Wedding Ale Recipie

By request I here bring the latest version og my Wedding Ale cecipie. New beer dringkers can start here. It is very drinkable, and will offend no one.

Style: Belgian Pale Ale
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (35,0) Light body and flavour. Easy drinkable.

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 23,00 L
Boil Size: 27,37 L
Estimated OG: 1,062 SG
Estimated Color: 13,0 EBC
Estimated IBU: 31,5 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75,0 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
5000,00 gm Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5,9 EBC) Grain 83,3 %
1000,00 gm Munich Malt (17,7 EBC) Grain 16,7 %
100,00 gm Saaz [3,00%] (60 min) Hops 26,5 IBU
10,00 gm Williamette [6,60%] (30 min) Hops 5,0 IBU
10,00 gm Williamette [6,60%] (1 min) (Aroma Hop-StHops -
6,00 gm Klar Urt (Boil 10,0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs Abbey Ale (White Labs #WLP530) Yeast-Ale


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Light Body, Batch Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 6000,00 gm
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temp Step Time
Mash In Add 15,66 L of water at 71,9 C 65,6 C 60 min
Mash out Heat to 75,0 C over 2 min 75,0 C 10 min


Notes:
------
Batch #029
2006-08-27 Secondary SG 1006

The Best Copenhagen Brew

Over at Alt om København (Everything About Copenhagen aka. AOK) they now have the yearly polls about the best many differnet categories.

On poll is on The Best Copenhagen Brew - if you know any of the places, please go there and wote, at least to let them know that beer lovers like us DO care and have an opinion. The runner ups are:

• Nørrebro Bryghus (Nørrebro)
  
• Bryggeriet Apollo (City)
  
• BrewPub København (City) - my favorite
  
• Husbryggeriet Jacobsen (Vesterbro)
• Færgekroen (City)

Just go to The Best Copenhagen Brew page now and vote!

The Beer Day

Danske Ølentusiaster (Danish Beer Enthusiasts aka. DØE) has been hosting 'The Beer Day' since 2003, which is now held on the first saterday in september. The reason for using the first saterday in the month rather than a specific date, is that more people can celebrate and drink beer on a saterday. No word yet on plans to make the following sunday a National Aspirin Day, but I guess that it is up to the pharmasutical companies, and not DØE.

On this first saterday of semtember, everybody is welcome, also non-members. This is also a promotional day for DØE where we also try to get new members to our great cause of making better beer available on the Danish market (amonst many other issues adressed by DØE).

The Beer Day is also a platform for regional beer prizes that are given to:

"a person or a company in the region, who has done extraordinay work to show the multitude of the world of beer."

The criterias for winning the prize are build on the values that DØE fight and work for. The thing I really like about it is the many differnt beer related events you can paticipate in all over Denmark. Maybe I have not read the event calendar well enough, but there semms to lack some dedicated homebrew events on this day.

On The Beer Day the danish newspaper Ekstra bladet will launch a new column in the paper. The story is really that it is written by Ole Madsen, the editor of ØLentusiasteN (the great Danish Beer Enthusiasts member magazine). So now I have to check out Ekstra Bladet from time to time.

Is there a national beer day in your country?

Double walled glassware

Here's a classic beer glass with a twist — it's insulated to keep your beer cold and the glass from sweating all over you. These double-walled beer glasses are made out of a material that's used to make scientific lab glass and are way stronger than traditional glassware. Someone got the question: How do you improve on the classic beer glass? You insulate! The glasses keeps cold drinks cold, while hot drinks won't burn your hands.

It seems to be the trend right now. Even bodum.com has a large collection of doubble walled glases.

Is it clever? Well it can be! If your beer is not served at to low temperatures, like most beer in Denmark is. If it keeps your beer too cold all the way though, it is not smart at all. Imagine getting some of that Coors sub-zero beer (aka slush ice) that will just not melt. Sounds like a nightmare to me.

