Beer Brewing Blog

The Chocolate Cream Stout came out well I think but not perfect. It has a nice body and good lasting head. The nose is initially slightly chocolaty but the hops are noticable. The first taste has a dark chocolate beginning with the lactose sweetness mixing in for almost a sweetened coffee taste. Toward the end you there is an acrid bitterness to comes slowly but becomes stronger from the black malt used. My thoughts would be to use less black malt and less lactose should I do this recipe again. The alcohol on this batch was low, just under 4% ABV which I assume is attributed to the less active yeast and abundance of non-fermentables in this particular recipe. I’m tempted to try this maybe with some dark chocolate although I think it may hinder the taste of each. While drinking more, I’m akin to comparing this most to chocolate mousse. It is definitely a big beer but not in all the ways I want.

A few months after bottling my Wheat Beer, the mistakes I made on the batch are clear.  Initially I thought the batch may be ruined by an off smell I detected coming from the starter wort but while still a bit present, this off flavor has subsided.  I’ve had a few bottles over the past month or two and there was something that just seemed a bit off.  It isn’t a bad beer per say:  I don’t mind drinking it.  What I was noticing is that after a glass or so, the taste just seemed to become more off the more I drank.  After listening to one of my homebrewing podcasts, I realized what the problem with this beer was - not enough hops.  The purpose of the bittering hops is to compliment the sweetness of the malt and if you do not use enough, the sweetness of the malt with eventually overpower the tastebuds.  As it was described on the podcast (I can’t remember which one) you will drink the beer but not have the urge to drink another due to the subtle oversweetening of the beer.  This is right on the money for this beer.  While initially it tastes like a nice German hefeweizen, the more you drink there is almost this subconscious urge that something is out of place.  This beer had 8 lbs of wheat/barley malt extract plus two pounds of wheat/barley grains and the 1 oz of Hallertauer hops just was not enough to offset all of the malt.  I’ve been drinking bottles here and there but this is definitely not one I want  to share and has taught me that you really need to head your sugar/hop ratio.  While I’m generally not a hop head, I now see that you can’t skimp on the hops too much or you end up with a sickly sweet batch of beer that is drinkable but not necessarily palatable.

After about a month of conditioning, the Blood Orange Hefeweizen came out really good. The nose has a very noticeable orange aroma made sweeter by the wheat malt extract. It takes a semi heavy pour to pull off a one finger head which disapates quickly. The color is a deep brown-amber. The taste is a nice smooth sweetness you would expect from a hefeweizen with the orange just hinting at the beginning. The low hop level seems just right for this beer; barely noticable but enough bittering to mellow the sweetness of the wheat. Overall a great beer.

I finally did my first all grain batch today, a Belgian Tripel that I’m calling Drunken Monk.  Here is a link:

 Drunken Monk