Posts Tagged ‘garage brewer’
AG#128 – Belgian Hop Burst
Posted on: September 21, 2014
Belgian Hop Burst – I wasn’t going to brew today I was going to trim the hedges, I decided to skim the yeast from the Belgian Extra Blonde in the fermenter so I could experiment more with WLP575. The yeast had thrown off a lot of sulphur while fermenting I’d guess for one of two reasons; 1/ its just a yeast that does that sort of thing, 2/ the liquor treatment I used had too much in the way of sulphates in it so it made the yeast express this with co2 as it fermented. The FV had been left on the garage floor and the thermometer strip on the side said it was at a pretty steady 22c, if that thermometer was actually a bit wrong the beer could have fermented too cool and the lack of vigorous fermentation may have stopped enough of the sulphurous odors from gassing off, though its not like I’m saying the yeast didn’t ferment vigorously as it went off like a rocket spewing out all over the garage floor 🙂
So yeah, the hedges are still in need of trimming but I have made wort! I am aiming for a fruity, malty & sweet sort of beer, this recipes lack of sugar will hopefully be compensated for by the lower mash temp than that of AG#127… we shall see.
The yeast flavour is actually quite clean so the double edged sword of a warmer more controlled ferment coupled with no added sulphates, just a simple Tsp of CaCl, will hopefully bring out more of a Belgian character and gas-off any volatile sulphur compounds.
Recipe Specs
Batch Size (L): 20.0
Total Grain (kg): 4.166
Total Hops (g): 90.00
Original Gravity (OG): 1.048 (°P): 11.9
Final Gravity (FG): 1.010 (°P): 2.6
Alcohol by Volume (ABV): 5.03 %
Colour (SRM): 11.3 (EBC): 22.3
Bitterness (IBU): 27.2 (Rager)
Brewhouse Efficiency (%): 75
Boil Time (Minutes): 60
Malts:
3.334 kg Pale Malt (80%)
0.208 kg CaraGold (5%)
0.208 kg Dark Crystal 340 ebc (5%)
0.208 kg Munich I (5%)
0.208 kg Vienna (5%)
Single step Infusion at 65°C for 60 Minutes.
Hops:
2.0 g Willamette Leaf (6.4% Alpha) @ 60 Minutes (First Wort) (0.1 g/L)
44.0 g Ahtanum Leaf (4.5% Alpha) @ 0 Minutes (Flameout Stand) (2.2 g/L) (Software calculated as 5min boil)
44.0 g Columbus Leaf (16.5% Alpha) @ 0 Minutes (Flameout Stand) (2.2 g/L) (Software calculated as 5min boil)
My yeast was raring to do with just a little wort added to it at the start of transfer so I’ll probably end up making a yeasty mess of the fermentation fridge… which is set to 24c
Malts and Calcium Chloride:
A massive 2g of First Wort Hops!
Liquored back to 1048:
*22 Sep ’14 – Gravity at 1014.5 thats fair ripped through the fermentation since pitching yesterday and no sulphurous odors and flavour is still quite clean, hop flavours tasting good.
*Bottled 4th Oct ’14 – with 70g of sugar in just short of 20L, tastes good, has more character with the warmer ferment, could use a touch more Dark Crystal to boost the colour a bit and hit a deeper red.
*15th Oct ’14 – This is tasting rather good, it has a nice slick mouth coating body, I could go a touch heavier on the hops but otherwise has good depth.
AG#127 – Belgian Extra Blonde
Posted on: September 14, 2014
Belgian Extra Blonde – A mix of Pale (didn’t have any Lager malt), Carapils, Dextrose (partly sugar as I didn’t have enough of either), Oat malt & Wheat malt.
Hops are a tiny amount of Magnum to bitter then a subtle amount of Mittlefruh in the last 5 minutes and about half the coriander you’d expect to add to a Wit.
I’m fermenting with WLP757 which I revived from a 2 year old Whitelabs tube.
The Malts, mashed at 69°c for about 90mins:
The 9g of bittering hops!
The Coriander:
Second sparge running to copper:
Hit 3 points over my target so liquored back to 1047:
I’m hoping for just a hint of coriander and a light coloured, light bodied beer with enough but not overpowering Belgianiness! I’ve used sugars for part of the bill to keep the strength at 5% ish without adding too much colour.
