First Extract Brew - Way to Amarillo - Timings & Lessons Learned

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Toffee

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(wrote this out a few weeks back but forgot to post)

OK, so I have been brewing now since Oct 2014. With a few kits under my belt, I decided to do my first extract.

As I have learned so much from this site I thought I would share what my brew morning looked like, and the lessons I learned from my first extract brew.

Equipment: Like I said, I already had a few kit brews completed. I bought the Coopers Home Brew kit last year, so had everything to do a kit. The only things I needed ontop were a large saucepan & a sieve.

I bought a 20L stockpot from Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00BIYHI1G/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

Bigger than I needed for this, but figured it might be useful if I go BIAB. I got the largest sieve I could find in Tesco (could do with bigger to be honest). I also bought a second FV to use as a bottling bucket, instead of bottle priming, and used this to store my water.

In the past I had never treated my tap water in any way, so decided to use the second FV to store all water used and to treat with half a campden tablet to remove any chlorine.

I opted for the "Way to Amarillo" extract pack from BrewUK:

http://www.brewuk.co.uk/amarillo-recipe-pack.html

recipe:
http://www.brewuk.co.uk/american-ipa

I mostly followed these instructions, with a couple of minor tweaks that seemed to make sense to me.

ingredients:
50grm Amarillo hops
3 x 1kg light dried malt extract
Safale US-05 Yeast


I drew out a rough schedule for the morning, and I am happy to say my actual timings were fairly close to what I predicted. I started to brew at 9am on Sat:

9:00 prepare! make up fresh starsan solution in 5L water container
wash and sterilize first and second FVs, & 3L jug
fill second FV with 24L of water.
add half a crushed campden tablet to remove chlorine. Use this water from now on.
9:30 bring 6L water to the boil in pan, Leave lid on
Weigh out hops and get everything else ready.
9:50 nearly boiling, add 1KG of DME. Lid off from now on
10:05 Full boil. Add 30g of Amarillo hops

10:45 40 mins into boil add rest of DME and then add 10g hops. Had to turn down heat when adding hops as it started to foam up a bit so watch out for that

11:00 55 mins into boil turn off heat, add 10g hops and allow to steep for 20 mins
11:20 start to cool down, move to sink, keep lid on from now on.

Change water and add ice around pan every 10 mins
Fill primary FV with 8L of de-chorinated water from secondary FV. Add 2L of de-chlorinated water to kettle to boil for temp adjustment later.
11:50 get temp in pot down to around 40c (I think mine was way lower)
Add wort to 8L already in FV. Top up to 21L, straining cold water through hops in sieve. Adjust temperature with hot water from kettle if needed to get final temp around 20c. Aeriate wort well.
12:05 pitch yeast, by sprinking ontop of foam. Stir in (with sanitized spoon!) 30 mins later.


OG was spot on at 1050

Lessons learned:
I cooled hot wort too well! I needed to use the kettle to bring temp up, and even then I pitched at 19c where I was aiming for 20 or 21c.
The rising boil when I added second lot of hops nearly took me by surprise. be ready for that!
My initial estimated timings were pretty good, in fact I finished slightly ahead of schedule.

I bottled this after 2 weeks, batch primed with 90g of sugar, and then last night, after 8 days in the bottle, I had to have a sneaky taste. Beer had cleared well. but not quite enough carbonation. I think it needs more time, plus the room i was using is a little cold. But even so, bloody lovely. really impressed! :cheers:
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Great post, thanks for sharing. A good morning's work and it sounds like it went well.
 
Good work! It's so much more enjoyable to make than watering down a tin, don't you think?

Had two bottles from my WTA stock on Friday. It was the only thing that made Wales losing bearable. I've had about six of them now and every time I bore the missus to tears going on about how nice it is. Even mates were impressed, so much so that demand for it is way outstripping my willingness to supply! It's what's made me think I'll only do extract now.
 
Superb, thanks for that.
I have just bought the same pan and also Way to Amirrillo too, going to have a crack at this either tomorrow night or Wednesday, running up 40 litres of Reverse Osmosis Water as I type then good to go. Really looking forward to this, my first extract brew and trying WTA which seems to get excellent reviews...
 
Good work! It's so much more enjoyable to make than watering down a tin, don't you think?

Had two bottles from my WTA stock on Friday. It was the only thing that made Wales losing bearable.

Don't mention Friday. Still not over it. :cry:

But yeah, much more fulfilling than a kit. That said, I put a Wherry on in the week cause it only takes 20 mins or so to do, and that turned out to be a nice pint when I did it before!
 
I went to the match, but get the feeling I may be the only person here that enjoyed it:mrgreen:
 
I watched the game on TV and really enjoyed it too, apart from the first 5-10 mins. :whistle:

Enjoy the WTA, Toffee, enjoyed reading your account of the brewday, cheers!
 
