Dear Replicator, Me and my girlfriend visited beautiful Asheville, NC this summer. While I knew that the state wasn’t a good-beer desert, I was surprised to find an excellent selection of small microbreweries producing some outstanding beers. Tops on my list was the selection from Highland Brewing. I thoroughly enjoyed all of their beers (especially the Pale Ale and IPA!), but what thrilled me the most was their Gaelic Ale, with it’s perfect malt-to-bitterness ratio. Said to be an American Ale, it reminded me more of the rare Scottish Light (“60-Schilling”) style -- or perhaps an English Light Mild –- with purely American hops, to further confuse things! Since I don’t plan on being back there for a while, and I doubt that their beers will ever make it this far West, how about a Clone recipe of this most interesting ale? Cheers, Todd Bissell Imperial Beach , CA Todd, I talked to Highland’s head brewer, Tim Keck, about brewing Gaelic, and Tim had lots to say about this beer. Tim says Gaelic is a beer that Highland works hard to achieve a balance between the hops and malt. This gives the beer a complex malt flavor up front, with an appropriate balance of hop bitterness to give you a smooth taste. Here a great example of a wonderfully flavorful beer that does not fit any of the beer style “guidelines”, so it is sometimes hard for the brewery to get recognition in brewing competitions. But this is definitely a tasty beer worthy of homebrewing. I would say this beer is a bit of a crossbreed of Scottish ales and American Amber, with characteristics from Scottish ale like higher original gravities and some of the intense maltiness of Scottish ales, while using the characteristics of the American Amber of a higher hop bittering level than a Scottish ale, and using a yeast variety that ferments to a low ending gravity, which reduces the malt flavor a bit and brings it into balance with the rest of the beer. Highland uses exclusively Briess Malts to make this beer, and US hops and yeast, making this truly and American beer! Tim’s recommendation to homebrewers when making this beer is to be sure to ferment this beer at cooler than normal temperatures (64 degrees) to reduce the estery flavor (fruitiness) in this beer, and to have some fun! You can get more information about the Highland Brewing Company at http://www.highlandbrewing.com or calling them at 828-255-8240. Highland Brewing Company – Gaelic (5 gallon, extract with grains) OG=1.056 FG=1.013 IBU’s = 30-32 Alcohol 5.6% by volume Ingredients 3.3 lbs. Briess Light malt extract syrup 2 lbs. Briess Light dry malt extract 1.5 lbs. Briess Munich malt 10L .5 lb. Briess Crystal 60L malt 1 lb . Briess Crystal 40L malt .25 lb. Briess Extra Special malt 8 AAU Chinook hops (bittering hop) (.75 oz. of 12.0% alpha acid) 2.5 AAU Willamette hops (aroma hop) (.5 oz. of 5.0% alpha acid) 2.9 AAU Cascade hops (aroma hop) (.5 oz. of 5.8% alpha acid) 1 tsp Irish moss for 60 min White Labs WLP001 California Ale yeast or Wyeast 1056 American Ale 0.75 cup of corn sugar for priming. Step by step Steep the crushed crystal malt in 3 gallons of water at 150° for 30 minutes. Remove grains from wort, add malt syrup, dry malt extract and bring to a boil. Add Chinook (bittering) hops, Irish moss and boil for 60 minutes. Add Willamette and Cascade hops at the end of the boil, and let steep for 2 minutes. When done boiling, strain out hops, add wort to 2 gallons cool water in a sanitary fermenter, and top off with cool water to 5.5 gallons. Cool the wort to 80°, heavily aerate the beer and pitch your yeast. Allow the beer to cool over the next few hours to 64°-66°, and hold at these cooler temperatures until the yeast has fermented completely. Bottle your beer, age for 2-3 weeks and Enjoy! All grain option: Replace the light syrup and powder with 6.0 lbs. Briess pale malt, and increase the Munich malt to 2.75 lbs. Mash all your grains at 150° for 60 minutes to achieve high fermentability. Collect enough wort to boil for 90 minutes and have a 5.5-gallon yield. Lower the amount of the Chinook boiling hops to .6 of an ounce to account for higher extraction ratio of a full boil. The remainder of the recipe is the same as the extract. Dear Replicator, Is it possible to obtain the recipe for Millennium Ale from BJs Pizza and Beer in Woodland Hills, CA . They originally brewed this dark and highly alcoholic beer for the New Years 2000 celebration. They brewed it once more in Feb 2000. But not since then. It was a wonderful brew and is the reason I decided to take the homebrewing plunge. If you could get this recipe it would become my home standard. Thanks, Craig Shapland Agoura Hills , CA Craig, Many brewpubs and breweries made “special” high gravity beers for Y2K, and BJ’s Pizza in Woodland Hills chose to make a Belgian Triple style for this event. David Mathis, the Head brewer at BJ’s Woodland Hills, was kind enough to give me the finer details of this beer that they brewed for Y2K. David was responsible for formulating this recipe. For fermentable sugars BJ’s used only one malt, and David suggested that you use a European (preferably Belgian) 2-Row pale malt. They also used Candi Sugar and honey for fermentable sugars. Hop bitterness is kept low for a triple, and David said that they used European Hallertau Hersbrucker to get the hop (bitterness) flavor they were after. They then finished off the beer with 3 spices often used in a variety of Belgian beers for both aroma and flavor. When using spices like this, it is normal to not have any aroma hops, since the spices add lots of great aromas. There is a fairly high alcohol to this beer (9% by volume) but this beer does a nice job of covering up the alcohol flavor. BJ’s conditions this beer for a month and that helps mature the flavors. I would suggest that you be sure to heavily aerate this beer to give the yeast enough oxygen to ferment all of the sugars. This beer should be a great winter beer to have around on a cold night, since it is sure to keep you warm, with only the first swallow! You can get more information about BJ’s Pizza and Breweries at http://www.bjsbrewhouse.com/ or calling them at (818) 340-1748. BJ’s Pizza & Brewery- Millennium Ale (5 gallon, extract with grains) OG=1.090 FG=1.024 IBU’s = 24-26 Alcohol 9.1% by volume Ingredients 7 lbs. Munton’s Light dry malt extract 2 lbs. Honey (orange blossom) 1 lb Light Candi Sugar 8 AAU Hallertau Hersbrucker hops (bittering hop) (2.0 oz. of 4.0% alpha acid) 1 oz. Bitter Orange Peel ( Curacao) 1 oz Ginger Root .5 oz. Coriander Seed (crushed) 1 tsp Irish Moss for 60 min White Labs WLP500 Trappist Ale yeast or Wyeast 3787 Trappist Ale 0.75 cup of corn sugar for priming. Step by step Heat 3 gallons of water to a boil, add malt syrup, honey and candi sugar and bring to a boil. Add (bittering) hops, Irish moss and boil for 60 minutes. Add spice for the last 10 minutes of the boil. When done boiling, add wort to 2 gallons cool water in a sanitary fermenter, and top off with cool water to 5.5 gallons. Cool the wort to 80°, heavily aerate the beer and pitch your yeast. Allow the beer to cool over the next few hours to 68°-70°, and hold at these cooler temperatures until the yeast has fermented completely. Bottle your beer, age for 4 weeks and Enjoy! All grain option: Replace the light powder with 11.75 lbs. Belgian pale malt. Mash your grain at 154° for 60 minutes. Collect enough wort to boil for 90 minutes and have a 5.5-gallon yield. Remember to account for the 2 lbs. of honey in liquid form. Lower the amount of the boiling hops to 1.75 oz. to account for higher extraction ratio of a full boil. The remainder of the recipe is the same as the extract.
