Sunday, November 1, 2009

Variations on a Theme: At Giza

Before getting into this one, also updated the Berlinerweisse post.
Update. . .this is now part of the Variations on a Theme series: 

October was  a mix of gorgeous days and a lot of rain.  As a result, we're skipping the malty harvest/Oktoberfest/pumpkin beers.  We are not really in love with those in any case.  Instead we are planning for the winter with an Imperial Oaked Bourbon Porter.

Three days prior to the brew, we soaked a few ounces of medium char American oak chips in Kentucky Bulleit Bourbon.  These were added to the secondary fermenter.

The brew day recipes is as follows:  
Mash:
11 lbs. Domestic 2-row
2.5 lbs. Munich 17L
1.5 lbs. Brown malt 75L
1.0 lbs. Crystal 120L
0.5 lbs. Crystal 40L
1.25 lbs. Chocolate malt

Mash 60 min at 154

Hops:
1.0 oz Strecklebracht 14% AA @ 60min.
0.5 oz Kent Goldings 5% AA @ 30 min.
0.5 oz Kent Goldings 5% AA @ 10 min.

Yeast:  Dry English Ale with a 1QT starter prepared two days prior to brewing.

OG:  1.078
Primary fermentation:  10 days
Gravity at transfer to secondary:  1.019

FG:  TBD

On transfer to the secondary, we added the oak chips along with a few drops of the now oak soaked bourbon.  We want the bourbon and oak to lend a notable contribution, but are hoping to error on the subtle side versus over-powering.  We'll know more in about 5 weeks.  Fingers crossed as the beer sans the oak showed tremedous potential.