Mad Fermentationist Saison Blend #1
Continuing on from my last Bootleg Biology post (Chardonnay Pale Ale) I'm continuing to work through my Bootleg Biology packs of yeast. This time it's the Mad Fermentationist Saison Blend. Obviously as a homebrewer who loves funky and sour beers I've devoured Mike Tonsmeire's blog The Mad Fermentationist including his book American Sour Beers, so I was super excited to try this one. This was also my first brew at my new place in the Lower Haight, so it was fun trying out the burner in my back parking area.
The website describes the blend thusly:
"
Source: A unique blend of cultures curated by The Mad Fermentationist, Michael Tonsmeire
Bootleg Biology is proud to announce The First Official Mad Fermentationist Culture!
Fine tuned over two years, this blend morphed over time to become an elegant powerhouse of classic Saison spice, stone-fruit Brett, lactic tartness and a dry but well-rounded body. The final master blend consists of Saison yeast, wild Saccharomyces, rare Brettanomyces and an opportunistic Lactobacillus culture.
At temperatures as low as 68F (20C) The Mad Fermentationist Saison Blend exhibits a relatively clean primary fermentation profile and high attenuation. Traditional saison temperatures (around 80F/27C) bring out citrus and elevated phenols (pepper and clove). The Brett character shifts depending on wort composition, as maltier beers emphasize cherry and stone fruit qualities.
This blend integrates beautifully with fruity and tropical hops, with the unique Brett culture keeping hop aromatics crisp and bright for an extended time. For best results use a highly fermentable wort, dry hopping during the tail of active fermentation, and carbonating naturally.
"
I totally forgot to wear my Mad Fermentationist shirt while brewing instead opting for my favorite Cantillon shirt, hopefully this doesn't affect the final beer!
I decided to go with a pretty simple recipe because I wanted to let the yeast shine. In retrospect I could have gone with slightly less hops to try to bring out the tartness, but I always end up wishing the beers I make have slightly more hop character even though I'm not a huge IPA drinker. Oh well, no regrets.
Grain
7lbs Domestic Pilsner
4lbs Wheat
0.5lbs Belgian Aromatic
Hops
1oz Saaz @ 60
2oz Cascade @ 5-10 (supposed to be 10, but I cut the boil a little early)
Yeast
The Mad Fermentationist Saison Blend
OG: 1.050 (~65% efficiency!)
Estimated IBU: 25
4.5 gal Strike water @ 170 degrees targeting 155 (didn't check)
3.25 gal first runnings
4 gal sparge
4.5 gal into the boil kettle
5.5 gal into the fermentor (estimated)
Most of the time spent brewing this beer was me reading the Bayou Burner's instruction booklet over and over and over again and being ridiculously paranoid about burning my building down. Once I relaxed and really opened up the regulator, it got up to a boil super quickly and everything turned out great. I think the lack of a good boil on my old setup where we were balancing the kettle on two burners in an apartment building was one of the real issues with our efficiency. Yesterday I had an excellent boil going and the wort really reduced down; I would estimate I got 5.5 gallons into the fermentor.
Another area where I think I got better efficiency is in my mash/sparge regimen. We used to use at least 9 gallons of water between strike and sparge and sometimes more. This time, I mashed with 4.5 gallons of water (just over 1.5 qt/lb) then I ran off as much as I could (no squeezing), which ended up being 3.25 gallons. Doing some quick algebra that means the grain absorbed about 0.1 gallons/lb which sounds about right.
After this, I sparged with 4 gallons of water from my tap set to hot, but I didn't wait for it to get hot. After 15 minutes I ran off 4.5 gallons including squeezing the grain. It's probably better that the tap wasn't hot, because it was nice just using my hands to really get in and squeeze the grain bag.
After boiling for almost an hour I used my simple immersion chiller from MoreBeer and it took about 20 minutes I would estimate to get the wort just below 80 degrees Fahrenheit. When I checked on the beer this morning it was sitting at about 70 degrees and fermenting nicely.
I'm off to Europe next weekend for 3 weeks (2 weeks vacation with guy friends including Oktoberfest and 1 week of work in England + some downtime in London with my girlfriend) so I figured this would be the perfect beer to brew before leaving. When I get back it will have been a month since brewing; I'm planning to keg it and leave it to carbonate naturally with some sugar for two weeks before putting it on tap.
