Ok, so you would have to have seen There Will Be Blood to understand why we called our last homebrew such a mouthful of a name. Well, it really isn't a homebrew, we created it at Barleycorn's Craftbrew On Premises facility. For all you Massachusetts locals, Barleycorn's is in Natick and you really have to make a visit--Dan Eng has a great facility and really knows his stuff. I go with my buddies from work...for those who don't homebrew, it is a great night out and perfect for a birthday or special occasion. You brew the beer there, leave it to ferment, and then come back to bottle it...without having to worry about cleaning up the mess. This is the seventh beer we created at Barleycorn's and they just seem to be getting better and better each time.
Let me explain the name. Daniel Plainview, a cut throat oil man, is the main character in the film and he tells another character that he "drinks his milkshake," that is he steals the oil on his property with a well adjacent to his land. I think the rest of the name is pretty self explanatory.
We wanted to make an imperial porter with oak and vanilla notes. We were inspired by Daryl, one of Dan's assistants, who let us taste his version of a juiced-up porter during our last bottling. I admit we made several shortcuts in creating it, but the end result was really very good. Rather than purchasing an oak barrel, we bought a bag of Jack Daniels Oak BBQ chips (actual JD barrels chopped up into pieces). We took several handfuls of the chips and popped them into a tupperware container and marinated them in about 8 shots of Jack Daniels for about 2 weeks. I shook up the container every night to really get the chips saturated all over. I then purchased a bottle of Trader Joes Pure Bourbon Vanilla Extract and put that in with the JD and the chips for an additional week. We added lots of malt extract and a couple of pounds of pure cane sugar to give the yeast a little extra something to munch on. We added the saturated oak chips during the last couple of weeks of a five week fermentation to let the flavors infuse into the beer.
In the end, we ended up with a yield of twelve 22oz bombers (the name of my fantasy baseball team by the way) at a cost of about $2.90 per bottle. Not bad considering the cost of beer these days and that this one weighed in at a robust 8.0% abv. This beer pours the color of oil with a massive head and has pleasant whiskey, oak, and vanilla notes and a silky smooth mouthfeel. It is excessively drinkable for the alcohol level and works out well as a slow sipper throughout the night.
"I want the beer...I will not backslide."
2 comments:
I give the movie a C- and the beer a B+. Kudos to you and the others for brewing a really good porter. I'm a big fan of porters and enjoyed all 22 ounces of your JDPVPM. If you would have bought the oak barrel, I would have given you an A!
JD
Perhaps there will be an oak barrel in my future. I would opt for one filled with single malt...that would mean I would have to finish that before brewing the beer.
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