Recipe: Demeter Auran (Fourth Edition) [Batch #101]

Continuing with the recipes, this is a batch of Demeter Auran (the fourth time I've brewed this beer), most of which ended up going into my 13.2-gallon oak barrel.  For the portion that I kegged, I didn't end up taking formal tasting notes on any of the batch, even though I would have liked to as half was dry-hopped with Citra and half was dry-hopped with Galaxy.

The recipe for the full batch is as follows:

Batch Number: 101
Brew Date: August 15, 2015
Bottle/Keg Date: See notes below.
Batch Size: 20 Gallon
OG: 1.037 (measured)
FG: 1.004 (measured)
Fermentation Temperature: 76-78*F.
IBU: 51.0 (modified Tinseth)
ABV: 4.2%
SRM: 3.0

Mash: Single infusion for 60 minutes at 154*F.
Boil: 60 minute

Fermentables

16.00 lb French Pilsner (53%)
9.00 lb Wheat, Flaked (30%)
3.00 lb Oats, Flaked (10%)

2.00 lb Acid Malt (7%)

Salts & Water

10.0g Calcium Chloride (all added directly to the kettle)

8.0g Calcium Sulfate (all added directly to the kettle)

11.0g Sodium Chloride (all added directly to the kettle)

Resulting water profile is as follows:

Mash pH (est.): 5.35
Calcium: 82
Magnesium: 12
Sodium: 50
Chloride: 125
Sulfate: 70

Hops

2.0oz Citra (13.0 AAU), leaf, at 60 minutes
8.0oz Citra (13.0 AAU), pellet, at flameout

5 gallons of the batch was dry-hopped with 2oz of Citra leaf, and another 5 gallons was dry-hopped with 2oz of Galaxy pellets.  The remaining 10 gallons went into the barrel after fermentation and did not receive any dry hops.

Other

4 tsp. Wyeast Yeast Nutrient at 10 minutes
56g Orange Zest at flameout
20g Rose Hips at flameout

Yeast

Fresh pack of Wyeast 3726 (Blaugies), 200ml of Wyeast 3726 slurry, and 200ml of Wyeast 3724 (Dupont) slurry.

Notes

08.16.2015: Pitched at 77*F 15 hours after cooling.  I pitched late as chiller only went down to 88*F. Temperature controller off for now.

08.17.2015 (8:00 AM) Temperature has been sitting between 76* and 78*F without any assistance. Water bath container seems to have a small leak.

09.07.2015: Transferred 5gal to keg with 2oz Citra leaf.

11.02.2015: FG is 1.004 and pH is 3.50. Dry hopped with 2oz of Galaxy pellets. Transferred with CO2 using stainless setup.

Science & Art #3: Tasting Notes

Now that my keg for this blend kicked yesterday, I figured it was about time to put up some tasting notes.  First, a bit of background on the beer, which is the third "Science & Art" installation, a series of blended saisons.  The first was a blend of approximately 85% Farmhouse Mild and 15% Citrine, and the second was a similar blend of Dionysus #2 and Citrine.  The series has really inspired me to make sure to keep plenty of extra beer on hand in kegs for future blending, though I may also look at putting portions of batches that are promising for future blends into 1-gallon jugs.  I've already started to ensure that I'll have plenty of Citrine on hand at all times for future blending, and -- of course -- enough for blending multiple batches of Citrine and aging some on fruit.  (Michigan tart cherry version coming soon.)

For this one, all of the components of the first two were involved in different ratios, and I also added in Demeter Passion, which is a portion of a recent Demeter Auran batch aged on passion fruit puree.  I started with a keg of Farmhouse Mild, and it made up approximately 50% of the blend.  From there, Citrine made up about 20%, with Dionysus #2 (aged version of this batch of Namur) and Demeter Passion each filling out 15% each for the remainder.  I blended this directly into the keg of Farmhouse Mild that I had around, as I was looking for something unique to submit to a TalkBeer saison homebrew competition.  The results of that should be coming in soon enough, and I'll make sure to post some outside feedback once I have that.

Unfortunately, I didn't take any photos of this one, so the best I've got is a photo from a friend's Untappd checkin:

Appearance: Mostly clear with a bit of haze.  Pale golden color with an orange tint.  High level of saison carbonation leads to great retention with plenty of lacing on the way down.  (Unfortunately the above doesn't capture the usual form with a pour out of a growler that I had filled straight from the tap.)

