Wheat Wacker Dandelion Sorghum Pils

Drink one, smash one, save one, go!

I though I'd just need one or two of these today, but watching Dobbs pass away Tenn victory over the Sooners has been enough to drive one to drink.

Only one of these beer is American now.

The storied skunky Dutch brewer Heineken has purchased 50% of @langunitasbeer, plowing deeper into America's taste for highly hopped, rich, cheesy sour flavors first introduced by those college dudes parading around their daylight skunked cases of green "Hinies".  I guess it's safe to say skunk flavors grew on us (the Dutch do), and Tony McGee, who some people are calling the PT Barnum of brewing, has done it again... okay, well, nobody is really calling him that, but I thought it would be funny.


Wheat Wacker
Speaking of skunky flavors, what started with Italian dandelion I grew, a few pounds of malted sorghum and wheat, turned out well and way better beer than I thought it would with this Wheat Wacker Sorghum Dandelion Alt Factor.  It ended up with a very thin Belgium-ish (ie, New Belgium) taste with a dry distinctively aromatic, bitter finish, different from hops, but surprisingly agreeable, like a hand full of other hop alternatives, whether it be Heather, or Pine.  

Most Sorghum beers are promoted as an alternative to the evils of gluten, so wheat is usually not part of the grain bill on these brews.  Not so here-- fusion baby-- it's a little like ketchup and mustard on your hot dog, which I know is a sin in parts of Chicago, but a little patience and understanding go a long way... remember those those great Cuban-Chinese restaurants that used to be all over NYC?  

I hopped the beer with fresh dandelion flowers late in the boil, the way I've done Heather in the past to give it an Alt aroma and it worked well.  It ended with big frothy bubbles, that didn't last long.

This batch turned out great, which is to say, worth repeating. 

I drank that bomber in two sittings and it was better the second day... it also put me in the tank.

The Letter F is for Fall, Football and Fermentation

So as you're there, standing in the grain isle designing a new batch of beer by hunch with just 20 minutes to select and grind up the grains, you realize your hunch is based on a taste for something very bready, all hopped up and maybe with a red tinge, remind me what I'm drinking if the label falls off one later on.   

So here is my list of starters:

 

  
In addition, I know I'm using 5% Rice Hulls to clear it up, and Dex to raise the ethanol. 


I pulled Centennial and Amarillo out of their fridge to make as hoppy as need be. Nevertheless, even though I literally had the brewing software opened (BeerSmith), and the pot on the stove, I backed it down.  Didn't feel right.  I'm still not so sure, or ready to cook it all up, so needs more time to search, research, incubate and scheme.  

But soon... soon.

And recently had this Smuttynose at a Lobster Bash in upstate NY, and it was as inspirational as it was, well, frankly..  debilitating... yes, it required walking around town for a hour or two before lighting out. You can find the skinny on Homunuculus here.  It's a very hoppy, Belgian style monster that rocks out at 9.48% ABV, which will may just have you circling the parking lot too.  To hop it up, they use Bravo, Sterling, and Calypso, which sounds a little like directions from air traffic control, to be sure.

I also picked up this blast from the past months ago, and finally got around to it.  All it needed were a set of Lawn Jarts and 30 M-80s, just like 4th of July, circa 1979.