Beer Forum

hay anyone have good ideas for brewing tripples?
what hops & spices if any and is it ok to do a decotion also

Tireman,

According to the book title in your subject line AND the Belgian Ale Style book, most belgian styles are charactized by a lack of strict guidelines. Wheat, Sugar, Spices, American Hops, marmalade, fruit, anything goes. However, if you're looking for a more traditional example of this "style":

Malt - stick to pilsener malt for 75% or more of the grainbill. You can use anything you want to fill out the rest. More Pils, Aromatic, Munich, malted wheat, etc. Just keep the color pale golden. You probably want to use a good bit of sugar too. A pound of clear candi sugar or just plain corn sugar will do nicely and help dry this out, but you can use cane syrup, honey, invert sugar, whatever you like.

It's "okay" to do a decoction, but it's not necessary in this style at all. It may even leave too many unfermentable sugars as you want this pretty dry (i.e. low mash temp). If you're itchin' to try a decoction save it for a German Lager like a bock or a nice malty Oktoberfest/Marzen.

As for Hops, Vinnie from Russian River says Styrian Goldings, but you can use anything European really. Czech Saaz will work and so will German Hallertauer or Tettnang. Keep the bittering around 20-25 IBUs max and the aroma hops about 1/4oz for 5min.

For spices you can try the usual 1/4 - 1/2 tsp Grains of paradise, maybe some corriander, etc. though most of the "Spiciness" comes from the fermentation. They say to pitch this a little low if you can, 63f - 65f and then let it rise on it's own. I wouldn't let it past 75f at the most. This is also a big beer so you probably want to use a starter.

Hope this info helps. If you are looking for an actual recipe just say so.

Rob

Rob, fantastic description. I have nothing to add.

so i'am not far off, as far as the grain bill.
belg pils 16#
belg aroma 1#
vienna 5#
wheat malt 2#
the hops ? kent gold & saaz
spice insmall amounts corriander & grains of pardise and sweet orange peel.
white labs 530

Personally i would leave all the spices out, as Rob said, you can add them in really small amounts but the yeast is supposed to be the star in this beer. I would probably leave the wheat out as well, no really reason in my opinion. Just bump up the Pils or use some cane sugar, which I didn't see in your recipe. The sugar is needed to dry it out.

Your recipe looks pretty good, those are just my experiences with the style and what I have read.

Excellent reply BrewBum. I too have nothing to add. I will however RE-emphazise the sugar. Gotta have the sugar. If sugar freaks you out, brew German!



And best of luck this week BrewBum. I will not be kicking your ass until next week.

Rob

All excellent advice above. Keep the spices subtle. Increase them on the next batch if they are too subtle. Also good advice on using sugar to dry it out.

The one item not mentioned is one that comes up over and over in Brew Like a Monk. This is the fermentation temperature schedule. Yes, there really is such a thing (though not called that) for the trappist beers. They start out by pitching cold, a la Jamil, letting it ferment for a day or so and then let it slowly rise naturally to something around normal room temperature. The cold pitching is to keep the normal rapid rise in temperature at the beginning of fermentation from getting over 68-70 degrees. This will allow the yeast profile to develop the way you want.

Wayne
Bugeater Brewing Company

I can only assume you are speaking of the USC v Nebraska football game next week...

Prepare for a beat down my friend!!

Honestly, you guys looked better than I thought you would, it will be fun no matter what. I just like the fact we are playing a meaningful game in sept. We are also the only team in the country to play the 2 teams that played in the National Title game last year.

This week we have the powerhouse Nicholls State, if we struggle or God forbid lose i doubt i will even watch the USC game and I will throw my season tickets in the trash!