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Author Topic: Californian / Japanese Amber Ale  (Read 2308 times)

Offline Greg D

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Californian / Japanese Amber Ale
« on: May 11, 2014, 10:56:19 pm »
My 10th home brew is an attempt to tie the Pacific coasts together as my wife is from Japan and I am from California.  And this isn't a beer recipe "idea", I just installed the blow off hose. 

Recalling the very first craft beer I ever tasted; was a 1984 St Stan's Amber Ale which was actually a red altbeir (1st one brewed in America) with the founder in his back yard in Modesto California off Dale Road and Hiway 99.  The tour of his hop barns is a smell I will never forget.   I've always wanted to replicate that and recently got the original recipe.  Took over 10 years of asking.  They finally gave it up.   This is not quite it, but close.    (It will be my next brew).   

Domo.  Thanks to my wife and relatives showing me the beers of Japan, local craft brews that you could only dream of tasting as they don't export nor even cover the nation itself.   Real Japanese local crafts.   I noticed a very powerful lemon lime perhaps being in trend only hop driven by something I have never smelled / tasted anywhere in the world.   I am talking about a hop that even the most adventurist global taster might have not been exposed to.   That's called the Ace Sorachi hop.  (There are actually 11 hops listed with the Japanese Farm Registry and Rice Sorachi Hop (converted into English as Ace Sorachi) is the only hop ever exported.

http://www.weblio.jp/content/%E3%82%BD%E3%83%A9%E3%83%81%E3%82%A8%E3%83%BC%E3%82%B9

Took 2 gallons of Crystal Geyser spring water bottled at the source in the Ouachita Mountain Range and soaked 1# Crystal grains (from morebeer.com) in my own grain bag up to 170F for about 30 mins.

At boil added 14 oz. Brewvint alcohol booster from Austin Home Brew and 8 pounds of Ultralight Malt Extract from Morebeer.com.   Got the sugars stirred and dissolved without sticking to the bottom and entered in the boil.

Additives;

60 Minutes until burnout: (1) oz. Ace Sorachi hop pellets (Japan) from Morebeer (AHS has been out of them for over 6 months)
10 Minutes until burnout: .5 oz. Ace Sorachi hops
05 Minutes until burnout: .5 oz. Ace Sorachi hops, Whirlfloc moss and AHS Yeast Fuel
01 Minutes until burnout: Wife added 1 oz. Ace Sorachi hops while talking to her Mom in Japan on Mother's Day. 

Dropped it to 70F in a tub with 50#'s of ice.  Then poured it upon two gallons of nearly frozen freezer water (like the White House does).  Pitched the White Labs San Diego Super Yeast as a toast to California, topped up to 5 gallons with more pure spring water. 

Beer is now named.   "Domo Arigato : Dude, Well ain't that a Mother!?" 

OG is 1.072 and tasting the sample;    Yeah.   Hell yeah.  Killer flavor and aroma.   Clean trip from start to finish.  Carbonation will most certainly finish it.   Well and fermentation but that's a given.   :)

Unlike many beer recipes you may read, I actually will follow up on this thread with tasting in about a month.

Greg D
College Station, Texas
Home of Texas A&M University



« Last Edit: May 11, 2014, 11:13:04 pm by Greg D »

Offline bbesser

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Re: Californian / Japanese Amber Ale
« Reply #1 on: May 12, 2014, 10:32:52 am »
Interesting.  I was just in Japan and had a couple Japanese Amber Ales.  There was a distinct and odd flavor in all of them that I could not quite put my finger on (odd in that it was unexpected).  Perhaps now I have my answer.  The Ace Sorachi hop (although Hop Union sells Sorachi Ace as a domestic hop that is a cross between Brewer's Gold, Saazer - OP and Beikei No. 2 male) which has a lemon and dill characteristic that was developed for Supporo.
"He who breaks a thing to find out what it is, has lost the path of wisdom." - Gandalf