Northern Monk Striding Edge

Our Patrons Projects to date have explored working outside of the classic four brewing ingredients, introducing different coffee, fruits and other additions more common to the culinary world, and all have also been very much towards the higher end of the ABV scale. All have tested the team as brewers in their own ways, but in 'Striding Edge' you could say we had our biggest challenge to date. With no fruit additions on the table and without the firm canvas that higher ABV gives, we set about creating a 3.0% ABV session beer with a flavour, intensity and mouthfeel of a drink of much higher strength. Starting with the base, we made sure our water was super soft and well balanced. Enough Sulphates to lift the hops, enough Chloride to smooth out the mouthfeel. For the malt we trialed a new Super Pale variety, making this by far the palest beer we have ever brewed, and made up 1/4 of the grist with Oats for the creamy mouthfeel they contribute. Ensuring the mash temperature was as high as we could go while ensuring some enzyme activity, we filled the wort with complex sugars to ensure a higher finishing gravity and consequently a chunkier body. We then layered in as much hop flavour across 3 dry-hop additions, going with west coast favourites Simcoe, Amarillo and Mosaic for an intense Pine, Grassy and Citrus character, backed up hints of Orange and Mango from a bonus Citra addition.