I'm trying to brew my own Norwegian "juleol", or Christmas beer. I'm a frequent homebrewer, not for profit but pure pleasure as a hobby. I have brewed several beers, lagers, and mead as well, so I'm not unskilled, just lacking in juleol resources.
What I'm looking for is advice and tips from anyone who might have tried this before, even if you failed, hindsight can be helpful too.
Advice appreciated.
Chris
Randy Mosher's book "Radical Brewing" has several pages on Christmas Beers and a whole chapter on different spices and ideas for experimentation. I knew I remembered seeing the term "Jul-ol" before, and it was in his book as I thought, but it is only in there as a caption under several labels from different Jul-ol beers (in the section on Chrismas beers). If Jul-ol is a generic reference to spiced Christmas beers, his book might be worth checking out for you. If it is a specific kind of Christmas beer than maybe or maybe not as there is not a recipe specifically listed as Jul-ol. He has a number of Christmas beer recipes though. For what its worth, I would recommend this book in any case and even more so if you have a leaning towards beers with interesting spices or other exotic ingridients.
Thanks!
I'm actually trying to brew my "own" Juleol, but using a traditional base to work from. It will be a Norwegian brew, but I find plenty of brand names and labels, nothing in terms of recipe. I've had to work from the ground up, researching beer spices and herbs from the Viking age. I'm going to attempt to make this a "gruit", rather than use hops. So I've been reading all the toxicology information, trying to make this both traditional as well as safe. Some of the old gruit herbs were potentially dangerous.
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