So my brother-in-law wants to brew a Saison ...

[dutchoven]

My brother-in-law has recently caught the brewing bug and is looking to learn how to brew. He's been researching like crazy and is quite into learning how to brew, but has yet to make a beer. I've invited him over to show him the process and asked if there's any style he'd like to make. Well ... Saison ...

I've been brewing all grain for years, and typically stick to West-Coast Pales, Commons, Wheats, and IPAs, but have never made a Saison. I've always been curious on the style and am down to brew it, but am looking for pointers. I'm planning to brew two, 10-gallon batches to walk him through the process; one all grain, the other extract, just so he can see both.

I'm stumped on the Saison. I'm thinking of brewing an all grain Common, Pale, or Kolsch, and perhaps brewing the Saison extract. I'm searching recipes now, but have a few questions on the process for Saison:

• Based on my cursory research, it looks like Saisons have a relatively simple grain bill of pilsner and munich and perhaps wheat, honey, or adjuncts. I'm seeing other, more exotic ingredients, but am looking to keep it simple. Anyone have an extract Saison recipe they've brewed with success?
• I'm seeing that fermentation is maybe hot (75-80) and long (~one to two months) for Saisons. Can anyone comment on fermentation temps and durations? Do Saisons require a long fermentation or a secondary fermentation?
• Taking a look, I see many "farmhouse" Saisons out there are soured with brett or other bacteria. If I were to use bacteria, I would be concerned about cross contamination with my brew equipment. Can anyone comment on the risk of cross contamination (following standard sanitizing) and methods for brewing sours?
• Any yeast recommendations?

I"m still researching, but if anyone has any recipes or pointers, that would be great!

Thanks

 

[DSorenson]

Last summer I brewed three saisons, and the best was the one that used mostly pilsner and a pound of rye. Less is more! I believe for 5 gallons I used 10 lbs of grain. I fermented it from 75 to 90 degrees with WYeast Belgian Saison for 4 or 5 weeks.

Remember that people do really fancy things with saisons, but truly good brewers can make a subtle, refreshing saison from very few ingredients. I honestly think it's a great beer to show someone how to brew.

I recommend a gravity of 1.050 or below. Some people use sugar, but I believe it is over used in many saisons.

Edit: forget about getting fancy with brett- I believe it will be interesting enough without it. If you truly want something interesting you can use 5% acidulated malt for that lactic acid flavor without the sour beer issues.

Edit X2: Also, I kept it in primary. Treat it like any other beer, just ferment it warmer and be careful bottling too soon. I also see no reason why you couldn't use extract to make an effective saison, but I recommend a mini mash. Ray Daniels in his book "Designing Great Beers" mentions that the best extract beers usually have a mini mash that accounts for 25 to 67% of the fermentables.

Edit X3: Just to let you know how simple you could brew a really enjoyable saison, you can use 100% pilsner or belgian two row. The hops are down played- consider 25 IBUs a limit. Let the yeast control the flavors (not the hops), but you can consider dry hopping. This is really effective.

 

[Fuzzymittenbrewing]

I love using Belle Saison dry yeast or Wyeast 3726PC . Whatever you settle on for a grainbill I strongly suggest adding a pound of table sugar to dry it out and add a crisp finish.

 

[upheaval]

Seems like the popular yeasts to use are either Wyeast 3711 or 3724. I prefer 3724 (more fruity), but most seem to like 3711 (more spice character) being that it finishes quicker. I kept my temps at about 75-80 degrees.

As far as recipes go I'd suggest keeping it simple... The yeast is the true winner in these brews. I normally run 100% pils with very minimal hop additions and either honey or table sugar.

Enjoy!

 

[kingwood-kid]

Saisons are easy and simple, if you want them to be. They're also tremendously versatile and adaptable to different tastes if that's what you want. They're probably better suited for all-grain than extract, since you want them to dry out. I don't know how patient your brother-in-law is, but since you sound like you want something quick, I'd keep the gravity between 40-50, and not use 565/3724 on its own. You can use 3711, 566, 585 or 568 (my pick is 568) and get a beer in normal ale times.

You can make the grain bill 100% pilsner if you want to follow tradition, although any base malt will be fine. I use 2-row, since it's cheap and provides a decent blank canvas for the yeast to paint on. If you want to mix in wheat, rye, biscuit, Munich, etc..., they'll add a little something different. Since you want a dry beer, stay away from crystal malts. Sugar is optional, but with a long, low-temp mash, you shouldn't need it.

IBUs should be in the 25-35 range, bearing in mind that the dryness will make the beer seem more bitter than the numbers say. Adding Saaz or any noble hop late in the boil is typical, although you can add any hop you want, small spice additions, or nothing at all. Once you get familiar with what Saison yeasts can do, you can cheerfully throw all these recommendations out the window and make whatever you want.

