[majorvices]

I don't think the BUs are out of range. Styles too often kill creativity. Books like "BCS" are the harbinger of doom to delicious beers. What fun is it if all your beers taste the same? I just don't get it.

Obviously there are things that DON'T belong in beer (like pumpkin spice ) but brewing is about having fun. Not glamming to styles. IMO.

[dmtaylor]

I don't think the BUs are out of range. Styles too often kill creativity. Books like "BCS" are the harbinger of doom to delicious beers. What fun is it if all your beers taste the same? I just don't get it.

Obviously there are things that DON'T belong in beer (like pumpkin spice ) but brewing is about having fun. Not glamming to styles. IMO.

I heartily agree with all of this.  Always brew the beer you want to drink.  Style naziism can be taken too far.

Also, I trust Tinseth over Rager.  So your recipe is probably in line with a Baltic after all anyway.

[el_capitan]

I don't think the BUs are out of range. Styles too often kill creativity. Books like "BCS" are the harbinger of doom to delicious beers. What fun is it if all your beers taste the same? I just don't get it.

Obviously there are things that DON'T belong in beer (like pumpkin spice ) but brewing is about having fun. Not glamming to styles. IMO.

I have to disagree with you there.  I have brewed about 20 of the BCS recipes and have made some fantastic beers that way.  It's great to have a good starting point to brew any BJCP style with proven recipes.  Once you brew the "standard" of a certain style, then you can start to tweak and change a recipe, or even just make up your own. 

That said, I've been brewing fairly loosely lately, not being too concerned about hitting a certain style.  This weekend I brewed two batches with all homegrown hops, which is kind of a crap shoot.  I think both batches are going to be great.  In fact, one will certainly be the Schiznitte (Sterling, Chinook, Zeus, Willamette). 

[majorvices]

I don't think the BUs are out of range. Styles too often kill creativity. Books like "BCS" are the harbinger of doom to delicious beers. What fun is it if all your beers taste the same? I just don't get it.

Obviously there are things that DON'T belong in beer (like pumpkin spice ) but brewing is about having fun. Not glamming to styles. IMO.

I have to disagree with you there.  I have brewed about 20 of the BCS recipes and have made some fantastic beers that way.  It's great to have a good starting point to brew any BJCP style with proven recipes.  Once you brew the "standard" of a certain style, then you can start to tweak and change a recipe, or even just make up your own. 

That said, I've been brewing fairly loosely lately, not being too concerned about hitting a certain style.  This weekend I brewed two batches with all homegrown hops, which is kind of a crap shoot.  I think both batches are going to be great.  In fact, one will certainly be the Schiznitte (Sterling, Chinook, Zeus, Willamette).

Don't get me wrong there's nothing wrong with brewing to style, I just don't want us to all be brewing the exact same recipes and thinking anything different is "wrong" per se. If you are trying to brew a Helles and you have 20 different types of malts and centennial hops you are certainly doing it wrong. But if your bitterness is on the high range of you RIS that doesn't mean you missed the style completely.

[JJeffers09]

Smells like strong CO2  .  Took a gravity and tasted it.  It's malty, but astringent like dark english tea. Slight coffee, and I get nothing in the way of hops.  Those floaties, the look like seeds, pulled some out with a sanitized spoon and they are hard as rocks, but if you look closely the translucent material? Is that hop material or a formation of some kind?

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[Joe Sr.]

Once you brew the "standard" of a certain style, then you can start to tweak and change a recipe, or even just make up your own. 

Dunno about that.  Brew whatcha like.  Who set's the "standard?"

A solid, proven recipe is a great start.  But there are any number of solid, proven recipes for a given style and you'll find variation among them.

As far as MO for a base malt, in my experience it doesn't come through in a dominant way in a dark beer.  I think it should be fine to use, even if it's not the traditional approach (this is homebrewing, after all).

The only reason I care much about style guidelines is for competition, and that's not so much.

It's also nice to have a touch-stone for other people when they're trying your beer (OK, there's two reasons).

[JJeffers09]

I felt like making as side by side AM/Pro Baltic porter.  Most of my family loves leinenkugels Snowdrift porter and I am on the I bet I can make it better mission.  But now that I am worried about an infection, I'm not sure if I should risk the secondary on vanilla beans or just boil the beans and pitch into the bottling bucket

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[Stevie]

Don't boil the beans. That is a terrible idea.

Are you worried about causing an infection, or worried you already have one? If option one, don't. If option two, what do you have to lose?

[denny]

I felt like making as side by side AM/Pro Baltic porter.  Most of my family loves leini's aged vanilla Baltic porter and I am on the I bet I can make it better mission.  But now that I am worried about an infection, I'm not sure if I should risk the secondary on vanilla beans or just boil the beans and pitch into the bottling bucket

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I have used vanilla beans many times.  You don't want to boil them...seriously.  I always split them lengthwise, scrape out all the gunk and add it and the pods to secondary.  Never a problem.

[JJeffers09]

I am a little worried about the floating material in the fermenter now.  See previous post.  I think it is fine, it doesn't taste or smell funny.  I just have never seen hop material sit on the surface after the krausen fell out like that before.  I am sure it is fine I was just worried to transfer to a secondary vs just bottling right away.  And was thinking about throwing the beans in with the priming sugar in the 3tbsp or so of water then tossing it in and racking on top of it.  Not like a full boil with beans, just treating it like priming sugar.

I am just going to go the secondary route in the bottling bucket as a secondary.  If it gets infected it gets infected.  The ABV is 7.9% as of today.  So I am going to get a new bottling bucket tomorrow, going to split my beans and not use a tincture this time.

[brewinhard]

From your pic, I would say it looks fine.

[JJeffers09]

So it stayed on VB for 48 hrs and it stopped in its tracks at 1.020@8.0%

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[brewinhard]

So it stayed on VB for 48 hrs and it stopped in its tracks at 1.020@8.0%

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Perfect.

[chinaski]

Wait until you (and maybe your friend) taste it, then talk style.  You both may decide that it doesn't matter that it isn't a Baltic porter.

[santoch]

Wait until you (and maybe your friend) taste it, then talk style.  You both may decide that it doesn't matter that it isn't a Baltic porter.

This