Groom to be needs inspiration for wedding brews

[Deathrage]

Hello all! Great to be here! So I have a few questions for you guys if it's not to much. So for a little background before I start asking questions/recommendations. I am new to home brewing, I just started the primary fermentation on my 4th 1 gal batch yesterday. I have been doing my best to read and understand things, and I'm getting better (reading "how to brew" by John Palmer).

So here is my dilemma. I just proposed to my GF last week and kind of had an epiphany after we booked the venue (big day is in October). The idea was to brew some special beers to be served along with all the other alcohol for the special day. I was thinking of two different beers, one manly beer based off the groom, and a kind of light and/or fruity beer based off the bride. I'm looking for recommendations on some recipes, and also if there is any place that could print labels for the bottles

 

[Teromous]

Barleywine - Maybe a Bigfoot clone
Tasty wheat beer - Maybe an Oberon clone

I think it would be good to have a high ABV dark barleywine to represent the tuxedo (and get everyone smashed) and a light low ABV wheat beer to represent the dress (for those who don't want to get smashed). You could have orange slices for those who like to have oranges with their wheat beers.

Alternatively you could always just brew two beers that you like, and serve Mimosas to people who want something fruity.

 

[Deathrage]

Barley wine is a good choice, might be better than the vanilla bourbon porter I was considering.

I'll be picking up supplies to start doing 5 gal batches.

So far I have only been doing extract brewing. All grain brewing is still a bit intimidating

 

[sandyeggoxj]

First, can your venue let you serve outside alcohol? Liquor licenses can get complicated.

Second, what do you like? Do you have hobbies that can be represented in beer?

 

[socratesbrewing]

I did a patersbier and a mild for my wedding. I kept them simple and low abv.

 

[ol-hazza]

How about and english ale, you could call it "my wifes bitter".

 

[Deathrage]

It's kind of a smaller wedding, and they don't have a liquor license and the stipulation was we would have to bring own.

I am personally a fan of barrel aged stouts and porters. But I love nearly all beer. She has been asking. If I could some how replicate some of the fruity Belgian beers. She remembers having this green apple ale that she loved.

 

[Teromous]

It's kind of a smaller wedding, and they don't have a liquor license and the stipulation was we would have to bring own.

I am personally a fan of barrel aged stouts and porters. But I love nearly all beer. She has been asking. If I could some how replicate some of the fruity Belgian beers. She remembers having this green apple ale that she loved.

You could also consider doing a bourbon barrel porter. The apple beer your wife was talking about...is it one of these? (they are the two most common ones I see available in bottle shops)

 

[aprichman]

I would do a IIPA around 9% as the "groom beer" and then a wheat beer with whatever fruit is in season and locally available for the "bride beer".

 

[Deathrage]

You could also consider doing a bourbon barrel porter. The apple beer your wife was talking about...is it one of these? (they are the two most common ones I see available in bottle shops)

Those are not the ones, what sucks is she is really picky in what beers eh likes, one out of 20 beers she tries of mine she might be ok with, then maybe 1 out of 50 she might actually like.

Also how would I do a bourbon barrel porter at home? Do you just add some bourbon? Or do I have to get an actual bourbon barrel which seems a bit unreadable.

As for adding fruit. How do you add it to the batch? Do you juice them? Add them to primary or secondary fermentation (I have yet to do a secondary fermentation....don't have the supplies....yet lol)

 

[Zuljin]

A honey beer. Mead, if there's time. There's all kinds of history of honey and weddings.

 

[MirImage]

Congrats! Wanted to do this for ours, but we couldn't bring any alcohol in.

For a bourbon barrel check out oak spirals or chips. You can get different char levels and you can soak that in bourbon. If you start now you have some time to play around with the levels you'd like. Keep in mind a stronger beer will need some more time.

May consider making a beer that more people may enjoy. I obviously don't know your friends/family but remember they're giving you presents .

 

[treacheroustexan]

I am kind of in the same boat. I haven't proposed yet, but I have all of our wedding beer planned out! haha. My advice is, if you are wanting to do all grain, then just do it. No need to be intimidated! As a new brewer, it seems scary reading about it online at first. I was intimidated too for my first AG brew, but all it took was for me to jump in and do it and just learn as I went along. I'm 3 batches of all grain in now and I have never tasted better beer! So my advice, just go for it.

