Winter Seasonal Beer Holly (Christmas Ale)

[DagoBrewer]

Just stopped at my LHBS and picked up everything for my brew day tomorow!! I used crystal 120 instead of the uk medium and gonna use wlp001 cuz thats my favorite yeast for ales!! Ill post some pics and updates tomorow!

 

[DagoBrewer]

All went well today, i ended up with an OG of 1.078 and hit 80% according to brewersfriend.com! I did a half oz of 12.6% cenntenials for the first wort hop just cuz im a total hop head! The color was absolutely beautiful, a nice deep reddish color! I cant wait to taste this one after a couple months of conditioning!!
Cheers!

 

[adam01]

A word of warning to you who brew...

I brewed this last November! Used way too much spice tea - cinnamon out the wazoo,
ginger slickness on your tongue for a long time (it almost tingled.)

10 months later the cinamon is only an aroma (good) but the ginger is a long aftertaste.
At 9.3%, its tasty and warm. I thought I threw this out. Now I'll keep it for this Christmas.

 

[DagoBrewer]

Maybe you just used to much of the "spice" ingedients... Ive done that before.

I just tasted my winter lager from last season which had way to much ginger and cinamon.. Its clear as F...!! But still has too much ginger taste!

 

[brando632]

Can anyone spare the specifics of their ingredients for the tea? I made this last year, and used the prescribed amount of fresh grated ginger root, one of the cinnamon sticks from the grocery store (the stick was probably three inches long, Kroger brand I think, came with multiple ones in a red and white metal can), a vanilla bean from whole foods, simply split down the middle, and the prescribed amount of bitter orange peel from the LHBS. After six weeks in the bottle, it was ALL ginger, and overbearing. No orange peel, vanilla, or cinnamon whatsoever. I tried one a few days ago, nine months later, and still overpowering ginger. Finally dumped the batch to free the bottles, with the exception of three bottles. So what went wrong? I'm gonna try it again this year, because of all the raves it gets on here when you hit it right. The beer was awesome before bottling, so I'll probably try to bottle half without the tea, and half with. Anyone see any issues with my tea process? I'm probably gonna go with the dehydrated ginger this time around. How long is the cinnamon stick you use? Do you scrape out the insides of the vanilla bean, or just split it down the middle?

 

[jmo88]

Hopefully people that make this beer really think the spice step through completely. Spices are extremely variable and if you just make a quart of the tea using my directions and just toss it in the bottling bucket without tasting it, you'll likely flub the beer up. If you are bottling the beer, it's probably best to make the tea without the priming sugar at first. After you make a quart of the tea, pour off a few ounces of the unspiced beer (note the exact measurement) and add a small measured amount of tea to the tasting serving until it is a subtle profile. Do the math to figure out how much tea you'll need to add to the bottling bucket to get that profile. Assuming you need to reduce the amount of tea, toss the extra amount down the drain and add the priming sugar to the newly measured tea and heat it briefly to a boil and add to the bottling bucket. I hope that clears up the problem of over spicing.

 

[enthuzed]

Came across this recipe... Pretty psyched to brew this up next week and let it sit in the bottle till December/Winter timeframe

Thanks! (jmo88)

 

[MedicMang]

So I want to brew this tomorrow since I was unable to do it a couple weeks ago. I was thinking about the hops and I don't have centennials. I do have cascades, us goldings, warrior, nugget, Columbus, and Apollo. Any suggestions on what to sub with and how much?

 

[twofieros]

I would sub cascade and use the same amount as centennial. They are very close to each other.

 

[MedicMang]

Aren't cascades lesser alphas than centennials? Should I adjust? I'm still not read up on how the alpha thing works.

 

[jmo88]

Aren't cascades lesser alphas than centennials? Should I adjust? I'm still not read up on how the alpha thing works.

The ibu's for each addition are: 25 IBU at 60m, 9 IBU at 30m, 2.5 IBU at 5m. Look for an online IBU calculator to figure out what amounts you need to hit those numbers with the alpha acids of your cascades. Since the 5 minute addition is really just aroma and the IBU is not the important figure in its case, just use 1/2 oz cascade for that addition.

 

[MedicMang]

Thanks. Strike water is heating as I type.

