baBIABias (Brewing a belgian In A Bag, in a shed)

[lancsSteve]

Brew evening with Mr C - making a Duvel-a-like from GW recipe in "Brew Classic European Beers at Home" (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Brew-Classic-Eu ... 755&sr=1-1 ) great book, a little dated but very useful tech info and recipes.

Missed early stages of doughing in but this was done in a boiler with 2.4kw element, heated to 68c and with a Ritchies mash and sparge bag.

90 minute mash - will leave Mr C to post the recipe from BrewPal.

Started 7pm, finsihed at 10:30, all cleaned up and done for 11!

Removing the goods from the boiler/mash tun in the ritchies mash and sparge bag:


Turbid as all hell wort coming up to boil:


Levels of turbidity laid out for you - having never done thsi and always recirculated etc. for clarity I thought 'what the hell?!?!?!' at this point:



Turning out the darker-than-it-should-be-but-lovely-and-tasty candi sugar:


Added wort to a measuring jug and diluted this to melted so it wouldn't just land on the base or burn on element:


15 mins from end in went final hops and the key ingredient to it working: protafloc tablet + wort chiller in.

Knocked out and started cooling and TBH I was stunned at the cold break and clarity of the wort:


Running off SERIOSULY clear



More 'bloody hell that's clear' pics:


That's a SERIOUS break!!!


In the fermenter, bubbling away within 10 minutes or so after pitching a 1.5l starter recultured from Duvel Bottle.


Name TBC, either 'Beelzebubble Dubbel' or 'Symputhy for the Duvel'...

Mr C... care to share the recipe by exporting from BrewPal?

[mr.c]

Beelzebub-el Dubbel
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Batch size 23 litres
Boil size 31.51 litres
Boil time 90 minutes
Grain weight 7 kilograms
Efficiency 70%
Original gravity 1.070
Final gravity 1.017
Alcohol (by volume) 6.9%
Bitterness (IBU) 22
Color (SRM) 16.8°L

Yeast
1.5l starter recultured from Duvel Bottle

Grains/Extracts/Sugars
7 kilograms
Maris Otter
38ppg, 4°L 6 kilograms
85.7%
Dry Candi - Amber Turning out the darker-than-it-should-be-but-lovely-and-tasty candi sugar:)
32ppg, 70°L 1 kilograms
14.3%

Hops
60 grams
Bobek hops
4.5%, Whole 60 grams

Mash
60 minutes, 41.17 litres


Boil
90 minutes,
Bobek hops
4.5%, Whole 60 grams
90 minutes (+0)
Wort chiller 15 minutes (+75)

Ferment
21 days @ 20-24°C
Rack to secondary 7 days (+14)

[WishboneBrewery]

Just need a Pumpkin head on that last shot
Looks like a cracking brew and brewday

[Tom_D]

Nice work lancsSteve, looking good!

[danbrew]

Really like the look of that...

So this here Belgian... Am I reading the recipe right...? It's just Maris Otter and candi sugar...? Never done one before and a bit confused about them... But that looks dead easy..!

[art.b]

lookin good there i am planning a biab brew soon,
that pic of the cold break looks interesting, is there always that much debris..
do you have a filter to prevent it leaving the boiler.. ?

[lancsSteve]

Really like the look of that...

So this here Belgian... Am I reading the recipe right...? It's just Maris Otter and candi sugar...? Never done one before and a bit confused about them... But that looks dead easy..!

Yup - it's based on a GW recipe but we used marris otter instead of a more purist 'belgian pale ale malt' (I figure the Belgians would use MO if they could get it just like they use EKGs and Styrian Goldings and recultured yeasts from British Ales - Chimay originally came from McEwans Export!!!) and candi sugar instead of cane sugar to add some of the lovely caramel flavours and colour. It's the yeast and fermentation temps of them that really give belgian its character not complex malt bills or addtions like coriander and curacao (in fact I wish I;d never added those to my dubbel and trippel as they've added a spicy extra flavours that are dischordant, keeping it simple seems best). While this is 'inspired by' Duvel and not a clone that approach is typical e.g. Achouffe use base malt and then coloured candi sugars to change their brew colours and add flavour rather than doing this with malts... Sugars thin it out crystal malts bring body in.... Sugar is essential to get the higher alcohol but thin body characteristic of belgian ales - either use straight cane sugar or making candi sugar is V. easy and fun, but the stuff in home brew shops is an insane rip off.

lookin good there i am planning a biab brew soon,
that pic of the cold break looks interesting, is there always that much debris..
do you have a filter to prevent it leaving the boiler.. ?

The hops formed a really good hop bed and it ran off very smooth - a little break in the bottom of the fermenter but not a lot - yeast food. Always prefer to use a lot of low alpha hops in a boil rather than a few high alphas and with this kind of break think that looks a little more rather than just desirable... Then again for US beers huge late additions of American high-alpha 'c' hops (centennial, columbus etc) would do the same and give you bitterness, hop flavour and a good hop filter. With the prices of hops having comedown from circa £7 per 100g to nearer £2.50 thanks to people like barley bottom, the malt miller and thrifty shopper there's no longer the econiomic argument for using fewer hops IMHO...

No idea if there's always this much debris as it's first BIAB but from what I've read and worked out that seems to be the case - the received wisdom is that would make it all cloudy and you should recirc wort but protafloc + decent hop bed worked wonders here...

[chris_reboot]

awesome brewday chaps.
Lovin' that clarity and cold break!

Looking forward to bottle swaps next week if you're still up for it.
PM me (if I dont first).

[Barley Water]

That looks like fun, I also did a Belgian this weekend. Unlike you however, I did a very messy formulation employing basicly the Jamil Z recipe with some of my own tricks (you know, us Yanks like to make everything complicated). Anyhow, one of the things I do to Dubbels is to add about 6 ounces of raisins, run them through a blender with some of the first runnings then carmelize the whole thing on the stove while collecting the rest of my wort (and yeah, I had a small boil over doing it, what a mess). One of these days I may try this with currents just for grins. It looks like you made your own candi sugar, I was lazy and just purchased the Belgian liquid stuff (expensive but really nice tasting). Anyhow, it will be interesting to see how it comes out, it's all about yeast handling now (I went with the Chimay strain) hopefully I can keep the bananna down to a low roar. With luck, I will get a very rummy/dried fruit flavor. I am also going the bottle the entire batch in Belgian 750's with the corks and wire cages (except for 1/2 a 6 pack for competitions). I will say this though, those raisins make for a very nasty looking wort, it's impossible to get all the damn things out of there when moving the cooled wort to the fermenter.

[lancsSteve]

Unlike you however, I did a very messy formulation employing basicly the Jamil Z recipe with some of my own tricks (you know, us Yanks like to make everything complicated).

Don't you just! That's why BIAB for a belgian with a simple recipe seemed like a winner. My last two belgians werre WAY too heavy on the 'secret ingredients' even though I only added tiny amounts of ginger / corainder / curacao I wish I'd gone KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)

Mr C - how's fermentation going? Wonder if you need to raise temps if they're fluctuating in the lounge...

[TheMumbler]

My last two belgians werre WAY too heavy on the 'secret ingredients' even though I only added tiny amounts of ginger / corainder / curacao I wish I'd gone KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)

If only you had listened to the sage advice on hand