Double brew day dog **** disaster

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Simonh82

Landlord.
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Sorry for the stupidly long post, I needed to get things off my chest.

Yesterday, I had the first chance to brew since the arrival of my second child at the end of May. Wanting to make use of the now rare opportunity, I decide I would attempt my first double brew day. The plan was to make a super hoppy American red ale for me and a porter (mostly) for my father in law, who like to keep in beer. I should have jacked in the idea of two brews when I didn't get started till 9pm, but as I often finish late I decided to plough on regardless.

Well unsurprisingly it was a catalogue of errors from beginning to end. Firstly I only remembered that I was half way through a project to mount my grain mill on a new base (that fits over a bucket properly), when I got to the shed. 25 minutes later and I'm packing the jigsaw and sand paper away and ready to start milling my grain.

To save time, I decide on a 40 minute mash and 30 minute boil and only a basic dunk sparge rather than my usual faffing around topping up the boil with the runnings from a second dunk sparge. I therefore dropped my efficiency by 10 points to 70%.

The mash went OK, although my still half finished brew shed proved so disorganised that the 40min mash ended up being a full hour. I got the boil on and started milling grain for the next brew.

At that point I popped outside to sling a bucket of water into the bushes and trod in something the dog left behind. I didn't realise until I had trodden it all over the shed floor. After a lot of swearing, a change of shoes and some scrubbing of the floor I was ready to go again.

As the first boil was coming to a an end I mashed in the second brew. I had already given up the idea of using my new counterflow chiller as I didn't have the right spanners to tighten the final compression fittings, so it was back to my immersion chiller. After chilling to 27°C (all I could manage with the warm ground water at this time of year) I started draining the kettle but found the bazooka filter kept blocking, a problem I've never had before. Eventually I got it into the fermentor at 2.45am.

At this point I decided to jack it in for the night. The heavens had opened and the bottom of the garden had flooded so I got soaked to the skin heading back to the house.

I got 3 1/2 hours sleep and the didn't even get a chance to look at the second mash till 2pm the next afternoon. I had used my second smaller kettle for the second mash and as it was meant to be a short mash I hadn't bother to insulate it. By the following afternoon the mash was down to 35°C and I as worried that bacteria would have been breeding. Luckily the mash pH was still 5.5 so no lactobacillus infection evident.

After a quick dunk sparge I got the second boil on. I checked the pre-boil gravity and it was at a whippy 1.060! Given my target OG was 1.048 I knew the extended mash had boosted my efficiency a lot. I topped up the boil with several extra litres of water and boiled for 30min. After the boil I had an OG of 1.055 and was 3L over volume, so there were some small silver linings.

Hopefully pitching the yeast at ~25°C won't have a detrimental effect. The first brew is in the brew fridge so hopefully I got it down quickly enough. The porter is just at ambient temperature so I'm hoping it will chill down overnight.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they actually turn out OK in the end.

Recipes posted below.
 
New England Red Ale (maxi BIAB)

Brew Method: BIAB
Style Name: American Amber Ale
Boil Time: 30 min
Batch Size: 28 liters (fermentor volume)
Boil Size: 28 liters
Boil Gravity: 1.055
Efficiency: 75% (brew house)


STATS:
Original Gravity: 1.053
Final Gravity: 1.011
ABV (alternate): 5.7%
IBU (tinseth): 45.19
SRM (morey): 18.72

FERMENTABLES:
4.1 kg - United Kingdom - Maris Otter Pale (61.4%)
0.2 kg - United Kingdom - Crystal 90L (3%)
0.2 kg - Belgian - Special B (3%)
0.3 kg - German - CaraAroma (4.5%)
0.5 kg - German - Munich Light (7.5%)
0.2 kg - German - Carapils (3%)
0.1 kg - United Kingdom - Crystal 15L (1.5%)
1 kg - United Kingdom - Wheat (15%)
0.075 kg - German - Carafa II (1.1%)

