Tony1951
Bungling Amateur
My last brew - based loosely on a couple of Greg Hughes recipes but seriously adapted has turned out really nicely. It's a hoppy, fresh ale that is going to go down a storm with my boys at Christmas. Lest Child Line feel concerned, the 'boys range in age from 28 - 35, so you can discard images of young lads in drunken chaos being led astray by a terrible parent.
I think one part of the hoppy success of this came out of an accidental problem that left me unable to drain my boiler through the hop filter. It was completely blocked and in disgust, I decanted the whole contents of the kettle, wort, trub, and all the hops into the brewing bin and just pitched and brewed it out until a fortnight had elapsed. I didn't expect much, but it is rapturously good - not grassy at all, just banging with Centennial and Citra flavour and smell.
Here is the grain and hop bill and more about 'technique' later:
APA
5.8Kg of Pale Malt (Weyermanns used from Getterbrewed)
145g of Crystal Malt
1 hour 30 minutes mash starting at 69C and cooled to 66C after ten minutes.
Magnum Pellets 32 grammes (13%) @ 60 minutes.
Wirflock tablet @15 minutes.
Citra Pellets 15 grammes (13%) @10 minutes
Centennial Leaf (10.3%) @10 minutes
At the end of the boil cool wort to 80C
Then add:
Citra Pellets 44grammes (13%).
Centennial Leaf 45 gramme (10.3%).
Leave at 80C for thirty minutes then cool rapidly to pitching temperature.
Decant whole kettle to fermentation vessel.... Weird I know. You will have a lot of trub and hops in there. I had 23 litres of volume at this point.
Pitch US05 and ferment for two weeks at 20C, irrespective of the fact that it will finish earlier.
After straining off hops and trub I managed to bottle 20 litres of beer. The ABV is about 5.8%.
This is a really nice beer in spite of my unorthodox method of leaving all that hop debris in the fermenting vessel. The lads claim it is the best yet. REALLY love teh tang of Centennial. Perfect bitterness for us here and quite a strong ale.
I think one part of the hoppy success of this came out of an accidental problem that left me unable to drain my boiler through the hop filter. It was completely blocked and in disgust, I decanted the whole contents of the kettle, wort, trub, and all the hops into the brewing bin and just pitched and brewed it out until a fortnight had elapsed. I didn't expect much, but it is rapturously good - not grassy at all, just banging with Centennial and Citra flavour and smell.
Here is the grain and hop bill and more about 'technique' later:
APA
5.8Kg of Pale Malt (Weyermanns used from Getterbrewed)
145g of Crystal Malt
1 hour 30 minutes mash starting at 69C and cooled to 66C after ten minutes.
Magnum Pellets 32 grammes (13%) @ 60 minutes.
Wirflock tablet @15 minutes.
Citra Pellets 15 grammes (13%) @10 minutes
Centennial Leaf (10.3%) @10 minutes
At the end of the boil cool wort to 80C
Then add:
Citra Pellets 44grammes (13%).
Centennial Leaf 45 gramme (10.3%).
Leave at 80C for thirty minutes then cool rapidly to pitching temperature.
Decant whole kettle to fermentation vessel.... Weird I know. You will have a lot of trub and hops in there. I had 23 litres of volume at this point.
Pitch US05 and ferment for two weeks at 20C, irrespective of the fact that it will finish earlier.
After straining off hops and trub I managed to bottle 20 litres of beer. The ABV is about 5.8%.
This is a really nice beer in spite of my unorthodox method of leaving all that hop debris in the fermenting vessel. The lads claim it is the best yet. REALLY love teh tang of Centennial. Perfect bitterness for us here and quite a strong ale.