Well, I watched the game and that is why anyone watches rugby. Fantastic game.

Saturday afternoon and - One bounce of the ball and Finn Russell could have been in...
OK - See any report of any game lost by Scotland - plenty to choose from.

Used to do extract brewing back in the early 1980's when the advice was thin on the ground and the hops were in large plastic bags and smelt of nothing much at all.

Kit plus a few grains and hops might be not far off the extract brewing quality, so am going down this route myself.
 
...Kit plus a few grains and hops might be not far off the extract brewing quality, so am going down this route myself.

I'm looking at 19-20L stove-top BIAB at some point but would like to have a bash at this first. It'll be interesting to see how it improves a kit.

PS. Being a Welshanese I'm avoiding all rugby discussion at the moment. :nah:
 
Lessons learned:
I cooled hot wort too well! I needed to use the kettle to bring temp up,

That's because the mains water is so cold this time of year, I normally do the same as you and, in summer, I need to re-fill the sink twice to get the temp down. Just did an Extarct this weekend and I didn't even need to cool the wort, by the time I'd made it up to volume with tap water the temp was about right, even then a bit cool so I added a bit of boiled water to bring it up to 22C.
 
I'm looking at 19-20L stove-top BIAB at some point but would like to have a bash at this first. It'll be interesting to see how it improves a kit.

PS. Being a Welshanese I'm avoiding all rugby discussion at the moment. :nah:

Yes, agree that this will be be an interesting experiment.

PPS - I see next Saturday's fixture as a winnable game for Scotland - only Wales after all.

"Sometimes it's the hope that kills you." :hat:
 
I came back to homebrew last year after a break of around 20 years, and did quite a few of the all malt kits, and I was impressed. This year I did a couple of extract recipes before moving to all grain...and the last extract one I did was Way To Amarillo. Given it's so simple with just the malt extract and hops (no steeping grains) I wasn't expecting much, but after just a few weeks in the bottle I am amazed...it's really good, well balanced malt plus lovely hop character...just like all the reviews on the brewUK site say...so definitely worth a go to anyone thinking about trying an extract recipe. I took care to oxygenate the wort and used a safale 05 starter and the fermentation was complete in about 5 days.
 
how much bottle conditioning does everyone think this needs? it was great after only 8 days. it's two weeks now, mulling over another "sample" tonight......
 
normally I allow a full month for bottle conditioning but this stuff is tasting great after 2 and a half weeks. Go have another sample tonight for comparative scientific purposes :geek:
 
I really fancy having a go at one of these extract kits, how easy are they to do for a numbskull like me? How clear are the instructions?
I fancied going down the all grain route but to be honest I'm more than happy with the results I'm getting from the 2 can kits I've been doing but these get such great reviews I fancy giving one a go.
Are they so much better than something from Festival or St Peters?
Cheers
 
Mine have been in the bottles for about 7 weeks (2 warm, 5 shed) and I can't say I've noticed it change much in that time, it was great from the first bottle which I had after 4 weeks. I've not had that many yet so still plenty of conditioning time/beer left, but frankly even if it doesn't improve I'm over the moon with what I've got.

Doing the brewuk Galaxy single hop this weekend (if I get my a*se in gear) and going to do the citra too. I think these are a great way to learn what hops you like, and make great beer en route. Was going to do both at once as small batches but the good lady seemed unimpressed at two more small fv's turning up...
 
@ Sausagefingers

Just do it! I'm hooked on extract brewing, dead easy. Beyond basic kit, I only have a 12L pot and it's generally fine, though my cooker doesn't get it to a fierce boil, so not much foaming. Loads more rewarding than kits, for not much more investment.

Go for one of the recipe packs off brewuk, the way they pack it all up makes it a doddle. They now even split your hops into packs, labelled 1,2,3 etc, and you just add pack 1 when it says, then 2... Etc. easy peasy!
 
Sausagefingers, its really easy, you just need a big pot to dissolve and boil the malt extract in and add the hops....just like in Toffee's original post. I've got a 26ltr boiling kettle but you can do it in a more concentrated form with a big stock pot on the cooker and top up to final volume later. The bigger the volume the better. Then cool the boiled wort and drain to the fermenting vessel. I've got a wort cooler and hop strainer, but you don;t need that. You can put the hops in a muslin bag and cool in iced water in a sink. So you end up spending more time than a kit, but I think the taste is just that bit 'cleaner' and seems to be ready to drink more quickly than the kits I've tried. Worth giving it a go...also check out on youtube, there is video posted of someone doing the amarillo extract kit in a normal kitchen.
 
Yeah, it's really not too hard. I have resisted sampling tonight, but will give in at some point over the weekend. Might do brewuk's mosaic ipa kit, as I really like mosaic in the beers using it I have tried. Although I am threatening to go biab next brew......dunno....
 
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