HOPS:
15 g - Admiral, Type: Pellet, AA: 13.8, Use: Boil for 30 min, IBU: 14.01
20 g - Falconer's Flight 7Cs, Type: Pellet, AA: 10.3, Use: Boil for 5 min, IBU: 3.62
20 g - Mosaic, Type: Pellet, AA: 11.5, Use: Boil for 5 min, IBU: 4.04
30 g - Galaxy, Type: Pellet, AA: 14.5, Use: Boil for 5 min, IBU: 7.64
35 g - Falconer's Flight 7Cs, Type: Pellet, AA: 10.3, Use: Whirlpool for 5 min at 100 °C, IBU: 4.51
35 g - Mosaic, Type: Pellet, AA: 11.5, Use: Whirlpool for 5 min at °C, IBU: 5.03
35 g - Galaxy, Type: Pellet, AA: 14.5, Use: Whirlpool for 5 min at °C, IBU: 6.34
45 g - Falconer's Flight 7Cs, Type: Pellet, AA: 10.3, Use: Dry Hop for 4 days
75 g - Galaxy, Type: Pellet, AA: 14.5, Use: Dry Hop for 4 days
45 g - Mosaic, Type: Pellet, AA: 11.5, Use: Dry Hop for 4 days

MASH GUIDELINES:
1) Infusion, Temp: 66 C, Time: 40 min, Amount: 22 L

YEAST:
Wilko ale ( Nottingham)


TARGET WATER PROFILE:
Profile Name: Hoppy post adjustments
Ca2: 125
Mg2: 4
Na: 24
Cl: 48
SO4: 160
HCO3: 0
 
Tony's Porter

Brew Method: BIAB
Style Name: English Porter
Boil Time: 30 min
Batch Size: 23 liters (fermentor volume)
Boil Size: 28 liters
Boil Gravity: 1.046
Efficiency: 92% (brew house)


STATS:
Original Gravity: 1.056
Final Gravity: 1.014
ABV (alternate): 5.61%
IBU (tinseth): 33.17
SRM (morey): 16.58

FERMENTABLES:
4 kg - United Kingdom - Maris Otter Pale (89.9%)
0.3 kg - United Kingdom - Crystal 45L (6.7%)
0.15 kg - United Kingdom - Chocolate (3.4%)

HOPS:
15 g - Admiral, Type: Pellet, AA: 13.8, Use: Boil for 30 min, IBU: 18.21
30 g - Challenger, Type: Pellet, AA: 7, Use: Boil for 10 min, IBU: 8.72
20 g - Challenger, Type: Pellet, AA: 7, Use: Whirlpool for 10 min at 100 °C, IBU: 2.13
30 g - First Gold, Type: Pellet, AA: 9, Use: Whirlpool for 10 min at °C, IBU: 4.11

MASH GUIDELINES:
1) Infusion, Temp: 68 C, Time: 40 min, Amount: 14 L

YEAST:
Wilko Ale Yeast (Nottingham)
 
Nightmare brew day! I can't believe you were still at it at quarter to three in the morning :lol: bloody mental that is, I'd have jacked it in at the dog doodaa stage me.
 
WOW! The joys of brewing eh!?!?!? :doh:

Your biggest problem should come in about six weeks time when you are drinking a great brew ... :thumb:

... and trying to remember just how you managed to make it! :lol: :lol:
 
You have my sympathies. Late night brewing can get tedious even when everything goes to plan. My second was born a couple of weeks ago and just the thought of going from changing nappies in the middle of the night to having to clean dog mess in the middle of the night makes my temple throb. Anyway, the hop schedule on that American red looks amazing and you'll surely be rewarded for your efforts.
 
You have my sympathies. Late night brewing can get tedious even when everything goes to plan. My second was born a couple of weeks ago and just the thought of going from changing nappies in the middle of the night to having to clean dog mess in the middle of the night makes my temple throb. Anyway, the hop schedule on that American red looks amazing and you'll surely be rewarded for your efforts.

I used a similar hop schedule for my first new England IPA. It was amazing and came out smelling like a tin of peaches. Unfortunately, I just got back from holiday so no time to make a starter from the Brewlabs Sussex yeast strain that I used that time, so had to go with boring old Nottingham.
 
I bottled the porter on Saturday evening. Ended up with 22.5L which was more than I expected and it was considerably stronger than I planned so wasn't a total failure. It tasted lovely, even to me who isn't normally a great lover of dark beer.

As the red ale is in the brew fridge this one was fermented at ambient temperature. It stayed at a fairly consistent 21-22°C, maybe a but higher during peak fermentation. No off flavours present and the yeast dropped out nicely but you can see a clear haze that I think must be protein related. I couldn't cold crash it so I think I will try to get it into the fridge at 0°C for a day or so when it is has carbonated.

I've kept two mini kegs for me and the rest will go to my father in law to help maintain family relations.
 

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