Black Sheep Bitter - My 2nd AG

OK, this is the story of my second All-Grain Brew, which I started at 7.40pm last night (Friday) and finished at 2.20am today (Saturday). It’s a Black Sheep clone from Worcester Hop Shop.
Pale Malt (maris Otter) (grams) 3340
Torrefied Wheat (grams) 390
Crystal Malt (grams) 195
Black Malt (grams) 8

Start of Boil
Challenger Hops (grams) 19
Fuggle Hops (grams) 8
Golding Hops (grams) 8

Last Ten Minutes of Boil
Fuggle Hops (grams) 10

1 x Protafloc last 15 mins of Boil
1 pack of S-04

Compared to my first SMaSH, it went smoothly – but I still made some silly mistakes that I kicked myself for. I’d value feedback and comments from more experienced hands.

I borrowed an urn to act as a HLT, treating tap water with Campden. I switched the urn on with 30 litres of water at 7.40pm, and whilst the water heated I got on with sterilizing and cutting up the insulation for my FV Mash Tun.

By 8.20pm the water had reached 72 Celsius, and so I added the recommended 10 litres of hot water, mashed in the grain in the bag and tucked it up for 90 minutes. The initial temperature was 68 Celsius.



At 9.50pm with the HLT at 80 Celsius I unpacked the mash tun (66 Celsius) and using a second FV and a colander began to sparge.




Firstly I slowly poured through the first runnings from the mash back through the grain, then I slowly poured through 20 litres of sparge water. This was a very low-tech thing, just using a jug. After each sparging of 5 litres of water through the grain, I poured the result back through a second time. In total this took 30 minutes. Though this process I began to transfer the wort to the boil pans. By 10.20pm I had 3 pans containing a total of 24 Litres of word, plus another 5 litres if wort in an FV.

It took ages for the pans to come to the boil. I found this irritating. I need to grow up. The two big pans on the larger electric cooker rings were fine, but the small pan on the small cooker ring was a problem. Eventually I gave up on the small pan and added it’s contents to the larger ones after the hot break. The boil began at 10.55pm. I added hops etc to schedule, splitting between the pans according to their volume of wort.


During the 90 minute boil I filled the bath with cold water and at 12.25am I carried the pans upstairs to the bath. The temperature dropped quickly for the first 20 minutes down to around 46 Celsius, and then I changed the water and it dropped further.


Here I made a mistake: I stopped chilling with the wort at 35 Celsius, thinking that I high pour would give sufficient further cooling. I was wrong. The treated water in my urn was still around 40 Celsius, so liquoring back didn’t help either. So, I ended up hanging around for an extra hour from 1 to 2am waiting for the wort to cool.
Well, I cleaned the kitchen…rehydrated the yeast….had a beer…Festival Golden Stag….felt frustrated….
With temperature correction, after making up to 23l, the OG was 1038. The online calculator gives this an efficiency of around 70%
Eventually I pitched at 2.20am, and crawled into bed, to the mockery of SWMBO.

What I learnt:
1. You learn by doing. Its great reading and learning on this forum, the people are great and I have learnt lots. But at the end of the day, it’s the doing that counts.
2. Know your set up.
a. With my cooker, I can only really boil wort on the two big
rings, and then only up to 10 litres in each pan.
b. I had originally planned to mash overnight, but because I
didn’t know the limitations of my insulation, I decided to play it safe
– I will need to experiment more before I trust my set up to go
overnight without losing too much heat.
3. It still feels really dodgy carrying big pans of hot sugary water up the
stairs.
4. I need to plan my brew day better. Next time, I will get the family to
switch on the HLT before I get home from work, so I can get the mash
on c6pm. This will just lead to a better experience.
5. When it gets late, and I are tired, I can try to rush – and in the end this
just makes things take longer.
6. It is still fun, even when things are tricky.

Cheers

Martin

Great report and pics Martin keep us updated how it goes :clap:

Good report and nice work! I'm not into starting late, I find I get tired and start rushing. I don't brew often enough though, cos it's hard to find the time to fit a brew in!

I've just bought a gas burner cos I want to get out of the kitchen, at least when the weather is better, and I can also only get around 10L boiling in a pan too. Not used it yet, but hoping it will be quicker and able to boil more liquid.

I think my main observation, based on my attempts to keep the brew time as quick as possible, would be to do a batch sparge. I'm getting 75-80% efficiency by using around half the water for mashing, and then heating the sparge water while the mash is on and doing a 45 minute mash, stirring well at the end before lifting the bag. I then put the drained grain bag into the sparge water for 10 - 15 mins and stir well before and after the 10-15 mins. I get the first batch of wort on the heat while the batch sparge is taking place. I used very well milled grains - I buy whole, and mill my own, twice. You can get the shop or online grain seller to grind the grain fine, for BIAB.

Sorry but I had to laugh at the finish time :p

Good post :hat:

My observations to save time - I know the recipe might call for it but I'd reduce the mash time down from 90 minutes to an hour.

And - get a chiller, I think mine was about 35 quid and it makes a big difference getting the temperature down to pitching in about half an hour.

And thanks for the recipe. I'm trying to perfect a golden sheep. Did the recipe specify us-04 ? I have some but it doesn't seem right.

