A recipe to evaluate the taste of Mandarina Bavaria hops. It’s using a malt bill that has worked for a number of other pale ales with English Ale yeast.
Measure all the malts: Pale ale, Carapils, Vienna and a handful of Extra dark Crystal maltAs always used malt conditioning and rolled with a 1.4mm gapEvery now and then I check that my process is still producing an acceptable mash PH range. I don’t do it every time I brew, only when something changes in the process or when changing the RO water filters for example.Mashing in processEarly mash circulationWithin the firs few minutes of mash circulation temperature stabilised at 65CMash PH is fineMeasuring the hopsEnd of mashing While the malt pipe is draining I start heating up the wort for boiling and add the first dose of hops, this is my FWH methodPre-boil SG 1.044 and post-boil SG a little higher than expected – 1.049After cooling and whirl-pooling the wort gets transferred to the SS Chronical fermenter. With my Spanish tap water I rarely get the temperature below 22C, so I finish cooling in the fermenterUsing a WLP002 yeast harvested from the actively fermenting beer in the other fermenterAfter a couple of minutes crash cooling I get it down to ~18C and it’s at the temperature to be pitched with yeast a and oxygenatedTwo weeks later there’s no more yeast activity and it’s time to keg the beerFinal gravity at kegging time is 1.006, giving a 5.6% beer. Not bad for WLP002!As expected with WLP002 most of the yeast has dropped out of suspension and it’s already fairly clear. Now it’s time to move the keg to the kegerator for conditioning
Results
Tasting notes:
Appearance
Golden-amber. Medium haze. Moderate carbonation.
Nose
Herbal, citrusy sweetness, some pine and maltiness.
Taste
Slight citrus flavour with a sweet malt note and apparent esters.
Mouthfeel
Medium-bodied with a balanced sweetness and bitterness ratio
Summary
As a surprise the WLP002 finished lower than anticipated, but this did not make it dry. It actually ended up fairly balanced. Although it’s a drinkable beer, I don’t feel that the pairing of Mandarina Bavaria and WLP002 work very well. There’s something with the yeast esters that just don’t go together. I might have to try again using a cleaner yeast, perhaps with the WLP001.
