Using some of this year's hop harvest to try a Belgian pale ale based on the Antwerp Afternoon recipe in Brewing Classic Styles, page 205. We're calling it Pliny Was Not Belgian, Otto! as a riff on Jamie Lee Curtis's late-in-the-movie speech from A Fish Called Wanda.

BeerXML for this recipe, generated by BrewTarget.

Ingredients

  • 11.2 lb. continental Pilsner malt.
  • 12 oz. CaraMunich malt.
  • 4 oz. biscuit malt.
  • 2.75 oz. Teamaker hops, home-grown, at 90 minutes.
  • 0.90 oz. Saaz hops, home-grown, at flame-out.
  • One (125mL) pouch Wyeast 3522 (Belgian Ardennes).
  • 1 crushed Campden tablet.
  • One cup orange-blossom honey from Bennett's Honey Farm, added as priming sugar on 28 Feb 2025.

Procedure

Treated ten gallons of tap water with a Campden tablet, then allowed it to sit for fifteen minutes before dacanting off of the resulting mineral salts at the bottom.

Heated ~7.5 gallons of dechlorinated water in the electric boil kettle, then poured it over the mash bag and grains, bringing the mash temperature to 154℉. Moved the pot out of the way, covered it with a lid, and wrapped the pot in a sleeping bag. Mashed for 90:00, during which time the mash temperature fell to 148℉. Moved the wort to the electric boil kettle.

Boiled for 90 minutes, not starting the count until a full boil had been reached and the hot break had occurred. Added hops at 90 and 0 minutes, sanitizing the immersion chiller by inserting it during the last fifteen minutes of the boil. Moved the wort from the large brew pot into a bucket, filtering it through the large sieve to catch hop trub. Agitated by stirring with the large brewing spoon.

Pitched Wyeast 3522, based on the recommendation of the nice man who runs Beer Meister</cite> in Medina, our only remaining local homebrew store.</p> </div>

Brew day: 3 November 2024
Predicted original gravity: ????
Measured original gravity: 1.038
Estimated IBUs: ????
Predicted final gravity ???
Predicted ABV: 6.6
Bottling day : date
Final gravity: 1.008
Estimated ABV: 4%

Yield:

  • 48 x 12 oz. beer bottoles
  • approx 9 oz. hydrometer tube

Total yield: Approx. 585 fl. oz., or just over 4½ gallons.

Observations

  • 2024-01-01: Racked to new sanitized bucket, adding 1 cup sugar.
  • 2025-02- </ul>