I took a little bit of a break from homebrewing, but I am happy to say I finally jumped back on the wagon. I did brew two batches of beer at Hopster’s relatively recently, but it’s been over a year since I brewed beer at home. The major reason for the break was that my wife was pregnant, and then we had our baby. We were busy and with her not drinking at all I cut back on my beer consumption a bit. Even under normal circumstances it takes me a while to go through two cases of homebrewed beer, especially with all the commercial beers I drink for reviews and other blog related activities. A style of beer I have really enjoyed recently are well-hopped saisons, I love the interplay of expressive Belgian yeast with the citrus and tropical fruit flavors of new world hops. I am hoping to brew a few different hoppy saisons over the next year or so, keeping the malts and yeast the same but late/dry hopping with a different variety each time. My first attempt at this recipe was a Mosaic Saison, I love the light fruity notes of Mosaic hops and thought it would be a good place to start. On a side note, I purchased my ingredients at Boston Homebrew Supply, the relatively new homebrewing store on Beacon St. in Brookline. I came away very impressed, the place was clean and well stocked and the staff was extremely helpful and interested in chatting with me about my vision for the beer. I would definitely recommend checking them out! Without further ado, here is my recipe (5 gallon batch, 3.5 gallon boil for 60 minutes):
Malts: 1 lb. Rye, 1 lb. White Wheat, 2 lbs. Vienna, 1 lb. CaraPils.
Extract: 3.3 lbs Pilsen Light LME, 1 lb. Golden Light DME.
Hops: 1 oz. Columbus (60 min), 1 oz. East Kent Goldings (20 minutes), 1 oz. Mosaic (1 minute), 3 oz. Mosaic (dry hop in the secondary).
Yeast: GigaYeast (GY018) Saison #1
Other: Irish Moss (1 tsp., 15 minutes).
Steep the malts for 30 minutes at 120-150 C, add extract and bring to a boil. Add hops at the times shown. Ferment for 6 days (primary) then 14 days (secondary). Bottled and sampled after ~2 weeks to carbonate with priming sugar.
Hoppy Boston Mosaic Saison pours a clear light orange with a mild white head. The scent is a mixture of fruity and spicy yeast along with some mild tropical fruit from the hops. To be honest it’s not quite as pungent as I hoped for. The yeast leads the flavor, notes of pear, apricot, pepper and clove. The hops come through stronger on the tongue, touches of mango, lemon and passion fruit along with some crisp bitterness. The malt backbone is present but subdued, the yeast really dried the beer out, but you get some bready grin and just a little spicy rye. The finish is crisp with some lingering spice and fruit flavors. I really enjoy drinking this beer, it is light goes down smooth but still flavorful, perfect for the porch in the summer. The only thing that disappoints me is the aroma, I though three ounces of Mosaic hops would give me a big pungent hop kick, but it ended up being pretty mild. Any ideas what might have happened here? Issue with the hops or with my fermenter? I would be happy to hear any suggestions, and I am definitely going to try this beer again with another variety of hops (Citra and Cascade are the top of my list right now). Cheers!
Hoppy Boston 
