RUM CASK SCOTTISH ALE status: GONE

Inspiration

Innis and Gunn?  That's at least the idea I had when creating this masterpiece in my head!  I love oak.  I love rum.  I love spiced rum.  I love beer.... you get the idea.

When I was brewing the dopplebock, I had the idea to continue sparging my grain slowly in anticipation I would collect more volume than needed for the bock.  I was correct.  I used the richest of the wort runnings for the dopplebock but continued to collect about 1.5-2 gallons of a weaker gravity bock wort.  I knew this wort would still have some sweetness and toasted caramel notes, but needed more strength.  I had a package of unused light DME (dry malt extract) normally reserved for extract brewers or in my case: making yeast starters.  This was some higher quality muntons extract that I thought would be perfect for the stove-top batch I was in the midst of creation.  I ended up with about 3-4 gallons total, bittered with goldings, and fermented in porous plastic for a month then transferred to glass with spiced rum soaked american oak chips.  I chose the golden standard of spiced rum: captain morgans since it contains such a high ratio of vanilla flavors which is native to oak character.  This choice should  support the Innis and Gunn character I am looking for.

But wait Kurt!  What yeast did I use you ask?  Well, the same harvest of second generation scottish ale yeast that I originally collected from the Malt Monster!  The other half of the second generation scottish ale yeast was used on the Kona Oatmeal stout... remember?  Talk about saving money while improving my beer batman!

The beer will be on tap soon sitting between 5-5.5% and should contain a toasted oaky malty sweet vanilla character ;)

the ol' STENBATOR! status: GONE

the ol' Stenbator!
5-C Doppelbock


This style of beer is like the Munich Dunkel I brewed a while back in the fact that its a dark german lager with wonderful rich toasted notes from high usage of munich malts.  The doppelbock literally translates into "Double-goat" which is somewhat strange and you will often see a goat on the label of a commercially made "bock" style beer.  The double is true in the fact I used twice the amount of grain I normally would on a batch of beer.  This gives me a stronger concentration of malt sugars to ferment which creates a bigger bodied, sweeter, higher alcohol brew.  More is always better right?  In this case yes!  I needed a huge amount of yeast so I recycled the yeast from the dunkel and re pitched it immediately after racking out the dunkel into a keg.  (that is the main reason I brewed the dunkel.  To ferment and create a large amount of yeast for this beer.)

Fun facts about doppelbocks:  Doppelbocks always end in the suffix "ator".  Salivator, Celebrator, Master..... you get the idea.  They are so rich and used to be even sweeter back in the day, because of poor fermentations etc, that they were considered full of nutrition and monks used to drink them for sustenance during Lent and gave the beer its nickname "liquid bread".  Historically, beer was also the safest beverage to drink since water supplies and even wine were all contaminated and made people sick.  The boiling process when making beer, sterilized the liquid making it the safest option.  I also believe beer is still considered a legitimate "staple" in the diet of germans.


Actual Brew Date March 8, 2012
Size: 5.75 gal
Efficiency: 77.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 283.92 per 12.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.085 (1.072 - 1.096)
Terminal Gravity: 1.021 (1.016 - 1.024)
Color: 18.5 (6.0 - 25.0)
Alcohol: 8.4% (7.0% - 10.0%)
Bitterness: 23.0 (16.0 - 26.0)

Ingredients:
13 lbs Munich Malt 1
3.5 lbs Pilsner Malt
2 lbs Caramunich® TYPE III
1.25 oz Tettnanger (4.5%) - added during boil, boiled 60 min
0.5 oz Tettnanger (4.5%) - added during boil, boiled 25 min
1 ea WYeast 2206 Bavarian Lager

Notes:
striked 18.5 lb in 20 quarts water @172= 155 rest 60 min.