Once I've kegged it I'm planning to sanitize a mason jar and keep some of the slurry for next time. Next time I brew with this blend I definitely plan to bottle it to see the differences between the short-term keg carbonation (never done a natural carb in the keg) and how the bottles change over time.
The website describes the blend thusly:
"
Source: A unique blend of cultures curated by The Mad Fermentationist, Michael Tonsmeire
Bootleg Biology is proud to announce The First Official Mad Fermentationist Culture!
Fine tuned over two years, this blend morphed over time to become an elegant powerhouse of classic Saison spice, stone-fruit Brett, lactic tartness and a dry but well-rounded body. The final master blend consists of Saison yeast, wild Saccharomyces, rare Brettanomyces and an opportunistic Lactobacillus culture.
At temperatures as low as 68F (20C) The Mad Fermentationist Saison Blend exhibits a relatively clean primary fermentation profile and high attenuation. Traditional saison temperatures (around 80F/27C) bring out citrus and elevated phenols (pepper and clove). The Brett character shifts depending on wort composition, as maltier beers emphasize cherry and stone fruit qualities.
This blend integrates beautifully with fruity and tropical hops, with the unique Brett culture keeping hop aromatics crisp and bright for an extended time. For best results use a highly fermentable wort, dry hopping during the tail of active fermentation, and carbonating naturally.
"
I totally forgot to wear my Mad Fermentationist shirt while brewing instead opting for my favorite Cantillon shirt, hopefully this doesn't affect the final beer!
I decided to go with a pretty simple recipe because I wanted to let the yeast shine. In retrospect I could have gone with slightly less hops to try to bring out the tartness, but I always end up wishing the beers I make have slightly more hop character even though I'm not a huge IPA drinker. Oh well, no regrets.
Grain
7lbs Domestic Pilsner
4lbs Wheat
0.5lbs Belgian Aromatic
Hops
1oz Saaz @ 60
2oz Cascade @ 5-10 (supposed to be 10, but I cut the boil a little early)
Yeast
The Mad Fermentationist Saison Blend
OG: 1.050 (~65% efficiency!)
Estimated IBU: 25
4.5 gal Strike water @ 170 degrees targeting 155 (didn't check)
3.25 gal first runnings
4 gal sparge
4.5 gal into the boil kettle
5.5 gal into the fermentor (estimated)
Most of the time spent brewing this beer was me reading the Bayou Burner's instruction booklet over and over and over again and being ridiculously paranoid about burning my building down. Once I relaxed and really opened up the regulator, it got up to a boil super quickly and everything turned out great. I think the lack of a good boil on my old setup where we were balancing the kettle on two burners in an apartment building was one of the real issues with our efficiency. Yesterday I had an excellent boil going and the wort really reduced down; I would estimate I got 5.5 gallons into the fermentor.
Another area where I think I got better efficiency is in my mash/sparge regimen. We used to use at least 9 gallons of water between strike and sparge and sometimes more. This time, I mashed with 4.5 gallons of water (just over 1.5 qt/lb) then I ran off as much as I could (no squeezing), which ended up being 3.25 gallons. Doing some quick algebra that means the grain absorbed about 0.1 gallons/lb which sounds about right.
After this, I sparged with 4 gallons of water from my tap set to hot, but I didn't wait for it to get hot. After 15 minutes I ran off 4.5 gallons including squeezing the grain. It's probably better that the tap wasn't hot, because it was nice just using my hands to really get in and squeeze the grain bag.
After boiling for almost an hour I used my simple immersion chiller from MoreBeer and it took about 20 minutes I would estimate to get the wort just below 80 degrees Fahrenheit. When I checked on the beer this morning it was sitting at about 70 degrees and fermenting nicely.
I'm off to Europe next weekend for 3 weeks (2 weeks vacation with guy friends including Oktoberfest and 1 week of work in England + some downtime in London with my girlfriend) so I figured this would be the perfect beer to brew before leaving. When I get back it will have been a month since brewing; I'm planning to keg it and leave it to carbonate naturally with some sugar for two weeks before putting it on tap.
Once I've kegged it I'm planning to sanitize a mason jar and keep some of the slurry for next time. Next time I brew with this blend I definitely plan to bottle it to see the differences between the short-term keg carbonation (never done a natural carb in the keg) and how the bottles change over time.
Comments
Post a Comment