What should I do with my Chimay yeast?

[guildofevil]

Hi all,

Last Saturday saw me drinking a selection of beers, with a friend. These beers included some bottles of Chimay Red and on an (alcohol fuelled) impulse, I boiled up some sugar-water, allowed it to cool to 30C and rinsed out the Chimay bottles into a 1.5l plastic bottle, with a pinch of yeast nutrient.

After two hours in the airing cupboard it had come to life and formed a thick layer of kraeusen.

It is obvious that I have a healthy, vigorous yeast on my hands and I would really like to use it.

What would people suggest I do with this yeast and how long do I have to do it?

Séan

[noby]

Hi Sean,

If I were you, I'd stick it in the fridge, and start planning an appropriate brew for it.

Cormac

[Fast_Eddy]

Guild - weren't you the guy that wanted Belgian yeast - voila - you have Belgian yeast. Search the web for a Chimay clone and use it!!

Personally I'd step it up at least one more time before pitching it and I would've cooled the primer to closer to 20-25 C before mixing it with the yeast - you don't want to shock your yeast.

You could very easily be the only guy in Ireland with Belgian yeast :)

[guildofevil]

Yes, I was the guy looking for a Belgian yeast but it was a wit beer yeast I wanted.

Betty is rather fond of her wit beer and making her a beer she likes is a sneaky way of heading off any potential problems she might have with the growing amount of brewing equipment in our little house.

Anyone know how long this yeast will keep? I'll have a brew bin available for a new beer by the weekend. (Currently have a barley wine in the secondary and an IPA in the primary)

Anyone tried a Belgian ale recipe they can recommend? There's no shortage of recipes out there, so it can be hard to tell the good from the, not so good.

Séan

[Fast_Eddy]

It will definitely keep until this coming weekend. If you put it in the refrigerator it'll keep okay for a couple of weeks but then you'll definitely want to step it up again.

I have a book that contains a Chimay clone recipe if you're interested.

[guildofevil]

How about somthing like this for a 25l(ish) (6.5 gallon US) batch? Should make a Double, I would think.


Grain Bill:
3.5Kg (7.7lb) Pale malt.
250g (~0.5lb) Chocolate Malt.
250g (~0.5lb) Crystal Malt.

500g Raw Dark Cane Sugar crystals

Hop Bill:
40g Saaz. (Bittering)
20g Goldings. (Flavouring)
20g Goldings. (Aroma)

Séan

[YamahaXS]

i dunno, and my coffee has really done anything for me yet but how about bittering with the Goldings and flavoring with the Saaz.

[Fast_Eddy]

Style wise I think dubbels start in the 1.060 range - and you're only about half way there with that recipe for 6.5 gallons(at 75% mash extract efficiency). Nix the crystal and chocolate if possible. Also consider a pound of munich and maybe a half pound of Special B(if available) or maybe a half pound of caramunich or caravienne. Special B will add that nice raisiny character, too. I would probably use Styrian Golding not EKG but it's not unheard of.

Check out these recipes as an example:

http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/recipator?group=21&item=434

http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/recipator?group=21&item=2555

[guildofevil]

I can up the base malt without too much trouble but I'm running up against the ingredient availability problem again.

Here are the grains I can get in Ireland: amber malt, chocolate malt, black malt, crystal malt, pale malt, lager malt, wheat malt.

Damn it's frustrating to be restricted like this.

Séan

[Fast_Eddy]

Can you order from Wexford? They seem to have munich, at least. They also have Styrain golding and wit yeast. If I had to use their ingredients I'd use 1 lb of munich, .5 lb wheat, 1 lb amber, around .5 lb crystal(60 L?) and the rest of the grain bill in lager malt for a "dubbel". Maybe use a touch of chocolate to adjust the color.

Approximately this(I pulled this outta thin air - it's the best I can do):

-------------

Type: All grain Size: 6.5 gallons
Color: 13 SRM Bitterness: 23 IBU
OG: 1.069 FG: 1.015
Alcohol: 6.9% ABV

Grain:
11 lb. British lager
1 lb. Wheat malt
1 lb. British Munich
.5 lb. British amber
.5 lb. British crystal 50-60L
3 oz. British chocolate

Mash: 75% efficiency

Boil: minutes SG 1.056 8 gallons

1 lb. Belgian candi sugar

Hops:
1.5 oz. Styrian Goldings (5.5% AA, 60 min.)
.5 oz. Saaz (3.75% AA, 15 min.)
.5 oz. Saaz (aroma)

-------------
Geez, Ireland is really a homebrew wasteland.

