Redwulf's Brewdays

[Redwulf]

GrainFather Brew #6

Greg Hughes Belgian Blonde

Grainbill

6kg Pilsner Malt

0.2kg Aromatic Malt – Couldn’t get Caravienne.

0.150kg Caramunich 1

0.100kg Torrefied Wheat/Wheat malt

Hop Additions

30g East Kent Golding @ 60 Mins

20g Styrian Goldings (Bobek) @ 15 mins

Other

0.3KG Brewing Sugar @ 5 mins

½ Protofloc Tablet @ 10 Mins

Yeast

Wyeast Belgian Strong

Batch Size 23L

Pre-boil gravity 1.058

Post boil gravity was 1.068 which was spot on after the sugar went in.

Assuming a final gravity of 1.013 we're looking at around 7.2% - Final Gravity was 1.011 so about 7.48 -7.5%



Bit flustered today, bottom seal would not stay in place and I ended up with a little bit of scorching on the base it cleaned off easily so hopefully it won't translate to the beer, aside from that it was a straight forward brew and yeast was pitched around 22-23°c and popped in the Fermentation chamber at set at 19°c

 

[cushyno]

I have a Belgian Blonde on the go too, loosely based on GH recipe.

You may wish to ramp that temperature up to 22-23 once it gets started, you'll get more character at those temps.

Some subtle differences in our recipes. Hope you're turns out well

 

[Redwulf]

I have a Belgian Blonde on the go too, loosely based on GH recipe.

You may wish to ramp that temperature up to 22-23 once it gets started, you'll get more character at those temps.
Some subtle differences in our recipes. Hope you're turns out well

For some reason I read the yeast wrong packet and saw 18-22. I just checked the Wyeast fact sheet and I'll crank it up in a bit.

Aye, I was short on Caramunich, so I subbed in the end of my Torrefied Wheat and Some Wheat malt I had about the place.

I did the Dubbel with 3787 at 22 and it has come out very nicely. I'll keg it later on and leave it to condition out of the way.

 

[Redwulf]

Grainfather #7

Sweet Cherry Saison

Batch Size 23L

Grainbill
4KG Maris Otter
0.5KG Wheat Malt
0.1KG Aromatic Malt

45 minute mash @ 63°C
15 minute mash @ 67°C
15 minute mash out @ 74°C

Hop Additions
15g Target @ 60 Mins
15g Progress @ 15 Mins

Other Additions
1/2 protofloc Tablet @10 Mins
3KG Frozen Sweet Cherries - Secondary Fermentation
0.150KG Brewing sugar - Late Boil Addition

Yeast
CML Lille Saison

OG 1.050 (1.055 including the cherries)
Expected FG 1.005 - Hit the Target after 12 Days before moving to secondary for 5 more days..
ABV 6.51%
IBU 27
EBC 8.8 (not accounting for the cherries)

This one is a bit of an experimental brew to test using fruit in secondary, I've got a couple of brews planned using fruit in the next couple of months so I thought I'd have a go at a Saison and see how it goes.

I filled the grainfather with 16 Litres of best yorkshire tap water and and started the brew mashing in at 63°C to maximize the fermentable sugars and stirred the every 20 mins or so, I increased the temp to 67°C after 45 mins for a further 15 mins and then mashed out at 74°C.

Once the mash out was complete I lifted the malt pipe out and started the 16 Litre Sparge, It was quite a slow sparge but I was able to add 3-4 litres wait 10 mins and add some more, it took about 45 mins in total.

Starting the boil I waited for the hot break and then added my first 60 minute hop addition adding the 2nd hop addition at 15 mins and the protofloc at 10 mins. Hooking the chiller up and running the hot wort through it for the last 10 mins of the boil. I diverted 200ml of hot wort to a saucepan and dissolved 150g of brewing sugar while heating it for 5 mins before adding it back to the kettle for the last 5 mins of the boil.

Once the boil was complete I removed the hop spider and give it a good stir to get a bit of a whirlpool and get the trub off the filter.

