Collaboration Brew with Blue Suede Brews: Introducing Red Eye Rye

So Sunday was the day that has been postponed, rearranged, cancelled, and finally, well, finalised more times than I can even remember – my brew day with Dean from Mr Foleys in Leeds. Or should I say, Blue Suede Brews.

We decided on the beer months and months ago, a well hopped Red Rye Ale not dissimilar to something like Founders Reds Rye P.A. around the same time in June I wrote this actually: Red Hop Ales the New Black IPA?

The idea behind going for the Rye was to give an added depth of flavour and a biscuity, slightly spicy malt flavour to balance out those big hops.

The recipe was kicked back and forth between me and Dean - essentially an amalgamation of a few different recommendations from brewing buddies, homebrew websites, and some last minute tweaking and tinkering from Dean who ultimately decided on the ratios we used. Oh and we threw in some Galaxy hops at the 11th hour because they smelt so damn good. But that’s what homebrewings all about isn’t it.

The ingredients were as follows:

Malts: Maris otter, Crystal, Cara Red, Rye

Bittering Hops: Riwaka

Aroma Hops: Amarillo and Galaxy

Dry Hopping Hops: Amarillo

Yeast: US 05

It came out a really nice deep, medium dark red/amber, but that could all change with fermentation, and secondary fermentation in the bottle. What looks dark now may well drop out to be a much more crystal red, only time will tell.

Once I know, you’ll know.


p.s. Here's a sneak peak of the spiral label artwork I designed for the beer, tested on an empty bottle, it's called Red Eye Rye....



4 comments:

  1. ? You used Riwaka as bittering hop?

    Dominic, Thornbridge

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  2. It's not a hop I've used, but most of what I have read about Riwaka (and it all seems to be good), is that it might be best employed quite late in the copper.

    But hell, a few years back we didn't have black IPA's either, so unless people try something different, who knows?

    Make sure you give us an update.

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  3. Looks mighty fine to me. I haven't used Riwaka before so hopefully I'll be able to swap a brew with you so I get a chance to see how it works as a single hop. Love the dry hopping... you cannee beat Amarillo. (P.s. please stop with the amazing labels, I can't compete).

    ReplyDelete
  4. I've heard good things about Riwaka as a dual purpose hop but the main reason we used the hops this way round was because the amarillo and galaxy were super fresh.

    Hopefully it'll turn out well, but we'll have to wait and see!

    Dom - do you not rate Riwaka?

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