*16th Sep ’14 – Yeast spewing all over the garage floor this morning, the ambient temp is about 19c and the FV is a fairly steady 22c, the WLP575 is smelling quite sulphurous, this could just be the yeast or I could be encouraging the sulphur because of my Sulphate additions (Calcium Sulphate & Magnesium Sulphate) all of which should dissipate as fermentation completes.
*Kegged 20th Sep ’14 – its about time i used my cornies!
*30 Sep ’14 – taster from keg, quite a soft carbonation, has Duvel-like properties some of the Sulphur is going but some of it could be the Coriander thats confusing me. I let the keg for 24 hours at 20psi and 24 hours at 30psi then left it until now, Ive put 30psi on it again and will test it again tomorrow.
AG#126 – IPA
Posted on: September 7, 2014
Just two brewday snaps and a hop growing update really…
Going for 1057 to finish at 1014, mashed at 68c for 60mins, sparged at 78c, boiled for 60mins, fermenting with 2 packs of Safale us-05 to get an ABV of 5.6%, will be heavily dry hopping with a blend of three hops.
Malts & Salts:
Tiny amount of FWH:
The rest of the Hops were going in at 5mins before the end.
And the hops outside:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pdtnc/sets/72157647318338112/
*Bottled 17th Sep ’14
AG#125 – 2013 Homegrown Hops
Posted on: August 24, 2014
2013 Homegrown Hops – A British hopped pale ale, Yorkshire Homegrown hops from last years crop, I used the alpha acids that were last used in BeerEngine for the calculations but who knows what the bitterness will be like.
Fermentables:
Pale Malt – 89%
Carapils (Weyermann) – 11%
Hops:
Challenger – 60 mins – 9g
Fuggle – 60 mins – 9g
Challenger – 5 mins – 145g
Fuggle – 5 mins – 120g
Dry Hops:
Whitbread Golding 200g for 2-4 days
Final Volume: 25 Litres
Original Gravity: 1.053
Final Gravity: 1.013
Alcohol Content: 5.1% ABV
Mash Efficiency: 75 %
Bitterness: 42 EBU
Colour: 9 EBC
Mash: 60mins @ 69°c
Yeast: Safale us-05
Malts n Salts:
Lots of Hops:
First sparge wort going onto the FWH:
Quite a Hop charge at 5mins left to boil:
I’d liquored back with 2L during the boil as my volume in the copper was looking low, this later meant that I actually missed hitting my target OG of 1053 and got 1051. Weirdly the wort smells as if its been Wet-hopped even after drying and vac-packing my homegrown hops last September and kept in the freezer until now.
*28th Aug ’14 – Gravity at 1013.5 so dry hopped with 200g homegrown WGV, the beer was tasting good as it was so this may have been a mistake! Stirring them in has probably just oxidized the beer!
*Bottled 6th Sep ’14 – with 66g of white sugar in just over 20L so the hops and yeast accounted for about 5L of losses! Tasting pretty good, big orangy taste from the dry hops.
AG#124 – Big IPA
Posted on: July 13, 2014
AG#124 – Big IPA – Using BrewMate instead of BeerEngine as it lets me set attenuation so hopefully the beer should turn out about 9.2%, its loosely based around a recipe in the Mitch Steele IPA book.