 

[Schemy]

Along with everything mentioned above, the only times I've had a long fermentation with Saison strains is when I don't cool my wort sufficiently. Just because you can ferment higher doesn't mean you should start there. I think if you pitch too high, it can shock these yeasts and they then lag. I like to chill to 65, then pitch a nice start and oxygenate well, then let it free rise to as high as it likes. I've routinely had saisons with a 1.055-1.065 og finish out in 10-12 days to sub 1.008. I can go grain to glass in just over 2 weeks with saison, using yeasts like Wy 3711, 3726, & ECY08. I've played with Brett, but don't feel its completely necessary for a great saison.

Saison is a great way to start playing with flavors. One of my favorite IPAs that I've done started from a saison recipe that I hopped up and fermented 3711 sub 70 and really dried it out.

Good luck.

 

[beergolf]

The beauty of Sasions is that it is style with a lot of room for interpretation.

For your fist Saison I would keep it very simple. Mostly pils, then you can add some wheat or even some Munich. You can use some sugar if you want a real dry Saison. Mash low and you are good. Hop to a BU: GU ratio of .487 or so. You can use noble hops if you want it more traditional but citrus hops work also. My favorite Saison hops are Strisselspalt. Spices are not necessary but sometimes a little corriander or orange peel can be a nice touch. I would suggest for your first to keep it very simple so you can taste what the yeast brings to the brew.

I like 3724 a lot but it is a more demanding yeast that likes it hot to finish. Two other good choices that are much more forgiving and not very temp dependant are 3711 and Belle Saison. Both will finish very low. Brett can add another layer of flavor, but until you have brewed a few I would just use one of the above mentioned yeasts.

Also, brew software always underestimates the FG. Take into account that many Saison yeasts will finish in the 1.004-1.000 range so take that into account or you may end up with a brew with a high ABV.

Saisons are one of my favorites and I brew them often.

Look in the recipw database. There are several good recipes in there that would be good choices for your first.

 

[dyqik]

My first saison was almost a SMaSH - 12lb of pils mashed at 148F, 0.5 oz of Cascade for bittering, 1oz of Saaz for flavor. Fermented with 3711 (pitched at 70f, free rise to 78-80F in the basement in the height of summer). OG 1.055, FG 1.001(!). Bottled after 3 weeks and tasted good in a couple more for conditioning. Maybe it wasn't as complex as saison can be, but it was a good, dry and refreshing and clearly a saison like beer.

Hmm, my basement is warming up now and I have some older cascade in the freezer, might be time for a rebrew.

Also, last year I brewed the Brewing Classic Style's Saison d'Raison from extract with my fiancee's sister for her wedding. That was then aged on apricots and bottled for their wedding this April. That turned out pretty well, but didn't quite dry out enough for my tastes. If you can do it all grain, that's probably a better bet, but you could up the simple sugars in the recipe to make sure it dries out. I did the same beer all grain, but with 3724 over winter last year, and couldn't get it to dry out enough at all though - FG was about 1.016.

 

[DSorenson]

My first saison was almost a SMaSH - 12lb of pils mashed at 148F, 0.5 oz of Cascade for bittering, 1oz of Saaz for flavor.

SMaSH stands for "single malt and single hop"...

For the record, if SMaSH is your goal you should only use one hop.

Edit: I stand corrected... 2nd grade is just so tough! Maybe I can learn to read this year!

 

[Fuzzymittenbrewing]

SMaSH stands for "single malt and single hop"...

For the record, if SMaSH is your goal you should only use one hop.

He said almost

 

[sandyeggoxj]

Here is my recipe. I really like it. It is a fantastic summer beer. It has a light spiceyness and a little banana. It is fairly dry and tart but not bitter. Very refreshing. Has a nice haze to it from the wheat. I have been using castle malt but I have a bag of Franco belgs and I am going to try it with that malt and see how it turns out.

11 Gallon Batch, Pre-boil 14 gallon, 80% Total Efficiency
OG 1.054
FG 1.009
21.9 IBU
3.6 SRM

Grain:
18# Belg Pils
2# White wheat

Hops:
2 oz Mt Hood(4.9%) @ 60 [17.2IBU]
2 oz Santiam(6.6%) @ 5 [4.6IBU]

Yeast:
WLP565 w/stirred starter pitched at 1 mil/ml/°P

Pitch @ 70*f and ramp to 80+ (ideally, it isn't warm enough here)

Keg and Force Carb and 2.3 volumes

 

[dutchoven]

Thanks gang! Appreciate all the feedback.