[funkconnection]

Originally posted by guildofevil
I can up the base malt without too much trouble but I'm running up against the ingredient availability problem again.

Here are the grains I can get in Ireland: amber malt, chocolate malt, black malt, crystal malt, pale malt, lager malt, wheat malt.

Damn it's frustrating to be restricted like this.

Séan

Have you asked at some micro brewery about buying some malts. It's by this way that we arrived to have a better quality and a lower price. Sure, we need to accept to take a bigger quantity (25 kg, I don't know the conversion)

[brewmonkey]

It depends on the brewery. I would sell some malt to a few locals but I did not make a habit of it because the homebrew shops would feel the pinch. Piss one of them off and you will see a drop in sales.

25kilos is 55LBS.

[chazwicke]

If I remember correctly, Jeff Liebish (SP) founder of Fat Tire "borrowed" some yeast from a Belgian brewery to start his New Belgium Brewing Company. He spoke at a tasting I attended years ago. He stole it and propagated it.

[fretlessman71]

This is true! At least that's what they say at the brewery tour. Wonder how he pulled that one off....?

[chazwicke]

Do you recall which brewery it was?

[fretlessman71]

Originally posted by chazwicke
Do you recall which brewery it was? DUH..... New Belgium! :D

[chazwicke]

No, the brewery that he stole it from?

[fretlessman71]

I know... I just couldn't resist. :)

If they mentioned it, I don't remember. The website doesn't say, either. I can only imagine they'd be a tad upset if they got wind of this!

[Fast_Eddy]

Originally posted by Fast_Eddy
Can you order from Wexford? They seem to have munich, at least. They also have Styrain golding and wit yeast. If I had to use their ingredients I'd use 1 lb of munich, .5 lb wheat, 1 lb amber, around .5 lb crystal(60 L?) and the rest of the grain bill in lager malt for a "dubbel". Maybe use a touch of chocolate to adjust the color.

Approximately this(I pulled this outta thin air - it's the best I can do):

-------------

Type: All grain Size: 6.5 gallons
Color: 13 SRM Bitterness: 23 IBU
OG: 1.069 FG: 1.015
Alcohol: 6.9% ABV

Grain:
11 lb. British lager
1 lb. Wheat malt
1 lb. British Munich
.5 lb. British amber
.5 lb. British crystal 50-60L
3 oz. British chocolate

Mash: 75% efficiency

Boil: minutes SG 1.056 8 gallons

1 lb. Belgian candi sugar

Hops:
1.5 oz. Styrian Goldings (5.5% AA, 60 min.)
.5 oz. Saaz (3.75% AA, 15 min.)
.5 oz. Saaz (aroma)

-------------
Geez, Ireland is really a homebrew wasteland.

After reviewing a few Belgian recipes - I'd probably knock the chocolate back to 2 oz's. You could also consider toasting .5-1 lb of the lager malt for a little extra complexity.

[guildofevil]

I've tried ordering from wexbrew but that was two weeks ago and I still don't have a price, let alone the supplies. He keeps going on about having to order from his suppliers and shipping from the UK and stuff.

Originally posted by Fast_Eddy
After reviewing a few Belgian recipes - I'd probably knock the chocolate back to 2 oz's. You could also consider toasting .5-1 lb of the lager malt for a little extra complexity.

I'll cut back the chocolate malt as you suggest. How dark would you toast the base malt? I was looking at How to Brew (http://www.howtobrew.com/section4/chapter20-4.html) and I was thinking that "350 °F Wet for 1.5 hours: Toasted Malty, slightly sweet" might be the way to go.

What do you think?

Séan

[Fast_Eddy]

That's exactly the toasting choice I'd pick.

[guildofevil]

I pitched this yeast into my latest batch on Saturday and it went to work like crazy, bubbling up huge quantities of CO2.

I ended up making a Belgian brown with an OG of 1.040, which is a little on the light side, I know, but my LHBS let me down and I only had half the grains I ordered :(

I toasted 300g of the base malt and used 50g Chocolate malt.
Hop wise, I was let down by the LHBS again and ended up using 40g Saaz for 60 mins., 20g Saaz for 15 mins. and 20g Saaz for 5 mins.

I think culturing my own yeast is the way for me to go from now on. The homebrew shops in Ireland don't seem to be any help, so I'll just have to help myself.

Next, I'll try culturing some yeast from bottles of Hoegaarden. After all, I did promise to make Betty a batch of Wit.

Séan