I mentioned a dusseldorf alt earlier today. I'm decided that that's what my next beer will be.

This beer will be an almost alt. I'm not going to engage in the traditional conditioning process for the beer. In place of that, I will do an extended room temperature conditioning where the beer will be held between 60 and 70 degrees. I hope to keep it in the cooler range of this range, but we'll see what's really feasible. I'm undecided between using White Labs European Ale yeast and German Ale yeast. Anyway, I'll decide on one soon enough.

The grist will be approximately 5% melanoidin, 10% dark munich, 10% light munich, 74% pilsener malt and 1% caraffe, in quantity for a target gravity of 50. This should produce a complex maltiness that the style requires. To enhance the malt character, I'm going to use a decoction to raise the mash from the sachrification rest to the mash out. The conversion rest will be at 150 degrees. I'm going to remove approximately one gallon of the mash after 20 minutes of this rest. That gallon will be raised to 158 degrees for ten minutes to complete it's conversion and then boiled for 30 minutes, after which time it will be returned to the mash for the mash out.

I'll use traditional spalt hops for bittering, enough to achieve a about 40-45 IBU. That is a substantial level of bitterness, but I believe that the robust malt character of this beer will stand to it well.