Re: Festival Razorback IPA Review

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Seems like a dead-ish thread but just thought I'd thank you all, I read this from start to finish before beginning brewing and have adjusted my standard approach accordingly.

Day 1: make 23L wort, pitch yeast, ferment at 20°.
Day 14: dry hop
Day 21: rack to secondary and cold crash
Day 28: prime and bottle, keep at 20°.
Day 42: cold condition at 6°
Day 63 onwards: drink

The 1050 OG means a fairly hefty 6% if all goes to plan, but also lots of suspended yeast, hence the secondary and cold crash, as I really dislike agitated yeast in a bottle. Seems this is also one of the causes of over-priming.

I like a hoppy smelling beer, hence the late addition, although it'll probably die off a little in the two weeks pre-bottling.

I'm surprised the wort is so fermentable as I didn't brew short. I'll have to keep an eye on the airlock as there's not much room left in the vessel for the wort to do its usual knicker-twisting. The only question mark is the ferment temperature of 20°, which I may need to drop for the above reason.

Cheers
 
It will be interesting to see how yours turns out. Mine is cold conditioning now so I should know in a couple of weeks how successful (or not!) it's been.

I fermented mine at 21.5ºC and dry hopped for 3/4 days. 7 days is quite a long time - I hope you haven't overdone it.

Let us know how it turns out.
 
GhostShip said:
It will be interesting to see how yours turns out. Mine is cold conditioning now so I should know in a couple of weeks how successful (or not!) it's been.

I fermented mine at 21.5ºC and dry hopped for 3/4 days. 7 days is quite a long time - I hope you haven't overdone it.

Let us know how it turns out.
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I had a feeling I might be hopping far too early for the timescale planned! Thanks. When the instruction says dry hop after 5 days, I've used that as an anchor point instead of the bottling stage, and adjusted from there.

In truth, I'm still sketchy with how hop aroma and hop taste are affected by the timing of addition. I'm thinking maybe even add them once they're in secondary since it settles for a week, but cold crashing is a different ball game I imagine, and might be best done prior to that. I just love the hop smell, ideally with only some bitterness.
 
Aleik said:
I had a feeling I might be hopping far too early for the timescale planned! Thanks. When the instruction says dry hop after 5 days, I've used that as an anchor point instead of the bottling stage, and adjusted from there.

In truth, I'm still sketchy with how hop aroma and hop taste are affected by the timing of addition. I'm thinking maybe even add them once they're in secondary since it settles for a week, but cold crashing is a different ball game I imagine, and might be best done prior to that. I just love the hop smell, ideally with only some bitterness.
Click to expand...

I must admit, the Razorback instructions seemed a bit odd to me - certainly different from other kits I've done. I let the brew ferment out and then added the hops for 3/4 days. It did kick off a bit of action in the airlock again, but only for a couple of days. I then bottled. Had a little taste when bottling. The colour was fine (which was a relief after my AIPA disaster), and it smelt good. Tasted very bitter but then you'd expect that at that stage.

I'll post back in a couple of weeks once I've had a taste.
 
Knew I should have started at a lower temp...the foam has nearly clogged the airlock after one day! I've only had time to drop the temp one degree, sanitise a paddle and mix in the foam for now til tomorrow morning. Blow-off tubes at the ready.
 
My first taste of my Razorback IPA tonight, and it’s grim. Only two weeks since it finished cold conditioning, but it’s flat (no carbonation), no head at all, is quite bitter and I’m not getting any hop flavour. I’ll give it another month or so, but my hopes are not high.

Apart from my AIPA (which Young’s replaced immediately as there was clearly something wrong with the wort), this is the first brew I’ve done in the fridge.

I’m getting this all wrong but I’ve no idea why.
 
Yikes. Thats not good! Did you use the 100g packet of priming sugar? I'm using 150g based on the info I got from brewersfriend priming calculator.

Glad to have taken your advice on late hop addition, although might not cold crash it now since you've said that about the flavour. I'm so sorry you're my canary down the mine!
 
I’m wondering about the fridge. I made a stand for the FV, which included gluing the legs to the ‘platform’ and I then painted the edges of the legs and main board with emulsion. It is possible that fumes from the glue or the paint could have an effect on the beer in the confined space of the fridge?
 
Aleik said:
Yikes. Thats not good! Did you use the 100g packet of priming sugar? I'm using 150g based on the info I got from brewersfriend priming calculator.

