BREW DAY - NEVERSINK GOLD (v1.0)

The base recipe for this beer was another SMaSH beer that I had brewed in the past having been interested in trying to brew a simple, easy drinking, ale that I might enable me to convert some domestic beer drinkers into the craft brew ranks.

Much like any SMaSH beer, the recipe was simple: Rahr Premium Pilsner Malt, German Spalt Hop Pellets, WyYeast American Ale 1056, and NYC tap water.

I chose to use American Ale yeast rather than German Kolsch not only for ease and speed of fermentation, but also to see if how clean a profile I could achieve fermenting 1056 at relatively low temperatures (for Chico at least). For hops, I used one lone First Wort addition to try and get a pleasant, rounded hop flavor and sharpness without too much hop aroma.

The resulting beer was light and easy drinking, but definitely lacked some of the malt flavors that I was trying to achieve.

For Neversink Gold, just like the Tall Pines IPA, I wanted to add just a touch of malt flavor (ideally biscuit & honey) without adding any discernable body to the beer. In an attempt to achieve this, I was torn between using Munich and Melanoidin (aka Honey, Brumalt or Super Munich). I had Munich on hand the day of the brew, so my choice was made for me. I also added a small amount of both gypsum & ordinary table salt to the strike water to get my NYC tap water just a touch closer to that of Köln, Germany (the only city that Kölsch beers can technically be made).

Expect a Ver. 1.1 of this beer shortly with Melanoidin substituted for Munich, especially if the small Munich addition doesn’t quite achieve what I want in this beer.

Cheers guys!