This beer will hold a special place in my heart, as it is named after our gone, but never forgotten, original Little Bastard, Smokey. He was with us for an all-to-short year of our lives, as he passed away due to an extremely rare (of course...why wouldn't he have something like that?) genetic disease that attacked his nervous and muscular systems. Poor little guy. However, my intention is to have his spirit (deceptively strong, straightforward yet complex in body and soul, and always comforting and a pleasure to have around) live on with the following recipe (loosely based on a family favorite: Aventinus ***due to falling so short in recipe design and hitting my numbers...this go round will be slightly renamed ;-) ***):
Smokey's AvenTINY (Weizenbock) - brewed on 3/20/2011 - Weyermann Pale Wheat: 3 lbs 15 oz - Weyermann Munich Type II: 2 lbs 8 oz - Weyermann Cara Munich I: 2 oz - Crisp Chocolate Malt: 2 oz - Hallertau Pellet Hops: 1 oz (.85 @ 60 min, .15 @ 5 min) - Weihenstephan Yeast
mash: 151-152° for 60 minutes in 1.7 gallons of water sparged one time in about 2.5 gallons of water for 20 minutes, stirring often
*anticipated: 1.078 OG. 7.4 ABV, 17 IBU*
ugggg...ACTUAL: 1.057 OG, 5.5% ABV, 16.7 IBU
~what the heck went wrong? ahhh, I had a duh! moment during my recipe design, and this brew never had a chance. I calculated everything based on 2.4 gal (which is what goes into the LBK instead of the 3 gal that I had left after the boil. Having some "left over" means I can keep a decent amount of junky stuff in the pot and out of the fermenter. So it managed to hit 70% efficiency, which isn't bad...but I simply didn't use enough grain in the mash. siiiiigh sorry Smokey~
pitched my slurry of Wyeast Weihenstephan 3068 @ 68° *FWIW, at least my new stir plate seemed to work correctly!*
also added 5 drops of FermcapS to the LBK to keep the yeast from blowing out (I hope!) ~12 hour update! the 3068 is going to town! HUGE layer of bubbly foam across the top of the LBK, but the FermcapS must be working too because it is NOT blowing the lid off :-) at least this part is going right ~crosses fingers~
~3/23 UPDATE: the fermentation has been cranking along, BUT it smells like rotten eggs! yuck! my little bit of research leads me to believe that this is an acceptable fermentation odor that is common with this strain...however, if it has not cleaned up by the end of the 2 week period, I might be in some sort of contamination/bacteria related trouble. ~keeping fingers crossed still~
~3/28 UPDATE: thank God...the LBK has actual "beer smell" coming out of it! sweet! :-) ~3/30 UPDATE: for future reference, the LBK has been sitting basically between 67-68° for the past 6-7 days
*anticipated 21 day fermentation period* since the OG is so much lower, I'll check things out and see if this isn't done in the typical 2 weeks ferment through: 4/4/2011 ~4/12 UPDATE: I ended up letting it go until today, and the sample I had during bottling was quite promising!
*MINIMUM of 60 days conditioning* ummm...again, since my numbers were lowered, I'm thinking more like 21 days carb/condition through: 5/3/2011
first test bottle: mid-May
drink notes: pours a deep mahagony with a pillowy off-white head. aroma of sweet malt and a hint of dark fruit. mouthfeel is smooth, almost creamy on the tongue. on the palate there is a nice malty-wheaty blend with a touch of the same dark fruit in the background plus a bit of toffee and a slightly roasty edge. This turned out quite nice, and I am considering leaving the recipe alone...but more than likely I'll give it another shot ;-)