New Braunfels Brewing to release 3 new funky beers

The second release of their barrel-aged Blondine refermented with local prickly pear fruit is ready to share with you. 

To create Saison de Figure de Barbarie New Braunfels hand-picked 530lbs of cactus fruit from a ranch near St. Hedwig, TX. It was hot, they got thorns everywhere and it took hours. But New Braunfels feels the effort was worth the final beer. After a couple of shifts over a few days they had harvested enough fruit for this year’s release.New Braunfels hand cut the fruit into halves before racking barrel-aged Blondine over them and macerating for a week. They left the skins on to enhance the minerality both in the aroma and flavor. They then pulled the beer off the fruit and refilled for a second, smaller ‘press’. This second beer spent an additional week breaking down the fruit and extracting the deep, electric purple color. This method of multiple presses produces two distinctly different beers, one highlighting the rich fruit and the other the tannins from the skins and seeds. New Braunfels does this with most of the beers in the Saison de series, sometimes doing as many as four presses. Both presses were blended together in one of their new 300 gallon flex tanks and given a few weeks to mature. These tanks are specifically designed to breathe at the same rate as a barrel so maturation continues as the two beers become one. 

On the morning of packaging, New Braunfels added simple sugar directly to the tank, instead of unfermented wort. The reason was that they chose not to dilute the color and minerality of the beer as it was in the tank. This is a bold, unique beer that highlights a fruit few people have much experience with. As always, New Braunfels’ goal is to take your senses on a journey, and they feel confident that with this beer they’ve done that. 

For Blend2, New Braunfels released 744 500ml bottles and 18 slim kegs.

 

New Braunfels’ eleventh release of their barrel-aged black wheat beer, Cosmic Dancer, aged with 100% TX grown red wine lees is ready to share with you.  

 

Sangre de Shiva was the first wine barrel product New Braunfels ever produced. At the time the few breweries utilizing wine barrels rarely mentioned the grape used much less the release year, winery and/or vineyard. As brewers with a passion for wine and the story it tells, they felt that the history of the wine, as well as the quality, would have important effects on the beer it came in contact with. So back in 2013 New Braunfels picked up a couple of barrels that previously held Enchante from William Chris Vineyards and in August of 2014, Blend1 was released.

 

For Blend 11, New Braunfels selected 2 barrels of aged dark sour beer and added 15 gallons of thick, dark purple wine lees directly to the barrels. After a few months of contact they blended them with two additional barrels in their fermenter with an additional 15 gallons of lees. The lees were a blend of 5 different grapes, all from William Chris Vineyards wines bottled earlier this year, and all from TX grown fruit. Tanat and Tempranillo are the star players of this blend and the richness and expressive aroma are obviously lended from them. 

The morning of bottling New Braunfels added fresh, unfermented Cosmic Dancer wort directly to the tank and recirculated to blend completely. 480 750ml bottles, 16 1/6BBL kegs and 3 half barrels were racked out and allowed to carbonate in the final serving vessel.

 

The bold flavors of this beer will continue to evolve in the bottle and keg for years to come. New Braunfels will be holding a few cases in their cellar for a few years and they recommend you drink one now and lay one down for later also. 

New Braunfels’ second release of their cuvee of barrel-aged Blondine is ready to share with you.  

 

The base beer for this project is Blondine, New Braunfels’ 85% white wheat mixed culture beer that they produce in their solar method. With a light body and a clean finish, the beer allows the local yeast and bacteria of their house culture to take a dominant flavor position. 

 

Heavenescent is a momentary picture of New Braunfels’ barrel-aging process. They selected 20 barrels for this year’s blend, utilizing Blondine of different ages and flavors. Some of the barrels had previously held red wine lees, some white wine, some were 15 gallon size and each was different in its own unique way. 

 

For Heavenscent their final goal is a beer of complexity, a beautiful mix of yeasty esters and flavors, bacterial acidity and a hint of oak. Because of the dynamism of each barrel, New Braunfels tasted each and experimented with different blends to reach the final percentages that made up this year’s release.  

 

The morning of bottling they added fresh, unfermented Blondine wort directly to the tank and recirculated to blend completely. Only 700 750ml bottles, 20 1/6BBL kegs and 7 half barrels were racked out and allowed to carbonate in the final serving vessel. If you’re a fan of math you’ll notice that there was quite a bit left over. New Braunfels used all of the blend leftover on this year’s Saison de Roncier by refermenting it with raspberries and blackberries. Look for that beer closer to the New Year.