A new mill sees the light

I finally finished my new malt mill with CrankAndStein rollers. Photos are on their way. In short I used tree small pieces of wood with some holes drilled in them. Crushing malt can be a tedious task. As a home brewer you can have it ground at the brew shop, or purchase a mill. If the malt supplier crushes the malt, then you are faced with using the grain in a short amount of time to insure freshness. I brew too little to be able to get all the grain used in due time. So the decision to purchase a mill and grind the malt at home was easy. The task can be made much more easy by putting a motor on it. I have seen many mills connected to a drill. The problem is that they burn out due to low torque. It is tough on the drill and shortens its useful life. With a good quality drill going for hundreds of dollars, it makes more sense to motorize the mill.

I already make decent beer, and the malt mill will probably not alter my brews in any noticeable direction. All the homebrew shops in Denmark, will supply pre-crushed grain, but you have to remember that freshness is the key to making good beer. The best part is that uncrushed grain is usually cheaper than pre-crushed. Crushing just before mashing also provide maximum freshness and you can adjust crush for maximum yield and lautering in your system.

Commercial brewers and many microbrewers have large mills that use multiple pairs of rollers to crush grain. After each step the grain can be run through a sieve that separates smaller particles to prevent them from being crushed again. Home mills usually only have the option between two three rollers, so I went for three with THE MONSTER.

The CrankAndStein rollers are connected to a gear and then to a motor. This motor is built to work hard at low RPMs. Now the hopper was dead easy; I just cut the bottom af at water cooler can, and it was finished.

If I knew that it was this easy to build it, I would have finished the project a year ago. :-)

A couple of links:
http://byo.com/
http://www.ipass.net/mpdixon/
http://sdcollins.home.mindspring.com
http://brewiki.org/

The difference between an Ale and a Lager Beer

This short video describes the difference between Ale and a Lager beer. Since I am in to craft brews I prefer ale over lager, and this is also because, that there was no alternatives to lager beers right up till recent years. Lagers are well tried in Denmark, whereas ales are new exiting territory in the beer universe.

Summer beers

Over at Hedonist Beer Jive, Jay has compiled a list of good sommer beer tasted this year. Check it out on the above link to his post.

Let's check the list out:

• Blue Moon Belgian White - the winner
  
• ANCHOR SUMMER BEER
• ANDERSON VALLEY SUMMER SOLSTICE CERVEZA CREMA
• DRAKE'S HEFE-WEIZEN
• HARPOON SUMMER BEER
• PYRAMID HEFEWEIZEN
• WIDMER HEFEWEIZEN

If I compiled a list like that, it would look wierd, because I have a lot of strong beers and not anything summer-like. Danish microbrew and craft brews would clear the score table. In fact i drank only my own beer yesterday. I had a Dark Czech Lager, a red ale, a porter and a couple of pale ales.

The World's best beers

I don't know about you, but I tend to like top ten lists. Not because it gives you the bottom line, but it gives you an actual list to agree or disagree upun. A recent issue of Details magazine has put together a little top ten of "the world's best beers." Here's a extract of what they recommended. As a little service the URL is provided if I knew it already:

• Best Beer Country: BELGIUM
• Best Beer in a Can: DALE’S PALE ALE
• Best German Beer: HEFEWEIZEN
• Best Beer for a Summer Barbecue: WITBIER
• Best Beer Web Site: BEERADVOCATE.COM
• Best Beer That’s Ripe for a Comeback: PORTER
• Best Beer Cocktail: SHANDY (equal parts cold lager and Sprite)
• Best Beer That Tastes Like Whiskey (sort of): ALLAGASH CURIEUX
• Best Stout to Drink Tonight: SAMUEL SMITH OATMEAL STOUT
• Best Stout to Drink a Year From Now: ROGUE IMPERIAL STOUT
• Best Excuse to Get a Hangover: DOGFISH HEAD FORT

The ten best thirst-quenching summer beers (according to Details Magazine) are :

• Ommegang Witte
• Allagash White
• Orval Trappist Ale
• Victory Prima Pils
• Jever Pilsener
• Paulaner Hefe-Weizen (sorry no link - crappy flash site)
  
• Sierra Nevada Wheat Beer
• Ruedrich's Red Seal Ale
• Dogfish Head Aprihop
• Victory HopDevil Ale

Sorry no room for Danish beer on the list. Logically the Dansih beers would be represented ig the list had been compiled here in the DK. Both my best and my worst brews have had a very small audience. It is the good old story about exposure, or 'I can not rate what I have not tried'. Denmark features a lot of very small breweries, and some of them make exellent beer that never goes outside Denmark.

