Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

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Tony B
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Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by Tony B » Thu Jan 20, 2022 7:27 pm

Hoping I have posted this enquiry in the correct forum.
A friend has asked if I can have a go at brewing a Velveteen Caramel beer from a recipe on the American Homebrewers Association website.
Apparently this beer is a very sweet low alcohol (around 3%) dark beer and I believe to be of Russian origin.
Ingredients for a 19 ltr batch are:
3 kg Pilsner Malt
340 g chocolate malt
340 g caramel malt
450 g demerara sugar
42 g saaz hops
White Labs WLP04 yeast

Instructions say to ferment from OG 1.053 to 1.030 and stop fermentation there by crash cooling.
I want to bottle the beer but have a concern that after bottling and raising the temperature for conditioning, fermentation may restart due to so much sugar present and with potentially dramatic effects.

Any advice or reassurance will be appreciated.

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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by f00b4r » Thu Jan 20, 2022 9:22 pm

That’s only 42% attenuation so I would be very concerned about ending up with bottle bombs, especially as WLP004 usually has much greater attenuation.
I know that classic British breweries with traditional yeasts sometimes control attenuation through temperature but that beer is then casked, out the door and consumed pretty quickly; if you leave it in the packaging the yeast will continue to slowly chomp away.

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Eric
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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by Eric » Fri Jan 21, 2022 1:20 am

Even in a cask it is likely the keystone could be blown out before it was tapped and even if it didn't, it would be very difficult to control and serve.

The sugar is 100% fermentable, the caramel malt is stewed during malting to be largely converted prior to mashing, so you'd have your back against the wall before starting. I've seen many recipes of American origin that make no sense, but this one ranks amongst the worst. If you want to attempt that recipe, you'll need to mash at a high temperature and store the resulting beer at a very cold one.

I doubt you'll hit the given gravity figures.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.

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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by Tony B » Fri Jan 21, 2022 7:50 am

Thanks very much for your advice confirming my concerns with this recipe.
Should I attempt brewing these recipe ingredients it probably requires further fermentation to a much lower FG to allow conditioning which of course will vastly alter the beer sweetness and ABV

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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by IPA » Fri Jan 21, 2022 8:15 am

As Eric said if you want to retain some sweetness mash at a high temperature.
"You're not drunk if you can lie on the floor without holding on." Dean Martin

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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by Tony B » Fri Jan 21, 2022 11:07 am

Yep and thanks for this.
If I try this brew I’ll definitely be mashing at the higher temp to try and produce those long sugars and higher FG

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Eric
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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by Eric » Fri Jan 21, 2022 12:39 pm

Consider a mini-mash in a preset oven with the grains and a probe in a suitable jug to find its potential FG. As your objective is other than quality, no great concern for wort clarity and a short boil will do, but avoid caramelisation and sanitise to usual standards. Fermentation might be done with dregs from a previous bottle conditioned beer.
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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by IPA » Fri Jan 21, 2022 3:24 pm

This might be helpful when deciding mash temperature and fermentability. I wrote it down eight years ago. It came from edsbeer.blogspot.pt
Written down byJaideep Chandrasekhar whoever he is ?
90% lager malt
10% carapils
Fermented with lager yeast
65°C =82%
70°C=70%
75°C=50%
80°C=30%
"You're not drunk if you can lie on the floor without holding on." Dean Martin

1. Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, thoroughly used, totally worn out and loudly proclaiming... "f*ck, what a trip

It's better to lose time with friends than to lose friends with time (Portuguese proverb)

Alone we travel faster
Together we travel further
( In an admonishing email from our golf club)

Tony B
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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by Tony B » Fri Jan 21, 2022 6:35 pm

Thank you IPA.
This info is interesting and for me at least new knowledge

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Re: Velveteen Caramel beer fermentation and conditioning

Post by Tony B » Tue Feb 01, 2022 11:05 am

Just an update to say I went ahead and brewed this recipe all be it with modifications.
Using a Grainfather G30 setup, grains were mashed at 70°C with the sugar added towards the end of the boil producing a 1.066 OG.
I substituted the White Labs yeast with a Lallemand Nottingham dried yeast mainly for economy as I was unsure where this brew was going to go.
During fermentation I decided (chickened out) not to stop it but let run the course to an FG 1.018 and the beer will now be bottled and conditioned without severe risk of bottle bombs.
So this brew has developed into a totally different beer to the recipe and I will be interested to see what it is like to drink in a month or so time.
Thanks all for your advice on this brew - appreciated

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