Rebate Belgian IPA follow up

Hi all,

Well i've had a bit of a result with this IPA! I have been trying to lower the ABV of my beers to a more suitable level (44 you see). The hoped for goal has been to keep the flavour and mouthfeel high as per a good strong IPA while achieving 'the balance' and not getting that watery background thing.

Here's the visual result.

Nice colour eh? I put that down to the Vienna malt. The mouthfeel side of this beer is a smooth lightly sweet malt profile balanced out by an acceptable bitterness. On the nose i am experiencing a nice typical mainstream Belgian yeast profile, not disimilar to a well cellared draft Stella Artois, tres smooth and Wheat present.The hops are there in a citrus style but not all the way up to Limes in the initial tasting with tropical notes intermingling well with the juicy malt at the end. Basically this is bang on quaffable, flavoursome beer which doesn't nail too hard! I LOVE the Chimay/Duvel split. It must be about gen 10 or 12 now and keeps getting better (or i am understanding it more).

Anyway, that's enough bragging, any brewers out there could do a lot worse than to give my recipe a whirl, no downside to this one! That's not the whole story though...

 I do like to experiment with my beers and as you may remember i brought a couple of kilos of bitter cherries back from Turkey in July with Wild ideas?

WELL Jings, they have worked their magic and i am now the proud owner of 40+ bottles of pink beer!

 

Allowing for the extra few points consumed by the Brett C and a touch of fermentables from the cherries i have named this as Wild Cherry Belgian IPA at 4.8%. I carb'd it slightly higher than its standard sibling and look forward to trying it on my return to Scotland in Oct. :)

Lower ABV massively flavoursome beers seem to be the way forward, who'd a thunk it?

 

 Edit 27/10/2013

Bugger! This is fantastic beer, a touch tart from the Brett but easily balanced by the residual malt sweetness. A proper moreish Belgian delight. Oh aye, and it's Pink! :)