Glad to have taken your advice on late hop addition, although might not cold crash it now since you've said that about the flavour. I'm so sorry you're my canary down the mine!
Click to expand...

I did use the packet that came with the kit. I think the beer is probably beyond saving, but I think I’ll open each bottle today and add a half a teaspoon of sugar just to see if it carbs up a bit. If it matures over the next month, it might at least end up being drinkable!
 
Unsure about the paint thing, I'd imagine if it were sealed and airlocked it wouldn't make a difference
 
GhostShip said:
My first taste of my Razorback IPA tonight, and it’s grim. Only two weeks since it finished cold conditioning, but it’s flat (no carbonation), no head at all, is quite bitter and I’m not getting any hop flavour. I’ll give it another month or so, but my hopes are not high.
I’m getting this all wrong but I’ve no idea why.
Click to expand...
Can't comment on the taste, since I've not done this beer. However another week or two in conditioning might do the trick
If the beer is 'flat' then
a) there wasn't enough priming sugar used to achieve the required level of carbonation; if you only get 100g sugar in this kit it really isn't enough for the style as @Aleik has said
b) the carbing period was not warm enough to allow the residual yeast to work properly
c) insufficient time in the warm was allowed during carbing for the yeast to finish the job
d) yeast levels were very low and insufficient time allowed for the yeast to do its job
e) any combination of the above
That said I'm sure you are aware of all of these.
As far as head retention, if its 'flat' then that's not a good start. However I read on here some time back that head retention improves with conditioning and my experience seems to bear that out.
 
Thanks for your help, guys.

For better or worse, I’ve opened each bottle and added half a teaspoon of sugar. I’m now going to put the bottles away and forget about them for a while. I’m expecting nothing from this brew based on my first taste on Friday evening, so if I end up with something drinkable, it will be a bonus.

I find it a bit galling that you can spend good money on a Festival kit and then find out that the amount of sugar supplied is inadequate. I wish I’d known beforehand.

I’ll let you know what I end up with in a month or so. My AIPA is currently fermenting in the fridge - if that’s a disaster as well, then I’m going to have to try and work out where I’m going wrong, starting with the brew fridge.
 
GhostShip, i had exactly the same issue and the fix was to leave it somewhere warmer for a week to get the yeast to react. After another week it was fine
 
RichBCN said:
GhostShip, i had exactly the same issue and the fix was to leave it somewhere warmer for a week to get the yeast to react. After another week it was fine
Click to expand...

Thank you! You've just given me a bit of hope when there was none! The bottles are now in a warmish room where I'll leave them for a couple of weeks. I'll let you know what I end up with!
 
Made a bunch of errors in bottling. Usual sanitation procedure but sloppy handling of equipment/lack of room during bottling, may get a few dud bottles. Also the gasket thing on my autosyphon was leaking so the wort has bubbled and oxidised a bit when passing through it.

I went with the 100g sugar bag instead of 150g as my wort was 6°C having recently been cold crashed.

All the same, smelling lovely and hoppy, so I'll take a few quality control swigs in the run up to mid Feb, and start ploughing through them once ready to make sure they're drunk young. Can tell this is definitely my kind of beer, just disappointed with myself for mistakes today!
 
Bottles feel like they’ve carbed up nicely following the addition of extra sugar, so have put them out in the shed today. I intend to leave them for a month or so as I feel one of my problems may be trying to drink my beers too early.
 
Well, there’s a lesson for us all. The beer I described as ‘grim’ back at the start of January, has improved no end.

Adding some more sugar and returning the bottles to the warm for two weeks before putting out in the shed (bear in mind it was very cold at that time) has done the trick. Opened a bottle tonight and although there’s no real head to speak of, it’s reasonably clear, has a nice hop/fruit flavour and a good bitter finish. It’s still not particularly carbonated, but there was a ‘sssshhh’ when I opened the bottle top and it’s an IPA and shouldn’t be too carbonated anyway.

I’ve salvaged it! Just another 36 pints to drink followed by 40 pints of American IPA and 30 pints of St Peter’s Golden Ale which are also in the shed. Feeling quite chuffed tonight.
 
Sorry I know this is an old thread but just wanted to ask a question about this kit. I have it currently fermenting, day 11, and was going to add hops a few days before kegging. Now my fv has a tap so I will not be using a syphon, so can I put the hops into the net/filter bag which comes with the kit? If so I assume I will need to sanitize it? Is this a case of putting it in star san or boiling water? Cheers
 

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