Simple Belgian Tripel Recipe Query

[J_P]

Hi All

Last night I had my first taste of Belgian beer and I was very impressed, so much so that I would like to have a go at brewing one to lay down for next spring / summer. My favourite was Tripel Karmeliet with Westmalle Tripel coming a close second.

I have been doing a bit of reading in the recipes section and have come up with a list of ingredients i could use.

Pale Pilsner Malt
Styrian Golding hops
Sazz hops
Candy Sugar
Specialist Yeast (WLP500 / 530)

The trouble is I'm unsure of the quantities of each to use.

Does anyone have a simple recipe I could attempt using a single step infusion mash please? I'm aiming for something around the 8-10% ABV range.

Thanks in advance

[steve_flack]

karmeliet is a pretty complicated beer as it has a whole bunch of unmalted and malted grains in it.

Westmalle Tripel is easier. It's just pils malt and sugar (just use brewing sugar or sucrose - either will work - about 15-20% of fermentables). IIRC EKG for bitterness and Saaz for late hops. WLP-530 is the Westmalle yeast. Because of the huge amount of sugar you aim for around 1.075 OG and I think it's about 40IBU.

This is just from memory. There's specs in the Brew Like a Monk book I have at home.

[J_P]

Cheers Steve

I did think the term "Simple Belgian Tripel" may have been oxymoronic after I'd typed it It appears this is one style where large quantities of sucrose are OK, do I just add this a little at a time half way through the boil as advised in Marc Ollosens book?

[delboy]

This a recpe i posted in the xmas brew thread for westmalle tripel, its from the clone brew book and adjusted to UK 5 gallon size.

OG 1088-90, FG 1.018-20, 9 % Alcohol.

mash at 65-66C C
8.375 Kg of Pils malt
0.142 Kg of aromatic malt

In the boil

90 mins
0.85 Kg Clear Candi sugar
53 g of stryian goldings (5 % AA)

15 mins
9 g of hersbrucker
9 g of tettnanger

5 mins
18 g of Saaz

Yeast 1st choice recultured yeast from a westmalle tripel (21-23 C)
Yeast 2nd chice wyeast 1214 Belgian abbey yeast (21-23 C)


Even though clone brews has stipulated wyeast 1214, i've read the westmalle strain is wyeast 3837/WL 530, but that also it is a beast of a yeast and can ferment the beer too far.
I had thought about using, the yeast from a chimay bottle which is 1214 and should behave itself better.

[steve_flack]

The characteristics of the yeast vary with temperature. Westmalle, Achel and Westvleteren all use the same yeast (the other two get their yeast from Westmalle). Westmalle controls the ferm temp more but Westvleteren pretty much lets the yeast do it's thing and go as hot as they dare.

There's a chart here that shows you what to expect given certain fermentation conditions. In general I'd start at 20C and gradually rise to 24C after a couple of days. Obviously you can only do this if you have some way on controlling the fermentation temperature.

[mysterio]

I did a tripel with the Orval yeast recently (white labs seasonal), I think I used 10% sugar which I don't think was enough - the beer was a little too sweet and malty. The yeast also attenuated way higher than expected, i think I ended up with a beer of around 11% alcohol.

JP, I say go with one of the tripel recipes posted and use the Westmalle yeast strain. It's a doddle to make - you'll probably find that the yeast will lift the temperature of the beer during fermentation on it's own (it's quite vigorous). One of the rules of thumb is to pitch the yeast fairly cool, then let the temperature ramp up during the course of the fermentation to get the fruity esters you want, but not the fusel oils. Remember to do a reasonable sized starter.

[mysterio]

Oh, here's what I did. Again I would use 20% sugar next time and drop the gravity to perhaps 1.070. The final gravity is according to beersmiths refractometer tool, i don't have a hydrometer and i'm not entirely convinced the FG was that low.

