Druvenbier recommendations

[billvon]

We recently bought a house and inherited a fair number of grapevines, both Merlot and Cabernet. (I can't tell them apart; they all look like little red grapes to me.) I figure this is a good opportunity to try a druivenbier.

Things I've heard about this style mainly from searching here:

- Dry ale yeast works to let the grape flavors come through.

- Belgian yeasts give you pretty good results (not many details on that)

- Red wine yeast can also work

- Grapes tend to dry out the beer, so go a little heavier on crystal malt and/or keep mash temps higher to keep it from getting too dry.

With that in mind I put this recipe together:

Type: All Grain
Date: 7/19/2011

Batch Size: 5.00 gal
Boil Size: 5.72 gal
Boil Time: 60 min

Ingredients

3.00 lb Red Grapes (3.0 SRM) Adjunct 31.58 %
3.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) Bel (3.0 SRM) Grain 31.58 %
2.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 26.32 %
1.00 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 10.53 %
0.50 oz Northern Brewer [8.50 %] (60 min) Hops 17.5 IBU
1.00 oz Goldings, East Kent [5.00 %] (5 min) Hops 4.1 IBU

Safale S-04 yeast

Est Original Gravity: 1.055 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.014 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 5.32 %
Bitterness: 21.6 IBU
Est Color: 17.3 SRM


Total Grain Weight: 6.50 lb


Mash
9.75 qt of water at 159.5 F
Step temp 150.0 F 60 minutes

========================================

So a few questions:

Anyone have a good reference beer they can recommend as a target? Chateau Jihau seems close but has a lot of complexity (crysanthemums, etc) that this won't have. Allagash Victor?

Any comments on that recipe? Is that amount of crystal appropriate? It's actually dialed back a bit from the recipe I originally saw.

I've heard rumors that WLP565 (Belgian) yeast is actually a red wine strain, which is why it needs high temps to finish. If so, might this be a good option?

 

[Oldsock]

More crystal malt than pale doesn't seem like a good idea to me. The simple sugars in the grapes will dry out the beer, but I'm not sure caramel flavors are a great match. I’d go with a high mash temp (~158 F) and a pound or less of crystal. The only grape beers I've ever brewed/enjoyed were pretty dry sour beers with wine grapes added to secondary (Cantillon, Russian River, Captain Lawrence, and Drie Fonteinen all do great sour beers with grapes). You could go with a clean beer, I just haven’t had one that I loved (although I heard great things about Lost Abbey’s Angel’s Share on Cab Franc).

If you want to really taste the grapes you might step it up to ~5 lbs. 1 lb/gal has worked well for me with frozen Cabernet Sauvignon grapes.

I had good luck with the red wine yeast BM45 as the primary strain for a, still aging, Flemish Red. It added a big mouthfeel (which would help your dryness problem) and some nice berry aromatics that will help the grape perception.

Hope that helps, good luck.

 

[billvon]

Thanks for the advice. Will probably dial back the crystal and go for a lighter base beer and up to 1 lb/gal.

I tried Allagash Victor last night and realized I didn't care for it much; there's just not much there, and interestingly it's not dry enough for my taste. So at least I have an example of what I don't want to try for.