Just picked up my grain and D-180. My plan is to brew a 3 gal batch, not the full 5 gallons, so I will not use all of the D-180 (only 9.6 oz).
Questions are:
will the remaining d-180 last for weeks/months until I get ready to brew another batch?
if not, will using the full pound of D-180 in 3 gallons really mess up the flavor?
cheers
Mess up the flavor? I think it would only improve it!
So let it be written…so let it be done!
:cheers:
For those of us who weren’t paying attention, :oops: what is d-180?
Don’t be :oops: , it’s Belgian candy syrup used in belgian ales like Dubbel rather than the rock candy form.
Some of us 
just discovered its goodness very recently.
:cheers:
Denny,
for their^^^ dubbel recipes, they recommend letting the ferm temp raise to 82 (first 3 days) then cool to high 60s. I believe you’ve basically recommended to opposite: cool-side ferm at the beginning, then letting it raiseto warmer temps.
What are the pros and cons of each method when using 3787 in a dubbel? In the past, I’ve always done cooler to warmer and have had great results. but their recommendation has me wondering.
cheers.
[quote=“StormyBrew”]Denny,
for their^^^ dubbel recipes, they recommend letting the ferm temp raise to 82 (first 3 days) then cool to high 60s. I believe you’ve basically recommended to opposite: cool-side ferm at the beginning, then letting it raiseto warmer temps.
What are the pros and cons of each method when using 3787 in a dubbel? In the past, I’ve always done cooler to warmer and have had great results. but their recommendation has me wondering.
cheers.[/quote]
Well, if you do it their way you’ll get a lot more esters and possibly fusels. Remember, there’s more than one way to make a beer. I prefer my method, they prefer theirs. You get to decide on your own!
Denny - are you having déjà vu?
StormyBrew, I am fermenting a Dubbel with 3787 as we speak. It went BANANAS (pun to be confirmed?) right out of the gate, spiking at around 82 degrees. The smells coming from the carboy when I switched over to a blow off tube were insane. I admittedly panicked a bit and threw it in an ice bath, ultimately bringing it down to around 70 degrees within a few hours.
A couple days later I bought a bottle of Westmalle Dubbel (apparently 3787 is the same strain as Westmalle uses) and the smells that came from the bottle immediately after opening it were almost identical to those coming from the carboy. FWIW…
BTW, getting back to the original post, I only used a 1/2 lb of dark syrup in my Dubbel, but active fermentation is just winding down now. Is it worth boiling the rest in water and throwing it in there, or will it keep?
I’ve always started low and let my dubbels warm over the first week. so, I will do same here. But now I have another problem. My AG efficiency is really really good and has been for the past year or so. I’m hitting high 80s. My recipe gravity (at 75% eff) should have been about 1.072. I hit 1.093!!
So, dilute to 1.072 or just let it go as it? If I dilute, I’ll obviously cut the abv, and that’s ok, but what about the flavor? I don’t want to cut the flavor. It’ll take about 3 qt of water (in a 3.25 gallon batch) to lower it to the expected value.
cheers
Probably not worth it to add it to the fermentor. My LHBS says it’s like honey and should keep indifinitely.
cheers
I would…you shouldn’t even need to boil it first.
Hrm…won’t it carry the risk of infection, especially since it’s been opened? On top of that, when I weighed it out, I poured a little too much and had to pour some back. lol. I suppose soon I’ll stop being quite so anal .
Also, active ferm is more or less done now, but there’s a !!!HUGE!!! foamy white yeast cake on top (is that what is meant by true top-cropping?). Can I assume the yeast will have no trouble devouring the candi syrup sugars with little to no help (e.g., swirling/stirring up the yeast)?
[quote=“ickyfoot”]Hrm…won’t it carry the risk of infection, especially since it’s been opened? On top of that, when I weighed it out, I poured a little too much and had to pour some back. lol. I suppose soon I’ll stop being quite so anal .
Also, active ferm is more or less done now, but there’s a !!!HUGE!!! foamy white yeast cake on top (is that what is meant by true top-cropping?). Can I assume the yeast will have no trouble devouring the candi syrup sugars with little to no help (e.g., swirling/stirring up the yeast)?[/quote]
Don’t worry about infection. Like honey, no cooties grow. Those yeasties will feast on the candi. Think about it like if you were reusing the yeast cake immediately for another beer. Plenty of live yeast remaining.
Based on what Denny replied above to my question, it will probably add additional flavor…maybe a few tenth’s-of-a-percent to the final ABV.
cheers.
Yeah, I’m mostly interested in the flavor. Good point re: pitching on the yeast cake (although I never do that, even if I’m racking off the cake on brew day, because I like to clean the carboy first).
OK, it’s in. I’m guessing it’ll make fairly short work of the sugars, and that I’m safe with the airlock…yes? It’s at 64* right now…
you should be safe.
How much room you got in the top of that carboy? Mine’s been busy for 24hrs at 62-64 and I have a 5 inch krausen. If you have any concern about a possible blow-off, then best to insert a blow-off tube in place of the air lock and not worry about it.
cheers
Well, there’s about 5.5 gallons of trub + fluid in a 6.5 gallon carboy. There’s probably about 8" from the top of the beer to the bottom of the airlock, but 1" - 2" of that is yeast cake. It looked crazy in there when I opened it up to add the syrup!
Fermentation restarted pretty much instantly, and now it’s bubbling gently but pretty much constantly. There’s a lot of space, but maybe I’ll just use the blow off just to be safe.
Still, I can’t imagine this could be anything like the initial fermentation…can it? Heh.
should be fine with that much room. I really doubt you’d get anywhere near original activity/krausen. if that didn’t need a blowoff, this won’t either. But…it never hurts to add one. just make sure it is sanitized inside and out.
cheers
