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Today is another kitchen sink recipe. We’ve gathered a variety of specialty grains and hops over the years, and it’s time for some mid-winter clearing out. Given the range of grains we have, we decided to do something dark. So this one is a brown-ish ale using some NZ hops. It turned out to be pretty dark. We’ll see how this malt and hops combination goes.
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This recipe comes from BYO. We just bumped up the flaked oats to 2.5 pounds.
We’re doing a step mash today. Aiming for a 122° mash to help break down some of the oat gumminess. Then going for a 152° rest.
Ended up overshooting the first temp and hit 126°. Added about a quart of cold water and brought the temp down too far to 116°. Then added some boiling water to finally get 121°.
After 15 minutes, we added boiling water to get to 152°. Within the target volume, we weren’t able to 152°, though, so we had to do a decoction to get the temp up. Ended up doing three rounds of decoction to finally hit 153°. I’m using “decoction” to mean that we pulled out about a half gallon of mash with liquid and grains and bringing it to a boil in another vessel then pouring it back in. I know that’s not quite the same thing that’s normally meant be decoction mash, but it makes me feel like we’re doing cool brewing stuff.
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I don’t know what this is a picture of because it doesn’t look like the beer we cracked open in November 2025
We tried a bottle on November 16, 2025. It tastes like a Belgian. No bubble gum flavor like we’ve had before. The honey flavor really mellowed out, and I don’t mind it as much as I did when we first tried it. I still think that honey isn’t the right flavor for a Belgian, although I’d be interested in trying a 50/50 mix of sugar and honey.
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This year we’re coming back with an English style Christmas beer using Maris Otter. No spruce tips this year. We weren’t sure we’d have orange peel this year, so we pulled out some cherries we had frozen for the cherry stout we never ended up making earlier in the fall. But the grocery store had some orange peel, so this year will be a cherry orange Christmas beer.
The first sip on bottling day, pretty spicy. Matt mentioned Underberg. So we’ll see if it mellows out in the next month.
Trying the beer a year later on November 16, 2025, definitely mellowed out. Aroma is one of the best cherry scents we’ve had. Smells like fresh cherries. Kind of a metallic aftertaste. ginger and orange peel come through in a balanced way. Whatever other spices are in there, they are playing an accompanying role. There’s definitely some spice in there, but it’s not distinct. There’s a bit of a medicinal taste, but it’s not off putting. Overall, this is a really good Christmas beer. It has a nice balance of spices that don’t overwhelm. The cherries come through in a pleasant way. Cherries are a clear characteristic that makes this year’s edition unique, but it’s not something that needs to make an appearance regularly.
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Weiven Beer 