Sunday, February 5, 2012

It was Christmas but now its February

so... I had hoped to brew a Christmas beer but I ran out of time, so I am releasing my Christmas beer in February.  This beer owes much to Matt as we were at his house smelling every spice in his cabinet just brainstorming.  He then came up with the idea to use Jamaican allspice in a beer.  I loved the smell but had no idea what I was going to do to create a beer.  What I came up with was an amalgam of a British Winter Warmer and a Belgian Spiced Beer.  This Ale comes in at a whopping 9% ABV and uses Pale, Crystal, Munich, and Carapils malts.  With the hops I wanted to try something with higher AA values to offset some of the spices so I went with Chinook for bittering and Northern Brewer for Aroma.  Finally this brew uses turbinado sugar, molasses, Jamaican allspice, sweet orange peel, and cinnamon to create hopefully a layered flavor.  For the finishing touches I used a yeast blend of 3 Belgian and trappist yeasts.  I have no idea if people are gonna love or hate this beer, but I certainly channeled my mad scientist side in coming up with this one.