Boulevard Tank 7

Boulevard Tank 7
Boulevard Tank 7

Boulevard Brewing‘s Tank 7 arrived in Iowa City recently, and I was excited to try the latest in the Smokestack Series.  Tank 7 replaces Boulevard’s Saison, which I had taken a liking to.

It was a nice, light farmhouse ale.  Initially, it smelled a bit fruity.  The taste was a light and crisp citrus flavor, with a hint of fruit.  It left my palate very crisp and clean, leaving just a bit of citrus.

Have you tried Tank 7?  What was your impression?

Samuel Adams Longshot Lemon Pepper Saison

Samuel Adams Lemon Pepper Saison
Samuel Adams Lemon Pepper Saison

I’m on the East coast again.  This time I was able to pick up the Samuel Adams Longshot 6-pack.  Over the next few days, I’ll be reviewing the three different beers available in this pack.

If you don’t know what the Longshot pack is, every year Samuel Adams hosts a homebrew competition, and the top two homebrewed beers are featured as two of the three beers in the six-pack.  The other featured beer is homebrewed by a Samuel Adams employee.  All three beers are converted to commercial recipes and are distributed.

The first one I tried as part of this six-pack was made by Samuel Adams employee Jeremy White, the Lemon Pepper Saison.  It was a light saison that tasted light and citrusy.  It had a fairly clean finish that had a slight pepper aftertaste.

I’m glad Samuel Adams chose this beer because I enjoy saisons, and this is a good example.

Is the Longshot pack available in your area?  Have you tried the Lemon Pepper Saison?

Homebrewing Update

Boiling Wort
Boiling Wort for the Caramel Apple Tart Beer

Some of you may have remembered me mentioning brewing a saison.  Since I wrote about it last, it has been completed and consumed.  To be honest, it was good, but might have been a bit phenolic, so next time, I will lower the fermentation temperature a bit.  It did hit as high as 85, but for this strain of yeast, that may have been a bit high.  But, it’s gone, so it couldn’t have been that bad, eh?

About a week before I made the saison, I brewed an IPA.  I have been brewing for about  two years, but this was my first IPA.  Personally, I think there is a right way and a wrong way to use hops in IPA’s.  In my opinion, the wrong way is using the hops early during the boiling of the wort, making the finished beer very bitter.  I don’t think this is right at all.  Instead, the correct way, in my opinion, is to concentrate the hop additions later in the boiling process, giving the resulting beer much more flavor and aroma, with balanced bitterness.  The IPA recipe I created used Cascade and Simcoe hops, for a nice, citrusy hop flavor and floral aroma.  I also dry-hopped with Simcoe to enhance the aroma.  It ended up as a very delicious beer.

Last week, I heard about a pastry place in southeast Iowa that creates a dessert called a  “Caramel Apple Tart”.  I thought to myself that it sounded like it could be a delicious beer.

So, Friday, when I got home from my trip to Boston, I ventured into unknown territory: a “sour mash”.  It was a small batch, about 1.5 gallons of wort, and I added a handful of dry grains to sour it.  I let it sit in a warm place until today (Sunday).  Today, I tasted it, and it was pretty good, because it was just slightly sour from the lactic acid produced during the procedure.  I mixed about a gallon of the sour liquid, the “tart” in my experimental beer, with the beer I brewed today, which was similar to an Irish Red, to give it the “caramel”.  As soon as the fermentation is over, I’m planning on adding a couple of pureed Granny Smith apples, to accomplish the “apple”.  Viola!

What do you think?  How does a “Caramel Apple Tart” beer sound to you?

Brewed Saison Update

A week ago, I spoke about brewing a saison.  The temperature fluctuated a bit, but stayed around the 75-85 degree range.  After about 3 days, the fermentation process appeared to stop, but I recalled from Farmhouse Ales that there may be a chance the process wasn’t yet done.

5 days later (8 days total), in the morning, I heard the airlock start bubbling again.  I’m going to let it continue for another week or two before transferring the beer to a keg.

Brewing a Saison

Today I brewed my first Saison.  I usually use White Labs yeast, but in this case, I salvaged the yeast from the bottom of 2 Boulevard Smokestack Series Saisons.  I plan to crank the heat up on this one, to 75 for a couple of days, then to even 80.  I read from Phil Markowski in Farmhouse Ales that brewing a Saison is not like any other type – particularly in the temperature department.  It is kind of neat because in the old days, the farmers would have their own house yeasts, and sometimes swap with neighbors to “liven up” the little buggers.

Not that this is the same, but borrowing some friends from Boulevard kind of makes me feel the same way.

What’s your experience “harvesting” yeast?  Has it worked out for you?