French Press Dry-Hopped IPA

At a recent homebrew club meeting, I wanted to spice up a dark IPA by doing a cold-press of leaf Simcoe hops in a french press coffee maker. We did a side by side against the unadulterated version and the results were what you might expect:  really, really good! I put 1 oz. of leaf Simcoe hops in the press and slowly added two bottles of the IPA (which was brewed with Simcoe and Citra pellets). It steeped in the refrigerator for about 1 hour before serving. The press hopped beer revealed more of everything associated with hops (and I really pressed the juice out of those hops). More aroma, more flavor, but it was different. You got the citrus and pine, sure. But there was an intense, biting, vegetal spice that the non-pressed beer lacked. It even made my fellow club members a little (shall we say?) high. We all had an aura of hop glow around us for several minutes. It was nice, but boy were those hops intense! If you have some extra leaf hops, or just want to buy hops for this express purpose, I would highly recommend everyone do this at least once. Be warned though. It's kind of a waste of lupulin if you don't have something to do with the hops afterward, and it kind of turns your friends into hop zombies. Here are some pics to go along with the post, including what my friend, Ian, looked like when he tried to eat on of the hop cones. Enjoy! Be Fermentive!

Hop Harvest Time (Almost; with pics)

Let's face it. We're getting tired of waiting for our homegrown hops to be ready to harvest. With everyone talking about fresh hop beers and pictures on our Facebook walls of people laying in bins of freshly harvested cones, we've been itching to pick our hops and deflower (so to speak) pots full of virgin wort and process the remainder for the year's upcoming brews. (cue "screeching to a halt" soundbyte) Just wait!!! Don't succomb to peer pressure or your own lack of willpower. Your hoppy beer will thank you later. The knowledge of picking hops later than usual has been passed on to us, the homebrewer, by Stan Hieronymus, author of recently released book, For The Love of Hops. As the cones mature, the resinous lupulin glands become a more golden (orange-y) schoolbus yellow color. They get more sticky. They get better, imparting better flavor and aroma to your beer. So some of the bracts are browning around the edges? No big deal. If you harvest too early, you won't get those intense hop characteristics you are looking for. I'm not going to tell you exactly when you should harvest. Only you truly know your bines. You listen to them don't you? If not, you should! They have much to say. In fact, here is a very good YouTube video showing what I'm talking about.

That being said, I am planning a simple extract hop harvest ale this weekend anyway. Here's the recipe. Enjoy! Be Fermentive!

Hop Harvest Ale

3.3 # Light Pilsner LME
3.3 # Amber LME
1 oz. Simcoe (First Wort Hop) 60 min.
at least 1 # fresh from the bine Chinook cones at flameout

30 minute hop stand (submerge fresh cones; put a lid on it)

Pics of my hops courtesy of Galen Strole

Visit to Michigan Organic Hops

Today, I had the great opportunity to visit Lyle at his hopyard and farm (Lyle Schmidt Farms, LLC) in Mendon, MI. "Certified" Organic since 2006, the farm sits in the heart of the rolling hills, forests, and lakes of southwest Michigan, a short drive to the St. Joseph river. Lyle grew up on the farm, and typically works there 5 days per week, but technically lives in Cincinnati, OH. In addition to several varieties of hops, Lyle grows organic fruits and vegetables, barley, oats, rye, and also an heirloom variety of free pollinating corn he intends to sell to a distillery near Lansing. The majority of the hops are sold to local craft breweries.

The hopyard consists of a 1.25 acre plot on a south facing hill above a vineyard. Hops grow vertically up coir lines on a 21' trellis supported by black locust poles (tree trunks, essentially) buried 3' in the ground. There is a pole every 53' and rows are 480' long. Being such a "small" hopyard, large motorized equipment is not cost-effective, but he does use an 18' tall siege machine-looking cart structure built on a trailer (sorry, I did not take a picture of it) where workers ride and spray the bines and other maintenance. At harvest time, the lines are cut at the top and bottom, loaded on a trailer, and transported up to the Michigan Hop Alliance in the Traverse City, MI area where they are stripped and the cones are pelletized and packed in nitrogen.

After showing me the hopyard, Lyle had a few minutes to share some of the homebrew I brought. We tried my Sour Pumpkin beer, and I also gave him a couple of saisons to try before I left (I thought a "farmhouse" ale would be appropriate). I really appreciated Lyle's hospitality and willingness to set aside some time from his busy day to show me around and chat for awhile. It was very interesting to get the perspective of a larger hop-growing operation than I am used to (although his is still rather small in comparison to other farms). I encourage anyone interested to seek out Lyle and his products, as well as the rest of what southwest Michigan has to offer. If I am able, I may go out again at harvest time to hand-pick some fresh hops. Even if you are not able to come to Michigan, I encourage you to explore your surroundings and discover the products available to you locally. These activities may not involve fermented foods or beverages, but they certainly require an adventurous and creative spirit. Be Fermentive!

