Harvest Moon is a hybrid saison style beer blending both British and Belgian styles to create a dry, refreshing flavourful ale. Plenty of wheat and light caramelised malts have been combined to give a sweet smoothness, whilst a low gravity finish and a brewing liquor high in salts imparts a dry, crisp character. Just to be clear in a brewery 'liquor' is treated water for making beer with, water is what's used to rinse the floor down.
Bottom fermenting British ale yeast was used to produce this batch as the trial brew back in early summer using the traditional continental strain wouldn't stop fermenting and resulted in multiple exploding containers and a very big mess in the warehouse! To counter the loss of peppery, spiced flavours through the yeast substitution fresh coriander and parsley were added to the beer during conditioning as well as ending up in the drayman's packed lunch (fair enough I guess). Despite sounding rather outlandish this addition of herbs is true to style in old farmhouse beers and is referred to as a gruit. Other options for herb and spice additions in beer include caraway, yarrow, juniper, ginger, aniseed, heather and bog myrtle. Williams Brothers in Alloa are probably the most famous brewery for employing botanicals other than hops to flavour their beer with and I would highly recommend a tasting session.
May is almost upon us and the abbey style blond Grand Cru goes on sale next week. With people becoming much more willing to give strong ales a go hopefully the the wonderful Belgian flavour profile of cloves, vanilla and tropical fruits will prove a hit. However, brewing this particular limited edition ale was not without its issues.
As with most beers of this style I used malt extract in the kettle to boost the starting gravity and enhance the flavour of the finished product; too much of this though can give a poor mouthfeel and make the beer taste thin. The malt extract comes in the form of a thick syrup which takes an age to pour from the tub as it oozes out in thick gloops. I had six of these to add to my wort before boiling, and whilst trying to manage the rest of the brewhouse I may have got more than a little hot and bothered but at least I managed to not spill any of it.
Foreign yeast that the brewhouse team were unfamiliar with provided the next hurdle. Some of these have behaved wonderfully in the past as with the Elderweiss brewed last summer; others have been more troublesome such as the trial brew for the upcoming September saison literally erupting beer like a geyser all over the cold store. Belgian yeast was used in tandem with our own strain to produce high amounts of esters and phenolic compounds imparting fruity and peppery flavours within the beer. This yeast set off like a rocket at the start of fermentation, munching its way through the sugary wort like a microbial version of man vs food. The brakes needed to be applied by dropping the temperature in order to prevent negative attributes developing such as the butterscotch aroma caused by diacetyl. Krausening (good word, isn't it?) with a ball of violently fermenting yeast near the finish helped to eliminate green-apple flavour acetaldehyde, allowing the softer, elegant flavours to come to the fore. For more great brewing lexicon check out the Oxford Dictionary of Beer.
This week also saw DBC win a Gold medal at the SIBA South West competition in the specialty beer category with our dark wheat beer Silent Knight. A great result for the team and something to be proud of.