I'm thinking I'll brew the Saison all grain with a simple grain bill of pilsner, munich, and a touch of honey. After review the myriad of yeast strains, I think I'm set on WLP566, just to get a quicker and simpler ferment.

Here's my working recipe for an 11-gallon batch, based on azcoob's Cottage House found in the database:

17 lb Pilsner (1L)
3 lb White Wheat (4L)
1 lb CaraMunich (60L)
1 lb Flaked Oats (1L)
2 lb Orange Blossom Honey (Late Boil)

Mash at ~148 for 60 minutes

British Kent Goldings bittering to 25-30 IBU

WLP566 Belgian Saison II, 2.0 L yeast starter per per 5 gallons

Should yield 1.058 and 29 IBU at 6.2 ABV, which seems a little ridiculous.

Any input would be appreciated. I'm leaning toward dropping the overall gravity to <1.050 and maybe dropping the bitterness to <25.

Thanks!

 

[urbanmyth]

You are going to get VERY little of the honey character coming through in the finished beer. It is essentially acting like simple sugar in that recipe, drying the beer out, but leaving little to no actual honey character to taste or smell. I would drop the honey and the caramunich, adding maybe a touch of table sugar instead. It's cheaper and does the same thing. I think crystal malts are out of place in saison, but what do I know?

 

[DSorenson]

Looks good- I even like the honey idea. Honey is best pasteurized and added at high krausen.

I'm not a fan of cara malts of any type in any saison I've done... just a heads up.

 

[dyqik]

SMaSH stands for "single malt and single hop"...

For the record, if SMaSH is your goal you should only use one hop.

Edit: I stand corrected... 2nd grade is just so tough! Maybe I can learn to read this year!

I put it in the Recipe database as a SMaTH saison - Single Malt and Two Hops. But I don't think using a different bittering hop is inappropriate in the SMaSH philosophy - almost all character from the bittering hop is lost in the boil, particularly a 90 min boil required to eliminate DMS from an all pils mash, so you are getting virtually all the hop flavor and aroma from a single hop variety.

My point was that a saison style beer can be very very simple (the only reason I used Cascade in mine was that I had some in the freezer and I wanted a few more IBUs than a single pack of Saaz could provide).

 

[kingwood-kid]

17 lb Pilsner (1L)
3 lb White Wheat (4L)
1 lb CaraMunich (60L)
1 lb Flaked Oats (1L)
2 lb Orange Blossom Honey (Late Boil)

Should yield 1.058 and 29 IBU at 6.2 ABV, which seems a little ridiculous.

Any input would be appreciated. I'm leaning toward dropping the overall gravity to <1.050 and maybe dropping the bitterness to <25.

If you want the ABV at more manageable levels, I'd just go with the pils and wheat, with maybe a pound of something non-cara/crystal, like Munich, Biscuit, Victory, etc... Depending on the attenuation, that should give you an ABV in the low 5% range.

 

[Hello]

I love using Belle Saison dry yeast or Wyeast 3726PC . Whatever you settle on for a grainbill I strongly suggest adding a pound of table sugar to dry it out and add a crisp finish.

Listen to this guy and look at his hibiscus saison recipe. You can exclude the hibiscus if you want because the base itself is awesome.

 

[dutchoven]

Thanks everyone ... appreciate the great comments.

I'm putting the finishing touches on the recipe (brewing this weekend). I've pulled info from some recipes here and this is what I'm thinking:

11-gallon batch

14 lb Pilsner (1L)
4 lb Munich (10L)
2 lb Cane Sugar
1 lb Flaked Oats
1 lb Flaked Wheat

Mash at ~148 for 60 minutes

British Kent Goldings bittering to 25-30 IBU

WLP566 Belgian Saison II, 2.0 L yeast starter per per 5 gallons

Should yield 1.057 at 30 IBU.

I've done a little research on drying the beer, and like the idea of using cane sugar, though I'm not familiar with its use. I'm seeing most five-gallon recipes call for one pound of sugar, so I've scaled accordingly for my 11-gallon batch. Does anyone see a problem using that much sugar in an 11-gallon batch? If I'm mashing low (~148), would the added sugar dry the beer too much?

Thanks!

 

[kingwood-kid]

Adding sugar doesn't dry the beer out all by itself. If you substitute sugar for an equal amount of malt (by gravity points, not by weight), you'll get a drier and more alcoholic beer. If you just drop the malt without subbing in sugar, you'll get an equally dry beer without the alcohol boost. I would drop the sugar and probably the oats, which would give you an OG of about 1.047 and an ABV around 5%. Don't be afraid of the low FG; the Munich and wheat will give you plenty of mouthfeel.