Drying Out Your Beer.

[Dave70]

Are there any tricks to getting beer to finish with that Duvel-ish quality of dry finish whilst retaining that bit of residual sweetness?
The beer is about 2/3's finished at the moment. I mashed at 64, started at 18 and raised to 24 last night and about 16% of the bill was maltose, so I tied to give it the best chance from the start. And indeed, the yeast are farting constantly.

That sounds good enough to me, but would the addition of yeast enzyme or a Champaign yeast make any difference at this stage?
I'm sure re-yeasting and secondary fermentation in the bottle plays a part, but I' doubt I'll be going that way as the potential for producing two milk crates of glass ordnance seems to great.

 

[Steve@PMF82]

Next time try a step mash. temp/time 55/5 62-63/10 67-68/45 72/10 mash out

Only way to do a Belgian IMO

 

[hoppinmad]

Do you mean 16% of the bill was maltose or sucrose?

I find the best way to get good attenuation is wait til krausen drop when the yeast has consumed most of the maltose, then start feeding it your sugar whilst gradually raising the temp every day. I have a Belgian golden ale in the fridge cold conditioning which got down to 1.004 using the above method. Added 1.3kg sugar over the space of a week and ramping up to 28 degrees to dry it out at the end

 

[black_labb]

I wouldn't try to modify the beer to be drier now that you have it going. Belgian yeasts tend to be pretty attenuative and I don't think champagne yeasts would offer much of a difference. They aren't as well suited for maltose and the other sugars expected in beer.

What is the recipe you are using? a bit of styrian goldings dry hopped isn't unheard of in beers like Duvel, though I'd be using restraint. You could always do a mini mash and boil some hops to add a bit more bitterness, though this is more of an adjustment.

A small amount of dark crystal (spec b or cararoma) give sweetness while making little difference to the FG and would help with a bit of the stone fruit flavours.

If using candy sugar the darker ones will add sweetness and flavour dispite not increasing the fg any significant amount. I did a double batch of a belgian dark strong, half with a touch of coriander (10g or so into the cube) that used all clear candy sugar, the other had a bit of pacific gem (~16%AA) into the cube and used dark candy sugar. The one with the dark candy sugar is a bit too cloying despite the extra bitterness where the clear candy sugar is spot on. They both finished at the same low FG of 1010. I'm expecting the one with the dark candy sugar to mellow out over time and maybe end up better than the lighter one. I was quite impressed with the resulting difference.

 

[Dave70]

Next time try a step mash. temp/time 55/5 62-63/10 67-68/45 72/10 mash out

Only way to do a Belgian IMO

Is that possible with my cutting edge esky & braid set up or will I need to upgrade my rig?

 

[manticle]

Are there any tricks to getting beer to finish with that Duvel-ish quality of dry finish whilst retaining that bit of residual sweetness?
The beer is about 2/3's finished at the moment. I mashed at 64, started at 18 and raised to 24 last night and about 16% of the bill was maltose, so I tied to give it the best chance from the start. And indeed, the yeast are farting constantly.

That sounds good enough to me, but would the addition of yeast enzyme or a Champaign yeast make any difference at this stage?
I'm sure re-yeasting and secondary fermentation in the bottle plays a part, but I' doubt I'll be going that way as the potential for producing two milk crates of glass ordnance seems to great.

I'd leave it alone.

Next time follow beer4Us solution. With a 15 minute mash at 62-63 and a 40-50 minute at 67-68, I'll get 1388 down to 1008 no problem. You will still get good mouthfeel from dextrins etc.

I too have a cutting edge esky and copper manifold. I use a grimwood to step mash. You can do it with a bit more difficulty using hot water infusion and decoctions (my recipe uses decoctions anyway)



This is my recipe and schedule: http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...amp;recipe=1298

 

[Dave70]

Do you mean 16% of the bill was maltose or sucrose?

maltose.

 

[manticle]

What's the rest?

 

[Dave70]

I'd leave it alone.

Next time follow beer4Us solution. With a 15 minute mash at 62-63 and a 40-50 minute at 67-68, I'll get 1388 down to 1008 no problem. You will still get good mouthfeel from dextrins etc.

I too have a cutting edge esky and copper manifold. I use a grimwood to step mash. You can do it with a bit more difficulty using hot water infusion and decoctions (my recipe uses decoctions anyway)



This is my recipe and schedule: http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...amp;recipe=1298

Cheers.
I don't have an immersion heater so the difficult way it is.
Should go well with my tendency to do things the hard way also.

 

[manticle]

If you scroll down this page http://www.grainandgrape.com.au/articles_o..._StrikeTemp.htm

you will find a calculator which you can use to calculate how much water to bring up to temp. May need to mash in with a lower liquor ratio although if you remove some grain for decoctions, you'll have a bit more room (obviously the decoction has to go back at some point but you can drain off some first runnings to do that). Be creative.

 

[Dave70]

What's the rest?

22L

Pilsner 4.8kg
Aromatic 2.2kg
Wheat 2.2kg

Hallertau 5.7% 45g @ 60m

Wyeast 1388

 

[manticle]

So by maltose you mean malt extract? Presumably there's a lot of maltose in the pilsner grain etc.

 

[hoppinmad]

So by maltose you mean malt extract? Presumably there's a lot of maltose in the pilsner grain etc.

Yes that is why I was confused. I would have thought malt extract would reduce fermentability

 

[Steve@PMF82]

So by maltose you mean malt extract? Presumably there's a lot of maltose in the pilsner grain etc.

Yes that is why I was confused. I would have thought malt extract would reduce fermentability

Pretty sure Dave is referring to Maltose syrup as talked about in this thread. http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...st&p=906323
Its different to malt extract

 

[Dave70]

Pretty sure Dave is referring to Maltose syrup as talked about in this thread. http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...st&p=906323
Its different to malt extract

Dam right I am.