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Photoshoot of ag63 moderately pale ale. Nomnomnom. Really cleared well.
So it will be extremely interesting to see hoe the yeast I used varies in taste to ag65, which is notty.
 

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In preparation for my next brew (dubbel) , I have been making some Belgian candi
Holding 500gm sugar with a dash of acid at 260-270f for 30 minutes until a nice Amber caramel and then hard crack it at 300f and pour in to a parchment lined tray.

Reckon this will be spot on once cooled
 

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AG number 66
Belgian Dubbel


So a little experiment for the next brew. I really like Belgian beers, but have never brewed one yet! I very nearly didn't do this one as the HB order missed with specialB, but sod it.
To start off with I made 500gm amber candi which I will add to the boil.

2kg pale malt
1kg Munich dark malt
1kg wheat malt
100gm crystal 360ebc
500gm Amber candi sugar
50gm Black patent

22l mash at 66C for 90mins followed by a 2l jug sparge and a good bag squeeze
Leaving 20l wort for a 60 minute boil and 17l in the FV

Hops
25 g styria Golding @60 min

Yeast
Lallemand abbaye yeast

Brewers friend was a little vague on the Munich dark malt so I used viking Munich dark in the recipe builder. This doesn't seem to have the right colour so I am a bit unsure on what colour I am going to get with this. And I also know without the specialB I will be missing out on some of the fruity raisen notes.

However I think it will be in the realms of 20-25srm, 25ibu and 6% and should still be an enjoyable brew. Its a yeast driven beer, so that's the main thing.
 
Brew day went sort of well. Other than I forgot to add the sodding candi until I was at 80c with the cooler!
Turned the tap off and dropped the sugary goodness in and brought it back up to the boil for 5mins and then restarted cooling.
Hit exactly 17l of wort and 1.063
Spot on!

Colour is a nice deep chocolate as well. Really looking forward to this one.

Contemplating doing a mandarina bavaria pale lager tomorrow whilst supping an IPA from ag65
 

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AG number 67
Hoptastic Lager


As most of you will know or guessed - i dont always like to follow the rules on 'styles' and frequently bastardise them to fit what i want or what ingredients i have to hand.
Now this one is a sumation of several past brews using mandarina bavaria. Its a really delicate but incredibly tasty hop. However previously when using MO malt and regular ale yeasts its been a bit overshadowed. This time I'm doing it with EuroPils malt from geterbrewed and mangrove jacks lager yeast. My thinking being the pils and yeast on this are quite delicate in terms of flavour and should let the mandarina shine through - especially as I am going to use 100gms of the stuff hahahahaha

3kg EuroPils malt
1kg wheat malt

22l mash at 66C for 90mins followed by a 2l jug sparge and a good bag squeeze
Leaving 20l wort for a 60 minute boil and 17l in the FV

Hops
25 g Mandarina Bavaria @30 min
25 g Mandarina Bavaria @5 min
50 g Mandarina Bavaria dryhop on day 5

Yeast
Mangrove Jacks Lager yeast

Shooting for 5% abv with 30 IBUs and a very pale 4 SRM
 
Just reading your front page has given me so many interesting brews to try! Thanks!
 
That was the most appalling brew day ever.
I'm not even sure it's worth letting it brew out and just chuck it straight down the drain :-(

First off the kettle element died after 45 minutes. So the bittering hops only got 15 mins at a good boil. I wrapped the kettle up and managed to keep it at 95c for the remaining time and for the 5 min hop addition.
Not the end of the world, as I am sure even at 95c it was doing its 'thing'.

Started to cool it and whilst I was doing some fencing, one of the joints to the copper pipe started leaking and sprayed water all over the shed. I am pretty sure some it went in the FV.
Then to top it all off, put the wort in the FV and put the lid on to take it to the cellar - not realising the bubbler still had water in it and it sucked some in to the FV when I picked it up.

So it didn't boil as long as I wanted. It might be tainted with water spraying about and dripping from the ceiling and sucked in a few drops of no sterile water from the airlock that had been there for a month or so.

Still hit the numbers and put my yeast in. F@#k it, beer wants to beer. It'll be reeeet


But I will do a taste test before wasting another 50gm of hops for the dry hop.
 
Dubbel appears to have brewed out and is now in the cellar at 12c to settle for a few days. Should be sorted for bottling this weekend.

