December and January brews

posted by Jon

The December brewing will be done on Sunday, December 19. We will be joined by our Hungarian beer club members. As originally planned, we will be brewing a smoked porter.

You may recall the post about the Von Bora Belgian Strong that was done as a side batch. Our January brew will be piggybacked with that side batch. I purchased a special yeast for that batch, White Labs' WLP545. It is a strain of yeast that is only released for a couple of months every year. It is a great yeast for Abbey Ales and Belgian Strong Ales. I am planning on keeping the Von Bora in the primary fermenter until January. Our January brew, a Belgian Blonde Ale, will be pitched directly onto the yeast cake left over from the Von Bora, meaning we don't have to buy any extra yeast and I don't need to do a yeast starter.