Back in April, in the middle of lockdown, I had a look at what yeasts I actually had in the fridge. I totally forgot I had this! A big shout out to Dan from the Water into Beer homebew club who let me piggy back on his order to get the Mad Fermentationist saison blend in to brew with.
I decided not to just make a plain ol’ saison with it and, instead, make a dark saison. I wasn’t sure what hops I had in the freezer, the list was surprising. How have I, a person who is not very hop tolerant, ended up with Citra, El Dorado, Amarillo, Chinook, Galaxy and Ekuanot? A bit confused by the hop supplies I plunged for the El Dorado. I figured the tropical notes would go well with, hopefully, the tropical notes of the yeast blend.
For malt I used Carafa III to darken the wort but not add to much roast and a bit of caramalt for some bite.
10 litre batch
2.5kg pilsner
100g Carafa III
100g Caramalt
10g El Dorado 60 mins
10g El Dorado 5 mins
This beer has zeroed out after 2 months, it’s got a tropical fruit hit, a bit of chewiness and then a peppery saison note at the end. I did think about dry hopping it but decided I didn’t want the hops to dominate.
Have I got brews for you 