In my early days of brewing I found a post on Homebrewtalk about a Blueberry Oatmeal IPA and I tweaked the recipe a bit and brewed it. Everything was going well until I added fresh blueberries to the secondary and that’s when I got my first infection! Ever since I’ve always used frozen fruit and haven’t had any issues.
I rarely brew the exact same beer twice, but I often make tweaks and brew a similar recipe which brought up the Blueberry Muffin Ale. For this beer I used a base of 2 row, a bunch of oats (malted and flaked), a little Munich malt for some clean maltiness, and added some victory malt for that biscuity, toasy, bready component. I added a dash of maltodextrine for mouthfeel and mosaic hops later in the boil for aroma. I then added 3 lbs of blueberries for 7 days in the secondary and opted out (forgot) the dry hop. It was nice to revisit the idea of this beer and add what I felt the recipe needed. Check it out!
I love enigma hops. Enigma hops are an Australian variety that are descendants of the Swiss Tettnang hop. Their descriptors are “pinot gris, raspberries, red currant, and light tropical fruit.” In the hop spectrum, they’re heavy on the fruit and they’re close to galaxy and vic secret, but lean more toward spice (see pic).
I had my first taste when I got my hands on a fresh can of Other Half‘s Enigma IPA. I loved how the hops were a little spicy, but also really fruity, tropical, and slightly dank. I was then on the search to get some of these hops. At that time, they weren’t easy to get, but I kept searching. I then got my hands on Other Half’s DDH All Enigma Everything and that really showcased the hops juiciness and fruitiness and I was even further hooked! Once I was finally able to get some Enigma hops I brewed an all Enigma IPA and it was bomb. Later I brewed Enigmanilla, with all enigma hops. Now on to the Enigma Oat Coat.
This beer has a simple base of Pale Ale malt and Fawcett Oat malt. I love brewing with oats, and now that I can regularly get oat malt, I’ve been using it quite a bit. I feel it gives the beer a distinct “oat” flavor and does wonders for head retention and body. Hopped exclusively with enigma hops, this has all the fruity, lightly spicy goodness. Check the recipe!
Whenever I see interesting ingredients or anything I could possibly brew with, I buy it. This happened with some chamomile I bought a little while back. However, this wasn’t new to me, I’d brewed a chamomile saison last summer and it came out quite nice, so I was excited to use it again. This brings me to the Honey Chamomile Wheat!
I stumbled upon this post on Homebrewtalk so I started doing some research…I found the recipe in the Extreme Brewing book here (full text here). It was first brewed at Dogfish Head in the summer of 2005 and they say this about the beer: “The addition of chamomile flowers and honey lends this American style Wheat beer a soothing character that compliments warm weather and relaxation.” I can dig that!
I’ve been interested in brewing a milkshake style IPA for some time, so I decided to give it a shot! The milkshake IPA style usually has fruity hops, milk sugar (lactose), fruit, and vanilla. This beer has been described as a sub-set of hazy NEIPAs, but it oftentimes has more mouthfeel & the hops have to mesh well with the fruit and/or vanilla.
It appears that Omnipollo were the first to put out these kind of beers when they came out with a “smoothie IPA” in 2014. In 2015, Jean Broillet IV of Tired Hands teamed up with Omnipollo to release the first “milkshake IPA”, which has turned into a growing series, including: Rose Panna Cotta Milkshake IPA, Bananas Foster Double Milkshake IPA, Raspberry Green Tea Milkshake IPA, and many more.
Jean Broillet IV didn’t only want to use lactose but, “[gobs of] oats, apple puree, vanilla, and fruit.” Brewing with oats increases viscosity due to the high content of beta-glucans, while the apple puree is used for pectins to create a luscious, thick mouthfeel. The beer is then conditioned on fruit & vanilla beans to round out the flavor profile. These are culinary focused beers and I’ve seen versions without fruit, without vanilla, and even without lactose. They’re more popular now and since they’re in such high demand and are damn tasty, I don’t see them going anywhere soon.
scraping split vanilla bean
For my iteration (milkshake style), I didn’t use any fruit or apple puree (next time). I fell in love with enigma hops last year when I had Other Half‘s All Enigma Everything and I’ve been hooked (kind of obsessed) since. I wanted to get all that enigma goodness, and I added a vanilla bean after primary fermentation to get some Nilla warmth that I think will pair well with the sweetness from the lactose, and the earthy fruitiness of enigma hops.
For my base I used 60% 2 row and went heavy with the oats at 40% (hell yea). 30% of those oats are Fawcett oat malt (which I’ve never used before). Oat malt is described as, “a unique malt that adds a distinct texture and smoothness to your brews similar to flaked oats.” I’d heard Tired Hands uses Fawcett oat malt in their beers so I was excited to give it a shot!
I really like the idea of milkshake style beers. They usually incorporate lactose (milk sugar), vanilla, and some fruit. There are plenty of these kinds recipes on the net for IPAs & ales, but I haven’t seen many for saisons. They exist, but it looks like only a handful of breweries have attempted them. My turn! So I set out to brew an orange creamsicle/milkshake “style” saison (like the ice cream bars).
I usually use Belgian pilsner malt as my saison base, but I wanted this beer to have more complexity so I used a pilsner, 2-row, and Maris otter mix. I then added white wheat and flaked oats for body and mouthfeel, and a bit of Vienna malt.
To get my orangey orange on, I used the zest of two oranges and dried sweet orange peel in the boil.
When this beer is done fermenting I will rack it onto the two oranges I zested (chopped & frozen), and 2 vanilla beans. To prep the vanilla beans I split them, scraped out the goodness, cut them in half, and soaked them in 1 oz of Titos vodka.