Rebel Rising Tasting

Rebel Rising Red

Update: 31-Aug
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This is almost gone, only a pint or two remaining. Over the past two weeks those strong dark flavours have started to mellow, and are now allowing a little of the spicy hop aroma through. It's finished up a wonderful brew, and as usual I'll be very sad to see the end of the keg. The changes I suggested will probably still be implemented next time round, just to compare and contrast, but this was by no means a 'miss'. In fact it's one of the beers I'm proudest of, having come up with the recipe myself.



Original Post
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So we're nearly four weeks in with this beer, and once again I haven't been able to leave it alone. I kegged this about 10 days ago and have been tasting every day since. I always find it fascinating to taste the dramatic flavour changes in my beer as it transitions through the conditioning phase. This one was severely lacking in mouthfeel and maltiness at first, but now has bucketloads of both. It's almost fun to start worrying about what looks like a bad beer, only for it to turn the corner to malty heaven.

My aim with this recipe was to have a go at creating a beer of my own, loosely based on the irish red ale style. I chose some of my favourite malts and hops, my favourite yeast, and put them together with some invert sugar to see what I could come up with. I gave the grist in weight in a previous post, but here it is in percentages:

Simpsons Maris Otter      83.1%
Simpsons Dark Crystal      7.1%
Simpsons Roast Barley      1.7%
Invert No. 2                        8.1%

I wish I had looked at this a bit more carefully before I started! Really I shouldn't have gone past 5% dark crystal. It's a malt I really love but it's flavours are quite intense (rum, raisin etc.), and it takes away from the sessionability of the beer. The invert no.2 is also adding flavours like this, and so some of the malt flavours become overpowering by pint number three.

Pints number one and two, however, are inspiring. This drinks really well, with a full mouthfeel and some interesting yeast derived flavours. The WY1968 has done a fantastic job here, and I will certainly stick with it for future versions. In the end it's the heavy dose of dark crystal which stops your session, which is a shame as making a really sessionable beer was one of the key aspirations for this brew. I'm relatively happy though, for a first go it's really good, and promising.

I think the following would make a good version 2:

Simpsons Maris Otter       84.7%
Simpsons Dark Crystal        3.5%
Simpsons Light Crystal        2.4%
Simpsons Roast Barley        1.2%
Invert No. 2                          8.2%

I have dialed back the roast barley a little. This is a colour consideration. Currently the colour is a deep ruby red, beautiful in it's own way but perhaps a tad darker than I was aiming for. Cutting back a little on the roast barley and dark crystal will cut about 10 EBCs and should result in a nice bright red.

On the hop front, I'm happy with the bitterness level, but I think I could aim a little higher with the aroma level (currently almost non-existent). I may consider trying cube hopping again with this one. Again I'm probably heading out of style, but who cares?

I'll be having another double brew day next Sunday, which will be a "Can you brew it" Fuller's ESB, and a Beamish. I've got a nice washed WY1968 yeastcake from this red ale for the ESB, and a recently procured packet of Pacman yeast for the Beamish.