Tripel
Belgian Tripel


Type: All Grain
Date: 3/4/2007
Batch Size: 5.00 Imp gal
Brewer: Geoff
Boil Size: 5.72 Imp gal
Boil Time: 60 min
Brewhouse Efficiency: 65.00

Ingredients

Amount Item Type % or IBU
7.60 kg Pilsner (2 Row) Ger (3.9 EBC) Grain 88.37 %
3.88 oz Styrian Goldings [4.00 %] (75 min) Hops 33.8 IBU
0.71 oz Saaz [4.00 %] (5 min) Hops 1.2 IBU
1.00 kg Corn Sugar (Dextrose) (0.0 EBC) Sugar 11.63 %
1 Pkgs Bastogne Belgian Ale (White Labs #WLP510) Yeast-Ale

Beer Profile

Measured Original Gravity: 1.085 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.001 SG
Actual Alcohol by Vol: 11.01 %
Bitterness: 34.9 IBU Calories: 380 cal/pint
Est Color: 9.5 EBC Color: Color

My Mash Step Time Name Description Step Temp
90 min Step Add 19.76 L of water at 70.1 C 64.0 C

[steve_flack]

1.001 ! That is low. Almost 'My beer has Brett in it' low. I'd want a second opinion on that gravity.

[J_P]

Cheers for all your input folks. What do you think of the following recipe

4.50 Kg Pilsner Malt
1.15 Kg Sucrose
(Roughly an 80:20 split)

50g Styrians 90 minutes 20IBU
50g Saaz 90 minutes 16 IBU

20g Saaz 5 minutes

That puts it at about 1.075 for 20l at 75% efficiency, to my uneducated eye that looks in the right ballpark. I'll make up a 2l starter tonight for the WLP530. I'll have 300g of light spraymalt left over from making the starter would it pay me to lob that in too? it'll take it to around 1.080 if I do.

Any comments, suggestions or pointers?

[mysterio]

1.001 ! That is low. Almost 'My beer has Brett in it' low. I'd want a second opinion on that gravity.

Yeah, it doesn't make sense. It didn't taste that dry but then again i'm not sure what effect that amount of alcohol would have on the reading.

J.P. the recipe looks good to me. Remember to aerate the wort as well as you can because of the high gravity, oh and put a mat under your fermenter if there's not a lot of headspace, the belgian yeasts tend to want to crawl out of the fermenter. I would save the spraymalt for a starter for another beer personally as it's quite expensive compared to grain (just use more pils malt if you want more gravity).

[J_P]

Cheers Mysterio. The starter liquid is just cooling down in the kitchen now.

[steve_flack]

What are the alphas on your hops? The bitterness comes out a bit on the high side in my calcs. I'm assuming 4.5% for the styrians (probably where the difference is) and 3% for the saaz.

Also when you add the sugar will make a difference to the bitterness. I'd dissolve the sugar in some hot liquor and add it in the last 10 minutes to avoid caramelisation and to get better utilisation from your hops.

Other than that it should be a great beer. Just try not to let the yeast go mental. It's climbed out of the fermenter on more than one occasion for me in the past....

[J_P]

What are the alphas on your hops?

The Styrians are 3.8 and the Saaz are 3.

I am planning on starting the ferment off at room temp and increasing to around 24C after initial fermentation is over. Does this sound reasonable for this style I'd like some interesting flavours but don't fancy the "Solvent" flavours promised on the chart above that.

[oblivious]

What are the alphas on your hops?

The Styrians are 3.8 and the Saaz are 3.

I am planning on starting the ferment off at room temp and increasing to around 24C after initial fermentation is over. Does this sound reasonable for this style I'd like some interesting flavours but don't fancy the "Solvent" flavours promised on the chart above that.

pitch at 16-17c at let it rise naturally

[TC2642]

What are the alphas on your hops?

The Styrians are 3.8 and the Saaz are 3.

I am planning on starting the ferment off at room temp and increasing to around 24C after initial fermentation is over. Does this sound reasonable for this style I'd like some interesting flavours but don't fancy the "Solvent" flavours promised on the chart above that.

pitch at 16-17c at let it rise naturally

Agreed, I used the WLP530 yeast for my Westmalle Dubbel and raised it slowly to 23oC (I only really wanted it to go to 20oC but I have no contro over my temperature!) over four days, initial aroma is very promising and it fermented like a bastard. I also remember from BLAM that this yeast may be rather sensitive to temperature, so I wouldn't recommend going higher than 24oC (although I have let some Belgian yeast go as high as 30oC with good results) or letting the temperature drop too much since it may stop fermenting completely.