pennine's brewdays

[Pennine]

136 - winter ale
brewed this one up a while back, was shooting for a nice winter warmer. this is the last bottle.

aroma is vague overall, burnt sugar, roast, and a little cherry.

carbed this one a bit high, closer to belgian trippel/dubbel levels. it accentuates the sour twang S-04 always seems to give. it is
very light on the palate and fades immediately. fruit cake and prunes are the dominant flavors, hardly any malt or hops. very little bitterness but suits the style. will try again in 10 minutes as it warms.

as it warms it now has a definite merlot/port like flavor, with dried fruit mainly raisins. just a small bit of malt but its faint.

not sure about this one, it reminds me of an oud bruin with less sour funk, there is still some but its mild. its enjoyable when looking from that angle. wonder if S-04 is used for flemish beers? definitely not the winter warmer i was shooting for.

 

[Pennine]

167 - wryzen bock
12l batch - 1.066/1.016 - step mash 50c/65c/68c
sort of stole then modified the the recipe from @strange-steve with ingredients on hand. he made quite an enjoyable wiezenbock and it has been a couple of years since i made one, figured it was perfect to balance out my current streak of hoppiness. i also wanted to try out mixing the rye to see what it does to a wheat beer. i like wheat beers, and rye beers, thought the mix might be good.

ended up adding honey malt accidentally, thought i grabbed the acid malt. hopefully its a nice addition. struggling with the mash as well rye is a difficult one to use with the braumeister. cut the mash out step and gave it an additional 30 mins at 68 to get full extraction, was at 1.052 at the end of the 65c step. it also shot way high with the mash ph was at 5.59 and was looking for 5.39. so i added and additional 1.5 ml of phosphoric. That dropped it to a respectful 5.44. preboil gravity is 13.8 so looks like I should hit the estimate above perfectly.

1.40 kg	Hook Head Pale (5.0 EBC)	44.2 %
0.60 kg	Rye, Malted (Simpsons) (4.0 EBC)	18.9 %
0.60 kg	Wheat Malt (Muntons) (4.3 EBC)	18.9 %
0.30 kg	BEST Munich (BESTMALZ) (15.0 EBC)	9.5 %
0.10 kg	Honey Malt (49.3 EBC)	3.2 %
0.06 kg	Caramunich II (Weyermann) (124.1 EBC)	1.9 %
0.05 kg	BEST Acidulated (BESTMALZ) (6.0 EBC)	1.6 %
0.04 kg	Chocolate Rye (Weyermann) (482.6 EBC)	1.3 %
0.02 kg	Carafa II (Weyermann) (817.5 EBC)	0.6 %
10.00 g	Summit [15.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min	27.2 IBUs
1.0 pkg	SafBrew Specialty Ale (DCL/Fermentis #T-58) [23.66 ml]	-

 

[strange-steve]

I love a bit of rye malt, it goes particularly well with those spicy German and Belgian phenols so I reckon it'll be great

 

[Pennine]

168 - Mosaic & Munich
22l batch - 1.061/1.012 - step mash 55c/65c
had a keg open up so made today a double brewday. my other two 13l fermenters are in use so its a big batch for this one. its a lot more work prepping a 20l vs. a 10l batch. also the midwestern ale yeast has been sitting in the fridge for a while. gonna try to make this one a little lighter body.

5.80 kg​	BEST Munich (BESTMALZ) (15.0 EBC)​	Grain​	6​	95.1 %​	3.78 L​
0.20 kg​	Carabelge (39.4 EBC)​	Grain​	7​	3.3 %​	0.13 L​
0.10 kg​	BEST Acidulated (BESTMALZ) (6.0 EBC)​	Grain​	8​	1.6 %​	0.07 L​
16.00 g​	Simcoe [13.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min​	Hop​	9​	22.0 IBUs​	-​
30.00 g​	Mosaic (HBC 369) [12.25 %] - Boil 10.0 min​	Hop​	10​	13 IBUs​	-​
40.00 g​	Mosaic (HBC 369) [12.25 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 20.0 min, 85.0 C​	Hop​	11​	10 IBUs​	-​
1.0 pkg​	Midwestern Ale (Yeast Bay #-)​	Yeast​	12​	-​	-​
50.00 g​	Mosaic (HBC 369) [12.25 %] - Dry Hop 2.0 Days​	Hop​	13​	0.0 IBUs​	-​

ended up with about 62% brewhouse efficiency. seems pretty standard with bestmalz munich. flavor going into the fermenter is delicious. mosaic and munich complement well.

