2021 & Things

Well I did a pretty bad job of keeping up with the notes for this project…I’ll try and do better this year.

The final batch of the year, Frozen Dead Guy, turned out ok. I didn’t get as much spruce out of it as I would have liked, but it may have been that the spruce tips were older than I would have liked. I’ll try again with some fresher ones.

So it’s the new year and I’m thinking about new ideas to try. I’m starting off with an old idea again, the cherry blossom tea sake. It uses salted, pickled cherry blossoms. It gives the sake a definite savory flavor. It is a good cold weather brew for sure. Not much cherry flavor in the mix, but I’m looking to play with the Kaze no Mori yeast I procured and see if it adds more of that fruit quality.

I’m also going to try and do the squid jerky bottle and cups sometime this year. We got a convection oven that has a dehydrator function. The idea had always intrigued me.

I “dry hopped” the Frozen Dead Guy batch while pressing. It didn’t do much, but it was a neat idea 😀

Frozen Dead Guy

Started a new batch of #sake a couple of weeks ago, pressed today and forgot to post some pics.
I thought I’d try a new take on the spruce tip sake I made last year. This time I took inspiration from Colorado’s frozen dead guy, Grandpa Bredo, and put some Norwegian twist on it. I used a combo of #kveik and number 901 yeasts, Rocky Mountain spruce tips and juniper berries in the rice steaming, water from Twin Springs in Manitou Springs,, and some local aspen wood staves that I lightly toasted.

So far it is going really well so far. it smells a lot sweeter than I expected and I’ll add in a tea bag of spruce tips and juniper berries in a bit.
🍶🇳🇴🏔💀🌲

Black is Beautiful pt 8

Well it was a good idea that needs a lot of work. There is a lot of flavor going on and it is an interesting failure. I’ll be interested in seeing how it matures with aging.

Was hoping to get these out by #sakeday but the labels weren’t done. So here they are ready to go. 1. Old Mose single pasteurized and filtered 2. DB not pasteurized and lightly filtered 3.SCFD single pasteurized and heavy squid ink test batch.

Black is Beautiful pt 7

So the squid ink isn’t working like I thought. I’m really wondering how much carbon is in squid ink, as it seems to have clarified the liquid and bonded to the solids coloring them.

As is it has a light brine with a pineapple/guava/green apple. As it warms up though, it gets saltier and more floral.

Black is Beautiful pt 6

#science is hard! So the color isn’t anywhere near dark enough after pressing so looks like squid ink might have to come off the bench for the last few minutes in the game. I also prepped some #aspen staves with a little toasting to get some flavor and color. I’m testing a small bit of the #sake with the squid ink to see what happens before I commit to the whole thing as well. Success or failure, this was a fun experiment. #sakeadventure #homebrew 🍶🦑🍶✊🏿

Not quite the black I am looking for

Wood before

Wood after

Sake kasu with a lovely lavender color

Sake with squid ink test

Black is Beautiful pt5

So I got curious about the flavor of the #sake after the surprising smell and did a little taste test with the crew. 2-1 in favor of the current flavor. The two picked up some strawberry and “summer” wine flavors. The one thought it was on the sour side, like the wine had started to vinegar. A mixed bag, but interesting. So I pulled the red rice yeast, gin barrel chips, and ginger out as a precaution. No need to push those flavors to an undesirable place. I also started testing the #squidink as a backup to see what this particular ink tastes like. A little certainly goes a long way 🦑 #homebrew

The tasters

Red rice yeast, gin barrel chips, and a piece of ginger

The squid ink. 1 tsp in 3 cups of water

Black is Beautiful pt4

Added a few color elements to the brew - some red rice yeast, gin barrel chips, and a piece of ginger. It doesn’t show so well in the pic, but it is a nice rose pink hue. It also has an incredible summer white/rosé nose. It is progressing nicely and might be just about ready for pressing.

Black is Beautiful pt3

Well all the rice additions are in and this light lavender #sake is on its way. Gonna wait a few more days before adding any other color change elements. It is letting off a lovely champagne and berries nose which is a nice surprise.

Black is Beautiful pt 2

So I left the pea flower tea to steep overnight and the lovely pea fragrance dissipated and the flavor disappeared as well, leaving me with a dark blue, generic tea flavored liquid. As a bonus when pea flower tea comes in contact with an acid it turns a vibrant purple. I feel like this is a good start to the process.

Black is Beautiful

The labeling for the Black Is Beautiful Stout project

Earlier this year Weathered Souls initiated an idea, Black is Beautiful, to get breweries across the US to make stouts to support restorative justice projects. This made me think that other liquor could do this as well.

A few years back when I first thought of the idea for Old Mose, I wanted it to be black in color and I just couldn’t get it to go much past a blood red (which also works). So I’m trying out a new plan to get it there. So my Black Is Beautiful idea is the black sake. It will be a combo of a few things I’ve experienced and worked with over the last few years. The goals are: something that tastes good and only uses natural coloring.

For this batch I’ll be making a pretty standard ginjo sake using a sandan shikomi method to try and get some good flavor from the sake before adding in all the extra ingredients…which will be: pea flower tea to get a nice blue base, red rice yeast to bring in some earthiness and a good red color, some gin barrel wood chips for color and some botanicals, and if needed to take it that extra mile some squid ink powder. I’m hoping that the powdered version has less brine and more umami to it.

With all that said, this could go very, very wrong. There are quite a few really powerful earthy flavors in the mix that could overpower a lot of things very easily. So I think secret to making it work will be the timed addition of those extra components. Too much of anything will really kill it.