For the wedding, I guess it would depend on the season. But I would say do a stout with whiskey soaked oak chips. For the girl, maybe do a mead (honey wine) or a really fruit wheat beer.

 

[madcowbrewing]

What we did when we got married was two-fold. (We asked permission to serve our own beer at the reception…even without a liquor license they will be responsible unless you sign a waiver.) We had 4 different beers on tap, two were mine and two were from a friend that owned a brewery. We had one porter, an IPA, a wheat, and an amber…covered it all. Then on top of that one of the original plans was as favors we were going to give 2 different beers to people. They were to be either drank right away or aged for our one year anniversary. I made an Old Ale for the groom beer and an Imperial Wit for the bride’s beer. The old ale was dark and malty, the imperial wit was light and fruity.

For your tastes, I would choose one you really like for a dark beer and try just a regular Belgian wit for the fruity one.

 

[aviator01]

This beer would be a great option for "her" beer. Crisp, clean and plenty of great flavor. I'm a big fan and all who've tried it love it.

Wheat Beer - American Wheat or Rye Beer
================================================================================
Batch Size: 5.585 gal
Boil Size: 6.835 gal
Boil Time: 60.000 min
Efficiency: 70%
OG: 1.052
FG: 1.013
ABV: 5.0%
Bitterness: 23.5 IBUs (Tinseth)
Color: 5 SRM (Morey)

Fermentables
================================================================================
Name Type Amount Mashed Late Yield Color
Briess - 2 Row Brewers Malt Grain 4.500 lb Yes No 80% 2 L
White Wheat Malt Grain 5.500 lb Yes No 86% 2 L
Briess - 2 Row Caramel Malt 40L Grain 8.000 oz Yes No 77% 40 L
Honey Extract 1.000 lb No Yes 80% 1 L
Total grain: 11.500 lb

Hops
================================================================================
Name Alpha Amount Use Time Form IBU
Willamette 5.0% 1.000 oz Boil 60.000 min Pellet 14.7
Cascade 6.0% 1.000 oz Boil 15.000 min Pellet 8.8

Misc
================================================================================
Name Type Use Amount Time
Ginger Root Herb Boil 1.000 oz 10.000 min
Irish Moss Fining Boil 1.000 tsp 15.000 min

Yeast
================================================================================
Name Type Form Amount Stage
Safale S-05 Ale Dry 2.232 tsp Primary

Mash
================================================================================
Name Type Amount Temp Target Time
Infusion 3.281 gal 174.941 F 152.000 F 60.000 min
Final Batch Sparge Infusion 4.896 gal 178.898 F 165.200 F 15.000 min

 

[JayDubWill]

Given you just started homebrewing doing something like an apple lambic is pretty tough. You would probably have better luck with brewing an American wheat and adding some apple flavoring. Flavorings can be found at most homebrew shops. As far as the high alcohol beers why in the world would you want to do that to yourself and your guests? Unless you don't want to be conscience by midnight and you only invite guests from your homebrew club there are not a lot of people who will enjoy, let alone appreciate, a beer as big as a barleywine or pumpkin peach bourbon barrel aged imperial smoked porter (That actually sounds pretty good, but i'm getting off topic). My best advice and sage wisdom I can give you is to brew your beers in the normal abv range of 4-5% so Uncle Frank isn't stupid drunk making farting sounds at passing bridesmaids in the corner before the cake is cut. A regular porter done well will please most who prefer craft beer and the rest can swill bud light.

 

[Skin5482]

Congrats! I'm in almost the same boat as you. I proposed back in October 2014 and we're getting married in October 2015. I really wanted to serve my beer at the reception but we had a hard time finding a place that would let us so we decided to do a beer as a wedding favor. My fiance loves stouts, I love IPAs so I went with a big stout for the wedding brew. I used this recipe and bumped it up a little so it was around 10% alcohol. It's a celebration, the beer should be big right?

