Poochops GF Brewday #10 Rochefort 10 clone

[Zephyr259]

Can these BIG beers be made in smaller amounts...? Yes...a blatantly "stupid" question...but...I think I'd struggle to get through 40 at 10%...I'm bad enough at over 6 or 7.....

I make 15L batches just now, my brunette worked well at that scale, hitting my usual 75% efficiency.

 

[Poochops]

2 weeks. Gravity 1.020, tastes very promising indeed.
I wonder if it'll go any lower it's looking pretty much finished but that's too high still.
10.76% currently and 79% attenuation, I'd like at least another 5 degrees off it, any suggestions?

 

[Ajhutch]

What temp is it at now? You said you were going to just let it go so I'm guessing it's fairly high. Maybe a gentle swirl and leave it a few days to see what happens.

 

[MagnusTS]

This might be a daft question, but do you think it would be possible to brew a big Belgian like this without temperature control, just at an ambient room temp? Or would that be a catastrophic fail?

 

[Poochops]

I've had it at 24 for the past week to try and get it over the line, I'll rouse it again tomorrow and see if it's dropped any by the weekend. If not then it's into a clean bucket to condition in the corner for a while, The inside of the FV is disgusting, everything above the beer level including the lid is coated in the thickest yeast I've ever come across, I'd hate for anything to take hold on it and go mouldy.

@MagnusTS i reckon if you pitched at the right temperature then insulated it good and proper you'd stand a fighting chance but I'd leave it till summer when it's not dropping so much at night. Ideally you want it constant but it will produce some warmth itself when it kicks off, it's about keeping that warmth as consistent as possible I think. Reading brew like a monk at the moment and in it they say some breweries let it rise and reach 30 in some cases so cooling might be less of an issue as keeping it warm.

 

[Poochops]

Siphoned this off into a clean bin last weekend, taste was dominated by lots of hot alcohols so I'm taking advice from earlier in the thread and I'm going to bulk age it for 3 months or more to see how it develops. Was initially a bit miffed but it's all part of the journey, I don't think I've done anything wrong with it so far so we'll see how it develops.

 

[strange-steve]

You'll probably find the alcohol flavour smooths out pretty quickly. If you pitched at 19° then it's unlikely to be a major fusel problem. I found the same with my big Belgian beers, lots of alcohol when young but smoothing out within a few weeks.

 

[Dutto]

........... to bulk age it for 3 months or more to see how it develops. ..........

I like that idea.

Nearly 9kg is a lot of fermentable material so keeping it somewhere nice and cool for a few months will give it time to sort itself out.:thumb:

 

[Slid]

This might be a daft question, but do you think it would be possible to brew a big Belgian like this without temperature control, just at an ambient room temp? Or would that be a catastrophic fail?

I did a Belgian Trippel using Mangrove Jack M31 last year @ 8.6% brewing in April with no temps control. Very nice beer indeed. 5kg MO, 1kg Candi Sugar, home made and 500g each of Biscuit, Munich and Crystal.

 

[Poochops]

Well the bulk conditioning sorted out the hot alcohol flavours but it didn't go any lower so 10.7% and 79% attenuation, it tastes very promising indeed.
Bulk primed to 2.5 with 140g of sugar and a fresh pitch of about 75billion wyeast 1762. Got 70 bottles and a plassy one to test the carbonation, the hard part begins now gonna let it carbonate for a few months before I try a bottle.

 

[Ajhutch]

What a beautiful picture :beer6:

Would love to get in the queue for a swap of one of these....!

 

[Zephyr259]

70 bottles! That should keep you going for a fair while. I got 33 of my brunette and think I'm down to about 25 now. Fortunately, my wife doesn't like it and I don't think my father-in-law will drink many of them so they should last me a reasonable time. Looking forward to hearing what you think of this brew in a few months time. How have the samples tasted? That yeast is meant to be cleaner than other beligain strains, did you find this?

 

[Poochops]

What a beautiful picture :beer6:

Would love to get in the queue for a swap of one of these....!

Haha no problem, remind me again in the summer we'll sort something out

 

[Poochops]

70 bottles! That should keep you going for a fair while. I got 33 of my brunette and think I'm down to about 25 now. Fortunately, my wife doesn't like it and I don't think my father-in-law will drink many of them so they should last me a reasonable time. Looking forward to hearing what you think of this brew in a few months time. How have the samples tasted? That yeast is meant to be cleaner than other beligain strains, did you find this?

The flavour change has been wierd to be honest, after it finished brewing it was very smooth a little roasty and chocolatey, two weeks later it was all hot and actually quite rough and now two months further on and it's calmed down again, it's very complex with raisin, chocolate, malt loaf, my Candi syrup was really quite caramely almost like candyfloss and I'm sure this is coming through. The Belgian character is subtle which is good as I find the original similar, I've only got CML Belgian Ale yeast to compare it too and that has so much character it's off the scale, so yes I think it's quite reserved, very pleasant.

 

[Zephyr259]

Sounds great, thats the kind of complexity I was hoping for in my brunette but it's a bit straightforward just now, will probably continue to develop with a bit of age.

I've tried WY 3522 Belgian Ardennes (Achoufle), Safbrew T-58 and my dubble is currently fermenting with WY1214 (Chimay) so it seems that I'm slowly testing my way through them. Was going to culture up the dregs of a bottle of Rochefort and see how that went.

 

[Martybhoy]

Hi, what's the effect of adding fresh yeast at the priming stage?

 

[Zephyr259]

Hi, what's the effect of adding fresh yeast at the priming stage?

Ensuring carbonation after a lengthy period of ageing during which most of the yeast will drop out. Also with a high abv any existing yeast will be very stressed or non-viable even if the ageing period wasn't that long.

 

[Poochops]

Worried about this now! It's carbed up in a week, the test bottle is rock hard :-( expecting bottle bombs now, but you never know.
In the words of Nat King Cole, 'there may be trouble aheeeeaaad'

 

[Zephyr259]

The benefits of a fresh pitch of yeast. I wish my strong beers carb'ed so well. Hopefully the bottles survive.

 

[Poochops]

Tried another of these tonight, opening the bottle the lid came off like a champagne cork it actually hit the ceiling! Surprisingly though it didn't gush but poured fine with a full inch of head in a Belgian chalice, I'm 3/4 down the glass and there's plenty of head left which is good.
So the first mouthful was quite alcoholic actually but after sitting for ten minutes subsided quite a bit, still there though. Body is great especially considering the amount of sugar, but the flavour has changed quite a bit it's mellowed a lot and doesn't have as much character as it did previously. Will be interested to see how it is in another 3 months.