Thanks Guys!

I am most blessed in my missus....she has hardly taken the **** out of me at all today!

At present, my entire set up (2xfv, donated insulation, borrowed HLT, borrowed pans, grain bag, spoon, hydrometer) has cost less than 50 GBP....

Twostage - I think a chiller may come next, but I want to make my own! The yeast was part of a bundle that the Worcester Hop Shop offers...I don't know enough yet to make judgements on yeast.

Clibit - Yes, I think a batch sparge may be right for my next...but does this mean no Vorlauf? I'm sure that I've read that running the wort through the grain clarifies the wort? Or does it not make too much difference?

I'm reassured that your maximum stove boil is 10L per pan. I think that my Coleman Dual Fuel Stove knocks out much more power than my electric stove - who knows, I might try that!

Cheers

Martin

MartinHaworth said:

Clibit - Yes, I think a batch sparge may be right for my next...but does this mean no Vorlauf? I'm sure that I've read that running the wort through the grain clarifies the wort? Or does it not make too much difference?Martin

Click to expand...

You could maybe have sealed the FV and pitched the yeast this morning. Not ideal, but a lot of people do no chill, adding the yeast when the temperature drops naturally. It's better to chill quickly though, a chiller is the way to go.

BIAB is a bit of a rougher version of AG brewing, you get more trub into the boiler, and into the FV, but I find it settles out and my beers are pretty clear most of the time. I do use a mashtun too, and re-circulate, but I'm not sure there is much if any difference in the finished beer. I use Irish moss or protofloc, of course. This, and time for settling, and maybe cold crashing, should remove everything that carries over, I think.

So, my old Young's FV would quietly vent CO2 when necessary through pressure on the seal.

My new Wilkinson's FV has a far superior seal, and vents CO2 explosively, giving an amusingly loud bang.

In on her own, SWMBO found such an unexpected loud noise hilarious, and was not at all grumpy with me and 'the bloody homebrew' on my return.

I made this for my second AG brew too! One of my favourite off the shelf beers. I have managed to find the discipline so far not to 'test' a glass, it'll be ready in about 3 weeks or so. When you first try it, let me know what you think. :)

Will do! I'm really pleased with the look of it in the FV already - the fermentation is very vigorous, and a lot of rubbish is already at the bottom.

RedDarren - did you follow the HopSHop instructions and move to a second FV to settle out prior to bottling?

Cheers

Martin

No I didn't mate, mainly because I don't have a secondary FV yet. I left it in the FV for 2 weeks and then straight to the keg with 125g of brewers sugar. It's been in there for a week now. I tasted the sample from the hydrometer tube and was very happy with it.

OK, just checked today and the gravity is showing at 1004. And it is as clear as a bell. And delicious

Fermented out and clear in 10 days (its been really warm, around 20 celsius the whole time).

It's finished lower than I thought, but I guess that's fine.

What pleases me is that there is none of the twang you get with kits.

So...should I go ahead and batch prime/bottle....no, I think I'll check again in 2 days, then bottle.

Piccies below

Thanks

Martin

MartinHaworth said:

OK, just checked today and the gravity is showing at 1004. And it is as clear as a bell. And delicious

Fermented out and clear in 10 days (its been really warm, around 20 celsius the whole time).

It's finished lower than I thought, but I guess that's fine.

What pleases me is that there is none of the twang you get with kits.

So...should I go ahead and batch prime/bottle....no, I think I'll check again in 2 days, then bottle.

Piccies below

Thanks

Martin

Click to expand...

Hi Martin

Your fg is 1004 wow thats low what does it taste like

That is clear as a bell!

Lovely stuff. :thumb:

Ding Dong (think the dulcet tones of Mr Philips here)

Thanks guys,

So I drank 150ml of warm flat beer...and it tastes better than beer usually does at this stage!

Is it just me, but sometimes when I make something myself I can be over critical, you know, what could I have got better? Well, perhaps it tastes a bit thin...but that could change with the mouth feel with carbonation and chill..

Am I right in thinking that going so low with the abv may mean that mash out didn't work properly? Could this lead to a reduction in flavour?

..or am I overthinking it...should I just get on with making drinking and enjoying beer!

Thanks

Martin

I think (and others will correct me if I am wrong) that BIAB methods are less efficient then a mash tun and sparge method but as I am not terribly familiar with BIAB it is only an impression from a variety of online reading. (I use a home made insulated mash tun, or used to and will be again very soon) The Ale does look quite pale to me for something of the Theakstone's /Black Sheep best type. If it is a good beer however and you like the flavour so what. I once made a dark lager from extract leftovers, it cam out about 3% and was delicious and very useful on a hot afternoon in the garden, I could swig a pint and then get on with no real effect. Oh how I hate this phrase "at the end of the day" is it tastes good and you enjoy it then stuff the rest.

A

The low FG suggests that the mash temperature may have been low 60s?

Thanks, I'll watch that next time.

MArtin

clibit said:

The low FG suggests that the mash temperature may have been low 60s?

Click to expand...

Check/calibrate your thermometer with ice & water for the bottom end and boiling water for the top. I've recently discovered mine is 2.5/3 degrees out