A New Season in Beer

I'm sure many of you are aware (some much more than others) of the flooding that has laid waste throughout the Midwest this week. The picture below is on my walking route.

However, one of the advantages of all this rain is that I have not had to water my hops at all. Other homebrewers, and those of you who live in regions south, have been talking about how your hops have emerged and are already 1 foot high in some places. Well, I hadn't checked mine for several days, thinking that the 6-8 inches of compost and soil would delay their arrival. I was wrong. The rains have coaxed the grass out of dormancy and it was quite high in my yard, so today I mowed the lawn for the first time this year. While picking up the sticks in the back yard that were the casualties of Winter, I looked at my hops again. They have all pushed up from the depths and are well on their way. Here are some pictures.

The Chinook (can't you tell?)

After spending the afternoon doing yardwork, it was nice to relax a bit with a double IPA by a fire made from the previous season's castoffs.

Bare tree and lacing

I look forward to many more evenings like this. Hopefully with a few friends, and a few good brews. Here's to shaking off the Winter chill and embracing the regeneration of Spring! Be Fermentive!

Splitting the Hops

One of the more common complimentary hobbies that consume the free time of homebrewers is gardening. Perhaps the most popular gardening-related activity is growing hops. Many hop varieties grow quite well in most parts of the United States. I may do a post fully devoted to growing hops in the future, but there is plenty of information available on the subject here and elsewhere. This post will specifically address my experience of digging up and splitting my 3-year-old hops. 

I planted the hops seen below in the Spring of 2011, so this is the beginning of their 3rd year. In general, the hop plant is an extremely invasive species that will takeover an entire area if allowed to grow freely. Therefore, it is recommended that the hop crown (seen below) be divided up every 3rd year or so. As you can see below, this Chinook hop crown is quite substantial (approx. 1.5 ft diameter). But it started from a rhizome (underground stem) approximately 6-8 inches long. This is also how the majority of hop plants are propogated, from the cuttings of the crowns. Treated correctly, each cutting will grow into its own hop plant. I grow 6 hop varietals: Chinook, Sterling, Northern Brewer, Pride of Ringwood, Nugget, and Fuggle. After cutting down the crowns and replanting, I collected several grocery bags full of rhizomes to be replanted by interested homebrew club members. Get them while they last!

Close-up of rhizomes with sprouting bines.

More rhizomes.

Sacks of rhizomes in the beer fridge. They're hiding my lagering Pilsner (notice the airlock).

Until next time, BE FERMENTIVE!

Partigyle Brewing: The Mash That Keeps On Giving

Brewing uses an economy which places the brewer in the intersubjective space between ingredients, process, creativity, and the various groups and individuals that will become its consumers. It was a similar economy which propelled the production of beer centuries before the modern era. Many may be familiar with the brewing traditions of the monks of Trappist fame and lore. The process used to brew several of these beers--and a few others, including some of Fuller's beers--is known as "partigyle" brewing. Partigyle brewing is a type of all-grain brewing in which a single mash yields multiple beers. In a typical all-grain homebrewing session, the mash tun is drained/sparged only one time, thus yielding only one beer. However, in a partigyle brewing session, after saccarification the mash tun is filled with hot water and drained multiple times, yielding worts of successively weaker specific gravities. The rationale behind this technique is based on the tendency for a mash to lose extract efficiency as the size of the grain bill increases. In general, grain weight and extract efficiency are inversely proportional due to the increased viscosity of the wort that is produced. When draining a mash tun that contains a more viscous wort, more sugars will be left trapped in the grain bed. As homebrewers, we have worked hard up to this point to mash our grain to convert starches into sugars. One way to ensure maximum extract utilization is to re-fill the mash tun and collect multiple gyles, lest no fermentable be left behind!

In some applications, each separate gyle is combined to form one wort. This is, essentially, the same as batch sparging, a popular sparging technique among homebrewers. Batch sparging is also known to improve extract efficiency for mash tuns constructed from picnic coolers, but that's a blog post for another time. However, in the famous Trappist breweries mentioned above, each successively weaker gyle becomes a different beer. Often given the monikers tripel, dubbel, and single respectively, each beer's "number" signifies its alcoholic strength. In terms of economy, these beers also served the purpose of social class distinction. The strongest beers would be reserved for special occasions or for royalty. The next strongest would be designated for the abbot or feudal lord. The 3rd gyle (or runnings) would be the "single" beer consumed in quantity by the monks. There may even have been a fourth gyle, which produced a very weak beer served to everyone else, including pilgrims and peasants alike.

