Cabernet Franc barrel Flanders Red

Even though our lambic from last year is nowhere near finished, we had so much fun brewing a barrel's-worth of beer last winter that we decided to fill another barrel this year. After tossing around some ideas, we settled on a Flanders red.

My first experience tasting a Flanders red was a disaster called Duchesse de Bourgogne. Man, that beer sucks. Between the intense salad-dressing balsamic vinegar aroma and the sickening saccharine-sweet finish, I was convinced I'd never have another Flanders red again. But after trying some of the different Rodenbach blends, and more importantly, Cuvee des Jacobins, I realized that not all Flanders reds were sweetened vinegar-bombs, and had huge complexity: malty, funky, dry, and sour. A red-wine barrel seemed like it would complement this style nicely so we acquired a used Cabernet Franc barrel for this brew.

Compared to a lambic, which typically involves a turbid mash, spontaneous fermentation, and a multi-year residence in a barrel, brewing a Flanders red should be a cakewalk. Typically, Flanders reds are brewed with mostly-malt grain bills (some recipes include flaked corn or wheat), with a standard single-infusion mash, and a controlled inoculation of microbes. Unlike a lambic, which derives most of its acidity from Pediococcus, Flanders reds get theirs from mainly Lactobacillus. Thankfully, Wyeast offers their Roeslare blend year-round now, which is supposedly an approximation of the blend that Rodenbach uses, and it seems that homebrewers have good results using this blend.

We used a pretty complex grain bill, kind of a hybrid between the recipe in Brewing Classic Styles and the one over on Mad Fermentationist. Ten gallons were brewed ahead of time to build up yeast and microbe numbers. Overall we wound up with about 58 gallons of 1.060 wort - a little high for the style, but whatever. This thing will probably be sitting in oak for 2 years before bottling, so a little extra gravity will probably be a good thing.

Flanders red v1

60 gallon batch (brewed 10 gallons or so at a time)

brewed 1/1/2011

34.4 lbs Munich malt (Weyermann type I)

34.4 lbs French pilsner malt (Malteries Soufflet)

34.4 lbs Vienna malt (Weyermann)

4.7 lbs Aromatic

4.7 lbs Caramunich (56 L)

4.7 lbs Wheat malt

4.7 lbs Special B

9.5 oz EKG @ 60 minutes

cast out ~56 gal @ 1.060 (approx 76% brewhouse efficiency)

Barrel full of wort, chugging away!

UPDATE:

- Bottling and first tasting (12/28/2011, 12 months old)