Nicks90's Brewdays

[Nicks90]

Well as I don't like ginger beer, it's probably going to me vile - to me at least...
In other news here's a piccy of my pale IPA. Absolutely stomping pint of beer.

And here's a pic of my office, complete with stout in a bucket and 'orrible stuff' next to my desk

 

[Appleyard]

I have read your post with interest. I have been using ground ginger, so it will be interesting to get an idea of what brew freshish ginger makes. I can say that the longer you can keep it (made with the ground stuff), the better. Well, you know what I mean, not *that* long, i.e. eternity, it does mature over a couple of weeks.

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Well as I don't like ginger beer, it's probably going to me vile - to me at least...
In other news here's a piccy of my pale IPA. Absolutely stomping pint of beer.

And here's a pic of my office, complete with stout in a bucket and 'orrible stuff' next to my desk

I like how your office comes complete with fishtank and executive steering wheel

 

[Nicks90]

Frodo the fighting fish is an important element to my office zen, as is plugging in the wheel and playing assetto corsa!!! Classic lotus and Silverstone..... Get in there!

 

[Nicks90]

AG58
Super Pale English pale ale SMASH thingy

Need to finish off the grains I have in my big blue bin and do a user-upper type brew. All I have left from my last order is 3.5kg of lager malt and some first gold hops, so a very very pale english smash is what we're getting!

3.5kg Irish Lager Malt

Hops
20gm First Gold @30 mins
20gm First Gold @5 mins


Full volume 20l mash at 66c for 1 hour. A good bag squeeze leaving 18l wort for a 60 minute boil and 15l in the FV. This will get back liquored to approx 17l, giving 11 Brix OG. Should be approx 5ebc and 23ibu
Yeast is some Lallemand Notty I recovered and washed from ag57 stout.

Actually really surprised at how clean it went, as i was expecting there to be a dark taint, but it crystal!

 

[Nicks90]

Talking of lager, here's my fake lager done with huellmelon.
Properly nice and bright. Plus you can definitely get the hint of stonefruit and strawberry from the hops.

 

[Nicks90]

AG58
Super Pale English pale ale SMASH thingy

Well that brewday didnt go according to plan! I presumed I had 3.5kg of pale lager malt left and it looked about right in the bag - but it must have been short! Either that or my process went horribly wrong.
Ended up with 15l in the FV as planned, but with only a brix of 9. that equates to 1.036. Presuming my efficiency stays about the same as it normally is, I think I had a smidge under 3kg of malt, instead of the 3.5kg I thought I had.
Whilst I am not averse to having a beer thats only about 3%, I would rather aim for about 4%
So I have cheated and added 200gm of sugar to the brew to bring it up to 1.044 and a more wholesome 4.5% end target.

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

How's the 'Orrible Stuff looking, Nick?

 

[Nicks90]

Funny you mention that. I'm going to take a look tomorrow to see if it's done and then bottle it. So far I have not even taken a sniff!
To be honest I've not actually wanted to, as I don't think it will be pleas3 as I ain't a fan of ginger.... But what the hell

 

[Nicks90]

Orrible stuff is bottled and you know what? It's not completely orrible.....
Pre-carb taste gets a smooth definite ginger flavour, but not very sharp - which then develops in to a typical ginger heat. A lot of heat. You can't taste the alcohol, so I reckon it's under 5%. I can't even remember what the og was and I couldn't be bothered to take a final gravity. It is what it is.
Once fizzy I reckon this might be OK.

 

[Nicks90]

First sneaky taste of orrible stuff.
It's not carbd enough yet, but you know what? It's not entirely orrible.

Has a pleasant ginger taste with a tiny bit of ginger heat in the after taste. Reckon if I leave this another week to fully carb it'll be alright!