Chocolate Espresso Stout

 

[Deathrage]

Given you just started homebrewing doing something like an apple lambic is pretty tough. You would probably have better luck with brewing an American wheat and adding some apple flavoring. Flavorings can be found at most homebrew shops. As far as the high alcohol beers why in the world would you want to do that to yourself and your guests? Unless you don't want to be conscience by midnight and you only invite guests from your homebrew club there are not a lot of people who will enjoy, let alone appreciate, a beer as big as a barleywine or pumpkin peach bourbon barrel aged imperial smoked porter (That actually sounds pretty good, but i'm getting off topic). My best advice and sage wisdom I can give you is to brew your beers in the normal abv range of 4-5% so Uncle Frank isn't stupid drunk making farting sounds at passing bridesmaids in the corner before the cake is cut. A regular porter done well will please most who prefer craft beer and the rest can swill bud light.

Well since me and my fiance are paying for the wedding all ourselves, we can't really afford a huge wedding that lasts half the day. We managed to get a nice small cute venue for 3 hours to host the ceremony and reception with a little bit of food. Soooooooooooooooooo, unless someone is trying really hard, there should not be enough time to get "shwastedhammered"

I'm not dead set on any particular style.... Sure I do want it to kind of reflect me a bit, but I want a brew that kind of signifies the groom and bride (and now maybe the guests.... Ugggggg). So far I'm leaning toward a nice Porter for the groom I think but am still open to suggestions (thinking Bourbon vanilla porter). But have no clue for the bride except for it being fruity. I might also do a simple beer for all the other jokers..... Something a bit more drinkable to the masses.

 

[kombat]

How big of a batch are you looking at brewing? Do you have any way to accurately and precisely control your fermentation temperatures?

 

[blackbeer]

since you are a beginning brewer, my advice is to follow the KISS principle. due to the timeframe, a huge beer like a BW might not be ready. shoot for a nice IPA around 55 IBU and 7% ABV and a light barley/wheat ale around 15 IBU and 4% ABV. both doable in this timeframe and appropriate in my opinion. lots of folks on here could contribute exact recipes/procedures for those.

 

[JonM]

I don't know if you and your bride-to-be are pun people, but there's a thread somewhere on HBT that's full of wedding beer names like "Hoppliy Ever After" and "For Richer or for Porter."

 

[JayDubWill]

Well since me and my fiance are paying for the wedding all ourselves, we can't really afford a huge wedding that lasts half the day. We managed to get a nice small cute venue for 3 hours to host the ceremony and reception with a little bit of food. Soooooooooooooooooo, unless someone is trying really hard, there should not be enough time to get "shwastedhammered"

I'm not dead set on any particular style.... Sure I do want it to kind of reflect me a bit, but I want a brew that kind of signifies the groom and bride (and now maybe the guests.... Ugggggg). So far I'm leaning toward a nice Porter for the groom I think but am still open to suggestions (thinking Bourbon vanilla porter). But have no clue for the bride except for it being fruity. I might also do a simple beer for all the other jokers..... Something a bit more drinkable to the masses.

In that case then I agree a bigger beer would be appropriate. It would actually be pretty easy to do bourbon vanilla porter, it just takes time. The question is if you want oak in there or not. If you do, someone already mentioned soaking some oak cubes in bourbon, and that's a great way to go. Adding a vanilla bean split in half will add another layer of complexity. Here is how I would do it, you may already have this or something like it in mind (i'm not trying to insult your intelligence here). This would be for 5 gallons:

1. Read this article: Oak in your beer.

2. Use the oak cubes, preferable french or Hungarian since they will give you the most control over the amount of oak flavor. I really like the French oak medium toast cubes, you can buy them at Midwest supply but they have other options, it really depends on your taste. If you don't want oak flavor, just skip it and add the vanilla bean to the bourbon during the last two weeks of primary.

3. Don't skimp on quality here. Buy a real Madagascar vanilla bean. They have them at world market and whole foods for about $4 each. One will give you a nice background note, two will be more upfront and three beans will be very noticeable. Also buy a bourbon that you enjoy drinking. No need to spend a ton here, but you don't want the cheap stuff either.

4. [Three months before wedding] Brew your robust porter. A higher alcohol porter that's a bit darker with more flavor will fall into this category. Add 1oz of oak cubes to 1 cup of bourbon in a mason jar and let sit while beer is in primary.

