Final Thoughts: Irie Stout

This is officially the biggest beer ever brewed at Bearded Brewing. This beer was originally inspired by Lion Stout, a Sri Lankan Stout I came across when I was on a big stout kick. I set out to make a foreign extra stout (what Lion is) but then ended trying another beer while I was at Northern Brewer buying the ingredients for Irie. Whenever I go in to the store, I usually talk about what I'm brewing with a guy who works there. I was discussing this and he invited me in the back to try a beer they had on tap that they were contemplating having as a kit. It was a Caribbean stout. It was very similar to what I had in mind, but I had wanted mine to have a bit more roastiness. So while I was at the store, I adjusted what I was thinking to kind of a mix between what I had in my head and the great beer I had just tried. The end result has been really good. I was shooting for around 8% abv, but the two packs of yeast really ate up the 1.5 pounds of sugar I had put in, and I ended up with a beer that was around 9.5%!

Here are my thoughts:
The Irie pours a dark chocolate almost black with a thin light tan head, it quickly becomes a thin lacing. Right away there is an aroma of dark chocolate with a little bit of roastiness. A slight citrus aroma coming from the dried orange peels that were added, but it doesn't stand out too much. It is very smooth with no alcohol presence. Sweet with quite a bit of chocolate flavors, a little molasses and just a touch of roasty aftertaste.
This beer is very good, and one I would love to brew again. Next time I would like to up the amount of black malt to give it a bit more roasty flavor and maybe add some more fruit either in the form of more orange peels, maybe try my standby marmalade or even something like mango. I wouldn't want to deviate too much since I think it turned out nice, but I think it could be tweaked to be a bit roastier and play off the balance I was trying to accomplish.
Here is the recipe, it's extract:
Steeping grains- .75 org Crystal 120
.25 org Chocolate
.25 black patent malt
9.33 lbs of org. liquid malt extract
1.50 lbs of org. brown sugar
2.5 Tablespoons of dried orange peels @ 5 min
1 oz Org. Admiral hops @ 60
Two packets of dry Safale US-56 yeast

Overall, a great first attempt at a stout in my opinion; sweet, drinkable, and strong enough to make you feel Irie indeed! I am anxious to hear Dave at Muckney Brewing's thoughts and also Rick at [BW] Beer Blog's.
Salud!
The Bearded Brewer

UNO- Orange Honey Wheat

This summer for my daughter's first birthday party, we are planning on having quite a few guests. I decided to brew a beer for the occasion, and plan on brewing a different one every year to mark the occasion. I had been playing around with different ideas for UNO, trying to think of something that would be accessible to a variety of people. The party will be in July, so I wanted something lighter and decided on a wheat beer, but wanted to do something with it so it was a bit more interesting. I decided on adding orange blossom honey to the recipe. At the last minute I decided to throw a teaspoon of orange marmalade in as well. I am brewing it now so I can make any tweaks before brewing it for the party.

Here's the breakdown:
1/2 pound of org. white wheat steeped for 25 minutes
6lbs of Wheat extract for 60
1 oz. Liberty hops @ 60
1 teaspoon orange marmalade at 5 min
1 lb California Orange Blossom honey @ flame-out.
Depending on the orange presence after I transfer it, I might add another pound of the orange blossom honey in the secondary or possibly orange peels. I don't want it too overpowering and I want some honey sweetness. We'll see how it goes. A nice easy brew on a Saturday morning.
Salud!
The Bearded Brewer

Beer Review- Troegs Brewing Company

One of the great things about trying beer from another region is finding a brewery that you love. However, the flipside is discovering a beer you wish you could get on a regular basis. So is the case with the three beers from Troeg Brewing Company I got sent to me. Hopback Amber, Nugget Nectar and Mad Elf were sent to me by Dave at Muckney Brewing Blog, and each beer was fantastic!
Troeg's Brewing Company is a brewery out of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and owned by two brothers. I was blown away by each beer, here's the breakdown:


Nugget Nectar Imperial Amber
Holy hops! This beer is very similar to Bell's Hopslam. Right after popping the cap, there's a strong citrusy-grassy hop aroma. I have said in the past that I'm not much of a hop head, but that might be changing. Despite the 93ish IBUs it lists, I really didn't find the beer to be bitter. It pours a beautiful copper-orangish color with very little head, just a thin white lace on top. There is a slight sweetness, but its mostly hops! Very citrusy, with a grapefruit flavor typical of West Coast hops. A very good beer.