Nose: Passion fruit and orange zest up front with a light acidic bite.  Very mild hints of oak with a bit of grain in the background.  Brett-related notes of mango and pineapple as well.  Pretty balanced with nothing standing out too much, though it's surprising how much passion fruit came through given that (1) Demeter Passion wasn't too heavy on the passion fruit and (2) that it comprised only about 15% of the blend.

Flavor: Quite similar to the nose, with the Brett-derived tropical fruit taking a more prominent role, though passion fruit is close behind.  A bit of citrus zest along with a mild funk, which appears here quite a bit more than in the nose.  Reminiscent of some of the character I often get from Crooked Stave beers, which makes sense as those dregs were used in a few components of this blend.  Just a bit of oak in the background as well.  Very light acidity, coming through more in the finish than as a substantial flavor component (just where I like it).

Mouthfeel: Light and crisp, though a decent enough amount of body coming from all the adjuncts used in many of the underlying beers, as well as the oak component coming from Dionysus #2.  Quite easy drinking, and was perfect for the first half of summer.  Light funk and acidity made this complex enough without being overpowering.  This probably explains why I went through the keg so quickly.

Overall: I was extremely pleased with this beer, and plan to blend something similar in the future.  I'd like maybe just a touch more oak in a future blend.  My only knock on this was that as it warmed, I could get just a hint of malt oxidation, which is likely because the Demeter Passion that I used came from bottles that I very gently poured into the keg to top off the blend after flushing the headspace with CO2.  While I was careful, I'm sure there was some oxygen pickup.

As mentioned above, in the future I'm hopefully going to keep around extra portions of miscellaneous beers in kegs or carboys so that I can blend easier.  Also, next time I'll definitely have to finish blending in a bottling bucket so that I can more accurately measure components and anything from bottles can be poured with the neck fully-submersed in the liquid.  Since this one was a bit on the fly and in a bit of a rush, that didn't happen here.

Finally, Science & Art #4 should be coming up soon, using Demeter Vert as the base.

UPDATE: This beer won the above-mentioned TalkBeer Homebrew Saison Competition.  Here is a link to the scoresheets that I received.

Demeter Auran (Batch 03): Recipe

This is now the third batch of Demeter Auran, and the first I've done fermenting with something other than my initial mixed-ferment saison dreg blend.  For this 10-gallon batch, half is being fermented with the second generation of grown up dregs from a few commercial saisons.  The other half is being fermented with a blend of East Coast Yeast 08 (Saison Brasserie Blend) and Brettanomyces Claussenii and Brettanomyces Bruxellensis Trois.

The recipe for the full batch is as follows:

Batch Number: 80

Brew Date: February 17, 2014

Bottle/Keg Date:

Batch Size: 10 Gallon

OG: 1.050 (estimate)

FG:

Fermentation Temperature: 79 F.

IBU: 29.2

ABV: 6.3% (est.)

SRM: 4.3

Mash: Single infusion for 60 minutes at 148 F.

Boil: 60 minute

Fermentables

9lb 8oz French Pilsner

8lb Wheat, Flaked

2lb Munich Malt

Salts & Water

7.0g Calcium Chloride (all added directly to the kettle)

Resulting water profile (based on EZ Water Calculator) is as follows:

Mash pH (est.): 5.49

Calcium: 67

Magnesium: 12

Sodium: 7

Chloride: 73

Sulfate: 27

Hops

5mL HopShot at 60 minutes

3.0oz Citra (12.9 AAU), leaf, at flameout

Other

2 tsp. Wyeast Yeast Nutrient at 10 minutes

28g Blood Orange Zest at flameout

10g Rose Hips at flameout

Yeast

Saison dregs / Ambrosia Blend 003 (5 gallons)

East Coast Yeast Saison Brasserie (ECY08) plus Brett C & Brett Trois  / Ambrosia Blend 002 (5 gallons)

Notes

02.18.2014: At 12 hours, the temperature was only 62 F in the basement, so I set up a water fermentation "chamber" in a large plastic tub.  I have an aquarium heater attached to a temperature controller.  I set the controller to 70 F with a differential of 2 degrees.  At 24 hours, the temperature was up to 68 F.  I upped the controller set temperature to 71 F.  The ECY & Brett portion is bubbling away, but nothing on the saison dreg portion yet.

