New Year - Slid Brewday

[Slid]

Bad brewday today making a sort of repeat of the Fullers London Porter clone, except that this time I use So4 and not US05.
Much harassment due to too much dust in the malt and in the pellet Fuggle hops. Dreadful efficiencies and worse temper from the Head Brewer (i.e. Slid). Endless chucking of wort from one container to the next and leaving a huge amount of wort at the end in order to watch Rugby. Also much and many interruptions from the 3 women sharing my brew space. (1 wife and 2 daughters, sadly, as opposed to, say, 3 concubines). So, in any event, the grain bill for the surviving 23.5L is so:

Pale MO 4.5kg
Dark Crystal 600g
Munich 500g
Brown 310g
Black 120g

Later - Sugar 265g

Hops - Bittering at First Wort: Warrior (14.6%) 17g
Then at 15m: Fuggles Pellets 35g

The grain first clogged up the whole system - so I did my BIAB trick of pushing all the wort through a bag.

Then the pelletised hops clogged up the filter so badly I ended up baling it all out and back in again. Maybe I should have whirlpooled it (the wort) before the chilling. That's what David Heath does. (Sanctimonious....)

I would have been more patient, except the start of the Rugby (Wasps vs Exeter) was imminent.

On the outcome, we get 23.5L @ 1058. May water it back tomorrow to 25L for more of a 1055 sort of a Porter.

 

[Slid]

OK, so a sort of happy ending, in that I water it back to 25L and it does have good mashing efficiency, but poor patience towards the end. The beer will be fine, no doubt.

Best of all, Exeter score six tries and Wasps a second best four.

 

[Slid]

Tomorrow is a Stout, with a very basic 25L recipe:

Pale 4.5kg
Flaked Barley 500g
Roast Barley 500g
Crystal 500g

Bittering to 40 IBU

Am unsure whether to go US 05 0r S 04 plus 250g of sugar to aim for a 6% Export sort of a beer.

 

[Slid]

Went well today with no incidents. Ended up with just over 25L in the FV at around 1.057. Decided on S 04 and sugar made up into a Golden Syrup on the stove.

Used Warrior 15g and Nugget 19g for bittering and no later additions, given the malt profile.

 

[Slid]

Well I am pretty rubbish already on keeping this up to date. Last weekend I did a dry stout:

Maris Otter 3.6kg
Flaked Barley 1kg
Roasted Barley 500g
Wheat malt 330g
Chocolate 100g

Did the bittering with Pilgrim - 39g @ First Wort
As the Bramling Cross was open and I read somewhere that it may be suited to a dark beer, 20g in @ 15m

I have noticed that adding the bittering hops to the GF as soon as the sparge is (finally) over makes the boil much easier to manage.

Well, well! I was re-organising the garage today and found the whole batch of this in a box. All 24L, bottled in February. Will have a drop perhaps this evening watching the rugby and report back. It's been there for 8 months. A beer that may stand some keeping, with a SG of 1.055.

 

[Slid]

To be honest this stout tastes no different to me than it would at 6 or 7 weeks. Three more months seems to make little difference on this style of beer.

Did add a Bramling Cross addition at 15m and that is less than discreet. It is, of course, unoticeable.

 

[Dutto]

To be honest this stout tastes no different to me than it would at 6 or 7 weeks. .........

Waiting "6 or 7 weeks" is the equivalent to looking back at the Boer War for some Forum Members.

It may not have got any better but I'll bet that it hasn't deteriorated ...

... and it will last well into 2019 if it's over 4% ABV.

 

[Slid]

Waiting "6 or 7 weeks" is the equivalent to looking back at the Boer War for some Forum Members.

It may not have got any better but I'll bet that it hasn't deteriorated ...

... and it will last well into 2019 if it's over 4% ABV.