 

[Pennine]

169 - anti-farmhouse ale
12l - 1.068/1.016est - mash 66c/2 hour malt roast
was listening to the recent basic brew podcast Basic Brewing™ : Home Brewing Beer Podcast and DVD - Basic Brewing Radio™ and was inspired by lars garshol's recent blog Figuring out how to brew keptinis about brewing a keptinis. then thought about it and i have a very good setup to try this one out. with some modifications to keep the cleaning to a minimum, going to use another jar of us-05 i have in the fridge thats getting old. i'll post pics of the process for this one.

malt bill is super basic figure the caramels and flavor will come from cooking the malt. im gonna mash as normal, then pull the malts and add back some of the wort to get the grains at a good moisture level to bake in the oven. spread them out on two baking sheets thinly to get more caramelization across the pans as lars mentions. i will add a little sugar water to up the sugar content as well. hopefully this will minimize cooking time by lowering moisture content.

2.10 kg​	Pale Ale, Golden Promise®™ (Simpsons) (5.0 EBC)​	70.0 %​
0.70 kg​	BEST Munich (BESTMALZ) (15.0 EBC)​	23.3 %​
0.20 kg​	Turbinado [Boil] (19.7 EBC)​	6.7 %​
20.00 g​	Flyer [8.00 %] - Boil 30.0 min​	27 IBUs​
10.00 g	Norther Brewer 8.5% - Boil 30.0 min	16 IBUs
1.0 pkg​	Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05) [50.28 ml]​	-​

regular brewday initially.

nice and blonde... to start.

roasting vessels.

drained and spread

Smelling the house up nicely. gave it a taste, has an amazing caramel like flavor.

a little over an hour in i scraped half off.of one tray.

two hours and out of the oven and back into the mash tun. doing a mash out to extract all the sugars and then will sparge and boil and bitter.

and the color difference is not that great, left is pre boil volume color and right is the mash. taste is incredibly different. an amazing caramelly candiness, delicious. i sense a slight astringency from the grains i can imagine.

done cleaning up, stats updated above. ended about .008 sg higher than anticipated.

 

[samale]

169 - anti-farmhouse ale
12l - 1.068/1.016est - mash 66c/2 hour malt roast
was listening to the recent basic brew podcast Basic Brewing™ : Home Brewing Beer Podcast and DVD - Basic Brewing Radio™ and was inspired by lars garshol's recent blog Figuring out how to brew keptinis about brewing a keptinis. then thought about it and i have a very good setup to try this one out. with some modifications to keep the cleaning to a minimum, going to use another jar of us-05 i have in the fridge thats getting old. i'll post pics of the process for this one.

malt bill is super basic figure the caramels and flavor will come from cooking the malt. im gonna mash as normal, then pull the malts and add back some of the wort to get the grains at a good moisture level to bake in the oven. spread them out on two baking sheets thinly to get more caramelization across the pans as lars mentions. i will add a little sugar water to up the sugar content as well. hopefully this will minimize cooking time by lowering moisture content.

2.10 kg​	Pale Ale, Golden Promise®™ (Simpsons) (5.0 EBC)​	70.0 %​
0.70 kg​	BEST Munich (BESTMALZ) (15.0 EBC)​	23.3 %​
0.20 kg​	Turbinado [Boil] (19.7 EBC)​	6.7 %​
20.00 g​	Flyer [8.00 %] - Boil 30.0 min​	27 IBUs​
10.00 g	Norther Brewer 8.5% - Boil 30.0 min	16 IBUs
1.0 pkg​	Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05) [50.28 ml]​	-​

regular brewday initially.
View attachment 25315

nice and blonde... to start.
View attachment 25313

roasting vessels.
View attachment 25318

drained and spread
View attachment 25320

Smelling the house up nicely. gave it a taste, has an amazing caramel like flavor.

a little over an hour in i scraped half off.of one tray.

View attachment 25321

two hours and out of the oven and back into the mash tun. doing a mash out to extract all the sugars and then will sparge and boil and bitter.
View attachment 25324


and the color difference is not that great, left is pre boil volume color and right is the mash. taste is incredibly different. an amazing caramelly candiness, delicious. i sense a slight astringency from the grains i can imagine.

View attachment 25331

done cleaning up, stats updated above. ended about .008 sg higher than anticipated.

