WFR's adventures in AG.

First brew with my new toys (grain mill and a false bottom for my peco boiler).

Aiming for a brew to put away for Xmas 2017* and decided to try a maple bourbon twist on gh vanilla bourbon stout and used up some pacific gem hops I got half price from my lhbs. Fermented with my go to yeast - US-05.

*going to bottle a dozen 330ml bottles for a monthly tester.

Brewed this a little long at just over 24 litres (as I did when using this as a base for a coffee stout) and added 500ml of Clarks maple syrup when I transferred to the fv and will prime with another 180ml and add the suggested 400ml of bourbon at bottling.

Crushed the specialty malt with my eBay corona type mill. As mentioned in the mill setting thread I had popped the ball bearing, fully tightened the side wing nuts and then tightened to credit card thickness. I collected an initial tub to compare the crush with the pre crushed base malt and was very happy with the crush. Ground by hand scooping two 500ml jugs worth of grain (to fill the hopper) at a time. 2kg of grain took about 15-20mins to grind, which I did while sanitising the rest of my brewing kit.

The false bottom from geterbrewed fitted tightly, disturbed slightly by the wort cooler and slowed the transfer slightly once the hops and other debris was visible. But very happy with it for just a tenner. Not sure if it was the false bottom affecting it or not but the boil above the element was quiet violent and "splashy".

Pretty straight forward brew day. Biggest clanger was forgetting to adjust for the greater AA of the substituted hops....

Top of replacement fv (also from geterbrewed) was domed this morning but no bubbles in the airlock.

Rebrewed my simple ipa yesterday.

Trying to be more accurate in how much water I added, as I have been over sparging and getting more beer but a lower gravity, and once I've used the last of the crushed grain I have I want to see how much of a bump I get from crushing my own.

BIAB

5kg pale malt
193g porridge oats
150g light crystal

60mins mash at 64°c in 26.5 litres (in the end)

20min dunk sparge in 7litres at 72°c (meant to be higher but normally add another 3-5 litres from the kettle during the mash)

20g millennium FWH (added at 95°c - in a why not moment, hopping to add a touch more bitterness)
15g of summit and cascade at 10mins
15g of summit and cascade at 5mins
20g of summit and cascade at 0mins

1tsp Irish moss

Fermenting with reclaimed us-05 at 20°c

3 day dry hop with 50g of summit and cascade.

Domed top on the fv (replaced at xmas and doesn't seem to bubble :-( ) this morning.

False bottom ended up at an angle but worked OK. Really liked the colour in the clear wort.

23litres at 1.048 so 68% efficiency.