Long time no see...

It's been quite for a while on my blog, I know. The reason? I haven't had the time to experiment as much as I wanted, mainly for family reasons. The last 2 months I haven't brewed anything either. That is at home. At work I have been brewing a lot, since I now work professionally as a brewer. So you'll understand that the urge for homebrewing has somewhat declined. BUT... it's itching, and a lot of brews are in the planning stage. How about a lager with White Labs Belgian Lager yeast? Or a black witbier? Or the all-brett beer I have been wanting to brew for half a year (can't do that at work)... So much to do, so little time. Hopefully a new post will come soon.

My next brew: A 2-in-1 blonde

With a family, one often has to improvise when it comes to brewing. I just found out that I'll be home alone next weekend, so I'll have to squeeze in a brew. I also have some yeast to propagate for two big beers I have in the pipeline. Nothing too strong, nothing too complicated: I'll brew a Belgian blonde ale. Or two to be more precise, as I'll split the batch.

Here's the recipe I came up with:

James Blonde (50 l)
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OG 1054
IBU 24

Malt:
9 kg Pilsner malt
3 kg Wheat malt
1 kg Munich Malt

Hops:
250 g Belgian Saaz, 2% AA, 90 min

Mash:
40 min @ 63°C
20 min @ 72°C
5 min @ 78°C

Yeast: WLP 530 Abbey Ale

The second beer is based in James Blond and will be called Honey Rider. I'll use another yeast strain, Wyeast 3522 Belgian Ardennes, and add 1 kg of honey to the fermentor. If all goes well, I'll have two nice beers and enough yeast for a quadrupel.

Belgoträffen 2011

Last saturday I was at a local homebrew meeting focussing on Belgian beerstyles. The amount of brews was less then last year (29), but we had about 50 more guests. Not bad. The atmosphere was really great and the response on my beer was good. It's always nice when other people also like what you have brewed. The results of the judges wasn't bad either. All my 3 beer ended up in the final 6. One of them won a bronze medal. I will try to post the recipes on my blog soon. Remind me if I don't. :) The next big event is the Swedish Championships in Stockholm. I have already brewed an imperial wit with some friends, now I have to decide what more to brew. Maybe a weaker version of the 9% ABV sorachi saison I had on tap last saturday? Probably. But what more? A blonde maybe, or a pale ale? Or more of the golden strong ale I had last weekend. It would be a good opportunity to perfect my recipe.