 

[petercarrjones]

Brewed this last weekend for the 3rd consecutive year, but did change things up a bit. We roasted 3 pounds of acorn squash and put it in the mash. Then we boiled as normal. 2 gallons went into the fermenter, 2.5 gallons went into a pumpkin! So we'll have a pumpkin beer party in October, but 2 gallons will receive the spiced treatment at bottling for christmas. Also, our friend drew a sweet skull on the pumpkin.

 

[DagoBrewer]

This is going to be one awesome beer this Christmas!! Gonna bottle this and my chocolate raspberry stout this weekend and forget about them til december!

Edit* im gonna bottle this on thursday...

Jmo88, the tea in the french press... Do you pour it all in there and let it sit for 15 and then press it, or press right away then set for 15?

 

[DagoBrewer]

Just made the tea and lettin it chill now, sanitized some bombers and drinking a cold IPA!! My kitchen smells like Christmas!! I love it!!



So after i mixed the tea in i had a small taster and it was amazing!! Thank you for this recipe!!

 

[DagoBrewer]

Ive been kegging for about a year now and forgot how annoying bottling is......... It'll be worth it when December rolls around!!

 

[BuffaloBeer1]

SWMBO has been craving a holiday beer. This one sounds delicious to me as well; it reminds me of the mulled cider she makes during the holidays. I also plan on using the yeast cake for a RIS. I'm planning on using the San Diego Super Yeast from White Labs; anyone try it with this yet? Supposedly it's really clean, and ferments quickly.

Also, someone mentioned trying this with cloves in a previous post. Anyone else try it? How did it turnout? How much did you use? and finally, in the boil or with the tea?

 

[DagoBrewer]

Ive used the sd super yeast a few times in ipa recipes and really like it! I bet it would go well with this brew.

Im gonna brew this again this weekend cuz i know by Christmas my first batch will be long gone hahaha!!

 

[BPhad]

I'm going to try this with harvested wlp002

Any reports on yeast for this beer?

 

[DagoBrewer]

I'm going to try this with harvested wlp002

Any reports on yeast for this beer?

I used a wlp001 starter and a blow off tube. It was bubbling like crazy the next morning! It went down to 1.014 in 10 days

 

[cheezydemon3]

strongly recomend getting a tad of color on the cinnamon stick over a flame or the like. Makes a world of difference!

 

[twofieros]

What does flaming the cinnamon stick do? I'll be adding the spices to my batch tomorrow. I might try this on one batch. I made two five gallon batches so I could easily experiment with one.

 

[blackollie]

Had a bit of a hang-up making the beer (new container I built for Mashing took longer than expected) but I think the container works because this is the darkest my Wert has ever been making this beer (looks like a porter). I'm interested to see how it turns out and will keep u guys posted. Should be done just in time for the end of the world in December so I am changing this years names on the bottles from 'holiday ale' to 'holiday apocalypse ale'.

 

[MedicMang]

Making the spice tea right now. Smells like Santa farted in my kitchen. Like Christmas up in here. Cant wait to crack on open near Christmas time.

 

[DagoBrewer]

Making the spice tea right now. Smells like Santa farted in my kitchen. Like Christmas up in here. Cant wait to crack on open near Christmas time.

Oh man!! I just did that a week ago and same thing! The whole house smelled amazing!!

 

[BPhad]

Has anyone made this with another yeast? I have some WLP002 I'd like to use.

 

[DagoBrewer]

Has anyone made this with another yeast? I have some WLP002 I'd like to use.

I bet that 002 would work out pretty good.

 

[jmo88]

Has anyone made this with another yeast? I have some WLP002 I'd like to use.

I used wyeast1968 once with hopes of getting a little more residual sweetness out of it. Strangely, it gave a drier impression than the 1056. Now I just mash at 156-158 with 1056 and like the results better.

 

[BPhad]

Thanks for the replies

 

[DagoBrewer]

8 days in the bottle and i just couldnt wait! Its almost fully carbed up, nice off white head and beautiful ruby highlights when i hold it up to the light! Its got a good hop bite that quickly fades into a sweet cinnamon and vanilla on the back of the tounge. That should fade a bit with time but this beer will be a grand slam with the friends and fam come Christmas eve!!