I rehydrated the yeast with cooled boiled water and after cooling the wort and transferring to a clean and sainitised FV I pitched the year at about 25°C before moving the FV to the Fermentation chamber and setting that 25°C

I plan to leave that for 10 days at which point I will siphon the wort off the trub onto the cherries in a new FV and return to the Fermentation chamber for further 5-10 days before packaging and conditioning for around a month.

I've been a bit busy but I opened this up on day 12 and took a gravity reading of 1.005. I took the Cherries out of the Freezer and placed them on the draining board for 4 hours before adding them to a clean sanitised fermenter and siphoning the beer on top and leaving for another 5 days.

 

[Redwulf]

The Beer Permission officer is keeping me very busy with projects not related to brewing or drinking beer and I've only got 3 batches in reserve so I grabbed a couple of bulldog kits from Boyes between trips to the dump today and got them going before she gets home from work as a little reward for not razing the whole village to the ground when I was burning my garden waste earlier... celebrate the little things!

1. Evil Dog Double IPA
Cleaned a fermenter bucket and sat the plastic bag of Malt extract in sink full of hot water while I boiled 3 litres of Water. Stirred in the now warm malt and poured in 23L of Water treated with Campden tablet. Stirred it up, checked temp and gravity which were 22°C and 1.062 respectively, pitched the yeast and put the Fermenter in the Fermentation Chamber in the garage at 20°C where it can sit for 10 days before I dry hop it for 4 days, cold crash it for 2 etc.

2. Four Finger Jack APA
I'd cleaned a 2nd Bucket and boiled 3L of water for this one while I was dealing with the other kit, but followed the same process. I stirred in the malt and topped up to 23L. Temp was 21°C and the gravity was a bit low at 1.040 instead of 1.046. I got 1.041-1.042 after a good stir but decided to sling 299g of Brewing Sugar to achieve the expected S.G. Pitched the yeast and sat this one under the stairs next to the fermenter with the Cherry Saison in it.

I'll hopefully get an all grain brew in next weekend thinking either a sour or milkshake IPA.

 

[Redwulf]

3 Floyds Brewing Gumballhead Clone

Grainfather Brew # 8

Brewday 15th May 2021 – Start time 12:30

Volume 20L
Mash Volume: 16L
Sparge Volume 13L

Grainbill
2.25KG Maris Otter Pale Malt
1.75KG Wheat Malt
0.250KG Carapils
0.250KG Aromatic Malt

Hop Additions
15g Amarillo – First Wort
15g Amarillo @ 15 mins
15g Amarillo @ 5 Mins

25g Amarillo 20 Min - Hopstand at 85c

50g Amarillo – Dry Hop on Day 10 for 3 days

Yeast – 11g US-05

This is an approximation of 3 Floyds Brewing's Gumballhead, heard it talked about on the Homebrew forum and thought it sounded like something worth trying out. A bit of research online and I've come up with the following.

I started out by drawing 29L of water and treating it with 10ML of AMS and 1 campden tablet.

I weighed out the malted grain and hops and set everything out. I poured 16L water into the Grainfather and 13 into the Peco for sparging and started the brew on the Grainfather app.

Around 25 mins later I mashed in then stirred up the mash at 20 and again at 40 mins. Mashed out for 10 mins.

Began Sparging around 14:30, Let it drain until 15:00, It was a quickish sparge though.

Took Hydrometer reading of 1.040 @ 37c converted to 1.044 @ 20c giving roughly 80% Conversion

Added 15g of Amarillo at First Wort and boiled for 60 Mins two further additions of 15g at 15 minutes and 5 minutes, before cooling to 85c and adding a final 25g of Amarillo and letting it stand for 30 mins giving me around 35 IBUs.

The only other additions were ½ a protofloc at 10 mins and 2g of yeast nutrient at 2 mins.

I'll add a final 50g as dry hop min way though fermentation.

After 30 mins I ran it through the counterflow chiller into a fermzilla all rounder resulting a temperature of around 19c and around 19.5 Litres with I pitched 11.5g of US-05 and stuck it in the cupboard.

S.G was 1.050, 1 point off my target of 1.052

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Sounds like you've got that process nailed

 

[Redwulf]

Sounds like you've got that process nailed

Everyone was out for the day so I wasn't trying to do 5 things at once and could just concentrate on the beer making...