 

[Nicks90]

I am having another go at Orrible stuff, as the last lot went down really well.
This time I'm going to double up the volume to 2 DJs and triple the ginger to make it a little stronger flavour

 

[Nicks90]

9l of ginger ale Orrible stuff ready and cooling in prep for some yeast.
Done with 800gm of sugar and 200gm shredded fresh ginger, all boiled up for 30 minutes
Should brew out to approx 4.5%

 

[Nicks90]

My order from THBS has finally arrived, this is a rebrew of AG40 - which is a stunning BrewDog-type IPA made with just El Dorado hops

AG number 59
BrewDog - IPA is dead

4 Irish malt
200gm crystal 30ebc
50gm crystal 360ebc

18l mash at 65c for an hour followed by a 4l sparge and a good bag squeeze
Leaving 20l wort for a 60 minute boil and 16l in the FV

Hops
10 g El Dorado 60 min
40 g El Dorado 5 min
Intention is to do a 50 g El Dorado dry hop on day 5

Yeast is Lalbrew American West Coast ale yeast BRY-97
Not used this one before so quite looking forward to how it turns out, as its supposed to really make the hops aromas shine
Scores on the doors for this one: expecting 5.7% abv, 40IBUs and 16EBC

 

[Nicks90]

Ag60
My saison returns

Another repeat recipe - this time a saison I did in ag52 with a few minor adjustments

Grain
3.5kg Minch pale pilsner malt
100g crystal 40ebc

Hops
10gm huell melon @40min
20gm huell melon @5min

Yeast
Danstar bell saison

Mashed in 18l water at 64c and managed to hold it there for 2 hours, with regular stirrings to get maximum efficiency.
2l jug sparge and a bag squeeze later, it went on for 40min boil. It should have been an hour, but dickhead me mistimed it with a finance meeting I had to join, so I cut the boil short by dropping the 5 min hops in with the Irish moss and dropped 20mins off the overall boil time. Ho-hum
Ended up with 16l of wort at 1.050 and about 20ibu
The belle saison yeast should do its usual monster job and get me about 5.5% abc

 

[Nicks90]

Wow, that West Coast ale yeast BRY-97 is a monster.
Look at the krausen on that!!!

Tempted to get a sterilised spoon and top crop some of that for reuse in a few weeks

 

[fury_tea]

Ag60
My saison returns

Another repeat recipe - this time a saison I did in ag52 with a few minor adjustments

Grain
3.5kg Minch pale pilsner malt
100g crystal 40ebc

Hops
10gm huell melon @40min
20gm huell melon @5min

Yeast
Danstar bell saison

Mashed in 18l water at 64c and managed to hold it there for 2 hours, with regular stirrings to get maximum efficiency.
2l jug sparge and a bag squeeze later, it went on for 40min boil. It should have been an hour, but dickhead me mistimed it with a finance meeting I had to join, so I cut the boil short by dropping the 5 min hops in with the Irish moss and dropped 20mins off the overall boil time. Ho-hum
Ended up with 16l of wort at 1.050 and about 20ibu
The belle saison yeast should do its usual monster job and get me about 5.5% abc

How was this the last time? I'm considering having a crack at something similar. Will you dry hop it?

 

[Nicks90]

How was this the last time? I'm considering having a crack at something similar. Will you dry hop it?

It was brilliant.
Huell melon hops is probably a little unusual for the style, but I didn't use many so it's not too bitter and overhoppy to let the yeast style come through.

 

[fury_tea]

It was brilliant.
Huell melon hops is probably a little unusual for the style, but I didn't use many so it's not too bitter and overhoppy to let the yeast style come through.

It was the hops that drew me to it because I have some to use up. I actually thought about upping the hops a little bit because I have so many haha

 

[Nicks90]

Not one to waste an enormous krausen of yeast for an IPA, 3rd brew this week has been put on

AG number 61
Waste-not-want-not

4kg Irish malt
200gm crystal 30ebc
50gm crystal 360ebc

18l mash at 65c for an hour followed by a 4l sparge and a good bag squeeze
Leaving 20l wort for a 60 minute boil and 16l in the FV

Hops
30 g Centennial @5mins
30 g Summit @5 min
Intention is to do a 20g summit and 20g centennial dry hop on day 5
And no that isnt a typo, all my hops are going in at 5 minutes with no "bittering hop". As 60gm of hops for the last 5 mins is giving plenty of bitterness according to the BF recipe calculator.
Yeast is some top cropped American West Coast ale yeast BRY-97 from ag29

Scores on the doors for this one: expecting 5.7% abv, 30IBUs and 16EBC