Trappist Ale conditioning advice

[gregorywbrown13]

Hey all,

I have a trappist ale from extract in the secondary right now and I'm look for some conditioning advice.

recipe was:

13.2 lbs Pilsen LME
1 lb Caramunich
.4 lb Biscuit
.3 lb Aromatic
.25 lb Special B
.2 lb Chocolate

1 bottle dark belgian candi syrup

1.5 Styrian Goldings 60 min
.25 styrian 15 min
.25 hallertau 15 min
.25 hallertau 2 min
.25 styrian 2 min

yeast was wyeast trappist ale with 1l starter


My SG was about 1.125
29.5 IBUs

I primaried at around 72 F for as long as fermentation was pretty furious, which lasted around 3 weeks

Its now been in the secondary for about 2 months

This is what I had planned
3 weeks primary
3 months secondary
1 month bottle at room temperature
1 month bottle around 40F

Just wanted to see if anyone had any advice on this conditioning schedule. This thing is going to be a 6 month project as it is, so adding a couple months wouldn't a problem, I just want to do it right.

Thanks for any advice

GWB

 

[RayInUT]

Some of the Belgian beers are put into secondary for three weeks or so at freezing or slighlty below after 120 hours of fermentation. What is your gravity now? I went from 1.073 on mine to 1.008 in five days on mine. I let mine get up to the low 80's while fermenting over the last couple days to bring the gravity down as low as possible. I'm going to rack it to secondary tomorrow and put it in a cooler of snow, ice, and water for three weeks. Halk will get kegged at that point and the other five gallons will get bottled, conition for two weeks at 70* and then put in the cold storage room at 40* for a month or two. The kegged batch will be long gone by then.

 

[Brooklyn-Brewtality]

I would bottle it now, and bottle age it at room temp for as long as you can stand it.

I would pop the first one in one more month, and then try 1/month until it's spot-on.

 

[gregorywbrown13]

Thanks for the advice

Couple of replies

I haven't bothered taking a gravity reading. There is still activity in the secondary, airlock bubbles every 10 seconds or so. I figured there was no point risking infection with a gravity reading since its gonna be fermenting/conditioning in the carboys 4+ months, I just figured I would get full attenuation.

Also, the choice between bulk and bottle conditioning was an easy one for me, since I've been kegging the past 3 years, I sadly don't have enough bottles to bottle yet. So far I've got around 25, so it'll be another few weeks before I can bottle.