This beer was my first attempt at a Belgian ale. I like to drink them but have never brewed them and I was eager to brew this beer, get my feet wet and see what the result would be. I brewed this beer a little over a month ago during the heatwave. I decided to brew this beer because Belgian ales tend to ferment better at higher temperatures and brewing seasonally is a great way to learn about beers from a historical perspective as well as to save energy.
Malt
- 5 lbs – Coopers light DME
- 1 lbs – Bavarian Wheat DME
Specialty Grains:
- 1 lbs – Belgian Caramunich (50L)
Hops
- 1.5 oz Styrian Golding (4.9) bittering
- 1 oz Kent Golding (4.8) finish
Yeast
- Saison Ale Yeast WLP565
Extras
- 1 tablet servomyces
- 1 oz Kifer Lime leaves
- 1 lbs – Corn Sugar
Original Gravity: 1.065
Final Gravity: 1.020
ABV: 5.91%
Process
- Steep grains @ 155° F for 30 minutes, then remove.
- Boil 1.5 oz Styrian Goldings for 60 minutes.
- Add 6 lbs of Coopers Light DME at the 30 minute mark.
- Add 1 lbs of Bavarian Wheat DME at the 30 minute mark.
- Add wort chiller at 40 minute mark.
- Add 1 lbs. corn sugar at 45 minute mark.
- Add servomyces at 50 minute mark.
- Add 1 oz of Kent Goldings and 1 oz kifer lime leaves at flame out.
- Cool beer to 70° F and pitch yeast from yeast starter.
- Aerate for 10 minutes.
Primary Fermentation — 7/14/2009
As I said before, I brewed this beer during the little heat wave we had. The interior of the house was no cooler than 75º F and was as warm as 90º F – 95º F. I let this beer ferment out for two weeks.
Tasting Notes (wort) — 7/14/2009
This beer is cloudy, lots of particulate matter floating about. It is a muddy amber/light caramel color with light amber highlights. The aroma is of sweet malt, slightly grainy, slight caramel, very low wheat character. Low hop aroma but has noticeable kifer lime leaf aroma underneath. The ber has an initial malt sweetness reminiscent of dry cereal with low bitterness and a residual sweetness. It is full bodied and flat.
Tasting Notes (primary) — 8/1/2009
Nearly opaque amber/light caramel color with no head. Slight alcohol presence in the aroma with honey-like malt sweetness and lots of fruit esters, pearl-like. Malty sweet, some fruit flavors and slight alcohol warmth. Seems slightly underattnuated.
Tasting Notes (final) — 8/24/2009
The saison pours out a caramel color with amber highlights. It is opaque with an off-white head. The saison has a sweet, malty aroma with slight peppery and clovey phenolics as well as a sweet, caramel-ish malt component. Sammy also detects a slight tartness in the aroma as well. Unfortunately, the kifer lime leaf aroma I detected at the end of the boil is pretty much gone. The saison has a caramel-like malt flavor balanced by clovey, peppery phenolics with very low fruit character. Hop flavor is low in intensity, with an earthy, spicy character. Hop bitterness is low. The body is medium/medium-high with medium-lo/medium carbonation.
I think this beer will taste a little better in a few weeks. The carbonation will get up to the effervescent level eventually. There’s supposed to be a slight sourness in the beer that I could probably fix by using acidified malt. I think this is also a beer that would’ve benefitted from bottle conditioning. Had I bottle conditioned this beer, I would’ve used lactobacillus as the bottling yeast. In the future, I won’t use Belgian Caramunich as I believe caramel is not supposed to be part of the flavor profile. Despite fermenting at a higher temperature, I’m at a loss to explain why there’s a lack of fruity esters. I will end up amending the recipe to add more spices as well, just enough for complexity but not to overpower the rest of the beer. I also think I’ll exclude the Bavarian Wheat DME as well as I’m not really enjoying the clovey phenolic character of the beer. Any suggestions as how to get more fruit character out of this beer?
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Starting the fermentation a little cooler and then letting it rise might get you a little more of the fruit flavor you are looking for, like as low as 68 and then over the course of fermentation raise it to 80 if you have the means of controlling it like that. On the same note, I think you are getting the clovey phenolic from the fermentation of the yeast rather than the wheat. I’d leave the wheat and cut way back on the Cara–like down to a few ounces. Reducing the cara flavor will help crisp it up and maybe it is hiding other flavors. Cheers and good luck!
I’d have to agree with Dan about the temperature ramp and phenolics. 68 to 80 or even higher worked for me. It does depend on the strain… supposedly WLP565 can go up to nearly 90 and people love it! If you can’t control temperature fluctuations, I’d at least try to start it on the cool side and then let ‘er rip. And if it doesn’t hit at least 75, you might even try to add heat… otherwise you might have to wait four weeks for even a sweet finish. It’s can be a slow, temperamental strain.
Since you’re using extract, I’d suggest replacing the Coopers with a pilsner extract — it’s the closest you’ll get to Belgian pilsner malt. B3 and I believe Williams sell it. Since you have no control over the mash and can’t mash it at 148 (I would guess that they mash at something higher, say a nice average 152) your resulting saison won’t be as dry as the style really likes to be. You might find that some white sugar or honey could help to dry it out. (I wouldn’t go past 1/2 lb, at least on the first try.) And instead of caramunich, I might try caravienne, if only for color. It’s fairly common for there to be some Vienna malt in the saison malt bill, which lends it an orange tint. The problem (as alluded to by Dan) is that caramel malts will add sweetness, which is not what you want!
I tried extract versions of the style twice… once was just okay, and the second was not so hot. Recently I went all grain, and brewed a pretty good one. I know “they” say that you can brew great beers with extract, but for whatever reason I never found that to be the case! I get the feeling that these dry Belgian styles are a bit of a challenge unless you have control over the mash.
Back to the sugar and/or honey… one thing I’ve been doing lately is to add it (boiled/pasteurized, of course) a few days into the fermentation so that the yeast can take on the more difficult task (maltose) first, rather than getting lazy on glucose before starting on the maltose. Supposedly this helps get that extra point or two of final gravity.
Cheers!
Cheers, Kim