The Cuvee

I was at a place in New York called BXL. It's a Belgian restaurant with a great selection of beers, each served in a special glass meant for the particular style. I was alone. I was meeting some friends later, but I didn't want to wait around my hotel room for two hours, so I got there early to eat and try some beer.

First on the list was a beer called Cuvee. It was the restaurant's house beer, made for only this restaurant by Ommegang Brewery in Cooperstown, New York. It was an amber ale made in a style like a Belgian white, meaning they brewed it with orange peel, grains of paradise and coriander. That alone was interesting, but adding to the intriguing nature of this beer was that it was very dry - no sweetness at all and carrying a 6 percent ABV. It was a session beer that packed a punch and had some interesting flavors. I had a few, and then some other stuff, and by the time my friends got there, I was talking loudly. It turns out, this restaurant is the only place in the world to get this beer, and because I don't live in New York, I have decided to try to make it. Amazingly, the waitress didn't know the recipe!

I wrote down the ingredients I could get from the menu and when I got back to Detroit, I e-mailed the brewmaster at Ommegang, Phil Leinhart, and asked him what kind of hops and yeast were in the beer and how to get it as dry as he did. We exchanged a number of e-mails and let me know to try Sterling Golding hops and just get a Wyeast or White Labs Belgian strain as the actual yeast was made by Duvel.

As I only do extract brewing, my plan is to use this recipe I have devised to recreate it. I will use 6 pounds of dry malt light extract and half a pound of crystal malt. Sterling golding for the boil. Will add orange peel, coriander, grains of paradise in the pitch with a White Labs Belgian strain. I will definitely move the beer into a secondary fermenter and possibly a third to clear the beer up. Then I plan on mailing the end result back to Phil.