5. [Two months before wedding] Transfer to secondary after 3-4 weeks in primary to get the beer off the yeast. Add oak cubes and bourbon from the mason jar to the secondary. After two weeks pull a sample and taste it. Don't worry about the bourbon we will be adding more later. You're checking for oak flavor. If it's at the point you want then keg it. If bottling hold off a bit, we still need to add the vanilla. If you want more oak flavor, let it sit another two weeks. Personally I've found one month on oak to be a nice amount.

6. [Two months before wedding] Check for oak flavor, if you want more add another ounce to a cup of bourbon and this time also split the vanilla beans and add to the mason jar. Let it sit for a week then dump everything into the carboy. If you added more oak check it every week for flavor. When it's at the level you like bottle or keg. If you didn't add any oak, bottle or keg after a week or two. This gives you about six weeks for the bottles to carb, since the extra time may be needed for a higher alcohol beer.

Keep in mind a pint (two cups) of 40% alcohol will raise 5gal by 1%. Sorry for the dissertation, I hope it helps.

 

[JayDubWill]

I forgot to add since your thinking of doing a third beer for the masses check out Biermunchers Cream of Three Crops or his Centennial Blonde. Can't go wrong with either of those.

 

[sfish]

Suggest a honeymead. Here is why.

Well I once heard that long ago before hops they could not ship beer from town to town because it would spoil. Hops being a good preservative enabled commerse to happen. So small villagers would be making beer and it would stay local, personal and friendly.

Now when there was a marrage the brewer would make a special batch using honey we all know as mead. As a gift he would give pitcher of the honey mead to the newlyweds for them to drink each night. They would drink it before going to bed for a month. A month because...

They measured time then by the moon phases and a month they would call from moon to moon. So the couple would enjoy honey mead for a moon phase and hense the word "honeymoon" began


You might consider a brown ale instead of the porter IMO it will be more liked by the masses. To me it seems people frown on darker beers.

 

[EJay]

For a newish brewer who must get this right, and it must be ready to drink on a specific date, I have to agree with those who are saying go simple. Maybe something like a Pale Ale and a Blonde.

The more complicated and bigger the recipe, the more to go wrong, and the longer it takes.

Go simple, your bride-to-be is going to make your life difficult for awhile, because you're going to be dwelling over this shade of yellow or that one for the invitations, etc. Keep the beer simple and give yourself one less torpedo in the water.

 

[myelo]

Well since me and my fiance are paying for the wedding all ourselves, we can't really afford a huge wedding that lasts half the day. We managed to get a nice small cute venue for 3 hours to host the ceremony and reception with a little bit of food. Soooooooooooooooooo, unless someone is trying really hard, there should not be enough time to get "shwastedhammered"

3 hours not enough time to get hammered with free beer? As my people say .... "Watch this!"

 

[cernst151]

Congratulations!

For the groom's beer I'd recommend a porter over a barleywine. I think barleywine is a very acquired taste that a lot of your guests probably haven't acquired. Since it's October maybe a pumpkin porter if you're into that kind of thing. Otherwise I like the other suggestions of an oak barrel porter.

For your wife, since she's not a big fan of beer, maybe do a cider or a graff. Cider is ridiculously easy to do and can be very good if you start with high quality cider. If you want to try a graff (cider with some beer wort) look up "Brandon O's Graff" here on HBT. Whichever you do, don't forget yeast nutrient to avoid farty smells.

 

[MacBruver]

For our wedding, I brewed two beers along the lines of what you're thinking. For the lighter one, I did a belgian witbier with jasmine rice and honey, since bees were kind of a running theme in our ceremony. It was a big hit, and all 10 gallons of it ended up gone.

The other beer was a rich oatmeal stout based on my own clone recipe of Firestone Walker's velvet merlin. It didn't go as quickly, but as soon as the wit was gone people started drinking more of the stout. The non-beer drinkers just assumed they wouldn't like a dark beer, but once there was nothing else they tried it and liked it.

Keep it simple. Not everyone is going to have a craft beer palate, and if you have lots of other different foods etc going on, not all beers will pair well with it. If you're interested in either recipe, I can dig them up.