02.19.2014: At 36 hours, controller says the temperature is 70 (temperature of the fermenting beer itself is the same).  Both are bubbling quite a bit.

03.01.2014: The version with Anna dregs has a sulfur taste just like the Saison Faible portion with this blend did.  I don't want to take any chances on 5 gallons, so I decided to make it a bit funky and added a wine thief full of fermenting Citrine (blend with lambic dregs previous Citrine dregs) to the bucket.

03.03.2014: Decided to create something I've wanted to try for a long time now, which is a passion fruit saison.  Since passion fruit is such a strong flavor, I wanted to keep it relatively subdued.  Thus, I added 28oz. of passion fruit puree to the Ambrosia Blend 002 portion of the batch, first saving a "clean" portion of the cake by filling a mason jar with a few wine thief pulls full of as much of the cake as I could get.  The puree was still a bit of a slush, so I added it through a funnel with the bottom of the funnel inside the liquid, attempting to limit any oxygen exposure.

03.16.2014: 23 bottles.  Aiming for 2.5 volumes.  122 grams of table sugar in 5 gallons of beer.

07.20.2014: Finally ready to do something with the portion that had grown up Anna dregs.  After adding the Citrine dregs, it has calmed down a bit, losing sulfur and is overall less funky.  To add another dimension other than the yeast, I added 84oz. of pink guava puree along with a thief full of the currently fermenting batch of Farmhouse Mild (Batch 05).  Hopefully this kick starts things.  I'm a bit worried about the temperature, as one of the 14oz bags of puree busted while thawing, so I ended up adding all of the guava as slush.

Demeter Auran: Recipe (Round Two)

This past Sunday I decided to go with another round of Demeter Auran.  This time I went with blood orange zest instead of clementine zest, and Mosaic instead of Citra.  I also upped the rose hips just a bit.  Aside from that, I split the 7.5 gallon batch with 5 gallons getting the mixed-ferment saison dreg blend, which was the cake from the original Demeter Auran.  The remaining 2.5 gallons got some white wine-soaked oak cubes and the cake from the portion of the Namur saison experiment that was done with grown up dregs from Tired Hands HandFarm.

I also increased the amount of blood orange zest, as I'm planning on sending the main 5-gallon portion to a keg to age with a good amount of white wine-soaked oak cubes.  I'll probably bottle one gallon of the base just to get a good comparison.

The recipe for the full batch is as follows:

Batch Number: 62
Brew Date: March 10, 2013
Bottle Date:
Batch Size: 7.5 Gallon
OG: 1.050 (est.)
FG: 1.002 (est.)
Fermentation Temperature: Ambient (~65 F)
IBU: 29.2
ABV: 5.8% (est.)
SRM: 3.6

Mash: Single infusion for 60 minutes at 148 F.
Boil: 60 minute

Fermentables

8lb 10oz French Pilsner
3lb 0oz White Wheat Malt
3lb 0oz Flaked Wheat

Hops

1.5 oz Mosaic (12.5 AAU) at 20 minutes
1.5 oz Mosaic (12.5 AAU) at flameout

Other

1 Tbsp 5.2 buffer in mash
21 grams of blood orange zest at flameout
6 grams of rose hips at flameout
White-wine soaked medium toast Hungarian oak cubes (amounts below)

Yeast

Saison Blend (5 gallons; oak cubes contained in the cake of the Demeter Auran batch)
Tired Hands Blend (2.5 gallons; half an ounce of white wine-soaked oak cubes)

Notes

03.10.2013: Brewday.  Everything went off without a hitch.  Each portion of the batch got 30 seconds of straight oxygen, with the saison dreg portion getting fermented in a 5-gallon bucket, and the Tired Hands dreg portion going into a 3-gallon Better Bottle.

03.11.2013: Fairly good initial fermentation from the Tired Hands portion after about 24 hours.

03.14.2013: It took the saison dreg portion quite awhile, and I was getting worried, but it's finally going really strong after 3.5 days.  If it wasn't going this morning, I was planning to take a good portion of the krausen of the Tired Hands dreg portion and also a thief or two from Citrine, and just see what happened.

