Brew day - Dark Island from the Orkney Brewery - with pics

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PD

Landlord.
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New brew started of today, the actual brew day is tomorrow !

Attempting the Marc Olloson's clone of the Orkney Island beer Dark Island, complete with its six different malts,some dark sugar and 2 helpings of a single hop – Challenger.

I started this morning by making up a yeast starter of DME and water for the Edinburgh Scottish Ale Yeast WLP028, this was suggested to me by Greysalchemy as being a suitable yeast for this brew.

I've since started to " warm the pot" , i.e my mash tun, with some hot water, ( not really necessary but its what I do )
I've weighed all the grains out into a bucket, feeling a little like Jamie Oliver cooking a varied menu, the most malts I've used in a brew...I do like my malty beers, and there's a few in this recipe !

Will be doing an overnight mash tonight ready to be off after breakfast. ( HLT switched on before coffee ! )

Will try and take a few pics of the brew as I tend to enjoy other folks brew day stories if they include a few pictures.

I don't know if anyone else has brewed this ale, I'd love to hear if they have, I'm aiming for 23 lts at 5.13% abv.

Report to follow tomorrow.....
 
Due to an unexpected visitor last night I didn't manage to do an overnight mash
Brew got on its way first thing this morning with the HLT switched on to bring the water up to temperature,weather chilly and very foggy.

Grain was added dry to the mash tun and I tried out the under-letting method of adding water this time, seems rather strange after my normal method of adding the grain to the hot water, however it seemed to help somewhat, there were no dough balls formed and strike temperature held up well and I managed to hit it spot on. The 2 large foam circles in their black plastic bag went on top and the tun sealed down for its mash time.
So far no problems...No.2 breakfast now due... :)

Edit :- very small leak on the bottom sight glass fitting, just weeping. Will need a quick tighten later, in the meantime a cloth will do.... ;)
 
Keep the updates coming PD :thumb:

Just wondering, what is your strike temp? The reason I ask is I will be using my thermopot mashtun soon (once converted) and I'm looking for a bit of guidance.
 
For my strike temperature I am guided by what my brewing so9ftwear tells me. In this case it was 76C to get a mash at 67C....However in the past I have failed to hit the mark by the time the water has been transferred to the tun. so I now add 6-8 degrees on to the recommended temps and hit it on the nose.

Brew is almost done, its chilling at the moment.
Points I've noticed...er I got a bit more than I aimed for.... :D
Its no doubt due to having the boil off figure too high, when I first calculated it the ambient air temps were below freezing and I was getting a boil off figure ( evaporation of around 30 % ) !! It worried me. However the weather is a lot milder now and I seem to have got it down to a respectable 10%, as a result I got more wort left in the pot...lol
Softwear to be updated !

My pre boil gravity was 1.032 temp corrected ( target was 1.035 ) so perhaps it might not be as strong as I set out to get.....

we will see.
 
My Dark Island brew worked well, and the beer disappeared far faster than I'd have liked, so must have been good :drink: :drink: :drink:
 
a few pictures of the day...

Obligatory grain shot. 6 different ones in this brew

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and miniscule additions, 2 lots of Challenger and a bit o sugar

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First runnings, nice and dark and a lovely Malty smell

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First load of Challenger take a dive

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This is a shot of the 2 circles of foam I put into the mash tun on top of the water and grains...seems to help

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Because I brew in my garage which is at the front of the house looking out onto a cul de sac road. I have to take security measures Each pot is chained to the metal bench to try and stop the opportunity thief, if I have to run for a pee !

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Oh yes, the sugar going in with 15 mins of the boil remaining, just before the last hops, protflock tablet and then the chiller... busy last few minutes....

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So that was the day Again lessons learned for next time. The evaporation figures will have to be amended in my softwear.
I ended up with 27 litres at 1.048 instead of 23 litres at 1.051 ish...oh dear so sad...never mind

Thanks for reading
 
Thanks PD, can't wait to get mine converted but currently waiting for some tools to come through the post.

Looks like you had a great day :thumb:
 
The chains were a bargain from B&Q 3 seperate vinyl covered chains 1.2 meters long, each with lock and 2 keys ( keys fit all the locks ) for £6 ish
I had been looking at one long chain to lasoo them all together at £20.

We get too many " scrap metal" men patrolling the area !
 
Warning

Oxy clean makes Stainless Steel Pots slippy !

and if you inadvertantly drop a 100 litre pot 9 inches onto concrete, several things happen.....
1 you frighten the garden birds away
2 you give your dog a heart attack
and 3...you put a small dent in the pot rim................... :shock: :shock: :oops:
 
Sorry to hear that!

It makes everything slippery, I have nearly lost a glass bottle or two on numerous occasions due to oxy clean :eek:
 
An update on the White Labs Yeast used.

I usually use sa4 or 5 or Nottingham in my brews and have no complaints whatever about them. However I decided to treat this brew to a Whitelabs liquid yeast...Edinburgh Scottish Ale Yeast WLP028.
First time I've used a liquid yeast as I'm normally a sprinkler of dried yeasts.
So the day before brew day I made up a starter of DME at 1.040 ( 1 litre ) and added the contents of the vial, covered with tin foil the container went into a warm spot for use the following day.
36 hours or so later I came to use it...and...it looked dead, no sign of any activity at all, the yeast has settled to the bottom and there was a litre of clear brown liquid above.
Somewhat concerned I stirred well and added it to the brew. 8 hours later.....nothing... even more concerned I left it over night.

This morning there was signs of activity and a scum forming on the brew ( fermenting at 18C ) Hurrah boys !
By this evening fermentation is well under way, although not as vigorous as Sa4 et al.
It seems to have taken a while to get going so lets see how it pans out.
 
I have had similar experience with whitelabs (albeit WLP001 and no starter) and the beer came out just fine.

On my last brew I dumped all the slurry from a previous brew I had just bottled into it and it took off like a rocket and proceeded to break free from the FV 4 days in a row. That was WLP001 again and the beer tastes great :thumb:
 
These Scottish yeast aren't quick to start, both from Wyeast and Whitelabs. I remember I had to wait almost 48 hrs before they finally took off. But the results was great.
 
Thanks for that, its going well today, pushing up on the lid...
 
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