hey charlie, finally got round to drawing my first pint of kazbek blonde off the polypin!
150g each of wheat and caramalt, then 2800g pale malt to 1,037, mashed at 67C
20g kazbek at 60min then 40g each at 10min and FO
FG 1,008 3,8%
straight outta the pack i thought they had a good lemony scent. early tastings (i was keeping a close eye on fermentation behaviour of the yeast you see..
) were delicious - a real citrus lemon scent and taste reminiscent of styrian goldings/bobek. the ringwood still had it away with a lot of the aroma, but it's conditioned beautifully and has pulled the taste together well and there's still a nice flavour there. so my conclusions are probably fairly similar to yours - next time, more late hops!! they got a nice, but weak, flavour. actually, it'd probably work well as a support hop - and i mean that in a good way! i'd definitely use again in a blonde/golden ale.
i actually fermented some of the wort with mauri weiss yeast and that got down to 1,005 and took away any flavour from the hops! kinda got a saisony vibe to it, but i think i'll have to give it a secondary on something 'cause it's a bit bland as is.
hows yours drinking mate?
dazzled, doused in gin..