I used to be like that a few years ago, with kit beers. 6 or 7 weeks would indeed seem like practically forever. Having some beer in storage is the answer to impatience, but that takes a couple of months,,, LOL

 

[Slid]

Here was today's effort at a sort of pale ale, Euro type thing. This made 26.5L in the FV:

Pale MO 5.2k
Crystal 25 EBC 300g
Cane / Beet sugar ~300g or so, perhaps, made into Golden Syrup

Nugget 22g @ FW
Then Hallertau Blanc 27g & Huell Melon 21g added around 35g @ 15m
Rest of HB and HM with 22g of Hallertau Mittelfruh @ 5m
US05

Added Gypsum (17g in total) and Epsom (6g) salts according to the Water Treatment guide on the forum.
For some reason, the GF never cut out today at all and it was an amazingly smooth Brewday today.
Came out around 1050 @ 27C, so maybe 1051.
Not put the numbers into Brewers Friend, but it must be around 74% BH efficiency.

So, a question - could the Water Treatment have had any influence over the amount of gunk sticking to the boil plate?
It does seem a bit far fetched to me, but that is the only change I made today.

 

[Dutto]

...........
So, a question - could the Water Treatment have had any influence over the amount of gunk sticking to the boil plate?
It does seem a bit far fetched to me, but that is the only change I made today.

I don't see why not.

In a "hard" water area, a brand new kettle will have a film of calcium on the element after just one boil.

 

[Slid]

Not brewed for a month or so, but drunk plenty. Looking forward to tomorrow's Golden Ale, which is heavily borrowed from the Cornish Tin Miners Ale recipe courtesy of Greg Hughes. Have weighed out the Grain in advance:

MO 4.9kg
Wheat malt 220g
Biscuit 250g
Crystal 40 500g

Hop schedule is planned as per yer man, Greg, with First Gold and Bramling Cross. S 04 this time, I think, as US 05 dries it out a bit.

A couple of weeks back I re-discovered this and a Stout made a week or two later. The main problem with beer brewed 9 months ago is the over-carbonation which gives you two issues:
Carbonic acid from dissolved CO2 - my problems being trivial compared to a shellfish, but noticeable nonetheless, and
Pick-up of yeast on pouring,

As a beer the Cornish Tin Miners ale is fine, but I think that 6 months might have been its high point. Never mind, good strong Ale it is.

 

[Slid]

On to today' 25L Brown Ale:

Pale 4.55kg
Crystal 310g
Chocolate 200g
Brown Sugar 300g

Green Bullet 12.2% - 22g @ FW, 22g @ 15m, 25g @ 5m and the rest of the 100g bag @ 80C in the chilling.

This is sort of clibilt's Centennial Brown, except that I used Green Bullet instead and didn't have any wheat malt either.

Brew day went well, with no GF cut-out. Used Gypsum and Epsom salts again, along the lines of the Water Treatment thread on the Forum.

 

[Slid]

On to tomorrow. I have a 3/4 year old bag of English Cascade from a HBC sale over a year ago.
Should be good, in a sense (perhaps less smell, but off we go)
So it's a 25L Greg Hughes SMaSH - ish with
Maris Otter 5.1kg
Caramalt 250g
Nugget 20g @ First Wort
Cascade 100g @ 15 / 5 / 0 - usual pattern

These days I find dry hopping a PITA. Possibly due to an appreciation of darker, malty beers over the current fashions.

My next planned beers are another Old Peculier clone and another GH SHA with Amarillo

 

[Slid]

On to tomorrow. I have a 3/4 year old bag of English Cascade from a HBC sale over a year ago.
Should be good, in a sense (perhaps less smell, but off we go)
So it's a 25L Greg Hughes SMaSH - ish with
Maris Otter 5.1kg
Caramalt 250g
Nugget 20g @ First Wort
Cascade 100g @ 15 / 5 / 0 - usual pattern

These days I find dry hopping a PITA. Possibly due to an appreciation of darker, malty beers over the current fashions.

My next planned beers are another Old Peculier clone and another GH SHA with Amarillo

This was a disaster, due to knocking the end off the hop filter. Clogged up the recirculation pipe and also the counter flow chiller. Much consternation, panic and confusion. About 8x baling out from GF to and from FV.
After this, I managed to start the chiller off with the warm water tap instead of the cold. Hard to know what to say about all of this.