Mad Elf Belgian Strong Ale
I was really excited about this beer. Brewed with honey and cherries, this beer sounded really intriguing. It's 11% alcohol, but that is masked very well. For starters, this beer pours a nice cloudy light brown with ruby redish hues coming through. There is a two finger lacy white head. Right away you get a bready, yeasty aroma with a hint of sour fruit. At first there is a musty, yeasty taste that is quickly followed by a nice cherry tartness. This beer has a wonderful balance of tartness and sweetness. As it warms up, the beer becomes more flavorful, but the cherries are never overwhelming. It reminds me a lot of Three Philosophers from Ommegang. Mad Elf has a nice carbonation that makes it quite refreshing and crisp. While this beer was fantastic, its almost a good thing I can't normally get my hands on it, because I could drink several of these in a sitting!


Hopback Amber Ale
This was actually the first of the Troegs beers I had and led me to drink the other two instead of try some of the other beers Dave sent me. This beer is outstanding. This is their flagship beer, and would be a regular beer of mine if I could buy it. I wrote "perfectly balanced" in my notes. The beer pours a beautiful amber color with a white head. There is a soft floral hop aroma. There is a perfect balance of caramel and biscuit flavors and is slightly sweet. The hops create a bit of bitterness, but not too much and there is also a slight spiciness as well. I think Amber ales can be hit or miss, but I love Fat Tire and a local beer, Rush River Unforgiven Amber Ale. I think that Hopback falls perfectly in between. Not as biscuity as Fat Tire, and not as hoppy as Rush River, just a perfect balance of hops and a sweet, flavorful body.

I sadly have no more Troegs left to drink. I had to lump these together because each one was excellent. I also love it when a brewery has quality beers from a wide range of styles, and Troegs seems to. Mad Elf is nothing like Nugget Nectar, and I like seeing that. Some breweries make a few really good beers, but tend to get mediocore outside of the their comfort zone. Breweries like Bells, New Glarus, and a few of my other favorites seem to be able to make a wide variety well. Based off what I've had, I'll add Troegs to that list and will make sure to try some other varieties the next time I get out to Pittsburgh.
Salud!
The Bearded Brewer

Big Box of Beer

Awhile back I got an email from Dave at Muckney Brewing Blog, asking if I'd be interested in doing a beer trade because he was interested in trying some Surly. I was excited about the prospect of getting my hands on some beers I don't have access to, so I quickly agreed. After several exchanges figuring out what beers we were interested in, we ended up with a pretty nice size load. I sent him out Surly Bender, Surly Furious, Rush River Unforgiven Amber Ale, Summit Maybock, Summit Extra Pale Ale, and two of my homebrews. I sent him out a bottle of Irie Stout, and Mayabock. I'm curious on his feedback on the Mayabock becuase I'm not entirely feeling it right now.
As for his big ass box, I was excited to come home to a great collection of Pennsylvania beers, Muckney homebrews and Dogfish. In his bundle of joy, there was the following: Troegs Hop Back, Troegs Mad Elf, Troegs Nugget Nectar, Stouts Smooth Hoperator (one of the best beer names ever), Otto's Jolly Roger Imperial Stout, Victory Horizontal Barley Wine, Erie Brewing Co's Ol' Red Ceast and Desist, and Dogfish Head's Immort Ale. As for the Muckney Brews, I got their Rising Sun Ginger-Sesame Red Ale, Dark and Mysterious Cinnamon Porter, Dark IPA, and Heavy Hefe Wheat Ale. I'm very excited to try their home brews. I will be busy drinking and posting my thoughts on these in the next week or so. A special thanks to our good friend Dave at Muckney for sending out the box of beer, and I look forward to drinking these great beers, and trading again in the future!
Salud!
Bearded Brewer