So this should be fun 😀

The pea flower tea at work

The extras waiting in the wings

Fun with science

One of my favorite things about fermentation is all the crazy things that happen when you change something or when you let things happen on their own.

The most recent batch was a wild ride of learning about yeast and how it functions in brewing. The yeast was riding a great sweet wave for a long time, then after pressing it took a sharp turn to the dry side.

Not what was expected, but an opportunity to try something out. I bought a nitro growler for my wife to make cold brew at home and I wanted to try nitro sake. So I took the batch, that wasn’t quite right, and pumped it full of nitrogen. It started off with a great pear nose and flavor on the front end and a mild grapefruit finish…and a lot dryer that’s I’d like it to be. After pumping the nitrogen in and letting it sit for a day it mellowed out the grapefruit and really pumped up the pear. It smoothed out the mouthfeel and gave it some effervescence.

It was a fun experiment. Something I’ll definitely play with again.

Cave of The Winds…almost

So I brought back a bottle of Kaze no Mori from my most recent trip to Japan and it had some live yeast that survived the trip so I had someone propagate it and gave it a go in a recent batch. It started off really good full of pear and cherry blossom bouquets and was very active. I mean really ready to go from day one. Which was great until it got away from me and quickly turned from a sweet sake to a dry sake. The pear stayed but it developed a grapefruit flavor that I wasn’t expecting.

it isn’t that it turned out bad, but it didn’t turn out the way I wanted. I’m curious to give it another go soon though. Sometime science isn’t as precise as you want it to be even when you’re careful and follow the rules 😂😂😂

#2 Sake Yeast Experiment

I was lucky enough to get a batch of #2 yeast from my friends at Colorado Sake recently. I’ve been I interested in trying out some yeasts that are very uncommon here in the states and was interested in working with this one because of the higher acidity sake the it makes. It makes me think that it may be the better choice for yeast for the El Colorado Red Sake that i have made in the past.

today I added the final rice addition and so far the sake has a very strong cider aroma with a tart green apple taste. Looking forward to seeing how it develops and ages over the next month or so.

Early morning steaming

Fermentation

Daimon Brewery Day 1

Today was full exhausting, but good. Me and my fellow brewers split into teams and tackled the first day well. Though I spent most of my day doing what brewers do most, cleaning, it was great to see all the parts of a brewery in action.

The other brewers are great to chat with and I’m defiantly learning some new info and perspectives on brewing. The only lady in the group, Patty from Brazil, is fascinating. She’s truly trying to make a Brazilian sake. She’s cultivating her own rice and working to bring out great flavors with only a 90% mill. I’m very excited to see what she brings to the market.

I’m also excited for what Troy is doing with Sawtelle Sake in LA. He’s got some great ideas and from what it sounds like, some great sake coming.

Daimon-San and the other brewers were nice enough to try the Cloud Antlers and give me some feedback. Overall everyone liked it and were excited to try it. Daimon-San found it a bit acidic and I wonder if that was in part to its traveling with me. It did seem like it still had some Nama qualities to it. Like I’ve said before, I will be exited to try that recipie again.

This experience has made me think a lot about the beginning and the basics again. I will have to try a simple sake for the next batch and get back to some small ideas with large flavor.

also got to go to my first onsen ever. Wasn’t mind blowing, but very nice after today.

Reviews of the Cloud Antlers Gin Sake

@marcehughes I don’t know enough to say anything other than that I like it (I don’t like sakes that taste too sweet or that give me a specific headache I get with white wine) , and it was good with heartier food than I’m used to having with sake!

So I ended up trying the sake this evening. It is my favorite of the three. It was soft, well rounded with really pleasant fruit notes in there. I didn't pick up much of a gin profile, however it may have been there and just very subtle and so I might have missed it because I was expecting it to have a heavy gin lean to it. But overall it was very delicious, enjoyable and easy to drink. Well Done Marc!!

Gin Sake…tentatively called Cloud Antlers

Did a light filter on the sake today. It pulled down the flavors a bit, but the nose is still really strong. There’s a lot more citrus coming through as well as some of the coriander. It still has a bit of a acidic kick on the back end that I hope will age out.

I saved a couple of bottles with some sediment to see how it plays.

All in all this was a really cool experiment. I will definitely be trying to add elements to the steaming again in the future. I think it plays more interestingly than infusion after brewing or flavor additives.

I’m not sure what score to give this one as it is really different from anything I’ve made or tried. So maybe a 4/5 with the harsh German judges giving low scores for non-traditional attempts.

Color and clarity test

Gin Barrel Sake - Pressing Day

Today I pressed the sake. A few observations:

1. The #12 yeast is killer with a gin base. It really pushes all the floral notes from the gin spices forward. It also provides great floral notes on its own.

2. The steaming process really imparted a lot of flavor into the rice. Upon doing a sample tasting today myself and my wife were surprised by the amount of flavor. There is a lot going on. The citrus notes from the orange peal are very present. The juniper and spruce tips push some of the piny/tree notes forward.

3. I was hoping the coriander might come through a bit more, but there are some subtle notes in there.

4. I’m not sure I’m going to need the gin barrel chips or the extra tea I saved. It may be too overpowering.

5. My wife made an interesting observation, that is tastes like a cocktail already.

I’m interested to see how it matures as I let the sediment settle over the next few days before filtering it. Fun times!

Gin Barrel Sake - Week 1

One week…

I’ll let you get that earworm out of your head before I continue.

The sake is quite active with a lot of bouquet. The steaming definitely imparted some tea vapor elements in the rice. The spice notes are definitely there, but not much “gin” coming through yet. Will have to see how those elements develop.