Brewing a Maibock today - Any pointers?

[SublimeBW]

Hey gang!

Pretty excited to brew my first higher gravity beer today with the AiH Man-o-War Maibock. This is my first time using a liquid yeast and a starter and cannot wait for work to finish (hence why I am on a brew forum). I went with an ale yeast instead of a lager since I want it to be ready by the first weekend of May (3 weeks in fermentation and 3 weeks in the bottle) so it isn't a "true Maibock (or so I read).

If you have any pointers/hints for brewing specifically a Maibock, higher gravity beers in general or starters please fire way. If not I will post later with some updates!

 

[solbes]

Which ale yeast are you using? I think it will turn out good, but it's difficult to replicate that really clean lager taste with an ale yeast. Using a hybrid yeast like wy2565 Kolsch certainly helps, but you can ferment in the mid 50's F with that yeast.

To get as close as you can with an ale yeast, I would find out the lowest fermentation temp for your particular yeast strain. Chill your wort a degree cooler than that, aerate the crap out of the wort, and pitch your yeast starter. Try to keep it on the very low end for fermenting temps until its nearly done fermenting. Then raise 1 degree per day for 3 days to let it finish up. Then drop it back 4-5 degrees for a week or two to clean up. Rack or cold crash, then bottle.