Youngs Harvest Pilsner

[louis macneice]

Second partial mash/mini BIAB 7/02/14; the mash/BIAB part went as follows:

1000g pale 2row
100g medium crystal


Mashed in 3.5 lts of water at approx 60 degrees for 60 mins; I kept the stock pot in a warmed oven to help retain heat, checking every so often.

Heated another 3.5 lts of water to sparge my grain bag in once I'd let it drain; heated to 65 degrees. I dumped the bag into the pot left it for ten minutes and then lifted it out and drained it. After that I left bag in a colander to collect the final run off.

I combined the liquid from the original mash, the sparge and the final run off and brought to the boil, adding 50g of Saaz for 60 mins, 25g of Saaz for 20 mins and 20g of Bramling Cross for 20 mins.

In the meantime in a fermenting bin, I mixed 1kg of dry light malt extract with 3 lts of cold water. Once that was thoroughly combined, I added the 1.5kg tin of Young's Harvest Pilsner extract.

The boiled, hopped wort (approximately 4.5 lts) was then added to the fermenter through a strainer. The whole lot was topped up to 21 lts with cold water. I sealed the fermenter and left to cool to pitching temp.

When the temp was down to around 20 degrees I pitched the slurry from my first all grain 1 gallon experiment (which used Muntons Premium Gold); fermentation took off pretty much straight away.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice

 

[dennisking]

Let us know how this turns out.

 

[louis macneice]

Transferred to secondary and dry hopped with 20 g of Sazz; moved to the shed. It was already pretty clear and a nice light yellow/golden colour; will bottle in a weeks time.

Tasted a sample; larger, hops and maltiness...which was the intention. It was ok but obviously nowhere near finished (unlike the Youngs Stout which tasted great out of the FV); it also cries out to be well chilled.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice

p.s. also tried washing the yeast left over in the primary; two large jars now sat in my fridge. I will use this for another 1 gallon AG experiment in a couple of weeks.

 

[louis macneice]

After 1 week racked this off onto 25g Saaz to dry hop for a week.

Bottled this last Friday using 100g of sugar for batch priming and of course had a sneaky taste. I was a little underwhelmed; much less hops and lager taste than I was hoping for. The biggest flavour was sweetness from the priming sugar.

I will chill a bottle after two weeks warm conditioning and see what's happened...fingers crossed.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice

 

[louis macneice]

This has turned out really rather nice; it's golden, with a thick creamy white head, has a chill haze and a fairly vigorous carbonation. The saaz hops are there both in the nose and in the the mouth making me think lager, but the bramling cross's berry flavours add some thing different, and the crystal malt has filled out the body a bit. All in all a very pleasant tipple served good and chilled from the fridge.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice

 

[louis macneice]

Had one of these last night, well chilled and it was lovely.

It has become more obviously a lager but with the bramling cross berry flavours still nicely apparent. The haze is still there, so I think that's a permanent feature, but it in no way detracts from this being a really nice refreshing pint.

I'm thinking about doing this again but with some amarillo hops that I have left over; if I do I'll let you know how it goes.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice

 

[clibit]

Interesting. The 50g Saaz boiled for 60 mins should have provided a fair amount of extra bitterness, like 25 IBUs, and another 15 IBUs or so from the 20 min additions, on top of the kit's bitterness, is it not too bitter?

I would mash a bit higher, like 65C. What OG did you get, did you measure it?

Amarillo would produce a good beer, more like an American Pale Ale, but tasty.

I think your technique is a great way to maximise a kit. But I wouldn't boil hops for 60 mins myself, I would just do late additions to add flavour without too much bitterness on top of what the kit provides.

 

[louis macneice]

Hello Clibit

I was trying to make a sort of lager/IPA hybrid; that's why I factored in the extra bitterness from the 60 min boil. The beer doesn't taste overly bitter but neither does it really taste like an ale; it's firmly in the lager camp with some extra bitterness and the pleasant surprise of the bramling cross berries.

As an aside I've got the IBU ratings for the Coopers kits (which I like using as a base) which has helped when using the Brewers Friend beer recipe software. I should contact Youngs and see if they can provide the same detail for their kits.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice