Thoughts on a "Kveik Dark Strong Ale"

[Zephyr259]

This started off as based on Drew Beecham's Saison d'Hiver Infernale (a 1.130 dark saison) which I simplified a bit then futzed with even more so it's now essentially my own recipe. Thinking of using Saure kveik because my wife doesn't like the flavour from belgian yeasts and Saure did a good job of an 80/- and a Jet Black Heart clone (still carbonating) and I think it could work well in a big strong beer as it's not as fruity as other kveiks and is said to emphasise malt from what limited info is out there.

15L, OG 1.091, FG 1.012, ABV 10.4% IBU 34, EBC 48

4.4 kg Golden Promise (69%)
1 kg Abbey Malt (16%)
500 g Sugar (carmelised into homemade candi syrup)
250 g Special B
250 g Cafe, Light (a Chateau malt, 250 EBC)

31 IBU of Admiral at 60 min, 20g of Tettnang at 20 min, 1 vanilla bean and cinnamon stick at the end for a 15 min stand.

Should I use pilsner malt in place of the golden promise? The GP base did fine in my saison inspired by Tripel Karmeliet and with the other malts and sugars its going to be a fairly malty beer anyway.

The other concern is strong belgian beers have lower bitterness to gravity ratios than things like barleywines, I guess this works because they are drier so don't have to balance residual sweetness as much, but I'm also worried it's because the spicy yeast character aids the balance and I won't have this with the kveik.

If this works then it will give me some confidence to try something even bigger like @strange-steve did with his stout, on this one I'm being cautious partly because my efficiency tends to suck on big beers in the GF so the sugar helps, this was built assuming 65% brewhouse efficiency.

Any thoughts about any of this?
Thanks

 

[Zephyr259]

Well it's in the fermenter bubbling away at 37c. Hit 1.094 and got 17.5L as I had to pour the whole GF into the FV after the pump got choked with trub. So I was over on gravity and would have been over on volume even if I'd lost the usual 1.5-2 L post-boil.

 

[JonBrew]

I'd be surprised if this doesn't turn out banging. Looking forward to hearing more about how it goes.

How did you make your candi syrup?

 

[Zephyr259]

I'd be surprised if this doesn't turn out banging. Looking forward to hearing more about how it goes.

How did you make your candi syrup?

As per an episode of basic brewing radio from 2009. 500g sugar, 1.25 tsp DAP (yeast nutrient) enough water to dissolve then boil til it hits 143c, add 1/2 cup water to cool it and stop cooking then reboil to 116c to form a syrup.

I used it in a Belgian brunette a couple of years ago and it was tasty. That batch was double cooked so after the water addition I took it back to 143c a 2nd time then finished as above. Just gets more concentrated flavours that way, I was making this during the boil this time so didn't bother with the 2nd cook.

Oh, I also subbed out golden promise for 1.1 kg of Vienna which was needing used.

 

[JonBrew]

As per an episode of basic brewing radio from 2009. 500g sugar, 1.25 tsp DAP (yeast nutrient) enough water to dissolve then boil til it hits 143c, add 1/2 cup water to cool it and stop cooking then reboil to 116c to form a syrup.

I used it in a Belgian brunette a couple of years ago and it was tasty. That batch was double cooked so after the water addition I took it back to 143c a 2nd time then finished as above. Just gets more concentrated flavours that way, I was making this during the boil this time so didn't bother with the 2nd cook.

Oh, I also subbed out golden promise for 1.1 kg of Vienna which was needing used.

Cheers. Will need to have a go at this. Was planning a spree of belgian beers so should come in handy and save me a few bob.

 

[Zephyr259]

Cheers. Will need to have a go at this. Was planning a spree of belgian beers so should come in handy and save me a few bob.

Good luck. You can vary the temp by 5c for different syrup colours. That's the darkest before it starts to go slightly acrid from the fructose caramelising. Don't worry about the mild ammonia smell while it cooks either that doesn't persist. My first batch seemed perfectly fermentable but BBR did a sugar experiment where it proved unfermentable for some unknown reason.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

This sounds lovely, I might have to have a go at this one! What yeast would you have used to give it a spicy yeast character?

 

[Zephyr259]

This sounds lovely, I might have to have a go at this one! What yeast would you have used to give it a spicy yeast character?

Any Belgian strain really, I've used wyeast 1214 (chimay) but pitched too hot and it wasn't good, meant to be more fruity than spicy. 3522 / Ardennes which is the A'chouffe strain and is a bit more restrained, used it in my first dark strong and it's nice, but again my fermentation wasn't the best as I was starting out and there's a tiny bit of fusels which some people get and others don't. Finally, I've had nothing but good results from 3726 farmhouse ale, it's a spicy Saison yeast (blaugies) that fermented a 1.070 Saison down to 1.002 for a very smooth 9%.

I've just got some more 3522 to play with, it's versatile, but if I only wanted for the dark strong then one day I'll try 1762 which is the Rochefort strain.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Thanks mate, I might have a go with the farmhouse one 3726. I bottle, presumably something this strong would need a fair time conditioning, up to a year you think?

 

[Zephyr259]

Thanks mate, I might have a go with the farmhouse one 3726. I bottle, presumably something this strong would need a fair time conditioning, up to a year you think?

Perhaps? For the Saison "karmeliet" (apart from the yeast it's a clone of Tripel Karmeliet) I was drinking it after about a month, I'd been wondering how long these 7 - 9% saisons would take to condition as I was going to do seasonal variations this year but that didn't happen. I pitched the yeast at 18c then started ramping up the temperature the following day by +1c per day until it hit 24c and held it there until fermentation finished, then cold crashed. Looking at my notes the beer was in the FV almost 4 weeks due to my offshore rotation, probably 3 weeks warm then crashed for a week would be my guess as I didn't record it in my notes, but that's often what I do when my wife is checking for me.

The saison also included 20% sugar by extract which is partially why it finished so low, but I was still expecting it to be in the 1.010 - 1.014 region, as it stands it hit 96-97% attenuation. Didn't do that on the 6% saison I made previously. Haven't used the yeast since as my wife doesn't like the character from belgian strains so I end up having a lot to drink myself. :-) I am planning on doing a split batch of hoppy bitter between Wyeast 1469 (West Yorkshire) and the saison strain, so I'll see what it does on a 1.040 wort.

 

[Zephyr259]

I suspect this may have finished, it stopped bubbling yesterday and has been 1.022 for 24 hrs, if it's still the same tomorrow I'll cold crash it. I got 1L of yeasty, hoppy trub dumped yesterday to help it clear. Hard to do a taste test at 37c but it seems like the usual kinda funky kveik, big on the malt. I don't think this is going to end up as the light bodied belgian style beer I was hoping for and I'm not sure why. Hopefully, it's still tasty as the hopping is quite low for a big beer that doesn't finish dry.

If the sugar was 100% fermentable then it's as if I mashed at 69c when I did a split between 60c and 68c or the yeast decided to attenuate almost 10% less than usual. I guess this beer is about double the OG of the two other beers I've used it in which may impact things and it's sitting at 75% apparent attenuation. I always mash high with kveik, 68c is common and I have gone up to 70c, never tried mashing low so maybe they're not as affected by mash temp as other yeasts and chew through the more complex sugars easily. May test this out in a future brew mashing something low and not adding sugar so there's less variables.

 

[Zephyr259]

Yeah, think I managed to break a kveik strain. The beer tastes pretty hot and funky in a bad way. Cold crashing it to see what that does but I'm leaning towards not even bottling it as it's not turned out to be the beer I was aiming for and I don't think it's think going to be properly balanced.

Looks like I've had a bad fermentation and I can't be bothered with it taking up 40 bottles in the cupboard for the next year while I wait to see if it improves. I've learned with other brews that cutting my losses and freeing up bottles and space is a good plan.

But time shall tell, tasting it cold might change my mind.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Oh no what a pisser! Fusely? Funky in what kind of way?

 

[Zephyr259]

Yeah think it's fusels from getting pitched too hot or just sampling a 9.6% beer at close to 30c, it fermented at 37c. Funky is hard to describe and probably mostly down to a hot malt flavour from it being warm beer. I get a characteristic earthy flavour from Voss and this on (Saure) is showing similar, might just be an excessive amount of esters from the high temp.

Sampling cold will remove the variable of tasting a warm beer so we'll see what it's like tomorrow.