Journal of Brewing

Ok, its been a while, but good things come to those who wait.

Acting on a whim, I decided to make some pale ale using exclusively Simcoe hops.

For the last few batches I’ve been doing all-grain but I just felt like doing an extract version. I just can’t wait to taste it.

Starter: Made a 1 litre starter, stirring it for about 24 hours. Standard issue.

Here’s the lineup:

8 lb Pale Malt Extract
.5 lb Crystal Malt (20L)
.5 lb Carapils Malt

1 oz Simcoe hops (pellets) (boil)
1 oz Simcoe hops (pellets) (15 min)
1 oz Simcoe hops (pellets) (aroma)

1/2 tsp Irish Moss
California ale Yeast

Grains

Ok, so i’m using extract, no biggie. Supplementing it with specialty grains.

Hops

Simcoe. My interest peaked with this hop from Weyerbacher’s Double Simcoe which I love so very much. I just want to hang 40 bags of these things around my apartment.

Yeast

Cali Ale yeast. We’re old friends.

So that’s that. Looking forward to this one.

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All ratings are performed on a 0(awful) to 5(great) scale

• Color – 5
• Nose – 3
• Body – 3
• Flavor – 4

Tasting Notes: Well, i’m actually happier with this one than I anticipated I would be. The brew session was kind of a disaster due to multiple equipment failure.

Sparge was the problem again. Didn’t extract nearly as much sugar as I wanted to. As a result, it’s overly hoppy and not as balanced as I hope. It’s drinking decently but I shall not be defeated!. I will remake this and it will have a more malty flavor.

Porter. Not much more you need to say about it. The weather is getting cooler and i’m running low on homebrew. The time has come.

Fermentation will take place in the kegerator with the external thermostat set to 70F. I will also be fermenting in a carboy for the first time.

Starter: No starter this time. I got a Wyeast activator XL pack. Should provide me 100 billion cells. I’m not feeling lazy, just trying to simplify.

Taking all this into account, let’s look at the line-up:

8 lb Crisp Marris Otter
1 lb Crystal Malt (40L)
1 lb Munich Malt
.25 lb Black Patent Malt
.50 lb Chocolate Malt

1.5 oz Northern Brewer pellet hops (boil)
1 oz Liberty pellet hops (aroma)

1/2 tsp Irish Moss
1084XL Irish Ale Yeast

Grains

Marris Otter. I love this stuff. Other grains were ganked from Jamil’s podcast on Porter and by looking at Porter recipes.

Oh yes, all-grain is possible inside my apartment.

So we doughed in a touch too hot. I mixed well and there were a few hot spots throughout the mash. I added some cold water to compensate. We ended up doing the rest around 151 for 70 minutes. Didn’t do a starch test, but I could taste that the sugars had been converted.

The phil’s sparge arm, in all it’s ghetto glory, was excellent. When we started using it I realized that I didn’t have a plug for the ends. With some quick thinking I shoved two dove chocolate wrappers in there and we were able to begin the sparge. I’ll have to get some real plugs for that thing.

The sparge lasted a good 45 minutes. We collected around 6.25 gallons of wort. We stopped sparging when we were at 2 plato.

I split the boil into two pots and put them on the large burners on my stove. Needless to say, I had a vigorous boil because I had to top up with around 1/2 gallon of water in the pot. Next time I will turn down the heat a touch.

I’m quite happy with the process. Fermentation is underway right now. Really looking forward to racking this and tasting it. It has a great color and good hoppy flavor. This one should be really good.

Pale Ale. I know, I know, it’s technically an English thing. But let’s face it, those cheeky bastards don’t get many things right. American Pale Ale practically defined microbrewing in this country as we know it. Thus, for my second all-grain attempt, i’m going Pale.

