Brewed a single hop citra golden ale and a California common this weekend.
For the golden ale I went my usual route of fly sparging but got the sparge water hotter to try and boost effeciency. It didn't work out. Haven't calculated but I hit short of my 70% target anyway.
For the cali common the next night I gave batch sparging a go and got 80% so well chuffed and will definitely be sticking with batch sparging for the foreseeable anyway!!
I've ended up with 3.5 litres extra from the common brew which I've put in a spare fv. (Added some "safety spare water" just in case) What to do with this? Is is worth trying to store for starters? Should I Chuck it in along with a coopers Aussie pale that's getting done tonight or tomorrow?
I also made starters for both brews just to try my hand. 1200ml water, 100g dme boiled for ten minutes. 500ml each to a litre soda water bottle and pitched the packet yeasts. It seems to have worked ok but time will tell. The packets dry are enough for the brews and that's what I normally do. The calculator however tells me that after this starter I'm still a few billion cells short. I'm not worrying about that as I should have more cells than had I just pitched the packets dry.
I pitched the starter during the transfer from kettle to fv. Any reason this is a bad idea? I half filled the bottle about 5 times and shook it like hell for extra aeration.
I also tipped the boiler back to get the trub to settle at the far end from the tap. This worked really well and both beers ran clear as a bell after 1 litre right through to the end. That's without using any kind of filter or whirlpool.
Slightly disappointed with the fly sparge again but I've tried all I can with it as it is and it hasn't worked well. I'll need a substantial equipmemt overhaul before giving it another go. The batch sparge was great though so happy with that and will stick with it.
Edit- forgot to mention that one of the Morrison's saver kettle elements chucked it's hand in getting up to the boil. I changed the fuse but nothing. No scorch marks or any obvious signs of damage. Has anyone managed to get one of these going again? I doubt there's much can be done other than replacing. This resulted in a less vigorous boil but I gave it an extra 30 minutes boil time which will hopefully balance it out.
For the golden ale I went my usual route of fly sparging but got the sparge water hotter to try and boost effeciency. It didn't work out. Haven't calculated but I hit short of my 70% target anyway.
For the cali common the next night I gave batch sparging a go and got 80% so well chuffed and will definitely be sticking with batch sparging for the foreseeable anyway!!
I've ended up with 3.5 litres extra from the common brew which I've put in a spare fv. (Added some "safety spare water" just in case) What to do with this? Is is worth trying to store for starters? Should I Chuck it in along with a coopers Aussie pale that's getting done tonight or tomorrow?
I also made starters for both brews just to try my hand. 1200ml water, 100g dme boiled for ten minutes. 500ml each to a litre soda water bottle and pitched the packet yeasts. It seems to have worked ok but time will tell. The packets dry are enough for the brews and that's what I normally do. The calculator however tells me that after this starter I'm still a few billion cells short. I'm not worrying about that as I should have more cells than had I just pitched the packets dry.
I pitched the starter during the transfer from kettle to fv. Any reason this is a bad idea? I half filled the bottle about 5 times and shook it like hell for extra aeration.
I also tipped the boiler back to get the trub to settle at the far end from the tap. This worked really well and both beers ran clear as a bell after 1 litre right through to the end. That's without using any kind of filter or whirlpool.
Slightly disappointed with the fly sparge again but I've tried all I can with it as it is and it hasn't worked well. I'll need a substantial equipmemt overhaul before giving it another go. The batch sparge was great though so happy with that and will stick with it.
Edit- forgot to mention that one of the Morrison's saver kettle elements chucked it's hand in getting up to the boil. I changed the fuse but nothing. No scorch marks or any obvious signs of damage. Has anyone managed to get one of these going again? I doubt there's much can be done other than replacing. This resulted in a less vigorous boil but I gave it an extra 30 minutes boil time which will hopefully balance it out.
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