Dark Honey Pumpkin Cran Apple Cider-Ale with Horseradish Cabbage Kraut

Fermentables.  I make awesome krauts by the gallon, using a wide array of vegetables.  But just recently, I've discovered adding fresh horseradish root puts it to the upper decks.  The stuff is awesome for pork chops, hot dogs, brats, sausages, and any version of BBQ that you'd like to go on about.  It's also perfect for pairings with beer as well as roasted beasts. 

But some beers are even better than others with it, such as this Belgian style concoction I made in the spirit of "Radical Brewing," just before New Year's: "Dark Honey Pumpkin Cran Apple Cider-Ale, with kraut (cabbage with fresh ground horseradish), for which I used dark Malt, Clover honey, Pumpkin mash, and Cran Apple cider.  And of course there were various spices in the mash. 

I've been trying to think of a shorthand name to distinguish the ale, but I'm not repeating the recipe just yet, so there's no rush... maybe Hudson Valley Saison Cider-Ale v.01.

I was going for a French-Belgian ish-esque sour Farmhouse, Saison flavor, and it worked pretty well, if a little sweet for my taste at this point. Perhaps a few more weeks in the growler would have helped bring that sweetness down a bit.  However, when paired with these highly sour krauts I'm kicking out, you've got a no hitter (yes, that's baseball metaphor number 2).  

The Cider-Ale had a thin but sweet finish, after a giant frothy head, and a very mild hoppy aroma.  I can't recall 100% the hops I used, but pretty sure it was the Chinook, which retained nice aroma and flavor in spite of all these errant flavor profiles form various forms of sugar. 

When used to wash down this fermented cabbage-horseradish sauerkraut mixture, this Belgian  Farmhouse on-the-Hudson style Ale is something worth writing home about.... and maybe Indonesia too via Blogger. 

Dark Belgian on Hudson Ale with Hard Heirloom Cider

This dark honey pumpkin cranberry ale was well enough on its own, but why would anyone go ahead and leave well enough alone with that, right?  

I had some Hard cider sitting around, outside in the freeze, that seemed flat, and shocked to death, so I decided to finish this Dark Honey Pumpkin Ale in the spirit of a Lambec, like a Gueuze, or a Kriek, only with Heirloom Cider Apples rather than, high acid, high sugar sour cherries.

In fact, I did end up adding some sour black cherry juice I had sitting around for juicing purposes, so a few bottles will be rather more like Kriek than mere metaphor. 

Well, the Nottingham came back to life when I took it inside, which meant frothy head on the cider, perhaps more than the Ale, which transferred over to the ale when I snapped this photo.  

The Cider thinned the mouth feel of the Ale well enough at 1/4 the jug, and way more at 1/3, so I kept adding ale to bring down that hollow cider taste (and perhaps the headaches it sometimes imparts).  

Right now Notthingham yeast is battling it out in the bottles with the other dry ale yeast I used for the beer.  I'm using PET bottles to avoid any trouble, and a few Champagne bottles with mere caps, hoping the small added honey I put in for carbonation won't make for pop goes the weasel. 

Stuff tastes great, but needs a few taste testers to really say.