Fermentation will take place in the kegerator with the external thermostat set to 70F. Hopefully that will be a good environment for my yeasties. A few changes this time in hops and yeast. I wanted Amarillo and Cascade however I waited too long to get my ingredients. Thus, I had to use Centennial in place of the Amarillo. It’s not going to be the exact same but i’m sure that it will work out well. As far as yeast goes, I’ve never used a White Labs product before. I kind of like the little vial it comes in, that’s kind of cool.

Starter: This time i’m making a much smaller starter. I’ve been making gi-huge-ic starters for the last few batches. I have also been pitching the whole thing. Seriously, that is way too much. My starter was about 10% of my batch size. I really don’t need that much, especially for a 12.5 Plato beer. A one pint starter will do just fine.

Taking all this into account, let’s look at the line-up:

8.5 lb Crisp Marris Otter (MO)
.5 lb Crystal Malt (20L)

1 oz Centennial pellet hops (boil)
1 oz Cascade pellet hops (aroma)

1/2 tsp Irish Moss
WLP001 California Ale Yeast

Grains

Ahh, MO, my old friend. Should lend a nice characteristic to the beer without weighing it down. Neill said to keep the amount of Crystal low and a picked a light one as to not ramp up the SRM.

Now comes the tough part. All-grain in my new apartment. I don’t have outdoor access so it’s all going to be in the kitchen. I’m also splitting the boil over two pots. I was able to pick up two 4 gallon pots at LNT on clearance. All SS so that’s a plus. I think i’ll collect 6 – 6.25 gallons of wort pre-boil. I need to conciously record how much I lose over the hour boil so I know for next time.

I’ll mash in around 152. I think i’ll go with a standard ratio of 1.25 qt/lb of grain. That should give me 2.8125 gal of water for the mash. I’ll make sure I have 6 gallons of sparge water ready. Another new thing i’m trying this time is the sparge arm that I got from Mr. Lanius. If it served him well i’m sure it won’t hurt me any. I’m definitely going to run a slow sparge this time. I want to make sure I get all that sweet sugar out.

Well, it ought to be exciting to say the least. Hopefully in a few weeks i’ll be Pale-in it up

All ratings are performed on a 0(awful) to 5(great) scale

• Color – 5
• Nose – 4
• Body – 4
• Flavor – 5

Tasting Notes: Wow, my first all-grain beer. I’m so happy with the results. It’s creamy, it’s malty, it’s very lightly hopped but Fuggles are in there. This beer is going to drink really well.

I really have to work on my sparging. This one went too quickly. For my next all-grain batch, I will lauter and sparge much slower, to really get all of those fermentables. Other than that, this beer is clean. I really like clean. I’m going to strive for that more in upcoming beers.

Honestly, I’m quite pleased. Good job self. Now onto more beer!!!

It was a last minute decision. I had been thinking about it for awhile and muttering about it at the brew club meetings. I happened upon two 7 gallon coolers and fitted them with ball valves. That’s right everyone, it was all-grain time.

Needless to say I didn’t enter this little exercise without preparation. I did however come by the ingredients at the last minute. Father Neill and brother Brian (neither of which i’m related to) were the two men good enough to guide me down this treacherous path. They called Thursday evening at around 9:30 and said “hey, you comin’ to pick up this damn stuff?” This time around I was able to get my ingredients locally. Brian provided all the grain and hops that I would need. Neill gave me some of what he described as “super-yeast.” I showed up at the doorstep of his brewery with a sanitized flask and a dream. Like a coach before a big game, he gave me a quick pep-talk.