 

[fimpster]

If it were me picking beers to represent my wife and I, the bride beer would be a light (color and ABV) session IPA, and the groom beer would be a wee heavy. That would suit us perfectly, but wouldn't suit everybody.

As has already been mentioned, mead is appropriate for a wedding.

And as far as all grain brewing goes, just do it if you have an interest in it. I brewed for over a decade with extract and specialty grains. I did some pretty advanced techniques using those ingredients too. When I finally made the jump to all grain, I realized it wasn't any harder than some of the brews I'd already been doing. Now I wonder why it took me so long.

 

[Deathrage]

In that case then I agree a bigger beer would be appropriate. It would actually be pretty easy to do bourbon vanilla porter, it just takes time. The question is if you want oak in there or not. If you do, someone already mentioned soaking some oak cubes in bourbon, and that's a great way to go. Adding a vanilla bean split in half will add another layer of complexity. Here is how I would do it, you may already have this or something like it in mind (i'm not trying to insult your intelligence here). This would be for 5 gallons:

1. Read this article: Oak in your beer.

2. Use the oak cubes, preferable french or Hungarian since they will give you the most control over the amount of oak flavor. I really like the French oak medium toast cubes, you can buy them at Midwest supply but they have other options, it really depends on your taste. If you don't want oak flavor, just skip it and add the vanilla bean to the bourbon during the last two weeks of primary.

3. Don't skimp on quality here. Buy a real Madagascar vanilla bean. They have them at world market and whole foods for about $4 each. One will give you a nice background note, two will be more upfront and three beans will be very noticeable. Also buy a bourbon that you enjoy drinking. No need to spend a ton here, but you don't want the cheap stuff either.

4. [Three months before wedding] Brew your robust porter. A higher alcohol porter that's a bit darker with more flavor will fall into this category. Add 1oz of oak cubes to 1 cup of bourbon in a mason jar and let sit while beer is in primary.

5. [Two months before wedding] Transfer to secondary after 3-4 weeks in primary to get the beer off the yeast. Add oak cubes and bourbon from the mason jar to the secondary. After two weeks pull a sample and taste it. Don't worry about the bourbon we will be adding more later. You're checking for oak flavor. If it's at the point you want then keg it. If bottling hold off a bit, we still need to add the vanilla. If you want more oak flavor, let it sit another two weeks. Personally I've found one month on oak to be a nice amount.

6. [Two months before wedding] Check for oak flavor, if you want more add another ounce to a cup of bourbon and this time also split the vanilla beans and add to the mason jar. Let it sit for a week then dump everything into the carboy. If you added more oak check it every week for flavor. When it's at the level you like bottle or keg. If you didn't add any oak, bottle or keg after a week or two. This gives you about six weeks for the bottles to carb, since the extra time may be needed for a higher alcohol beer.

Keep in mind a pint (two cups) of 40% alcohol will raise 5gal by 1%. Sorry for the dissertation, I hope it helps.

Now this sounds like my kind of beer, and not all that complex to brew either either! I also appreciate everyone else contribution. I'm thinking maybe I'll call it "groomsman secret service". I was also thinking of doing a 5 gal batch of each beer. I think for the beer for the masses maybe a easy to make beer like an IPA since I'll be spending a lot of time doing the other beers.

Welp....guess it's time to go to the home brew store this weekend and pick up the bigger beer kit this weekend. How far in advance do you think I could start bottling as long as I sanitize well?

All that is left is to nail down the other beers. I'm still in hopes I can figure out a green apple type ale, but if it ends up being to difficult might do a cider or something like someone else suggested. And not dead set on the IPA either

 

[Kiichi]

For the bride maybe a light wheat beer with rose pedals and honey added? Perhaps using a wit yeast? That way you can have it light and dry, but still retain some body due to the wheat, with mellow flavors. And roses are obviously fitting.

I have something like that on my list of things to try too. Already got my roses...

 

[JayDubWill]

Now this sounds like my kind of beer, and not all that complex to brew either either! I also appreciate everyone else contribution. I'm thinking maybe I'll call it "groomsman secret service". I was also thinking of doing a 5 gal batch of each beer. I think for the beer for the masses maybe a easy to make beer like an IPA since I'll be spending a lot of time doing the other beers.