Source:
http://men.style.com/details/features/full?id=content_4430

The first smoke free bar in Denmark

Good news for those of us who enjoys a beer, and not 2nd hand smoking. Ølbaren in Copenhagen has previously had a couple of weekdays without smoking in the bar, and have taken the full step.

From August 25 there will be no smoking in Ølbaren. Oh, how I have waited for this moment, where I can enjoy a beer and be able to smell beer only.

Ølbaren celebrates this event with the serving of different kinds of smoked beers. Candy, shaped as pipes, will also be present.

Oh - and if you need an ashtray, they have some for sale :-)

Jan Says:

"Many of your customers have been surprised by how nice it feels to avoid the smoke. Many smokers too find it nice to breathe clean air in the bar.

Jan K. Hansen, Ølbaren, Elmegade 2, København
Mail: mail@oelbaren.dk, tlf. 60 65 64 65

Microbreweries step up the competition

Acording to the Danish Beer Entusiasts malinglist list ’Ale-mail’ the war amoungst the danish microbrewerries has begun.

One story is about Nørrebro Bryghus being copyied by Veterbro Bryghus. Their brand and image is at stake when a product with less quality use similar visual image.

Anders Kissmeyer from Nørrebro Bryghus clarifies the situation:

”Your harsh reaction on Veterbro Bryghus and their parasitic use of our brand and image has to be seen as an initiative to protect our brand and image, and thus our business. But I will like to break the silence of the taboo about of whether all new small breweries add to the Danish beer culture. Clearly I believe that they do not all add to the Danish beer culture, and I foresee a intensification of the harshness of future dialogue. Not only from myself and Nørrebro Bryghus, but from the entire community of good craft brewers, that work hard and add value the beer scene, against those who are purely motivated by money and not good beer.”

The competition amongst Danish microbreweries must also step up due to the fact that more and more microbreweries emerge all over the country. Soon there will not bee room for them all, and some must die.

Let Darwin decide.

War on good beer?

In my recent visit to the Danish microbrewery Ølfabrikken, I was surprised to see no sign by the road. To be more accurate the sign was there, but it had been painted over.

I thought to myself that they just wanted to update the sign, and went on in. As always, in small breweries it is interesting to talk to their employees. Here I got the real story of the sign; It had been painted over in the the middle of the night. The empty sign was the result of pure vandalism.

It seems that one or more of Ølfabrikken’s neighbours does not appreciate a brewery being located where they are. At my previous visits to the brewery I have talked to several of the locals, many of which own part of the brewery and all being excited by their products and their mere existence.

My plea to the neighbour(s) in question: RELAX, have a homebrew. If you are annoyed by something at or about the brewery, go talk to them! They are really nice people, and you CAN talk to them. Please stop childish acts such as blocking their driveway with your car.

We need no more terrorists in the world – we need dialogue! I guess that everybody *but* the people I am writing to in this post, will read it. But now I started a dialouge instead of smashing up the car in question with a baseball bat :-)

NOTE: I picked up 'Ølfabrikken India Red Ale' and it is to die for.

Sex and fun in beer ads

I just wanted to share this lovely lady, promoting craft brew with you. It is a Sexy Troegs ad where a this hot girl in a bikini keeps burping and farting cause its 'natural'.



In Denmark there is Tuborg (not quite as natural) also with daring commercials. In fact beer commercials on televison is not allowed in Denmark, but you can see them in movie theathers.

Wedding ale

I finally got around to brew my wedding ale again, with small modifications. This beer was served at my wedding two years ago, and was a huge success, although I was not satisfired with it myself.

A couple of months after my wedding, I was subject to a blind test. There was this nice ale among the beers. I was the only one in the room who did not get the joke, as I was not part of the conspiray to smuggle beer from my wedding and present it to me in this manner.

What I learned is that you are your own biggest critic, as I really liked my own beer, when not knowing that it came from my hands. So now I am brewing the this lovely beer once again.

