Homebrew Session: Harvest Pale Ale 2009

Update: At the urging of some readers, I have submitted this post to the Grow Your Own (GYO) round-up. The GYO round up is a monthly collection of blog posts featuring stuff people have made using ingredients they’ve grown themselves. Seeing as how I used my homegrown hops for this beer, I qualified for the round up. If you’re at all interested in the GYO movement, check out the link below and peep the fabulous things over people have done or submit your own stories/blog posts for future roundups.

Check our the GYO round up here.

A basic American Pale Ale recipe, not too different from my usual pale ale recipe, but featuring home grown hops harvested a do or so before brew day. I was initially supposed to tap this beer around September/October but didn’t do so until late November. What can I say? Can’t tap the new beers until the old ones are finished.

Malt

• 6 lbs – Coopers light DME

Specialty Grains:

• 1 lbs – Hugh Baird (80L)
• 1 lbs – Bamburg Munich (6L)
• .25 lbs – Belgian Aromatic (20L)

Hops

• .5 oz Magnum (13.1) bittering
• 1 oz Perle (7.6) 30 minute addition
• 1 oz Amarillo (8.9) flameout
• 8 oz Cascade (wet, dry-hopped)

Yeast

• English Ale Yeast (WLP002)

Extras

• 1 tablet Servomyces

Original Gravity: 1.074

Final Gravity: 1.024

ABV: 6.56%

Process

1. Steep grains @ 155° F for 30 minutes, then remove.
2. Boil .5 oz Magnum for 60 minutes.
3. Add 6 lbs of Coopers Light DME at the 30 minute mark.
4. Add 1 oz. Perle hops at the 30 minute mark.
5. Add wort chiller at 40 minute mark.
6. Add servomyces at 50 minute mark.
7. Add 1 oz of Amarillo at flame out.
8. Cool beer to 70° F and pitch yeast from yeast starter.
9. Aerate for 10 minutes.

Primary Fermentation (wort) — 8/11/2009

Murky, amber ale with lots of hop particulate matter in suspension. Sweet malt aroma, caramel & grain cereal sweetness. Flavor is cereal sweet with a medium bitterness. Body is full & slightly cloying.

Secondary Tasting Notes — 9/7/2009

Clear, reddish brown color with amber highlights. I’m surprised at the clarity the beer has achieved. Slightly toasty malt aroma with medium-low hop aroma. Noticeable alcohol notes. Toasty, nutty, caramel flavor with medium hop bitterness. More bitter than aroma would suggest. Medium-low/medium body, some astringency in the mouthfeel. I added the 8 oz (wet) freshly picked Cascade hops at this point.

Kegged — 11/20/2009

Final Tasting Notes — 1/7/2010

The beer pours out a clear, dark brown with ruby highlights and an off-white/beige head that lingered for sometime before leaving decent lacing behind. The aroma is a balance between a pungent, citrus/piney hop aroma and a toasty, caramel malt aroma. The beer’s flavor tends to lean towards the malt side exhibiting a sweet, savory, toasty malt character with caramel notes. The hop flavor has a slight pungent quality (garlicy?) with resiny undertones. The hop bitterness is medium and not long lasting. The body is medium/medium-full with medium/medium-high carbonation. There’s a slight alcohol note in the aroma but no discernable heat in the finish.

There was an off flavor in the beer I was having trouble figuring out but I now recognize as a “plastic” phenolic. This could be the result of chlorophenols in my water or maybe I didn’t allow my carboys to drip dry thoroughly enough after sanitation. In any event, I’ll have to watch my process in the future.

Despite this, the biggest issue I had with this beer is the lack of Cascade hop flavor and aroma. Even though I dry hopped with 8 oz Cascade for about a month, the quality of the homegrown hops were on the low end. They weren’t as aromatic as I wanted and even though there were a lot of hops that were picked, they were much smaller in size, about as big as the tip of my pinky finger. Next year I’ll limit my Cascade plant to just 3-4 main bines to help increase the size of the hops.

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