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Schwarzbiers are underrated. There aren’t many people that care about them and I’m honestly not sure that most even know they exist. They are delicious. The flavor of a Porter with the body of a Pilsner. Roast, chocolate, and great during the spring and summer months.

Anyway, their obscurity means that almost nobody makes them. There are a couple of places in Atlanta that have Schwarzbiers from time to time (and do a great job -- I’m looking at you Wrecking Bar Brewpub and Halfway Crooks). I like them...a lot, and I want more of them in the world. So I tried to make some Schwarzbier on my own.

To make a long story, this beer style turned out to be tougher than I expected.

As always, here is my recipe

And here are my notes from creating the beer.

My brew day basically went off the rails from the start.

My pre-boil gravity came in way lower than I needed it to be, so I went on a quest through my house for DME to add to the boil and increase my OG to where I wanted it for fermentation (somewhere in the 1.05 - 1.055 range). I found some DME and was excited to get my metrics back into the ranges that I’d planned.

I also timed my hop additions wrong -- all in all not a great brew day, but I was super proud of myself for getting to the correct OG with some on the fly creative problem solving.

Like the Vienna lager, I fermented the wort in the Grainfather at 52 degrees for approximately 2 weeks, increased the temp to 65 degrees for 2 days (my diacetyl rest), and then brought the temp down to 39 degrees (the lowest temp possible) to lager for 4 weeks. And, while my samples on canning day were a little roastier and boozier than I’d hoped, the beer definitely tastes like a solid attempt at a schwarzbier. So I’m happy about that, all things considered.

What was notable about this brew session?
* My pre-boil gravity was a total disaster. First runnings came in where I expected, but I fucked up my sparging (I think I added too much water) and the blend of first runnings with everything else was barely wort.
* I found some extra DME in my kitchen, calculated how much DME I needed to get my OG corrected, and added that much before the boil.
* My late hop addition happened way too late to do anything -- I forgot to add them until well into cooling the wort down.
* Fermentation went awesome -- no crazy off flavors at any point of the process. There was definitely a solid 3 day period where our basement smelled like sulfur.

What pleasantly surprised me?
* I corrected a major mistake mid brew and the beer still turned out good.

Why can’t I officially call this my first good batch of beer?
* ABV is definitely too high -- a little too boozy and you can taste that.

This was a good brew. I feel like I’m really starting to understand how to make beer. Time to try something really hard -- Bohemian Pilsner here I come.