The Gringo- Imperial Mexican Cerveza

I've held off from reviewing this beer because I was curious to see how it would age. As I've written before, patience is not one of my qualities as a brewer. It would serve me well to be more patient, and this is a beer that proves that.
This beer came out of the idea of brewing an imperial beer, and seeing that imperial beers seem to be a big American trend, I thought it would be fitting to "Americanize" a Mexican lager. So in the spirit of Taco Bell and other such American bastardization of something Mexican... I took the concept of a Mexcian lager and upped the alcohol content and added a lot of hops. It took awhile for this beer to really mature, and this weekend I drank the last couple bottles I had, and I was really pleased with the turn out. It was an experimental 3 gallon batch, so I'd give this beer a B for effort and definitely have a foundation for a future beer that could be good with some tweaks.
For starters, I'll give my thoughts on the beer:
It pours a clear golden-light orange color with a foamy two finger white head. What hits you at first, and pretty much throughout the whole beer is the citrusy hops. This is what I was going for as I thought it would be cool to get that citrusy flavor we associate with Mexican beer, but from the hops (and no...not like Miller Chill). So I chose to use 2lbs of Centenial hops. These are characterized by their citrusy aroma, and The Gringo has a strong grapefruit flavor and smell to it. The citrus continues throughout the beer, as the hoppiness of the beer really centers on the Centenial hops. There is a puckering bitterness in the finish, but the lagering gave it kind of a smooth finish as well.
Overall, I was pleased with the experiment and actually plan on brewing it again because I think it would be a good summer beer. It is really hoppy, which is nice, but also kind of refreshing. I think that it loses most, if not all of the lager characteristics. I plan on using White Labs Mexican Lager yeast next time, as opposed to the Cali Lager 2112 yeast that I used. I'm hoping that might give it a bit more lager feel to it. I also plan on using some Agave or honey at the end of the boil or in the secondary to give it a nice balance at the end. I'm not saying this beer is on par with Bell's Hopslam at all...but there are some similarties, and I really liked how Hopslam had some honey at the end to really balance out the bitterness of the hops. Agave would make sense given the theme. If anyone has any experience using Agave, I'd love some thoughts because I've only had Breckenridges Agave Wheat, which was good, but have never used it before in a beer.
The point of my 3 gallon batches is to try something different and this beer falls under that category. I'm sending a bottle to [BW] Beer Blog, and am excited for Rick's thoughts on it. I also know now how long to let it mature, which is about 3-4 months. When I brew it again, I'll post the recipe, because I want to make some tweaks to it. This week I'll try to get to my review of the Irie Stout, but I also know I'm getting a big ol' box of beer from Pennsylvania, so I'll have plenty of treats to review in there as well.
Salud!
The Bearded Brewer

Beer Review- El Jefe

My friend Jeff has been my closest friend for over 20 years. While Jeff hasn't delved into homebrewing, he's been an integral part of the Bearded Brewing operation. He was the webmaster behind the first beardedbrewing.com website, has helped put in the tile in the brewery (a.k.a, my basement), built stuff for the brewery and is a very honest provider of feedback. So bottom line, its about time I made a beer named after him. I've had several ideas for El Jefe, but this summer I kind of settled on a lighter, crisp Belgian, in the vain of New Glarus' Stone Soup or even Mothership Wit by New Belgium. Something with some flavor, but light and crisp. Since my Inky's White and Bangy Tangy are more in the vain of wit, I wanted to go with more of a Belgian Pale Ale. El Jefe is 5.3% abv, so a nice session beer.
After about 2 months in the bottle, El Jefe is tasting fantastic. The actual brewing of this beer was a debacle because I was trying to juggle too many things, ended up missing the time I was going to put in the last of the extract, and boiled it for longer than I had intended. As always, I tried it too early, and was discouraged, enough to write a whiny post about it. Two weekends ago, Jeff and I cracked open a mini keg of it, and it was really good! I had also given a bottle to our buddy Josh who called to tell me that he thought it was better than the Bangy Tangy (the beer named by him).
Here's the breakdown:
It pours a cloudy light yellow with a thin white head. It has a fruity nose that is a little yeasty.
It is very crisp with a slight tartness, but has some lingering sweetness. Josh thought it was very close to Duvel or Delirium Tremens, which is a nice compliment. I think its a little lighter and less fruity than either of those, which is what I was going for. I think this would be a very good summer beer, and I think it will definitely be added to the rotation. I gave Jeff a couple six packs, but I still have another 1.5 gallon mini-keg of it left. I think I'll save it until the weather finally warms up!
Heres the recipe:
2 lbs org 2-row
.50 lbs org white wheat
.50 lbs org. Munich
.50 lbs crystal 4o
* above mashed at 150 degrees
4 lbs org. light dme
.35 oz Northern Brewer @ 60
.5 oz Sterling @ 45
.5 oz Sterling @15
1 tsp paradise seeds @ 5 min
Wyeast 1762 Abbey Ale II yeast

Next up, will be my thoughts on my Mayabock. We tried that as well, and it was good. Jeff's quote was "good, not awesome." I was determined to wait until May to crack this one open (after the 5 I've already tried), so hopefully time has improved it. Also, I'm excited because Dave from Muckney Brewing and I exchanged some beer, both commercial and homebrew. I'm excited to try some East coast beers I'm not able to get here as well as Muckney's interesting sounding beers. I'm getting some Troeg's, Dogfish, Stoudt's, and Otto's Jolly Roger Impy Stout as well as Muckney's Cinnamon Porter, Weizenbock, Dark IPA, and a ginger sesame ale. I'll of course review all those as well. More to come...
Salud!
The Bearded Brewer