First All Grain Brew - Belgian Dark Strong

[SirSpectre]

On Friday I am making the jump! First all grain, and first home made recipe. I was always partial to Belgian styles so i thought this will be a good one to start on. The plan in to take this recipe and experiment and refine until its just the way I like.

Recipe:

13lbs Pale 2 Row Belgian Pils
1.5lbs Caramunich
.66 lbs Special B
.33 lbs aromatic
1.5 lbs candi sugar
1 oz Hallertau/northern brewer (depends on what i can get) @ 60 min
1 oz E Kent Goldings at 5 min

300 B cells of Wyeast Labs 1214 (Belgain Abbey Ale/ Chimay strain)

153* 1 hour mash single infusion with no mash out 19 quarts. Fly Sparge w/ 3.5 gal @ 168*

Intended to be a 2 stage Ferment and as long as i can be patient for bottle age


I just made my mashtun with a square cooler and a copper manifold style. Stainless rest of the system.

Ignore the manifold. A fellow all grain brewer schooled me in my wrong ways and it has been fixed. (Only photos i have currently)

First step is ingredient shopping!

If any one has any advice or "OMG STOP NOW AND DO THIS" advice, I'm all ears!

 

[m00ps]

I'd definitely mash at like 150. You've got a lot of unfermentables with those 3 lbs cara-malts. (may want to replace a pound of more of those with something traditional like wheat) BSDAs still have a pretty lean body relative to other dark beers like stouts.

 

[SirSpectre]

Ahh you're right. Recommended no more than 10% in grain bill. Caramunich alone was 12%

Dropped munich to 1.5 lbs. Dropped biscuit completely.

Added 1 lb to pale malt

 

[m00ps]

That looks pretty solid. My last BSDA was with the same yeast and was my best attempt yet. Bit of advice: use a blowoff tube. Seriously

Here's the recipe for reference if you do any more tweaking:
9.0 pilsner
2.0 Munich
1.0 torrified wheat
0.5 special B
0.5 caramunich
1.0 D90 candi syrup
1.0 D180 candi syrup

@60:1.0 styrian goldings
@20:2.0 saaz
@0: 1.0 saaz & 0.5 coriander & 0.5 sweet orange peel

pitch at mid 60s, let it free rise, bump up temp near end (low 80s) of fermentation if needed to get yeast to finish

 

[BlueHouseBrewhaus]

Because of the pils you may want to consider a 2 step mash. I just bottled a BDSA that I mashed 131F and 150F. I've even done a 3 step at 131/145/158. It helps give you more fermentability (lower FG) and supposedly helps with the pils, although I have heard that it may not really be necessary with modern grains.

And definitely use a blowoff. I used the WLP Abbey Ale (Westmalle) with 3.5 gal in a 5 gal carboy and still almost blew the blowoff tube out. Eight inches of krausen! I did 3 days at 68F and then ramped up to 78F until the krausen fell. Then back to 68 for 3 weeks. Be sure to give the yeast plenty of time to finish. I do a minimum of 5 weeks in the fermenter. I had one Belgian that dropped 4 points between weeks 3 and 5. Enjoy!

 

[SirSpectre]

Because of the pils you may want to consider a 2 step mash. I just bottled a BDSA that I mashed 131F and 150F. I've even done a 3 step at 131/145/158. It helps give you more fermentability (lower FG) and supposedly helps with the pils, although I have heard that it may not really be necessary with modern grains.

And definitely use a blowoff. I used the WLP Abbey Ale (Westmalle) with 3.5 gal in a 5 gal carboy and still almost blew the blowoff tube out. Eight inches of krausen! I did 3 days at 68F and then ramped up to 78F until the krausen fell. Then back to 68 for 3 weeks. Be sure to give the yeast plenty of time to finish. I do a minimum of 5 weeks in the fermenter. I had one Belgian that dropped 4 points between weeks 3 and 5. Enjoy!

Yikes!

Yeah I learned the power of blow off tube with my last batch of Hefewiezen. Blew nice smells and krausen all over my closet. Definitely going to use a blow off here. I tend to like lower fermentation temps. I fermented my recent tripel at 62* (!!!!!!) and it came out amazing. Took a few extra days though. This one, I am thinking 68* for 3-4 days and then down to the basement for remainder of primary. 2 months in secondary at room temp (66-70 usually) then room temp for bottle aging for a month, then basement for who knows how long.

I think a 2 step would be better as well, but I lack the equipment to do it. This is more of an experimental batch anyway. We'll see how it turns out. Starting up the burner in about 4 hours!

(also just got the grain. 15 lbs of grain is a lot more than i thought it was! 6 gallon bucket fills passed 4 gal mark!)

 

[SirSpectre]

Brew night was a success!

My equipment profile in Beer Smith need some refining.

Mash temp was 152* 18 Quarts of water

My Pre-boil Gravity was 1.051 with 5.8ish gallons of wort. So like 42% efficiency? What can i do to get that higher? I used a batch sparge method.

OG after boil was 1.088. Estimated at 1.091. So not too shabby there.

Color was dead on what I wanted.

5.2 ish gallons to ferment for a while. Blow off tube installed.

Pretty happy with the OG and color results so far. Can't wait until its done.

 

[SirSpectre]

Update:

Fermentation took place around 72 degrees. It was suspiciously fast. Finished in 4 days.

FG reading 1.012. Right on target and smells absolutely divine.

I'll be moving it to secondary tonight while the yeast is still in suspension and leaving it at room temp for a week or 2, then down to basement temp for a few weeks.

 

[SirSpectre]

I got slightly impatient and decided to bottle after 5 weeks in secondary. Got 44 bottles out of it -1 due to dropping my case

Smells faintly of caramel, and tastes pretty good. A little grainy, and a little watery. Didn't smell or taste any fusels at all! I upped the Co2 vol a little more than i normally due. Hopefully get a better feel out of it. Going to leave it for a week and give it a taste with a little carbonation to it, then leave it to finish conditioning and aging for 2 months at least.

 

[m00ps]

Yeah let it age. My strong belgians are pretty tasty after a month in the bottle, but its the ones I leave in my closet for 6months+ that are great

 

[SirSpectre]

its been 2 months in the bottle and HOLY CRAP does it taste awesome! :rockin:

I can't believe the change it made from 6 weeks ago, to 4 weeks, to now. I'm not sure this is going to last long. Better make another batch and hide a few of this batch away for another 6-9 months!

 

[m00ps]

nice, do yourself a favor and stash at least a 6pack away int he back of the closet. Out of sight out of mind.