Update on the Sessionfest

Clean beer, dirty glass. 

So, this beer didn't turn out too bad.  This was meant to be an Oktoberfest but, due to a failure to properly measure volumes, I ended up brewing approximately 8 gallons of beer with ingredients meant for 5 gallons.  As a result, I ended up with a 3.5% festbier, a session-strength marzen if you will.

It's actually not that bad.  In fact, it's excellent and I'd be thrilled to have brewed it if this was the style I was aiming for.  It's also an amazing proof of concept beer, as it's the first lager I've ever made, and I did it using somewhat quick-production techniques, and using a dry yeast (34/70, the Weihenstephan lager strain).

One thing I'd like this blog to be is a tasting/brewing log.  I've got a fair number of notes in Beersmith and one or two composition books (including one with notes back to 2004!), but I'd like to do a better job of tracking my beer or my brewing over time.

It turned out pretty amazing for something I wasn't trying to brew.

Appearance - Delightfully clear. If it weren't such a deep amber color, it would be pretty easy to read a paper through this (I may need to work on my photography, as that's not showing in the picture here).  Pours with a thick, off-white head that sticks around (at least in a clean glass), and leaves nice lacing down the glass as you drink it.

Aroma - Very clean, lager-like aroma, with a touch of yeasty, maybe apple aroma that may be the slightest touch of acetaldehyde, but it's hard to tell. .

Taste - Again, quite clean, very malty, just bitter enough to balance the malt and with no appreciable hop character (unless you take it into the sun, in which case you get the classic green-bottle, sun-struck taste pretty quickly--not going to lie, I kind of like that flavor when it's fresh and limited). The slight yeasty flavor is at the back, and with the malt gives this just a hint of fresh dough. The munich malt comes through on the aftertaste with flavors like dark toast.

Mouthfeel - Nice and full when properly carbonated. I let it get a bit too spritzy at one point, and it thinned out and became surprisingly tannic and drying, with the hop bitterness coming through more.  It's nicer at a lower carbonation level, when it smooths out and has a surprisingly satisfying mouthfeel.

Notes - Overall, I'm as pleased as I could be for what amounts to a mistake. If I were aiming for a sessionable amber lager, I think there is room for improvement. I purposely left out any flavor or aroma additions when I was aiming for an oktoberfest, but as a sessionfest I think this would be better a bit more bitter and with some subtle noble hop character. I might also focus on getting a bit more dry, perhaps by adding more gypsum (there's a fair amount of calcium chloride in the brewing liquor this time). While I'm thrilled with it as a first attempt, the full mouthfeel (and finishing gravity) for such a small beer, coupled with the yeasty, just-ever-so-slightly apple flavor, makes me think the yeast may have dropped out too early.