At Big Brew Day in May we cracked open my bottle of Belgian Dark Strong that got second at the Colonial Cup in the Belgian Strong Ale category. A lot of people asked for the recipe. Here it is:
The batch size is ~5.5 gallons.
Grains:
17.5 lbs Pilsner
1lb Caramunich
1lb Dark Candy Sugar (to the boil)
1lb Cane Sugar (to the boil)
0.5lb Biscuit
0.25lb Special B
0.25lb Aromatic
0.25lb Chocolate
I mashed at 145 for 40 minutes
Then 155 for 40 minutes
and then a mash out at 163 for 10 minutes.
I sparged a lot on this one. I had to add boiling water to the mash to raise the temp. All said and done I sparged ~10 gallons into the boil kettle. I think I did a two hour boil on this one but only hopped for the last hour.
Hops:
60 min 0.7 oz Magnum 12.5%AA
15 min 0.25 oz Hallertauer 4.4%AA
15 min 0.25 oz Tettnanger 4.8%AA
1 min 0.25 oz Hallertauer 4.4%AA
1 min 0.25 oz Tettnanger 4.8%AA
Yeast:
Wyeast 1214 - I made a 1.5 liter starter with 250ml of yeast slurry that came from a Belgian Triple.
I started fermentation in the low 60s for the first three days and then let itrise to the upper 60s.
OG = 1.100
FG = 1.010
A fast ferment test was performed and confirmed the FG. With the simple sugarsand the mash profile this was a very fermentable wort. The ton of yeast I pitched help too.
Water profile:
97ppm Ca
100ppm Na
94ppm SO4
150ppm Cl
180ppm HCO3
alkinity as CaCO3 147
RA as CaCO3 76