Bruxelles Sprout: Week 3 conditioning tasting notes

• Appearance: Pours copper with slight reddish hue. Reasonably clear. A 1/2 inch head from a vigorous pour. Head quickly dissipates.
• Aroma: Deep dark fruit on the nose: raisins, dates, fig. Some green sour apple. No apparent hops.
• Flavor: thinner than the nose with a dry, phenolic (i.e., clove) finish
• Mouth: nicely carbonated but could be improved
• Drinkability: low alcohol level (5-6%) and modest flavor make drinking a couple pretty easy

I suspected the "secret" origin of the yeast to be Rochefort's own and a website did confirm as such. (This was facilitated by Nilam and my splitting of a Rochefort 10 on Friday night.) This is an excellent yeast and is really pulling the flavor weight. I'd like to give it more fermentables to work on.

I am enjoying this beer more and more now that it's conditioning into its peak. The apple hint suggests more conditioning time is needed. I hope the flavor improves but I don't expect a dramatic change. On a future iteration, I would like to bridge the gap between the excellent aroma and nice finish. This will probably require retooling the grain bill and raising fermentability.

Bruxelles Sprout results; IPA in primary

Hello Beerworld,

I have been enjoying Bruxelles Sprout for the last 10 days. Some thoughts:

1. Significantly under-carbonated relative to previous brews. I'm looking at my notes and trying to identify the difference. I recall not using cane sugar but instead a more traditional, corn-based priming sugar, though recollection is fuzzy. Also, I did try to dial it down. Finally, where previous brews were bursting by 7 days, this one may well need the full 3 weeks of conditioning. However, carbonation is pretty important with taste so I think it's still a negative.
2. I'm digging the esters/phenols from the abbey yeast.
3. Overall the taste is a little thin. This was by scientific design: I want to learn Belgian yeast and therefore tried to isolate the variable as much as possible. I went for a simple malt profile, relatively low alcohol, and a light hoppiness, that, combined, would let the yeast profile shine. And wow, the yeast is really a beautiful thing. But, I am perhaps enjoying the beer pedagogically.
4. The chill haze is oppressive in this beer. Look at a warm bottle and it's clear as water. Put it in the fridge for half a day and it's fog. Mostly cosmetic and equipment-related but I'd like to fix it eventually.

The next Belgian will be mashed for heavy attenuation. I don't want residual sweetness and the more the yeast gobbles up, the more of those delicious byproducts it will leave in the beer. I may try for more hops next time. I love the Belgian tradition, but damn, it breaks my heart to make a batch on an ounce of low alpha hops.

In the primary: a new IPA with a similar grain bill to P4P and a new hop. Looking forward to it.