Oaktoberfest in the Dimond is coming up, and the winner of the competition gets to brew at 21st Amendment. Now, I’m not going to win, but it doesn’t hurt to try!

Brewer’s Notes

Since I just brewed this beer with my dad earlier this month, I thought I’d try the same recipe on my equipment so we could compare the two.  We did a few things differently out here, first being toasting the 2-row pale, as required by the recipe.  This took 9 minutes at 350F, and smelled great.  The malt had already been milled.  The mash went OK, it was typically high, ~165F.  Added water to bring up to 15qt boil volume, and added 2gal at the end of the boil for 5 gallons of fermenter volume.  The wort was a really clear light amber.  I did not have as strong of a malt flavor as I remember from the Vermont brew.  There was more toast from the malt, with a little burnt flavor on the finish.  Very light malt aroma – Val thought it reminded her of apricots.

OG: 1.050 @ ~80F, target 1.054
FG: 1.020 @ 64F, target 1.017

Fermenting Notes

Primary

First time really trying to use our fermentation box to maintain a cold temperature.  It didn’t work.

Target Temperature range: 59F

Average: 67.68F
Standard Deviation: 3.21

princess_of_peace_2_primary

8.5.2014 – 1.020 @ 64F – Racked the beer to secondary.  Buttery, champagne aroma.  The beer is very hazy, I expect this from the yeast that is still in it.  Spicy flavor with a bit too much bitterness.  Peppery.  Malt flavor is light, and needs to fill out.  Hopefully the hops will drop a little as the beer lagers and balance it out a bit more.

Secondary

Target Temperature range: 45F

No graph – lagered in the refrigerator

9.9.2014 – Tasting before bottling for competition.  Carbed for a week at 18psi for a higher-than-normal 2.7 vols.  This was due to normally losing pressure when bottling from the keg.  This beer is very drinkable with a slightly toasty character and balanced malt aroma and flavor.  I think there is some acetaldehyde, but the beer really needs to age another month to be to style.  I wonder how much of the toast is from the grains.  Keg is now out of the fridge to make room for an IPA, but will sit in the garage until Oaktoberfest.

Tasting Notes

10.4.2014 – brought the keg down to Oaktoberfest after a few days in the fridge to ensure carbonation.  First pours were very cloudy, it appears that we had some secondary fermentation happen over the last month.  The keg blew in about 3 hours, so I am happy with the result.  The beer seemed to have lost some of the toasted notes from the malt during this time, but did ferment out.  Received quite a few positive comments about the beer.  Pulled off 3 bottles to bring to Vermont next month.

Judging results are here: Princess_of_peace_results

11.26.2014 – Side-by-side tasting with the beer I brewed with my dad.  Due to some issues with the regulator, his beer was lacking in carbonation, which affected the mouthfeel.  The two beers were very similar, with mine having a more full body / flavor.  There seemed to be some fermentation artifacts in the finish of my dad’s version, likely due to the differences in our ability to temperature control & lager.  My beer has more malt, and more sourness on the front.  I’d like to understand what caused that.  Color was the same between the two.  This was a fun exercise, and I hope I’m able to do something similar back at home.

Recipe