Brewing with phantasm in hazy IPA

Been using chit malt for years on a Helles beer I make. Gives it just the maltiness that I’m looking for. In essence chit malt is barely malted. And no, I’ve never had issues with it clearing.
Edit: and yes Mark, we’ve all been there. The lager that won’t clear and the hefeweizen that drops brilliant. :rage::joy:

2 Likes

I know I really should split so I could see the difference but my two 7gal conicals are full so that only leaves my two 14gal conicals for 10.5gal batches. I know a rough problem to have. I do want to make a Mexican lager with wlp940 and one with Lunar crush to see the differences. No other tricks. Same beer, different yeast.

Who’s the idiot? ME! Got to knockout and getting ready to clean the BK and noticed a container on my brew table. What was it? The PHANTASM. I FORGOT TO ADD IT! The whole reason for this beer! I quickly went to my starter induction burner and boiled up some water. Added my phantasm to that, let it cool a bit, then added to the fermenter. We’ll see how it turns out.

3 Likes

survey results from Halloween bonfire. 11 people liked the hazy IPA without the phantasm the best, one person liked the hazy IPA with the phantasm the best. I did not vote. Three did not like either IPA and of those three, one did not like IPAs period.

They kicked the half keg of the hazy IPA without phantasm first. When that ran out they switched to hazy IPA with phantasm. As an aside, they almost kicked the half keg coconut porter.

1 Like

I’m a week in, so no samples. Interesting people didn’t like the phantasm beer. I went with a blonde ale with minimal hop additions due to the thought that heavy loads pull the thiols out. I’ll follow my standard dry hopping technique of soft crashing and dry hopping a little cooler. Will report back.

So, figured I’d pull a sample today. It taste very similar to, well, white wine in a beer. :man_shrugging:

Pulled a sample today after starting a soft crash yesterday, it has transformed into a lot of guava! Pretty solid. I leave for San Diego Tuesday and won’t be back until Monday the 21st. I’ll dry hop with cryo Citra and Simcoe for a few days and then cold crash it.

Interested in hearing final results.

Just sampled it. Used 1oz each of CRYO Citra and Simcoe. Pretty much stripped all the thiols out. :man_shrugging:

Thanks for feedback. I tasted my beer with hops added at flame out to hop spider recirculating wort going through it. Simcoe and citra. It tastes really good like a guava nectar fruit beverage I bought. I used helio glazer in this batch and no phantasm otherwise same as the above batch. The guava flavor is much stronger and better in this batch. No peppery flavor. Based on your experience and the taste test, I will spit the beer. Half as is, half dry hopped. Will serve at christmas eve party with survey. Till then both splits go in kegerator at 32 F to try and hold the flavor till Christmas eve. Holding off on dry hopping till Dec 15, keg dec 21.

1 Like

So I re sampled and… back to guava! I’m chalking it up to hop bite. One thing I was surprised about with the helio gazer was the krausen head. A true top cropper! Took some extra cleaning.

Thanks loopie. Based on your results (that cryo does indeed not strip out thiols) I dry hopped with cyro citra and amarillo. I could still taste the guava.

I decided not to split the batch into one with and without dry hopping as prior to dry hopping, the beer just had a guava taste not a full range of hop flavors. It was more like a guava drink. I do think this guava drink I made would be better suited for a cleaner beer maybe an india pale lager type of beverage made with lunar crush and different malts. The experiments continue LOL.

1 Like

Yes! They seem very one dimensional! And from reading using too many hops to try to make it multi dimensional will strip thiols. Seems like you can’t win. I also purchased the lunar crush and plan on brewing my Mexican lager the same way and comparing it vs traditional Mexican lager yeast.

more experimental results. I tried phantasm hops in mash, wind dried malt and brewing IPA with lunar crush lager yeast dry hopped cyro. Had the most success getting quava and passion fruit with the lager yeast and making IPL. It was almost like a fruit drink. Interesting beer. Can provide further details if interested.

1 Like

I’m finishing up a beer now that I used lunar crush on. No mash hops or phantasm isn this one. Preliminary tastes remind me exactly of the ale I made with Helio gazer…

Tasting my lunar crush lager for the first time. It’s certainly guava! Much ‘cleaner’ than the Helio gazer. Of course they’re different recipes so that couldn’t account for that. Similar but more crisp and cleaner. This is a beach/ocean front lager. Guess it’s appropriate for the season.

1 Like