Thursday, March 15, 2012

Review: Heart Murmur - Ventricle

I honestly am very impressed with this brew. The more I drink it, the more I think it needs to become my house beer. It's simple, light, balanced, and delicious. It's actually quite complex for being only one malt and one hop. I will be posting a second review of "this beer" soon. I brewed 8 gallons of this wort and split it to 2 different Better Bottles and pitched 2 different yeast strains. This beer is all Great Western Pale Malt (3L) to 1.052, mashed for 1 hour @ 147*F. It has a bittering charge of 1oz Magnums for 60 minutes, and an ounce each of EKGs @ 15, 5, and FO (8 gallons). FG was 1.009 for an ABV of 5.7%. This batch was fermented w/ WY 1469 West Yorkshire. During an EKG for my blood pressure spike a few months ago, there was a flutter in the test called a Heart Murmur, which triggered some more tests; seeing as I was using all EKG hops, I decided to run with that as the name. Ventricle comes from the location of the heart, the ventricle is in the lower section of the heart as is West Yorkshire in England when compared to London (London ESB was the yeast for the other half of the beer).


Appearance: Pours a hazy golden-orange with a tight, pure white 1/2 finger head that persists and fades to a thick cap on top. Lacing is thick and sticks nice along the top.


Aroma: Smells of peaches, nectarines, and bananas, floral hops, faint citrus fruits, grassy, white pepper, bread dough, yeast, honey, herbal.


Taste: Taste mirrors the nose, floral hops, fruity, not yet ripe apricots, spicy, grassy hops, bread dough and yeast, floral alcohol, honey.


Mouthfeel: Medium-Light body, light on the tongue but not thin, dry finish, lingering bitterness in the back of the throat. Crisp and refreshing. Carbonation is light.


Overall: Very impressed. Great marriage of malt and hops, complex hop and malt character for a SmAsH brew, yeast creates an amazing fruity bouquet and draws out a depth to the malt, the bitterness is subdued, yet balances well with the dry finish. Very refreshing. The yeast haze is not to style, but I could care less about clarity.

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