Anyone have a tried-and-true Kolsch recipe? I would really like to get as close to Reissdorf as possible, so any tips or hints about possible clones or recipe ideas would be greatly appreciated.
I came across this recipe from Beer Captured, but I’m a bit skeptical of Beer Captured and I’m curious if anyone has made this before…
http://beer.dahoove.com/index.php?page= ... oove&id=35[quote=“rustyhoover”]Anyone have a tried-and-true Kolsch recipe? I would really like to get as close to Reissdorf as possible, so any tips or hints about possible clones or recipe ideas would be greatly appreciated.
I came across this recipe from Beer Captured, but I’m a bit skeptical
http://beer.dahoove.com/index.php?page= ... oove&id=35[/quote]As well you should be. For whatever reasons American homebrewers always over complicate a Kolsch. I will once again cry into the wilderness and strongly suggest eliminating the Munich malt and doing the same on the wheat or cutting it back some to about half of what is listed. The hop schedule is overly ambitious in both the number of types used and additions. Pilsner malt is your friend here and while I do add about 5% wheat to my Kolsch to help emphasize a tight, bright white head it is not a requirement. Simplify the hops to one variety, two tops, and get rid of the late additions. The 10+ IBUs of that recipe seem way too low. Low 20s is more like it IMO. Correction On second look that recipe does the hops in AAU. Another reason to be skeptical. 10+ AAU is too much. Again I say shoot for low 20s IBUs. What is a requirement is the Kolsch yeast. Kolsch is a very delicate brew and the subtle estery profile of the yeast strain are a big part of what separates this beer from similar styles like a Helles. The link below has what I think is some good information on the style. :cheers:
http://www.germanbeerinstitute.com/K%F6lsch.htmlThanks for the feedback…I am leaning in the direction you’re suggesting. The NB Kolsch kit recipe is pretty much exactly that.
By the way–my LHBS has White Labs yeast, and I guess WLP11 or WLP29 are the most obvious choices. Any advice on one vs. the other? Sounds like 29 is more attenuative compared to 11, so if I use 11, I will definitely nix the munich. Any observations on either yeast are welcome!
The WLP-029 is my choice when using White Labs. It makes a nice Kolsch.
Just back from the LHBS…I ended up with WLP029, 95% MFB Pils, 5% white wheat, Tett and Spalt (final proportions will be a gametime decision).
The only reason I really thougth of WLP011 is that on the web it didn’t look like they carried 029. Thanks for your thoughts :cheers:
Any others are welcome as well!
WLP029 will make a beer that tastes just like Reissdorf. WLP011 doesn’t produce the wine-like flavors of that beer, and is very clean, more like an Alt yeast.
That’s what I like to hear!
OK, this baby has been bubbling like crazy for more than 12 hours now. When I chilled the wort, I was surprised that it dropped down to around 57F or so (ground water getting colder all the time!), so things had to warm up a bit before it took off. Once it got going, though, it warmed up to 68 or so, so I’ve turned the temp on the ferm fridge down to get it into the 65-66 range. Not sure if this is the right temp to give it that slightly fruity/vinous characteristic I want, so any advice would be welcome.
I’m also trying to figure out if I can get by using the Kolsch yeast cake to do a reasonably big (American) porter I’m planning for next week. I figure it won’t be far from what I’d get using 1056, which would be fine by me. Thoughts on this?
I guess the obvious choice for the cake would be an alt, but I have a couple tawny/red beers already on tap and I’d like to get the whole spectrum covered :cheers:
Update: this beer has been in the keg for a while now and is pretty much ready to go.
It came out good, only problem being that I’m fairly sure I taste diacetyl. Anyone ever had this problem with WLP029 fermented in the mid 60’s?
Going to do a blind tasting against Reissdorf, Gaffel, and a couple domestic Koelsches, but if the diacetyl-like flavor doesn’t fade, I don’t think it’s going to fare well. We’ll see…
I’ve never had a Diacetyl problem with this yeast, but I’ve never fermented it at 68°F, either. This is a yeast that risks off-flavors, though, if you don’t allow it to thoroughly finish before chilling it.
You could try warming it up to remove the diacetyl, but the yeast is probably quite dormant by now. Perhaps you should try warming it up and pitching a bit of actively fermenting wort in there to kräusen it.
^Interesting idea…I have a really old pack of US05 that must be marginally viable now, but would probably be fine for the purpose you suggest. I’m going to let it sit a bit longer and try it again before I do anything, but I’ll keep this in mind if it continues to bother me.
Update: One week later and no significant problem after all. I think I can still detect a tiny flavor-component that could be diacetyl, but it’s very slight and it could just be my imagination.
Not sure what happened in the last week, but I detected the buttery flavor just a couple days after gelling on the first couple pulls, so I’m thinking it may have been a transient thing associated with that…
Anyway, I’m really, really pleased with how this came out (color and clarity are great too, just beautiful). Haven’t yet done the comparison tasting, but will do so in the next week.