Recipe Specs
—————-
Batch Size (L): 25.0
Total Grain (kg): 8.230
Total Hops (g): 469.50
Original Gravity (OG): 1.080 (°P): 19.3
Final Gravity (FG): 1.009 (°P): 2.3
Alcohol by Volume (ABV): 9.35 %
Colour (SRM): 6.5 (EBC): 12.7
Bitterness (IBU): 287.5 (Rager)
Brewhouse Efficiency (%): 75
Boil Time (Minutes): 90
Grain Bill
—————-
4.625 kg Pale Ale Malt (56.2%)
1.877 kg Wheat Malt (22.8%)
0.905 kg Dextrose (11%)
0.593 kg Vienna (7.2%)
0.230 kg Caramalt (2.8%)
Hop Bill
—————-
60.0 g Apollo Leaf (19.5% Alpha) @ 90 Minutes (First Wort) (2.4 g/L)
16.8 g Warrior Leaf (18.2% Alpha) @ 90 Minutes (First Wort) (0.7 g/L)
17.7 g Zeus Leaf (16.7% Alpha) @ 90 Minutes (First Wort) (0.7 g/L)
60.0 g Columbus Leaf (16.5% Alpha) @ 45 Minutes (Boil) (2.4 g/L)
45.0 g Amarillo Leaf (8.6% Alpha) @ 0 Minutes (Aroma) (1.8 g/L)
35.0 g Centennial Leaf (9.7% Alpha) @ 0 Minutes (Aroma) (1.4 g/L)
35.0 g Columbus Leaf (14.2% Alpha) @ 0 Minutes (Aroma) (1.4 g/L)
100.0 g Chinook Pellet (11.4% Alpha) @ 0 Days (Dry Hop) (4 g/L)
100.0 g Nelson Sauvin Pellet (11.5% Alpha) @ 0 Days (Dry Hop) (4 g/L)
Misc Bill
—————-
Single step Infusion at 66°C for 60 Minutes.
Fermented at 20°C with Safale US-05
I’ve basically made Hop-Stew 😉 And hit the OG I got 1082 and liquored back to 1080.
A few of the hops in the recipe changed as I went along due to what I found in the hop-freezer, I’ll dry hop in two parts half will go in when FG is reached then half 2 days later when I start chilling the beer so a half warm and half cold dry hop.
*19th Jul ’14 – I dry hopped this with 50g of Chinook & Nelson Sauvin, gravity was at 1011.5 @ 22°c
*22nd Jul ’14 – FG seems to be 1010 and steady, chilled to 17°c and dry hopped with the same T90 hops again.
*24th Jul ’14 – Chilled to 13°c, will chill to 8c before bottling.
*Bottled 2nd Aug ’14
*9th Aug ’14 – Tastes bloody good, the right level of bitterness with a medium carbonation and a good effect from the dry hopping, as you’d expect quite boozy with its 9% abv 🙂
AG#117 – Waimea Amarillo Ahtanum
Posted on: March 22, 2014
- In: Brewing
- 3 Comments
Waimea Amarillo Ahtanum – I’ll think up a better name than this! This is my brew for the bar at Saltaire Brewery / NCB Competition, I’ve gone for Flaked Oats & Barley in there and the water profile is for a Mild to try and keep some good body. I plan to dry hop this brew in the FV and probably a light dry hop in the cask too. Oh, btw… its a ‘Hoppy Blonde’ 😉
Fermentables:
Pale Malt – 71.3%
Munich Malt – 9.6%
Flaked Barley – 6.5%
Caramalt – 4.8%
Carapils (Weyermann) – 4.8%
Flaked Oats – 3.1%
Hops:
Cluster Pellet 7.9 % @ 60 mins – 3g (FWH)
Waimea Pellet 14.9 % @ 15 mins – 22g
Amarillo Whole 10.1 % @ 15 mins – 22g
Ahtanum Pellet 5.2 % @ 15 mins – 16g
Waimea Pellet 14.9 % 0 mins – 40g
Amarillo Whole 10.1 % @ 0 mins – 40g
Ahtanum Pellet 5.2 % @ 0 mins – 20g
Cluster Pellet 7.9 % @ 0 mins – 6g (Just ‘cos 6g isn’t worth keeping)
Final Volume: 25 Litres
Original Gravity: 1.041
Final Gravity: 1.010
Alcohol Content: 4% ABV
Mash Efficiency: 75 %
Bitterness: 29 EBU
Colour: 9 EBC
Yeast: Safale us-05
Mash: 68°c for 90mins
Liquor Treatment: THBF Mild profile
The Malts:
A Massive 3 whole grams of bittering hops:
The Waimea Turd, smelled great and were really sticky:
Running off the mash and heating the copper:
In go the 15min hops:
Flameout hops for a 20minute Copper stand:
Ended up with an OG of 1049 so liquored back to 1041 giving me 26.22L in the FV, using a fair amount of hop pellets in the boil has stopped hop absorption in comparison to whole hops, this should leave plenty of beer to fill a cask and get some bottles 🙂
*26th Mar ’14 – Gravity at 1010.5 so Dry Hopped with Amarillo 32g, Ahtanum 34g & Waimea 39g so round about 4g/litre
*Cask & Bottled 3rd Apr ’14 – Tasting good, decided not to dry hop the cask.
