Suggested water profile for belgian dark strong in Brun Water.
Brown balanced, full or dry?
Ardennes?
Please and Thank you!
I’m in favor of minimalism when it comes to Trappist “Style” ales. What is your water like? Do you build up with RO/Distilled?
My typical water profile when brewing the “Quad” of these styles (Single, Dubbel, Tripel, and Dark Strong) is as follows:
1.) Use low alkalinity RO/Distilled water as a base;
2.) Add Gypsum and/or Calcium Chloride to hit 40-50 ppm Ca;
3.) Sulfate and Chloride driven by Gypsum and/or Calcium Chloride additions;
4.) Supplement Sulfate with Magnesium Sulfate (if need be);
5.) Add Sodium to taste (take notes) and to supplement Chloride;
I let the additions for Calcium pretty much dictate the rest of the profile.
Thanks Big Monk,
I usually build up from RO.
After entering my grain bill into Brun water I’m at a mash pH of 5.4.
My plan is to Mash @ 154F until I squeeze all the SG out of the malt I can.
Do you recommend any steps in the mash?
Protein rest? Acid rest?
I was looking at a balanced profile to keep it simple. I was leaning toward slightly higher chloride to help the malt come through. I will be using WLP 530 Abbey ale yeast.
Also may try a quasi open fermentation.
From a mash standpoint, I am boring but consistent:
20 Min @ 145
10 Min @ 147-149
30 Min @ 162
10-15 Min @ 171
For a single infusion, I would imagine 60-70 Min @ 149 would better serve you than 154.
Definitely don’t need an acid or protein rest.
What does the recipe look like? I love the Westmalle yeast, although I typically use 3787. I like Wyeast.
I’m using what my local HBS had in stock for yeast. I plan on using Straffe Hendrix Quad dregs for conditioning.
My grain bill is a combo of some of my leftover grain and what my HBS had in stock.
10lbs 2 row
2lbs Honey malt
2lbs Pale Ale malt
8oz special roast 118L
8oz Aromatic
8oz Carapils
8oz Pale Chocolate
1 lbs Dark candi sugar
Well, good luck!
Thanks a bunch Big Monk.
I appreciate your input.
On your advice and that of several others, I’ve used that mash schedule on my last few continental brews. Frankly, I havent seen any difference from my usual single temp mash. I’m trying to figure out why my results are so different.
So no changes in the body of the beer or foam?
I have to admit that from the standpoint of the beta rest temps, it’s not a whole lot different. a 2 or even 3 step beta rest in the schedule is merely trying to take advantage of ideal beta mash temps. So I wouldn’t expect you to see any changes in fermentation if that wasn’t previously an issue.
I would have expected some changes in body and mouthfeel, as well as quality and duration of foam with the long rest at 162 and the prolonged mashout at 171.
When I first hooked up with Bryan, I was skeptical about whether adding different steps, especially the alpha rest at 162 and holding the mashout was going to make a difference. After a few brews I notice a few things:
1.) The multiple beta rests (in this case I still do 20 min at 145, 10 min at 148-149, and 5-10 min at 153) was helping me realize not only full conversion but also a few extra points off of the final gravity.
2.) There seemed to be a noticeable difference in the body of the beer. A sort of increase fullness which couples nicely with what are, in my case, highly attenuated beers.
3.) Without altering much of what I was already doing, I was getting glorious foam stands, almost mousse-like, which was long lasting with incredible lacing.
Now, inevitably, the comment will (and should for that matter) come along that it could be something else in the process giving me these gains. Given what I was already doing, my subjective opinion will be to the contrary.
It works for me and the results I’ve seen bear that out. To me at least. Taste is subjective, especially when you are the only one consuming your beer. With that said, we have a group of people who we interface with that have echoed some of the sentiments and gains I spoke of above.
No changes at all, and what you describe is exactly what I expected. I know that a lot of people claim the improvements you mention. That was why I was intrigued to try it. But in maybe 5 brews now, I don’t see any difference fromk my 148F 90 min. mashes
At least you tried it!
I’ve played with a lot of iterations too over the years, with continental, British and American malts. I do find the extended rest at 158°-162°F and holding the ~170° mash off greatly improves the foam and mouthfeel, and helps to some extent (reason debatable) in extracting the full yield. What really surprises me is that no matter what I do with the lower temperature rests, it seems to have negligible effect on fermentability, for which reason I think I’ll simplify to a single rest around 149°-150°F, time determined by progress of density measurements, followed by the alpha and mash off. Theory and practice are not converging as expected. I’m also thinking altering mash viscosity may prove a more effective tool for manipulating the relative contributions of the various enzymes and improving yield than fine tuning beta rests.
Sure. It was easy to implement so there was no reason not to at least try. Still don’t understand the results, though. And tried with several different brands of malt in case that made a diference.
FWIW…I have experimented with mash viscosity many, many times and found it to have no effect. It could be that you;re not seeing and effect on fermentability due to the high diastatic power of most malts. I’ve reached the conclusion that the way to control body and fermentability is through recipe, not process.
Remember, reality often astonishes theory.
Good to know. So I’ll choose viscosity based on convenience in my process. Agree recipe is the obvious thing to manipulate. More caramel malts if you want less fermentability. Choose the right yeast. And I’m getting back to my old happy place with British beers lately; so to increase fermentability, more brewing sugars!
If I were brewing this, I would drop the honey malt, the special roast, and the carapils, and I would add another pound of dark candi syrup and as much additional base malt as needed to hit the target OG.
That’s just my personal opinion though, as I tend to keep recipes pretty simple.
I have noticed an increased fermentability of the wort with no loss of body when doing a Hochkurz step mash. Something about the mashout making a difference there - Head retention is greater, if nothing else. I also will do a continuously increasing slide through the beta to alpha to mash out temperatures over an hour and that has resulted in similar results. I appreciate that maybe it is just in my head (confirmation bias), but on my process (HERMS) it seems to produce a good result on my lighter lagers and palest ales (10 gallon batches).
Try it and if it doesn’t work better for you, then certainly dump it as a process in favor of a simpler and equally good result. In the end it is just a hobby and everyone should experiment with their respective systems to find out what they most enjoy.
For what it is worth, when I make big ales or dark beers, I usually go back to 5 gallons and then I will opt for the simple batch sparge (BIAB) in my cooler, rather than breaking out the HERMS set up.
Good comments. Personally I like a bit of Special B in a BDSA, so after dropping the malts you mention I’d add 1/4-1/2 lb. of that.
I appreciate your input sir. I too would normally keep things simple. Excluding the base malts and honey malt the remainder of the recipe is Loosely based on a Westy 12 clone. I can see this recipe as is with lots of flavor and a nice bit of alcohol to go along with it. According to beersmith and knowing that my Mash efficiency is normally in the high 80% the Target OG should be about 1090.
It’s been awhile since I’ve rude oh, so I’m really looking forward to it.
“brewed one”?