Brewed "Winterfest" Today

Brewers have been making a special, extra-strong, year end celebratory or holiday beer for longer than anyone can remember. It's our little gift to friends and patrons. And today, I made just that - a big (17.8° plato) Amber Ale brewed with Maris Otter Pale malt from England, five different kinds of German specialty malt and plenty of Centennial & Cascade hops from the U.S. The mash tun was absolutely packed with grain. It should be quite a mouthful when it finishes fermenting! It's very similar to a beer I brewed many years ago in Seattle called Yulefest.

In a couple of days I'm heading off to Japan for a holiday break. I'll be back in late January and I imagine that quite a few will get a taste of Winterfest before I do. I've done my best to head out with a bang so-to-speak and remember, the quickest way to find out when it goes on-tap is to follow @BangaBrew on Twitter.

Happy holidays and best wishes to all for the new year!

Hefeweizen No.2 is On-Tap

I transfered my second batch of Hefeweizen to the cellar today and it is pouring. It's softer, less acidic and more complex than the first batch. It's a definite improvement and goes down quite nicely. This is the best selling beer at Craftworks. I'll be brewing wheat beer number three on Wednesday and plan on making it a bit darker by adding some Crystal and Munich malt.

Beery Factoids
Hefeweizen is a wheat beer of South German origin. Hefe means yeast and weizen means wheat.
Hefeweizen is cloudy because it is always unfiltered, wheat has more protein than barley and some yeast may be present. All Hefeweizen's are ales and made with grist that is usually 60% malted wheat and 40% malted barley.
A special yeast is used to ferment this beer that produces distinctive clove, banana and phenol flavours. Hop flavor should not be present. Hefeweizen should also be a little more carbonated than most other beer. All this makes for a very refreshing drink that goes quite well with Indian food and suits our hot climate very well. Prost...

E.S.B is Pouring

Photo: Tarun the Talented

Our American Amber Ale is gone and has been replaced with a classic English Amber Ale - Extra Special Bitter. It's brewed with the best English floor-malted Maris Otter Pale Ale malt I could get my mitts on, a bit of Crystal & Chocolate malt, a dash of jaggery and finished exclusively with East Kent Golding hops.

Next brew is Golden Ale on Friday. And I'm hoping to get a couple of additional brews in before I head to Japan for the holidays.

I'm giving the Twitter thing a go, thinking that it might be a quicker way for folks to find out what new beers are on-tap at Windmills Craftworks. So have a look for BangaBrew and follow if that kind of thing is of interest. Cheers...