Mash Brewing Belgo

Here at The Crafty Pint, we like a good story, so here's one from Mash's head brewer Charlie Hodgson: "It all started in the brewery one wintry day with the schedule a little quieter than during the madness of beer season. Winter sure has its upsides at times... I had some of our Belgian yeast sitting dry and in need of somewhere warm, worty and sugar-filled to hang out for a couple of weeks until it was required to be pitched again into our Belgian Blonde. We were feeling very much like putting something quite hop driven through the brewhouse when I had a lightbulb moment!! Why not make a Belgo-American IPA?? The initial plan was to use our Pale recipe and pitch it with the Belgian strain but brewers being brewers we couldn't help ourselves and had to start tweaking, first subtle changes to the grist, then thinking maybe we should up the ABV. I guess we probably should lift the bitterness as well if the ABV will be higher and so on until... The Belgo was born!" Subtitled the Tussle in Brussels, it's a battle between classic US hops and the funky Belgian yeast strain he says has a "fruity, floral, orange nose with sweet caramel malt surrendering to a powerful finishing blow from high alpha hops." The End.

Published August 24, 2012 2012-08-24 00:00:00