Happy Homebrew Wednesday!! This past Sunday (2/16/14) I brewed up a big Belgian Tripel (OG 1.088), which I’ve named Woman of Valor in honor of my wife. The beer’s name come from a poem that is sang in Jewish homes on Friday night that praises one’s wife for all her good qualities and what she represents to her husband, family and people that she comes in contact with. On brew day I had two friends over who had never brewed before helping me not only with the brewing, but with filming certain steps of the brewing process. In the end it was a learning experience for all of us. As such, I kept this week’s HBW video on the longer side so that you can see how my brewing processes / techniques have evolved and how I adapted them to brewing a Belgian Tripel. Cheers!

Woman of Valor Tripel Recipe

11.5 lbs Belgian Pilsner Malt

2 lbs White Wheat

6 oz Aromatic Malt

2 lbs Candi Sugar (clear)

1 oz Hallertau Mittelfruh (6.30% AA) 17.1 IBUs @ 60 minutes

.75 oz Saaz (4.60% AA) 5.7 IBUs @ 20 minutes

.75 oz Hallertau Mittelfruh (6.30% AA) 4.7 IBUs @ 10 minutes

1 oz Saaz (4.60% AA) 2.5 IBUs @ 5 minutes

Wyeast 3787 Trappist High Gravity – 2 liter starter

Mash @ 152F for 1 hour, vorlauf, then mash out for 10 minutes, vorlauf again and then fly sparge

90 minute boil – pre-boil volume: 7.94 gallons, pre-boil gravity: 1.066

Whirpool for 10 minutes

Target OG: 1.088…I collected between 5.25 and 5.5 gallons in my 6 gallon Better Bottle.

Target FG/ABV: 1.013 (10.1% ABV)

Target Brew House Efficiency: 72% (according to BeerSmith mine was 76%)

Currently fermenting @ 68-70F (STC-1000 controller set to 19.9C/67.82F w/ a 1 degree C differential i.e. it can get up to 20.9C/69.62F)

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Yakima Valley Hops – great prices on domestic and international hops
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