Dun Brat "Leine Lifter"

Some time ago a friend made a comment about Pike's Kilt Lifter being delicious and theoretically doing the job in its name...but having an Irish persona (and brewery), I decided this was inappropriate.  Kilts are only nominally period (pre-1603)...so I decided to make an imperial Irish red and name it leine lifter (leine being the primary garment of 16th century Ireland).

Brett. C "Mild"

Well...I say mild. It is built on the grain bill and meets most of the specifications of one...but my choice of using a brett means it will be a mild in the original sense of the term. And as it ages, it should transform into an old ale, as things should. This recipe was born by my need to use and build up a healthy culture of of Brett C (wyeast) so that I would be able to pitch dregs from the carboy and bottles.

Because I planned on direct pitching, and wanted it to ferment fairly quickly, I decided on a session ale; I also wanted to get a couple of low ABV beers into my pipeline, since I normally tend to brew on the bigger end. So we have an English style session ale, with about 13% crystal malts, and 8% rolled oats to keep that body up (brett doesn't produce glycerol like sacc does, so doesn't contribute to the body of your beer). In order to keep things from drying out too much, I also decided to mash high, at 157*--100% brett ferments don't get the same crazy attenuation as using brett in secondary.

Stirrup Cup Wheat

A while ago, somebody asked for a suggestion for a beer for an English autumn hunt.  Which naturally, got my brain whirring.

The Gaffer's Home brew: a Hobbit Beer

If you haven't figured out by now that I'm a geek, and love fantasy novels, well....you're blind.  I spent quite a while thinking on this recipe, to attempt to get something similar to an ale brewed by the residents of the Shire.  As modified by Frodo and Bilbo's comments in the movie "Have you been getting into the Gaffer's homebrew?"  "Well, yes. But that's not the point.".  Which to me says that the Gaffer's brew is something special--either extra strong, or with extra herbs. 

Kedrigern's Best Brown, rebrew

One of my favourite brews I have made was the Kedrigern's brown--last time, I had a couple of issues...one of which was that it was only a 3 gallon batch, and therefore didn't last long enough.  The post for the original batch can be found here

So, this time I'm fixing that and brewing a full 6 gallons (in two batches, since my setup isn't made for more than 3.5).  I've made a couple of changes to the recipe, the most significant of which is the use of actual liquid yeast for the first time.  Plus, since I will be aging in a 5gal secondary for a few weeks, I plan to take one gallon and put it through a secondary with brettanomyces.

Should be 6.5 gallons in there, bubbling happily

The Highwayman Old (well...) Ale

One of my favourite songs is The Highwayman, a poem written in 1906 by Alfred Noyes, and performed as a song by Loreena McKennitt (Link to youtube of the song). 

For some reason, the song spoke to me, saying it wanted to be made into some kind of beer.  Something traditionally English, common to the inns of the time, BUT with some continental influences--specifically French or Belgian character, since the mental feel I have of the Highwayman stereotype is at both English and French.  While the primary yeast and grain bill (other than the Special B) are English (and I will use something like treacle or apple cider concentrate for bottle carbing), I want plummy red wine and rum flavours in there as well.