Bride Ale
When
people got married in Olde Englande, a special beer would be made by the bride
in preparation for her wedding feast. This beer would be above average when
compared to the typical brews of the day in recognition of the special occasion.
The beer was called 'Bride Ale" and gives us the word 'bridal' as we use
it today. This ale was sold to friends and family to raise money for the wedding.
We will be performing this tradition in our home(with Ryan’s extensive beer knowledge, Brandon’s kit, and Steve’s help) . We are brewing a British Pale Ale, a Framboise (Red Raspberry) and GNU Castle. We've also made some honey mead, which is quite a treat!
Honey mead when store bought is mostly old and stale. Honey mead does age well, after about 1 year of aging in the bottle, it is at it's peak of taste. The good thing about our recipie is that you can drink it as soon as you get it, or let it age to get even better. It is made from pure Texas honey with fresh lemon and nutmug. A truly authentic brew!
Get the ingredients (Ryan and Stephen)
Step 1 - Sterilize Everying! Any stray bacteria can make the beer taste bad!
Step 2 - Heat the water to 150 degrees
Step 3 - Steep the grains in the hot water (like tea!)
Step 4 - Remove grains, boil water, and add malt extract (it's like molasses)
Step 5 - add the hops and boil for an hour
Step 6 - Chill the wort to 80 degrees within 20 mins. This is very tricky since it's 2.5 gallons of boiling sugary liquid, and uses a lot of ice. If you don't do it right, bacteria will get into it and make the beer taste bad.
Step 7 - mix wort and water to equal 5 gallons, then add yeast
Step 8 - Stir cool wort vigorously for a while to get some air in there
Step 9 - ferment in primary fermenter (left) for a week.
Step 10 - Transfer beer to secondary fermenter (pic above, right). The reason for doing this is that it gets all of the dead yeast and old hops out by syphoning, to clarify the beer. In the case above we added rasberries at this stage, causing fermentation to re-start. The thing on the top lets the CO2 gas escape without letting air in. That keeps bacteria and foreign things out the beer so it tastes good!
Step 11 - Transfer from secondary fermenter back to primary fermeter. Add priming sugar to mix, then bottle. This new sugar will ferment in the bottle, causing the beer to be carbonated after aging (about 2-4 weeks).
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