 

[Redwulf]

Ocean Water Blue Sour IPA

Grainfather Batch #9

Batch Size: 19L
Boil Length: 30
Grainbill

3kg Maris Otter Pale
750g Rolled Oats
500g Pale Wheat Malt
500g Lactose Sugar
100g Corn Sugar

Hop Additions
5g Magnum @ 30 Mins
25g Azzaca - 20 Minute Hop stand @ 78°c
25g Citra - 20 Minute Hop Stand @ 78°c
50g Amarillo - 20 minute Hop Stand @ 78°c

25g Amarillo Dry Hop at High Krausen
25g Azacca Dry Hop at High Krausen

25g Citra Dry Hop in Secondary
25g Azacca Dry Hop in Secondary

Yeast
11g Lallemand Philly Sour

Other Additions
1kg Mango Puree - Secondary Addition
1kg Pineapple Puree - Secondary Addition
20g Blue Spirulina Powder - prior to Packaging

O.G 1.058
F.G 1.012

Having been flat out for over month between work and home projects and narrowly failing to cut my fingers off last weekend trying to finish my pergola lean-to I found myself at a bit of loose end this weekend and sufficiently healed to be able to set the grainfather up and do some one handed brewing.

This one isn't going to be to everyone's taste as its a bit of an odd one. I got the idea from Ocean Water Blue Sour IPA, I like a sour, I like IPA and I will get a perverse delight from dropping a couple of bottles of this round to my dad and his mate who are a little conservative when it comes to beer but still find it in their hearts to drink everything I give them.

The original recipe uses Blue Spirulina and some food dye to give the beer a blue-green colour, it doesn't contribute anything else to the beer so if blue beer is too much it could be left out to create a "normal" sour IPA.

I made some changes to the original recipe, I felt it was too damn strong and having just finished a keg of Belgian Strong I felt that making it less agressive in the alcohol department would make it more enjoyable for my target audience its still going to sit between 6-7% but the original was up around 8%+ and I wanted something that people would be able to drink more than 1 of.

A note on water
The Water where I live has quite a high Sulphate to Chloride ratio, around 3:1 and the more I brew with it the more I notice it is great for IPA and Bitter but rubbish for anything else,

For this beer I wanted a more balanced water for a silkier mouth feel and no sharp edges. So starting with 25L of Ashbeck and 2 Litres of Tap Water, I added some AMS and a couple of grams of Calcium Chloride to the mash and ended up with around 1:1 but I think I needed a lot more Calcium Chloride to make a difference potentially 10-15 grams to get the 0.5-6 I was originally aiming for. That said I was quite happy with the mouthfeel of the post boil sample so fingers crossed I've done enough.

Brew Day
I heated 15L of Ashbeck and mashed in at 65°c, in hindsight I could have gone 66-67 for a bit more body and depending on my results with this brew I will try mashing at a higher temp next time I brew a beer like this. As usual I stirred in until there were no dough balls and stirred it again halfway through the mash and then after mashing out I sparged with 10 Litres of Ashbeck and 2 Litres of Tap water treated with the rest of the AMS and a Campden tablet. Once all the Sparge water had been added I left it to drain through for another 20 or so and started the Boil.

Its the first time I ventured away from the 60 minute boil but I will try and be more dynamic with my boil times going forward, I added 5g of Magnum at 30 mins. At 10 minutes I scooped out 2 litres of wort and and added this to a saucepan on the stove and brought this back to the boil before adding the Lactose and Corn Sugar to the pan. At 5 minutes I returned the contents of the pan to the Kettle and gave it all a good stir.

I put the hop spider in 5 mins from the end and started running the hot wort through the chiller into the kettle to sanitise it. I've found with the counterflow chiller its best to point it in the spent grain until you see wort coming through I've noticed it spits and splutters a bit when it starts so I like to wait until I have steady flow of wort before I point it back into the kettle just in case there is old water or sanitiser in it.

