Belgian Dark Strong

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