWest...but I did a double decoction and couldn't be happier. Brewed in January and is drinking great right now.

 

[schristian619]

For the starter, room temp is fine. You're going to decant it anyway (right?), so any off flavors are irrelevant.

 

[smarek82]

For the starter, room temp is fine. You're going to decant it anyway (right?), so any off flavors are irrelevant.

Oh hell yeah, with that large of a starter (~3000ml), I'm going to have to. I just never made a lager starter so I figured I'd ask, even though I'm sure its readily accessible if searched for.

Apparently I should have planned a little further back since most of you are hinting at letting this age near 6 months. I may go ahead and let about a case outta the bag for the holidays then let the other case sit for another 3-6 months.

 

[cactusgarrett]

A good rule of thumb I use is for every 8 OG gravity points, give it 7 days of lagering time. And with a BIGGER beer, longer could only help.


Therefore, 1.090 -> 90 ÷ 8 x 7 = 79 days.

 

[marc06]

When I made mine, I didnt let it lager long enough; I didnt have the patience. The last little bit of the keg was amazing!

 

[smarek82]

Agree on all ends, I do like your rule of thumb. Mostly what I have been reading is a week for every 10 points which would put me at 9 weeks possibly being premature.

Per the wiki link by kaiser, the longer it ages the more dark fruit and complexity will arise; ultimately what I am looking for. I am definitely thinking that since this is my first big beer I will pull out a bottle to enjoy every 3 months or so and take notes on how it changes. Traditionally I am not a very patient person, but with this I need to be!

Thanks...

 

[cactusgarrett]

One thing i did with my latest version is during the transfer to the secondary for lagering, i introduced a *little* more air than i normally do upon racking. I've read that a little oxidation yields the date-y, dark fruit characteristics as well, and it turned out very nice.

 

[markg388]

I did a similar recipe to WildWest...but I did a double decoction and couldn't be happier. Brewed in January and is drinking great right now.

My recipe needed more munich, so brew his .

 

[smarek82]

It seems that your recipe and mine are kinda the same with regards to equal parts munich and pilsner.

This is a zymurgy recipe, it turned out great.



Batch Size: 6.00 gal
Boil Size: 10.16 gal
Estimated OG: 1.072 SG
Estimated Color: 15.1 SRM
Estimated IBU: 25.8 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 80.00 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
9 lbs 4.0 oz Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 61.67 %
5 lbs Munich Malt - 10L (10.0 SRM) Grain 33.33 %
12.0 oz Caramunich Malt (56.0 SRM) Grain 5.00 %
1.80 oz Tettnang [3.80 %] (60 min) Hops 20.6 IBU
0.75 oz Tettnang [3.80 %] (20 min) Hops 5.2 IBU
1.00 items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs German Bock Lager (White Labs #WLP833) Yeast-Lager

I use Brewmasters warehouse and they only have 1 type of Munich. The Munich 10L. What is the other munich that seems to be only 1SRM lower? Any way of just subbing only munich 10L for 14.25#?

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

It seems that your recipe and mine are kinda the same with regards to equal parts munich and pilsner.



I use Brewmasters warehouse and they only have 1 type of Munich. The Munich 10L. What is the other munich that seems to be only 1SRM lower? Any way of just subbing only munich 10L for 14.25#?

Weyermann Munich Type II is 9L, their Munich Type I is only 6L. And FWIW, if the Caramunich is 56L then that should be right around where Weyermann Caramunich Type III is (Type I is ~35L and Type II is ~45L).

I just placed an order for some Munich malt and was going to order from BM but I couldn't find any info on the site about which Weyermann Light Munich they were selling, Type I or Type II so ended up going to another OHBS simply because they tell you exactly what you're getting (I wanted Munich Type I, I use a lot of that stuff). Where did you see the '10L' for the Weyermann Light Munich on the BM site? All I see are little color boxes (not to mention Weyermann is not 10L).

 

[Brewmasters Warehouse]

You should not have a problem just using all of the Munich we sell which is Type II (9 SRM). The caramunich is caramunich III so no problems there either.

Thanks,

Ed

PS - Those little color boxes can tell you the SRM of the grain. Just put your mouse over the color swab.

 

[smarek82]

Thanks for clarifying. I could have sworn that in the brewbuilder where you could drill down to select how much of 1 type of grain you needed, when looking at the lt. munich it was 10L.

Ed must have changed it up on the website because I just checked.

So therein lies the question, what is the 10SRM munich brand in the zymurgy recipe?

FWIW, I am looking at changing my recipe to a higher %age of munich.

Once brewed, tried, and true I will post a recipe to the database to widen the amount of recipes in the style.

 

[Brewmasters Warehouse]

Thanks for clarifying. I could have sworn that in the brewbuilder where you could drill down to select how much of 1 type of grain you needed, when looking at the lt. munich it was 10L.

Ed must have changed it up on the website because I just checked.

So therein lies the question, what is the 10SRM munich brand in the zymurgy recipe?

FWIW, I am looking at changing my recipe to a higher %age of munich.

Once brewed, tried, and true I will post a recipe to the database to widen the amount of recipes in the style.

The 10 SRM Munich may have been Briess Munich, which is 10 SRM. You could use a higher percentage of Munich but you are already at 95% Munich between the 2.

 

[markg388]

Only use Briess Munich if you want your beer to taste like Gordon Biersch. Still good, but not as good as the Germans.

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

Only use Briess Munich if you want your beer to taste like Gordon Biersch. Still good, but not as good as the Germans.

Briess makes a 'regular' Munich 10L that is 6-row and their Bonlander Munich 10L is 2-row. Not sure which one you're talking about and I've never used either but I wouldn't use the regular Munich 10L for a base. For a Dopplebock I agree, use continental malt if possible.