*12th Apr ’14 – This won the show of hands for ‘Best Cask Ale’ at the Northern Craft Brewers Competition at Saltaire Brewery 🙂
*26th Apr ’14 – Having a bottle of this now and its rather blooming good, its quite dry but a lovely flavour, more of a 4% IPA.
AG#116 – Blueberry PA/Saison
Posted on: March 16, 2014
Blueberry PA / Saison – I’ve never used fruit in a beer so the NCB/Saltaire Competition on the 12th April is as good of an excuse as any… (Don’t forget Entries close on the 31st March so get your entry emails into Shane competitions@northerncraftbrewers.co.uk as there is still plenty of time to brew).
I’m going to stew up the Blueberries in a pan to kill any wild yeasts or nasties and add them during fermentation, I’m splitting the wort into two FVs and using good old us-05 in one and Belle Saison yeast in the other, I’ll enter whichever beer turns out the best.
The malts in the recipe are a bit of a mish-mash but the hopping is straight Mosaic, for its Blueberry notes, and I may pellet Dry-Hop one or both of these.
Fermentables:
Pale Malt – 70.3%
Flaked Wheat – 10.6%
Caragold – 7.7%
Wheat Malt – 6.7%
Crystal Rye Malt – 4.6%
Hops:
Mosaic – 11.8 % @ 60 mins – 20g
Mosaic – 11.8 % @ 0 mins – 40g (Flameout steep for 25mins)
Dry Hops & Fruit:
Blueberries – a Punnet or two split between the FVs
Mosaic Pellet – 50g (25g per FV)
Final Volume: 25 Litres
Original Gravity: 1.056
Final Gravity: 1.014
Alcohol Content: 5.4% ABV
Mash Efficiency: 75 %
Bitterness: 21 EBU (I’m keeping the bitterness low to balance any acidity from the fruit and work with the dryness of the Saison yeast)
Colour: 19 EBC
Mash: 90mins @ 66c
Boil: 60mins
The malts all blended together:
Mosaic Hops smelling good:
Flameout hops:
1060.5 going for 1056:
400g per 12.5 litres Frozen Blueberries:
Microwaved and Mushed up (Added 18th Mar ’14):
*20th Mar ’14 – Gravities: Belle Saison at 1011.5 vs US-05 at 1017.5, the Saison is up at a higher temp to the us-05 just a subtle pink hue to the beer from the Blueberries, think I need more!
*22nd Mar ’14 – Dry Hopped with 25g Mosaic per FV:
Just pass me a spoon and some whipped cream 🙂
*Bottled 29th Mar ’14 – Primed with 37g sugar in the PA and 55g in the Saison
AG#114 – Magnam Style
Posted on: February 9, 2014
- In: Brewing
- 2 Comments
Magnum IPA – or ‘Magnam Style’ I’ve been wanting to try this for a while and I got some T90 off the jolly nice @Misterjk from Quantum Brewery, swapped for some homebrew Nice simple Malt bill, the T90’s will be used to dry Hop the FV.
Fermentables:
Pale Malt – 82.5%
Munich Malt – 17.5%
Hops:
Magnum Whole 12.7 % @ 60 mins – 40g (FWH)
Magnum Whole 12.7 % @ 5 mins – 60g (20min Stand)
Dry Hops:
Magnum Pellet 100g when fermentation has finished
Final Volume: 23 Litres
Original Gravity: 1.056
Final Gravity: 1.013
Alcohol Content: 5.6% ABV
Mash Efficiency: 75 %
Bitterness: 65 EBU
Colour: 14 EBC
Mash: 60mins @ 68c
Yeast: Safale us-05
Weighing the malts:
First Runnings:
To be liquored back to 1056:
Not so many pics today, ended up with 1.5 litres more than my target volume 🙂
*13th Feb ’14 – Dry Hopped with 100g Magnum T90 pellets as it was close to final gravity.
*Bottled 24th Feb ’14 – with 122g white sugar, tastes pretty bland with some light grassiness from the dry hop 🙂
*14th Mar ’14 – This is actually not bad, crisp carbonation and smooth bitterness, very easy drinking.
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