06.02.2013: The saison portion, which was transferred to a keg after primary fermentation before our move, was hit with 1.0oz of boiled oak cubes that had been soaked in Nisia Old Vines Verdejo since 03.30.2013.

10.08.2013: The batch has been with the wine-soaked oak cubes for just over four months.  There was no blow-off assembly in place, so the beer continued to condition in the keg at room temperature, creating plenty of carbonation.  Placed into the kegerator and set at 20 PSI.

Demeter Auran: Recipe

"Demeter Auran" will be my second use of a mixture of saison yeast and bugs. It was originally my intention to name my saisons as part of the Demeter line, after the Greek goddess of the harvest, so I'm getting back to that. Auran is the beginning of the Latin word for orange. I know I'm crossing over a bit there, but I liked the sound of it, and -- at least according to Google Translate -- there is no Latin word for clementine.

The first time I used this blend was a "clone" of the Stone 02.02.02 Vertical Epic that I switched up to saison yeast because I didn't want 5 gallons of an imperial witbier.  Based on how the aforementioned "clone" -- aptly named Ambrosia Repeating Numbers -- is doing, this blend creates a nice, expressive saison profile along with mild funk, citrus, and tartness. 

Aside from the yeast, this beer is spiced with rose hips and clementine zest, and contains a not inconsequential amount of Citra at 20 minutes and flameout. I'm hoping the citrus, tropical, and floral notes will combine well with the yeast. I'm also going to ferment the batch on medium toast Hungarian oak cubes that were pre-boiled and have been soaking in white wine since Thanksgiving. The amount of zest should lead to roughly 500 International Citrus Units ("ICUs") based on Embrace the Funk's interview with Shaun Hill of Hill Farmstead. 

The remainder of the batch will be split into separate one gallon portions. The first gallon will get some reused Wyeast 3725, and the second gallon will get a "funky blend" of dregs I've saved from Russian River Sanctification, Russian River Temptation, Fantome Saison, Jolly Pumpkin Oro de Calabaza, and Jolly Pumpkin Bam Biere.

The recipe for the full batch is as follows:

Batch Number: 53
Brew Date: January 12, 2013
Bottle Date: February 2, 2013
Batch Size: 7.5 Gallon
OG: 1.050 (est.)
FG: 1.005 (est.)
IBU: 28.9
ABV: 5.4% (est.)
SRM: 3.6

Mash: Single infusion for 60 minutes at 148 F.
Boil: 60 minute

Fermentables

8lb 10oz French Pilsner
3lb 0oz White Wheat Malt
3lb 0oz Flaked Wheat

Hops

1.5 oz Citra (12.4 AAU) at 20 minutes
1.5 oz Citra (12.4 AAU) at flameout

Other

1 Tbsp 5.2 buffer in mash
14.2 grams of clementine zest at flameout
5.25 grams of rose hips at flameout
White-wine soaked medium toast Hungarian oak cubes (amounts below)

Yeast

Saison Blend (5 gallons; 1 ounce of oak cubes)
Wyeast 3725 (1 gallon; 3 oak cubes)
Random Funky Blend (1 gallon; 3 oak cubes)

Notes

The main 5 gallons were transferred into a bucket for fermentation. The other two portions each went into a one gallon jug. The main portion of the batch got 30 seconds of oxygen, and the smaller portions each got ~8 seconds. They were left to ferment at ambient, which was around 65 F.

UPDATES

01.15.2013: Each of the batches has been very slow to start fermenting. After about 36 hours, I placed the 3 vessels into the chest freezer with fermwrap set at 72 F.

02.02.2013: Bottling day. Estimated that there are 4.25 gallons of beer in the fermentation bucket accounting for what will be lost to the trub and cake. Aiming for 2.5 volumes of CO2, I'm adding 105g of table sugar. Beer racked into flushed keg on top of sugar. Headspace flushed with CO2 and then gently shaken to mix in sugar. Filled with Beer Gun. Ended up with 22 750mL bottles.

I also bottled the 3725 and "Funk Blend" portions. Each of these was estimated at 3/4 of a gallon. Aiming for 2.5 volumes of CO2, each one got 17 grams of table sugar. Ended up with 8 375mL bottles of each.