Once the boil was complete I chilled it down to about 78°c and put the Hopstand addition into the hop spider and recirculated the wort through the chiller into the hop spider, I don't know if it makes a difference but in my head it does so thats how I do it. After 20 mins I removed the hop spider having done a few dunk and shakes before I the contents in the spent grain trug. I gave it a good stir and left it for 15 mins or so to settle before chilling and transferring to the FV at around 21-22°c. It looked like Pineapple juice at this point.

The gravity at this point was 1.058 and having had a quick taste it was the smoothest wort I've tasted so I am hopeful that I'll get a good smooth sour beer at the end of it all.

The Yeast was pitched dry and I put the FV in a Fermentation chamber set at 22°c.

Fermentation Activity
Once a Krausen has formed I am going to hit it with the first of two dry hops which will stay in contact with the beer for 3-4 days. The beer will stay in primary until the krausen drops at which point I will add the fruit to a fresh fermenter and transfer the beer on top it it. I'll leave it in secondary for a week or so before purging it and adding the 2nd dry hop for another 2 days or so.

At this point I will adjust the colour using the Spirulina and some blue food colouring if necessary. The original brewer adjusted the flavour using some fruit extracts at this point as well but I am not 100% sure that will be necessary for me as I am using slightly safer (in my opinion) fruit flavours then he did.

 

[Redwulf]

Summer Tryst Golden Ale

Brewday: 18/07/2021

Batch Size: 23L

Grain bill
3.5KG Maris Otter
0.75KG Vienna Malt
0.25KG Pale Wheat Malt
0.25KG Carapils

Hop Additions
15g Magnum @ 30m
25g Citra @ 15m
15g Citra @ Hop Stand
15g Amarillo @ Hop Stand
15g Azacca @ Hop Stand

50g Citra Dry Hop @ 10 Days
25g Azacca Dry Hop @ 10 Days
50g Amarillo Dry Hop @ 10 Days

Yeast
US-05

Other Addtions
1 tsp Yeast Nutrient
1/2 Protofloc

O.G 1.048 Planned – O.G 1.045

My hand has finally healed, the pergola roof is on and our lad popped round with his petrol mower to help turn the neglected wildflower meadow round the back into a lawn again. We delegated the mowing to my boy who had just spent a week antagonising the Military police on an OTC training course and I cracked on with a brew for the upcoming village music and witch-burning festival.

I consider anything less than 7% a session beer but I am reliably informed that this is not really the case for non-brewers, so I wanted something that I could drink all night and could safely give a beaker full to a friend and not start a riot. A small part of me did briefly think about turning up with a keg of my 80/87 Belgian Strong and seeing how much of the neighbouring village burned down in the aftermath but in the end I decided to brew something new at a true session beer of 4.5-4.8%

In the end I settled on a Hoppy Golden ale after watching David Heaths video on the subject and built up a recipe of Maris Otter and Vienna malt for flavour without overpowering what I expected to be quite a hoppy beer and added a bit of Wheat Malt and some Carapils for a bit of mouthfeel and head retention.

I then built up a hop profile based around Citra, Azacca and Amarillo to give a citrusy tropical vibe to the brew and for want of anything better added a bit of Magnum to give me the 40 IBUs I tend to enjoy.

My brew kit had been sat around for a few weeks so I started off by giving it all a good scrub and rinsed it all off with the hose pipe. I gather 17 litres of water for mash which was treated with half a campden tablet and 9ml of CRS which just adjusts the Sulphate to Chloride ratio of my water to a palatable 2.5:1 . I did the same with 16 litres of Sparge water. I did mess this up slightly and ended up with an 2L extra in the kettle which cost me 3 points but gave me a bit extra in the FV.

Once it had heated to 62°c I mashed in and gave it jolly good stir up and stirred again after 20 mins or so. The second mash step was at 68°c for a further 30 minutes and then a final 10 minute mash out at 74°c before Sparging.

It was a steady uneventful boil followed by a quick cool down to 78°c and the final hop addition. I then gave it all a jolly good stir and left it for 10 minutes before running through the chiller and into a fermenter at around 25°c ending up with around 23.5L of 1.045 gravity wort.