One big diffrence was also that I made a wirlpool in the brewpost just prior to racking the beer the the primary fermenter and pitching. This gave me a cleaner beer by far, but I had to saccrifice several liters of wort to the trub from the hot and cold break.

May I blog in English?

Hey - what's going on? Are you all of a sudden writing the blog in English?

Well - yes. After some consideration I'm giving it a try. The reason is mainly that the homebrew blogosphere in Denmark is tiny and the readers are scarce. I want to let the other bloggers outside Denmark read what I write. I soly read blogs from outside Denmark myself anyway, so why not make it into a two way road.

A couple of times i have posted about specific people, beers, places etc, and have gotten requests to translate the posts into English.

One drawback may be my poor written English and total lack of grammar, but for now I will just 'relax and have a homebrew'.

As one of my favourite posters on brygforum would put it: It will be beer anyway.

Ny maltmølle på vej

Jeg har alt for længe haft planer om at bygge en ny og mere effektiv maltmølle. Indtil videre en lille preview:

Valserne fra CrankAndStein

Motoren til den nye mølle.

Jeg har haft svært ved at komme i gang med at lave møllen, men nu er der hul på bylden. Selve monteringingen af valseværk, controller og motor er blevet ganske simpel. To stykker træ med statetisk korrekt placerede huller er alt hvad der skulle til, for at få den op og køre. Til at starte med havde jeg ikke de rigtige bolte til motoren, så derfor bevæger den sig på den nedenstående video (og ja, jeg ved godt at boltene til fastlåsning af valserne sidder i de forkerte huller :-) )

Hastigheden kan varieres fra under 1 omdrejning i sekundet op til ca 200, og ved de højere omdrejninger, kan møllen virkelig rive en arm af. Den observante læser vil også bemærke at der mangler en hopper / tragt til møllen, og her er jeg strandet pt. Ikke fordi jeg ikke har mod på at lave møllen færdig, men fordi valseværket er fabrikeret i USA og derfor ikke har de samme typer gevind som har i europa. Det betyder at jeg ikke har nogen bolte til at fasgøre hopperen. Så lige nu er jeg på udkig efter en dansk leverandør at boltene. Jeg ved at Maltbazaren.dk også arbejder på sagen, så er det bare at se hvem der kommer først med boltene.

Ikke mere Carlsberg til overpris

Ikke overraskende vil vi danskere ikke betale 25 pct. mere for den samme vare, bare fordi emballagen er ny, rapporterer Jyllandsposten.

Derfor opgiver Carlsberg endelig planen om at sælge dyre øl i smart indpakning. Hvor dumme troede Carlsberg egentig vi forbrugere er?

Øl lavet af smeltet indlandsis

Under et besøg på Ølfabrikken var jeg så heldig at møde et par gutter fra Greenland Brewhouse, et helt nyt bryggeri i sydgrønland.

Pudsigt nok kommer øllet ikke på det grønlandske marked til at starte med, og HVIS det kommer ud til grønlandske forbrugere, så bliver det kun som fadøl. Salik Hard og Rasmus Broge fortalte at det er på grund af at Grønland har et meget monopoliseret returflaskesystem, som kun accepterer én slags flasker, og dem har et tapperi eneret på.

Øllet er brygget på smeltet indlandsis, og det er jo ret specielt. Jeg har i hvert fald ikke set det andre steder. Ifølge bryggeriet er vandet mindst to tusind år gammelt og fuldkommen fri for mineraler og forurening. Jeg gætter på at mineraler skal tilføjes vandet, for at ramme den rigtige smag.

Greenland Brewhouses er placeret i Narsaq, og lagres i tanke på vej til Tyskland, hvor det tappes og sendes til Danmark. Til dem er under sig over hvorfor bryggeriet lige ligger i Grønland kom svaret promte fra Salik: -”Fordi jeg bor i Grønland, og hvis jeg placerede det i fx Danmark, ville det jo ikke være et grønlandsk bryggeri.”

Indtil videre er det blevet til en brown ale og en pale ale, og i skrivende stund er produkterne ved at finde vej til flere og flere danske ølbutikker.

Hvis Rasmus virker bekendt for os Københavnere er det fordi han havde den hedengangne Cafe Grif, der bragte os spændende øl tidligt i den danske ølrevolution.