But enough with the theatrics, let’s look at the lineup:

8 lbs Belgian Pale Malt (2-row)
3 lbs Vienna Malt
1/2 lb Black Patent Malt
1/2 lb Chocolate Malt
1/2 lb Roasted Barley
1 lb Quaker Quick Oats

2 oz Fuggles Pellets (boil)
1 oz Fuggles Pellets (flava charge)

1/2 tsp Irish Moss

1 flask full Neill’s super yeast (combo of American Ale yeast and some secret strain)

And so it begins……

Mash

The mash wasn’t really hard. I read lots about it and had the proper equipment. I preheated the tun with boiling water to minimized the temperature change when I doughed in. Since this was a single step mash I was able to precalculate the water needed and know the temperature that I wanted to hit. I planned on mashing for 1 hour at around 153F. I heated my mash water to 170 and used 1.25qt per pound of grain. This gave me roughly 4.2 gallons of water. When I mashed in the thermometer read 154 in a few spots. I stirred well to make sure all the grain were exposed to the water. Note to self, get a mash paddle!

Sparge

Sparge was certainly the tricky part. I used a strainer from an old pot to spread the water. I preheated the second cooler with boiling water and then added the sparge water to it. We measured it around 170F which seemed perfect. We then (Phil and I) set up the gravity system with which we were to perform the sparge. Attempting a continuous sparge on our first attempt was probably a bit over the top but that’s how I like to to things. In retrospect, I don’t see this two cooler setup lasting for long. The cooler for sparge water can only hold 7 gallons. That’s not going to be enough for sparging a larger grain bill. I also think I want to actively heat the sparge water while I’m sparging but that’s another show. The point is, after I recirculated the wort, the sparge happened too quickly. I now understand that it has to be a much slower process. It probably should have taken 45 minutes to 1 hour. Mine took probably 20 minutes. I think I left lots of sugar in the tun. I collected around 7 gallons of wort though for the boil.

Boil Starting Gravity: 1.048

I boiled for an hour and hopped as specified in the recipe list. It was quite dark by this point and getting cold. Still, I brewed by the moonlight and it felt great. After the boiling and wort chilling, my SG for this brew is 1.060. Next time i’ll certainly make sure to perform a better sparge. Also, my bazooka T got all clogged up with hop gunk and cold break material. I’ll need to figure out a way around this and it may involve a Polarware pot.

All in all i’m quite happy with the way things turned out. I finally had an all-grain session and I got to see what real brewing was all about. Without running any hard numbers I’d say that I hit somewhere between 50% and 60% for my extraction efficiency. Not so bad for my first time. The taste of the wort was very nice. A deep brown with all the grain elements, chocolately, roasty and smooth from the oats. The body seemed low for a stout but I can learn to tweak that in the future. The hop presence was excellent with the fuggles contributing that mild yet earthy flavor. Fermentation was evident within an hour of pitching. Looking forward to bottling this one.

The official name of the lager is LCD (Least Common Denominator). I sanitized all the necessary equipment and siphoned it over. The color is quite pale, like a pilsner should be. Final gravity was 1.013. It has a very thin mouthfeel (at kegging time) and mild hoppy flavor.

My first pull showed the clarity of the beer. It is really looking excellent and the lagering has its benefits albeit it’s a pain to wait on.

Second and third pulls show more hop character. Saaz hops were a nice addition. Should drink very nicely and develop more as time goes by.

All ratings are performed on a 0(awful) to 5(great) scale

• Color – 3
• Nose – 5
• Body – 3
• Flavor – 3

Tasting Notes: Kind of on the fence with this beer. I really like the style and it will do very well in the summer. It’s certainly quaffable. I used too much lemon this time and i’m quite sure I got some pith in there as well. That contributes to the slight astrigency. I might be a little hard on myself for this one because it’s been well received. It still has the similar extract taste discussed in the IPA ratings. That’s something that will go away with time and energy.

Banana and lemon on the nose and they hit you like a punch in the face. The lemon is really preset in your mouth after you swallow some. The lemon however becomes more pronounced yet at the same time, more a part of the flavor as you continue to drink it. I think I know how i’ll make v3.0. 1 less lemon and do a full wort boil.

Very happy with the results. I would give it time to mellow out but it’s drinking so quickly and well that it probably won’t have time. Maybe I can hang on to two of them or something.