Christmas Homebrews from Oregon

Hi homebrewers,

Sorry I have been away in Paris (more on that later) but I am back and lets get to an old Oregon tradition of brewing Christmas beer. Because nothing makes me want to drink 4-8 quality homebrews, than spending the day with my family during Christmas. This year I went with two beers, a spruce porter and a honey ginger orange IPA. Here are the recipes and I will let you know how they turn out. All recipes are for 5 gallons.

The Porter : Which I have named “Beavers beat the Ducks in double overtime spruce porter”

6 pounds dark liquid malt extract

For the steeping grains: 0.5lbs chocolate malt, 1 pound medium crystal malt, and 0.25 pounds black patent.

Hops: 1 oz of nugget for a 75 min boil and 1 oz willamette with 5 minutes left in the boil to finish

I used your run of the mill California yeast

The primary fermentation was for 9 days at 68 degrees and the secondary fermentation was for 3 weeks at 55 degrees. At the start of the secondary fermentation I added 2 oz of dried crushed spruce seeds.

I tasted the beer going into the bottle fermentation and my hopes are high. It was a nice clean classic porter taste, very balanced but not exceptional. The spruce taste was very mild so I am interested to see how that flavor changes in the bottle. I have a feeling I should have added twice as much spruce seed, but time will tell.

The Christmas IPA: no name yet

6 pounds light liquid malt extract and 2 pounds of honey added at the start of the secondary fermination

1 pound of medium crystal malt for the steeping

Hops: 2 oz of centinnial for a 75 min boil and 2 oz of cascade for a 5 min finish.

I used a dry bristish ale yeast

The primary fermintation was 9 days at 68 degrees and the secondary was 3 weeks at 55 degrees. At the start of the secondary fermentation I added 1 oz dried ginger, 2 pounds honey, and 0.5 oz orange extract.

Going into the bottle it was a pretty well balanced classic weaker IPA, which is what I expected. A nice balance between bitterness and malt. The orange aroma was present and it lingers on the palette a bit which I don’t like so much. The ginger is a bit strong, but I feel this will mellow greatly during bottle aging. I think the beer would have a shot at being very good if I have dry hopped with 0.5 oz casades. I think this would take care of the orange flavor lasting too long as I would rather finish with a nice hoppy flavor. So if you try this recipe I would recommend a bit of dry hopping.

But both of these beers should be ready in another 2-3 weeks and I will let you know the final results.