My Biere De Garde

Reading "Farmhouse Ales" last year, I found that you could make a passable Biere De Garde using an American Hefeweizen yeast.   So, I tried it, and it wound up being my favorite beer of the summer.    A little too alcoholic to be a "Lawnmower Beer", but it had a nice malty flavor that was both sweet and dry at the same time.   You didn't notice that it was around 7% ABV until you got up to get another glass.   It is somewhat difficult to describe a beer from memory.  My dad described it as almost like an Irish Red, which is what he tends to drink when he's not having my homebrew.   I haven't had an Irish Red in a long time, so I can't really comment on the similarities, but he was drinking it 9-10 months after brewing, and I don't know how the flavors might have developed in the meantime.





The "secret" to brewing this style is low temperatures.   Mash low to extract as much fermentable sugar as possible.  Add additional simple sugar to get the alcohol up a little higher while keeping the body light and refreshing.   Ferment cool to keep the yeast from expressing too much fruit character.   When primary fermentation is done (10-14 days), put the fermenter into a refrigerator and age the beer on the yeast for 4-6 weeks (This final chilling process is the "Garde" in the name).

For today's session, I have modified the recipe from last summer slightly.  I have reduced the amount of grain to reflect the higher efficiencies that I've been getting with my new pump and copper manifold.   I am also using Turbinado Sugar, instead of white cane sugar, just because I don't want to pass up a chance to get some flavor into the beer.  Due to not keeping track of my inventory as well as I should, I'm also changing the bittering hops up slightly. I also decided to add a little bit of calcium chloride, which should help amplify the maltiness. Finally, I'm using the appropriate yeast this time (repitching a little less than half of the yeast cake from the Rye Thing): Wyeast 3725 PC Bier De Garde.

My Biere De Garde

Batch Size (Gal): 6
Total Grain (Lbs): 10.42
Adjunct Sugar (Lbs): 1
Anticipated OG: 1.063
Anticipated SRM: 10.0
Anticipated IBU: 23.7
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75%
Wort Boil Time (min): 90

Grain
75.4% -- 8.61 lbs. French Pilsen Malt
7.9% -- 0.91 lbs. Franco Belges Munich Malt
4.0% -- 0.45 lbs. Castle Special "B" Malt
4.0% -- 0.45 lbs. Castle Belgian Biscuit Malt
8.8% -- 1.0 lbs. Turbinado Sugar

Hops
0.50 oz. US Fuggle (Pellet, 5.10% AA) @ 60 min.
0.50 oz. Styrian Goldings (Pellet, 5.20% AA) @ 60 min.
0.25 oz. US Saaz (Pellet, 5.80% AA) @ 20 min. 

Extras
Whirlfloc - 1 tablet @ 10 min.

Yeast
Wyeast 3725 - PC Bier De Garde Yeast (repitched slurry)

Water Profile
Clearview, degassed overnight
Calcium Chloride -- 1/8t in the mash, 1/8t in the boil

Mash Schedule
Sacch. Rest: 90 min. @ 147F
Batch Sparge:  15 min. @ 165F 

Notes

• Brewed Saturday, April 2, 2011
• Initial mash temperature came to 149F, added some cold Milksick water to reduce the temperature some.
• Realized that I was out of Fuggle, so added some Styrian Goldings.   They're genetically similar, and still style-appropriate, so that should be fine.
• Somehow, I managed to get a pretty crappy efficiency this time.   The mash may have gotten too cool.   Also, inserting the chiller killed the boil, and it never recovered, as I was simultaneously running out of propane, and the wind kept blowing the flame out.
• OG: 1.050, but I got more than my volume.  So this will be a smaller, more drinkable BDG than my last one, I guess.   Honestly, that's OK.
• Pitched ~1/2 quart yeast slurry @ 9PM, temperature was 65F
• Sunday @ 7:30AM, temperature was 67F and kraeusen had started.   Moved blanket back to keep temperature from rising too much.
• Monday @ 7:30AM, temperature was 66F.   Replaced blanket, to hold heat in (I'm fermenting in a cellar which typically stays around 56F through the winter)
• Monday @ 7:30PM, it was still at 66F, so I pushed it up to 67F, to make sure the yeast stay active.
• Tuesday @5:30PM, I bumped it up another degree to 68F.   Trying to encourage the yeast to eat up their Diacetyl
• Wednesday @5:30PM, increased to 69F.
• Thursday @5:30PM, increased to 70F.  It will sit here until the middle of next week.
• Saturday April 16 @3:00PM , took carboy to upstairs closet, A/C is off, hopefully this will help finish it out.
• Tuesday April 19 @5:00PM, checked gravity, and it was at ~1.004, so set carboy in refrigerator for garding period.
• Tuesday May 23, racked to keg.