Welp....guess it's time to go to the home brew store this weekend and pick up the bigger beer kit this weekend. How far in advance do you think I could start bottling as long as I sanitize well?

All that is left is to nail down the other beers. I'm still in hopes I can figure out a green apple type ale, but if it ends up being to difficult might do a cider or something like someone else suggested. And not dead set on the IPA either

For the green apple beer, I suggest a little exbeeriment. Go pick up a sixer of shock top, blue moon, Widmer's hefe, or whatever your favorite wheat beer is and also pick up some apple extract flavoring from your LHBS. Using a dropper put a few drops of flavoring into the wheat beer and see if your fiancée likes the flavor. Once you hit the right level count out how many drops it took for 12 oz of beer. 20 drops is a ml so you can calculate how much you would need for 5 gallons. Some might call this cheating, I call it playing it safe on a beer you can't mess up.

What hops do you have in in mind for the IPA? My suggestion is magnum for bittering and citra for aroma and flavor. Citra is such a crowd pleaser even non-IPA drinkers like it. I like magnum since it's a clean bitter, not catty or dank. Keep it balanced or slightly towards bitter with the late hop additions. What I mean is if you add 35 IBU's of magnum at 60 minutes add 30 IBU's between 20 minutes and flameout and/or whirlpool. You need enough malt to provide a nice platform for the hops as well. You could easily go 6-7% with 65 IBU's and have it be balanced. There are hundreds of ways you could brew an IPA (or any beer really), finding a clone of a commercial example of what you like is not a bad idea.

 

[pointcity-homebrew]

For the ladies, AHS has a Pink IPA, that uses hibiscus. For the men I would also go with a stout or porter.

 

[Newsman]

(snip)

All that is left is to nail down the other beers. I'm still in hopes I can figure out a green apple type ale, but if it ends up being to difficult might do a cider or something like someone else suggested. And not dead set on the IPA either

If you're interested in cider check out this thread.
Look around post #420 for the most recent thread. If you want it a bit sweeter, you can add a can of frozen concentrated white grape juice for back-sweetening. I like to make my own cinnamon extract. I get a small bottle of spiced rum, a jar of cinnamon sticks and pour the rum in the bottle of cinnamon sticks. I made a slightly stronger batch of this for a SF convention and it was a hit. I used about 1 cup of brown sugar and 1 cup of apple juice to make the syrup and put about a tablespoon of homemade cinnamon extract in there. You can also add a teaspoon or so of vanilla extract to add a little more complex flavor. As always, add to your taste. If you like a lot of cinnamon, add more extract. If you like less cinnamon, add less.

 

[Deathrage]

If you're interested in cider check out this thread.

Look around post #420 for the most recent thread. If you want it a bit sweeter, you can add a can of frozen concentrated white grape juice for back-sweetening. I like to make my own cinnamon extract. I get a small bottle of spiced rum, a jar of cinnamon sticks and pour the rum in the bottle of cinnamon sticks. I made a slightly stronger batch of this for a SF convention and it was a hit. I used about 1 cup of brown sugar and 1 cup of apple juice to make the syrup and put about a tablespoon of homemade cinnamon extract in there. You can also add a teaspoon or so of vanilla extract to add a little more complex flavor. As always, add to your taste. If you like a lot of cinnamon, add more extract. If you like less cinnamon, add less.

Wow, that cider sounds amazing! Hmmmmmmmmmmm.....ink we have a winner!

 

[Newsman]

Wow, that cider sounds amazing! Hmmmmmmmmmmm.....ink we have a winner!

It's great... but a word of warning... when it's back-sweetened, it is hard to tell there's any alcohol in it.

 

[Deathrage]

It's great... but a word of warning... when it's back-sweetened, it is hard to tell there's any alcohol in it.

I'm excited to try this cider (my first cider) I just put my grooms beer in primary fermentation yesterday (vanilla bourbon porter) and the OG is 1.070 so hopefully if I did things correctly and had a good enough yeast starter I should hit 9%ABV......hopefully.....