AndyBWood
Regular.
Wellâ¦.. once again temperatures plummet as we are covered with yet another blanket of snow.
But - what to brew on such a day, what would be most appropriateâ¦â¦â¦..
Of course. Hopback Summer Lightening !
Just a quick tour of my second decent into the dark side which, as predicted by many of you, was far easier than the first and I tried to take on board all your suggestions. Thanks again. :thumb:
Obligatory grain shot.
I suffered badly last time around with hitting my strike temp so took on board the advice regarding overnight pre-heating of the mash tun which certainly helped.
I also measured the temp of the grain and popped everything into Wheelerâs Beer Engine calculator which gave me a strike temp of around 73 degrees. I still ended up a little bit under and needed to adjust with a couple of litres of hot liquor but certainly better than last timeâs effort.
As well as beer Iâve also been making cheese recently; well â polystyrene disks covered in foil and clingfilm actually.
A nice Cheddar firstâ¦.
Followed by, of course, a crumbly Lancashireâ¦.
All tucked up at 66.5 degrees for 90 mins and the end resultâ¦.. I lost less than ½ degree, if anything at all. Some areas of the grain bed where still bang on with others being a tiny bit higher or lower. So, for my set up overnight pre-heating and cheese seems to work. I lost around 3 or 4 degrees last time.......
This time around I also took a lot more time re circulating the mash liquor to set the grain bed and the runnings were definitely clearer.
Still on the jug n tinfoil sparging method until I decide which way to go with this. I also got the boiler on the go as soon as I had collected enough wort to cover the elements.
So up to the boil and time for the first hops.
The boil last time around was definitely too aggressive using both elements and an uncovered pot. This time I partially covered the pot with the lid and, in doing so, I was able to achieve a nice roll with just the one element not to mention significantly less steam in my kitchen.
Ok â ten mins to go and another addition of hops plus irish moss hit the wort.
Chiller in, down to 80 degrees and post boil hops added.
Think I messed up here as I carried on chilling at this point and didnât let the post boil hops âsteepâ at 80 degrees for a while ? :hmm:
Anyway, down to 23 degrees and the drop. The final wort is many times clearer than my first attempt.
Also made an ice-cream in view of the weather !
Andâ¦.. the scores on the doorsâ¦â¦
Ended up with 23.5 litres at 1.055. Was looking for 25 litres at 1.049 so about right and my efficiency is around what I expected.
As last time, yeast is Whitelabs Yorkshire Square but Iâm fermenting at 19 degrees this time as opposed to 20. My first attempt was quite âyeastyâ so just an experiment to see if the lower temp leads to a cleaner ferment.
Been 11 days in the fermenter so far and still lots of bubbles rising; SG is 1.021 at the moment so still some way to go.
When done Iâm also going to raise the temp for a few days to make sure any diacetyl gets eaten up.
So, thanks again for everyoneâs input; hopefully the weather will have warmed enough to justify the brewâs title by the time its ready !
Cheers
A
But - what to brew on such a day, what would be most appropriateâ¦â¦â¦..
Of course. Hopback Summer Lightening !
Just a quick tour of my second decent into the dark side which, as predicted by many of you, was far easier than the first and I tried to take on board all your suggestions. Thanks again. :thumb:
Obligatory grain shot.
I suffered badly last time around with hitting my strike temp so took on board the advice regarding overnight pre-heating of the mash tun which certainly helped.
I also measured the temp of the grain and popped everything into Wheelerâs Beer Engine calculator which gave me a strike temp of around 73 degrees. I still ended up a little bit under and needed to adjust with a couple of litres of hot liquor but certainly better than last timeâs effort.
As well as beer Iâve also been making cheese recently; well â polystyrene disks covered in foil and clingfilm actually.
A nice Cheddar firstâ¦.
Followed by, of course, a crumbly Lancashireâ¦.
All tucked up at 66.5 degrees for 90 mins and the end resultâ¦.. I lost less than ½ degree, if anything at all. Some areas of the grain bed where still bang on with others being a tiny bit higher or lower. So, for my set up overnight pre-heating and cheese seems to work. I lost around 3 or 4 degrees last time.......
This time around I also took a lot more time re circulating the mash liquor to set the grain bed and the runnings were definitely clearer.
Still on the jug n tinfoil sparging method until I decide which way to go with this. I also got the boiler on the go as soon as I had collected enough wort to cover the elements.
So up to the boil and time for the first hops.
The boil last time around was definitely too aggressive using both elements and an uncovered pot. This time I partially covered the pot with the lid and, in doing so, I was able to achieve a nice roll with just the one element not to mention significantly less steam in my kitchen.
Ok â ten mins to go and another addition of hops plus irish moss hit the wort.
Chiller in, down to 80 degrees and post boil hops added.
Think I messed up here as I carried on chilling at this point and didnât let the post boil hops âsteepâ at 80 degrees for a while ? :hmm:
Anyway, down to 23 degrees and the drop. The final wort is many times clearer than my first attempt.
Also made an ice-cream in view of the weather !
Andâ¦.. the scores on the doorsâ¦â¦
Ended up with 23.5 litres at 1.055. Was looking for 25 litres at 1.049 so about right and my efficiency is around what I expected.
As last time, yeast is Whitelabs Yorkshire Square but Iâm fermenting at 19 degrees this time as opposed to 20. My first attempt was quite âyeastyâ so just an experiment to see if the lower temp leads to a cleaner ferment.
Been 11 days in the fermenter so far and still lots of bubbles rising; SG is 1.021 at the moment so still some way to go.
When done Iâm also going to raise the temp for a few days to make sure any diacetyl gets eaten up.
So, thanks again for everyoneâs input; hopefully the weather will have warmed enough to justify the brewâs title by the time its ready !
Cheers
A
