  Dave Member Username: Dave Post Number: 108 Registered: 10-2003 |
Give us an update on the porters and holiday brew. dave | ||
Awfavre Member Username: Awfavre Post Number: 78 Registered: 08-2005 |
Hi Dave. The Maple Porter is lovely--dark & no longer sweet. Very mellow compared to the start. This brew is aging so nicely . . . & it kicks butt at about 6.6% ABV. I can’t wait to try the recipe with the Grade B stuff. I genuinely love this beer. The Vanilla Porter is still rough around the edges. The first bottle (a 12-ouncer) was more mellow & tasted great. A recent 22-ouncer had too much hop-bitterness for my tastes for this recipe. We’ll see if that mellows with age, or if I boiled the bittering hops too long (I’m not yet experienced enough to know if such things could happen). The vanilla taste is strong, but very good, I just don’t like it as bitter as it sometimes seems. The Holiday Brew--At first taste, upon transferring it to the secondary fermenter (I like to take a wee taste or two at each stage to see how things change), it was wonderful. The orange peel & cloves balanced nicely. It’s darker than I originally expected, but I’m glad it turned out that way. I love this style of beer, so I can’t wait to bottle it this weekend & get it aging for Christmas consumption. The original recipe called for adding 1 lb of honey to the boil, but the guys at Hopman’s (Waterford) said not to boil the honey (any thoughts as to why?). We didn’t, so we added it to the fermenting bucket before adding the wort. The result was a high original gravity (1.040 or thereabouts), but the yeast seems to making good work of it (1.022 gravity at the transfer to the secondary fermenter). I’m guessing the ABV will be up there by the time it’s all said & done. For my next project, I’m thinking a raspberry stout might be tasty. How about you? Any homebrew projects lurking out there? | ||
Dave Member Username: Dave Post Number: 109 Registered: 10-2003 |
They all sound great. Maybe the brewers/winemakers on the list need to get together on Belle Isle next spring to sample each others wares. I've got a hard cider going in primary fermentation. I put in enough brown sugar to make it come out about 11 or 12% alc. I'll ferment it dry and prime some beer bottles and cap it. I put in cinnamon and cloves 'cause I wanted to try that. I have two wines aging. raspberry/currant/white grape and a frontenac/marechal foch blend. Two days ago I decided to try to make vinegar and I've mixed some cider vinegar that had some mother in it with a gallon of white wine I made that was a bit too acid. Yesterday I ordered fresh ripe olives from California and I'm going to try curing them myself. You don't need to boil honey because the nasties don't spoil it easy and I hear that it even helps fight them. Your Holiday Brew recipe reminded me of an easy beginner mead recipe called Joe's Ancient Orange and Spice Mead. It also contains orange peel and cloves. Here is a link to the recipe. (Followed by 45 pages of comments and discussion!) http://www.winepress.us/forums /index.php?showtopic=6114&st=0 dave | ||
Awfavre Member Username: Awfavre Post Number: 79 Registered: 08-2005 |
Wow, Dave, that Joe’s Ancient Orange & Spice Mead sounds so good, I have to try it. I read several of the subsequent comment pages on that site, & I can’t wait to start. I’ve got your maple mead recipe on file. Maybe I’ll progress to it one day after I do some “real” mead-making. The Holiday Brew is looking like about 6.3% ABV. The taste is calming down quite a bit to be more clovey, & I’m not sure I like that. I like cloves, but I prefer a more balanced taste in this case. The orange is really starting to stand out, though. Go, oranges, go! It amazes me how much the taste changes over time with this glorious product. I know it’s good to be patient, but it’s so hard sometimes . . . Thanks for the info about the honey. I love your idea from the other thread about having a homebrew tasting in the spring. Your hard cider sounds great. Best of good luck with your wine-vinegar & your olive-curing. |