Great write up. Really interesting stuff looking forward to see how this turns out

 

[strange-steve]

Good stuff @Pennine, I'll be watching this with interest. How much water did you use for the mash, it seems like it should be as thick as possible to speed up the caramelisation process in the oven? Did you get the sticky caramel layer that Lars mentioned?

 

[Pennine]

Good stuff @Pennine, I'll be watching this with interest. How much water did you use for the mash, it seems like it should be as thick as possible to speed up the caramelisation process in the oven? Did you get the sticky caramel layer that Lars mentioned?

i mashed in with 10l of water. after about 45 minutes i pulled the grain out and let it drain for a couple of minutes there probably was no more than half a liter left in the mash. then i transferred the grain to a bucket. here i added back about 1liter of wort and a half liter of water with 200g of sugar. mixed it well and then spread on the baking sheets. it did actually get quite caramelly especially around the edges as he mentioned. i actually pulled the malt off the parchment and let the caramelized sugars cool and harden and they broke right off the paper back into the mash tun.

i could have mashed initially with about 5l of water but i didnt want to get too crazy for the first try and be cooking the mash for 6 hours. next time i will probably add a little more sugar in less water, no wort added back and only half the grain to the oven to get more candied caramel crystals, that seems to be the goal for me as the mash gets enough sugar for the actual beer. im manily looking for flavor from the caramelization process.

 

[strange-steve]

Ah OK so you actually mashed as normal but drained it before baking, gotcha. So after baking the mash you put it back in the mash tun, is that along with the wort that was drained off previously? Then how did you do the mash out, did you have to add more water?

PS. Sorry for all the questions, I'm really intrigued by this.

 

[Pennine]

Ah OK so you actually mashed as normal but drained it before baking, gotcha. So after baking the mash you put it back in the mash tun, is that along with the wort that was drained off previously? Then how did you do the mash out, did you have to add more water?

PS. Sorry for all the questions, I'm really intrigued by this.

no problem at all. i left the remaining 6-7l of wort in the kettle. it was just slowly cooling while baking. then i added all the baked grain back in the reheated wort and did a mash out for 30 min to get all the sugar out of the grains and homogenized with the original wort. the grain was still pretty moist in the middle and only dry on the edges. then i sparged as normal with hot water and ended up with about 12l of wort pre-boil.

 

[strange-steve]

Thanks for that, I really like the sound of this beer and might give it a go in a small batch

 

[prog99]

Thanks for that, I really like the sound of this beer and might give it a go in a small batch

Have to admit, its intrigued me too.

 

[Pennine]

the only thing i am worried about is the hops and i possibly might have over bittered. he mentions they are pretty bitter to offset the rich sweetness and i think i got the aa's close to the recipe. but that is definitely a heavy bittering addition.

 

[Pennine]

ill send you out a bottle to try in a few weeks. im planning on letting this one sit in the fermenter for a week or so and get it bottled quickly.

 

[samale]

Is it a no boil beer

 

[Pennine]

Is it a no boil beer

traditionally it is a boiled beer because the mash will eventually get to boil temps in the oven, a super hot mash out or full volume decoction if you will. i did actually boil for 30 min to get the bittering hops in there. i wasn't too keen on the hop tea method and i don't have an easy way to strain hops... actually i do but i was being lazy and keeping the amount of equipment usage down to limit cleaning required.

 

[Pennine]

Thanks for that, I really like the sound of this beer and might give it a go in a small batch

the small batch actually made me think, why not use a concentrated DME (or LME) solution to add back to the drained malt before baking? might be a better option than sugar next time, and limit the baking time needed. i do think it is important to give the grains a good roasting so definitely need to mix a good amount of them back in.

i feel a little bad trying to hack and modernize a traditional, ancient process. i guess you could say i am working with the tools available as building a brick oven is definitely out of the question.

 

[Pennine]

took a taste of the hoppy marzen i brewed up and massive strawberries from the belma hops. thinking about doing a citra/belma saison...

also took an early sample of the farmhouse ale to get a gravity reading, down to 1.015 in 3 days with us-05. taste is pretty amazing even full of yeast

 

[Pennine]

took another reading of the wryzen bock today and was a little shocked how much things dropped? t-58? thats gonna be one alcoholic beer...8%. hopefully the refractometer is off, and it doesn't taste that light. but is really good! @strange-steve you didn't get this kind of attenuation on yours did you?

 

[strange-steve]

Mine had 81% attenuation which was higher than I wanted, with an FG of 1.012. I think a little more residual sweetness would have been better.