24L I took a hydrometer reading I don't believe @ 1.059. Just hope it makes some actual beer.

 

[Zephyr259]

Oh no, the grainfather is great until it isn't, then it's a massive pain. I'm due for a filter incident as it's been going too smooth recently. I'm sure it'll still be a tasty beer in the end.

 

[Slid]

One of my better clone brews was an Old Peculier, brewed about a year ago. This is essentially an Old Ale style of a beer. I borrow much from GW on this one and here it is:
MO 5kg
Munich 1kg
Crystal 330g
Chocolate 230g

This is essentially a malt forward sort of a beer - I suspect that the commercial version currently available is a poor reflection of its former glory, so I am thinking of adding a Brew Enhancer (BBF March 2017) on sort of "general grounds". Also, I can't see much other use for it, and it has been kicking around the place for a long time.

Hops are probably rather irrelevant, but the Nugget @ 13.2 is going in to bitter and some EKG from as recently as 2016 will be bunged in at 15m.

 

[Slid]

Glitch free brewday today! All done and dusted in time to watch England somewhat disappointingly lose 34-0 to a resurgent and excellent NZ side in the third RL test.

All there is to add is that I got 25.5 litres @ circa 1.073, the 40g EKG hops looked awful and more brown than green, the GF did not cut out and that I did add some gypsum and Epsom salts again.

 

[Slid]

On to today' 25L Brown Ale:

Pale 4.55kg
Crystal 310g
Chocolate 200g
Brown Sugar 300g

Green Bullet 12.2% - 22g @ FW, 22g @ 15m, 25g @ 5m and the rest of the 100g bag @ 80C in the chilling.

This is sort of clibilt's Centennial Brown, except that I used Green Bullet instead and didn't have any wheat malt either.

Brew day went well, with no GF cut-out. Used Gypsum and Epsom salts again, along the lines of the Water Treatment thread on the Forum.

This was bottled yesterday, it was wonderfully clear, but tasted vaguely of beer and pretty much nothing else. Also, yesterday saw the racking of the Cascade IPA. These old hops of mine should really have been chucked ages ago. If only I were not quite so mean. Pointlessly so, as I do admit. Why did I not just chuck them? Or bung the whole lot into some weird brew, like, "Shagged out hops IPA?"

 

[Slid]

On to tomorrow. I have a 3/4 year old bag of English Cascade from a HBC sale over a year ago.
Should be good, in a sense (perhaps less smell, but off we go)
So it's a 25L Greg Hughes SMaSH - ish with
Maris Otter 5.1kg
Caramalt 250g
Nugget 20g @ First Wort
Cascade 100g @ 15 / 5 / 0 - usual pattern

These days I find dry hopping a PITA. Possibly due to an appreciation of darker, malty beers over the current fashions.

My next planned beers are another Old Peculier clone and another GH SHA with Amarillo

Bottled this Cascade beer today and it tasted Ok - no huge hop presence, but a promising taste, even at this stage. It was down to 1.010.

Also racked the Old Peculiar Clone and did the Amarillo Pale with US 05, which is the so-called Chico strain:

MO 5.5kg
Caramalt 250g

Nugget to bitter and the Amarillo @ 15 / 5 / 0 in 20 / 20 / 60g.

Brewday went so well today that I had time to sort out the other beers and watch the rugby.
So, no Baling out, no GF cut-out and a day drinking the Belgian Beers made during the hot part of the summer.

 

[Slid]

I did the GH recipe for American IPA today. Having read about the harshness of the bittering of Citra, here is the recipe:

MO 6kg
Sugar in Golden Syrup 250g

Hops - Eureka 34g to bitter (9.15%)

Citra & Simcoe 15g of each @ 10m
Citra & Simcoe 44g of each @ 0m

US05

Managed to pump out about 1L onto the kitchen floor again today. There was an issue with the counter-flow chiller and once again, the pump was on at the wrong moment.
Maybe I should have put the spring and ball back into the pump tube.