I recently embarked upon a partigyle brew of epic proportions. Though I have done a partigyle batch before, I had never done a partigyle batch that would produce three very different beers. Oh, did I mention that all three beers have a pumpkin theme, and that the overall mash contained 8 lbs. of roasted pumpkin that had been in the freezer since October? My plan for the batch was to use up most of my partially emptied grain bags from the previous year. I had about 15 lbs. of base malt of different varieties and bits of specialty grains here and there, so I formulated a master recipe with specialty grain additions for each gyle. My goal was for a big barleywine as the first gyle, an IPA of unknown strength for the second, and a sour, berliner-style beer for the third (perhaps I will do another post on sour mashing, but please ask if you have questions before I get around to such a post). In addition to left-over grains, I also had several ounces of Apollo hops to use up. This was fortunate because I intended to make an extremely hoppy pale ale (at least 7 oz. Apollo hops, with over 40 IBUs in the last 10 minutes of the boil) So, here are the recipes with some pics. When they are ready to drink I will give a tasting report.

Main mash (common to all beers):

12.13# Maris Otter
3.13# US 2-Row
.13 # Black Patent Malt
8# Frozen roasted pie pumpkin

Barleywine (OG before sugar: 1.086) (4.37 gal. boil volume; 3.25 gal. in fermenter):

• 1.00 oz. Apollo (16.00%) @ 60 min.  50.6 IBU
• 2.00 oz. Brambling Cross (6.00%) @ 15 min. 18.8 IBU
• 3.00 oz. Brambling Cross (6.00%) @ 1 min.  2.5 IBU
• 1 tsp. Irish Moss @ 10 min.
• 2+ lbs. Table Sugar (boiled w/ 2 c. water/lb. to make syrup) added in 1 lb. additions to primary 
• started fermentation with SafAle US-05 yeast and added large 4L starter of WLP099 Super High Gravity Yeast after second sugar addition in primary

Mashed in with 28 qt. of 157.3F water for a 60 min. single infusion rest @ 150F. Fermented at 61F-64F ambient temperature. Fermentation temperature should stay below 70F.
Use http://yeastcalc.com/ and http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html to calculate yeast pitching rates

IPA (OG: 1.053):

• Added 1.5 lbs. quick grits and 1 lb. Bairds Carastan (30L-37L) to mash before refilling mash tun with 24 qt. 174F water for 40 min.
• 1 oz. Apollo (16.00%) FWH @ 60 min.  66.7 IBU
• 1.5 oz. Apollo (16.00%) @ 10 min.  33.0 IBU
• 3.5 oz. Apollo (16.00%) @ 1 min. 9.1 IBU
• 1 oz. Apollo (16.00%) dry hop 14 days
• 1 lb. Table Sugar @ 15 min. 
• 1 tsp. Irish Moss @ 15 min.
• SafAle US-05 ale yeast; ferment below 70F (65-68F; 61-65F ambient temp.)

Berliner-style Sour ale (OG: 1.030):

• Partial mash of 1 lb. of main mash grist reserved prior to mashing, .66 lb. Honey Malt, and .66 lb. Biscuit Malt in separate vessel at appoximately 150F until converted. This partial mash is added back to main mash with 26 qt. of 172F water.
• Sour mash: allow mash to cool below 122F before adding large handful of uncrushed malt (I used a combination of unmalted barley I grew last summer and leftover sauerkraut juice full of lactobacilis). Maintain a temperature range between 95F-122F for approximately 36 hrs (either with hot water additions or an internal heat source), checking for desired sourness every 12 hours. It is important to reduced exposure of oxygen to the surface of the mash as much as possible to inhibit unwanted bacterial growth. Plastic wrap may be used to cover the surface of the mash or carbon dioxide may be blanketed atop the mash surface. When desired level of sourness is reached, heat mash to 168F and drain mash tun as per usual.
• Boil wort only 15 min.
• 1 tsp. Irish Moss @ 15 min.
• .50 oz. Pride of Ringwood (9.00%) @ 10 min.  7.1 IBU
• Bell's Brewery yeast cultured from bottles of Oberon
• Fermented at similar temperature as the above beers

Pics:

Mash after draining first gyle. Notice the pumpkin pieces.

Hydrometer reading of barleywine wort post-boil

Barleywine. I got impatient and did not filter trub and hops.

Pretty Barleywine wort

Barleywine wort in the glass

Hops & break material from 2nd gyle (IPA).

Hydrometer reading on 3rd gyle (Sour mash beer):

3rd gyle wort in the glass. Wow! Very tart!

Thanks so much for following this post through to the end! I would love to hear about your partigyle brew experiences in the comments.

More info on partigyle brewing:

http://morebeer.com/brewingtechniques/library/backissues/issue2.2/mosher.html

http://www.astrocaver.com/java/Parti-Gyle.html

http://zombiebeergeeks.blogspot.com/2010/12/v-behaviorurldefaultvml-o.html

Until next time, BE FERMENTIVE!