Mandarina lager - that went through hell on brew day - appears to be beer!
Krausen has totally subsided, so took at sample to see if it's all crappy bacteria infected nasty slop. Nope! Tastes very nice. So I dropped another 50gm of mandarina bavaria hops in it and will slowly bring the temp up to 20c for a few days. Looking to bottle this one weekend after next,
 
Belgian dubbel bottled up, 32 bottles of chocolate coloured goodness. Finished at 1.011, so all on track with my expected numbers.
Kept the first half pint pulled from the bottling wand in the fridge to clear and have a 'raw' taste later on.
 
AG number 68
My Favourite IPA


Back to another IPA - might see a recurring theme wth these as cascade and centennial are my favourite IPA hops

3kg pale malt
500g wheat malt
125gm crystal 113ebc


22l mash at 66C for 90mins followed by a 2l jug sparge and a good bag squeeze
Leaving 20l wort for a 60 minute boil and 17l in the FV

Hops
10 g Centennial BBC @30 min
10 g Cascase BBC @30 min
40 g Centennial BBC @5 min
40 g Cascase BBC @5 min

Yeast
Lallemand American East Coast Ale Yeast

Expecting 7srm, 45ibu and 5% and should be a nice refreshing spring/summer pint out in th garden!
Last night i removed the temp safety cutout, as that appears to be what caused my issues with the troubled child lager in ag67. Whilst its mashing, i need to sort out the cooler hoses too to stop it spraying everywhere!
 
Feeling very uneasy about ag68
The east coast ale yeast has done nothing in the past 24 hours.
I know some can be 'slow', but I am nervous. But I have some notty in the fridge from a previous brew I can chuck in if I get no activity tomorrow
 
Well I hope it goes OK, cos that's one of several of yours I have on my waiting list!
 
Next job on the homebrew front is to play a little with my tea urn

After dismantling the plastic base to bypass the overheat sensor, I saw that is has 2 heating elements bonded to the metal base. A 1000w and a 1500w element wired in series.
I've always disliked how this thing boils. It's way too vigorous. We don't do roiling boils here, we Boil!!!!
So the plan is to cut a small hole in the plastic frame on the base and add a simple rocker switch. This will have the 1000w element wired in to it from the power taken off the connector plate. Should mean I can then use the full 2500w for heating up to mash temp and then getting to the boil, but then lower it to 1500w for the boil itself.
Will document and photograph my attempts for threadists pleasure.
 
Didn't d get a chance to modify the tea urn before today's brew. But I will do it next week

AG number 69
You've been tango'd bitter

As per my other thread, I wanted to use up some of the dark Munich malt I bought for the dubbel and chucked some in for an orange bitter. Looking at some pics I found on Google, using just pale malt and dark Munich gives something akin to tango. Hahahahha

3kg pale malt
1kg dark munich malt


18l mash at 63C for 120mins followed by a 5l dunk sparge and a good bag squeeze. I wanted to convert as much as possible with the dark Munich not being quite as productive as pale malt. So a fairly low temp mash is required
Leaving 21l wort for a 60 minute boil and 17l in the FV

Hops
20gm fuggles @60 min
15 g fuggles @15 min
15 g fuggles @5 min

Yeast
Lallemand English ale Yeast

Expecting about 12srm, 30ibu and 4.5% and it will be tango orange!
 
Didn't d get a chance to modify the tea urn before today's brew. But I will do it next week

AG number 69
You've been tango'd bitter

As per my other thread, I wanted to use up some of the dark Munich malt I bought for the dubbel and chucked some in for an orange bitter. Looking at some pics I found on Google, using just pale malt and dark Munich gives something akin to tango. Hahahahha

3kg pale malt
1kg dark munich malt


18l mash at 63C for 120mins followed by a 5l dunk sparge and a good bag squeeze. I wanted to convert as much as possible with the dark Munich not being quite as productive as pale malt. So a fairly low temp mash is required
Leaving 21l wort for a 60 minute boil and 17l in the FV

Hops
20gm fuggles @60 min
15 g fuggles @15 min
15 g fuggles @5 min

Yeast
Lallemand English ale Yeast

Expecting about 12srm, 30ibu and 4.5% and it will be tango orange!
A very simple recipe that I'm sure will be superb in the taste department and a delightful colour. I've been using up some light Munich with a heavy hand in a couple of recent brews and it does give a reddish hue, almost as red as Red-X but seems to mellow quicker.

I haven't brewed a fully fuggles hopped ale for too long. Even the thought of it is tickling my taste buds!
 

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