I'll dry hop this on day 10 for 72 hours before cold crashing down to 4°c and add 1/2 teaspoon of gelatine before kegging and carbonating up to about 2 volumes of CO2.

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

I consider anything less than 7% a session beer but I am reliably informed that this is not really the case for non-brewers, so I wanted something that I could drink all night and could safely give a beaker full to a friend and not start a riot.

I know what you mean - my preferred ABV has risen significantly since I started brewing my own. Unfortunately however my head for alcohol hasn't kept pace
I'm reminded of this: 3061500_700bwp.webp

 

[Redwulf]

The main problem with anything less then 5% is it gets guzzled instead of water round here.

 

[Redwulf]

Plum Porter

Batch Size: 23L

Grain Bill
3.8 KG Maris Otter
0.5 KG Munich Dark
0.25 KG Carafa Special 1
0.20 KG Torrified Wheat
0.20 KG Chocolate Malt
0.1 KG Special B

Hop Additions
15g Admiral @ 60 Mins
25g Bramling Cross @ 10 mins
25g Bramling Cross – Whirlpool Addition

Other Additions
1.5g Table Salt
8 g Calcium Chloride

3 KG Plums
.16 KG Caster Sugar
Cinnamon stick
½ Cup Orange Juice

O.G 1.054 -
Expected F.G 1.013

After a busy week off Yesterday was the last day to get this brewed ready for my pals homebrew party in September. So I measured out the ingredients and dumped 17.5 litres of water in the Grainfather and got down to it. I mashed in at 68c and it was quite a thick mash so I made sure to stir it well at the 20 and 40 minute mark.

Meanwhile I retrieved a bag of frozen plums from the Brewing supplies freezer in the garage and set them to defrost in a bowl of warm water.

After sparging I added 15g Admiral Hops, 2g Table salt and 8g Calcium Chloride. I didn't have any gypsum (must remember to add some to basket next time I order something) and it was only a 2g addition so I skipped it.

I brought wort to the boil and started the timer.

After 20 minutes I removed 500ml of Wort and placed that in a pan with 160g of caster sugar, ½ cup of Orange Juice and 1 stick of cinnamon. I brought this to the boil on the stove top and added around 1.5kg of Chopped and Stoned Plums and simmered for about 20 mins until it was stewed to a runny jammy consistancy

With 15 Minutes to go I added 25g of Bramling Cross and ½ of a protofloc tablet at 10 Mins. Thinking about clean up I added the Stewed Plums into my hop spider and then recirculated the wort through the cooler into the spider to ensure a good mix.

At the end of the boil I chilled the wort down to about 85c and pitched a final 25g addition of Bramling Cross and left it for a futher 15 mins circulating the wort through the hop spider to push as much of the plum and hop flavour out into the kettle.

Once the 15 mins was up I lifted the Hop Spider and did a gold panning motion until most of the liquid was out and then gave the kettle a good stir and left it for 10 mins to settle. Once it had settled down I used the counterflow chiller to transfer the Wort to the Fermentation Vessel at around 24c. I pitched a pack of CML Midland yeast and popped it in the cupboard and this morning I nice thick Krausen had formed.

I intend to leave it there for about a week before making a second batch of Stewed Plums which will be added to the wort in Secondary and left for another week before cold crashing and fining with Gelatin. I may at that point add some plum extract to finish it off.

 

[moto748]

I like the look of that Gumballhead, I reckon I'll have a go at that, thanks!

 

[Redwulf]

I like the look of that Gumballhead, I reckon I'll have a go at that, thanks!

No worries, it didn't last very long. I'm going to make another batch very soon I think.

 

[Redwulf]

Strawberry Milkshake IPA

Batch size: 25L

Brew Length

Grain Bill
Maris Otter 5KG
Rolled Oats 1KG
Wheat Malt 0.75KG
Carapils 0.25 KG

Hops
9g Magnum @ 30 Mins
25g Amarillo - Hopstand
25g Citra - Hopstand
50g Amarillo - High Krausen
50g Comet - Dry Hop
50g Amarillo - Dry Hop

Other Additions
Lactose 500g
Strawberry Puree 2kg

Yeast - CML Voss Kveik #1

A friend and I are having a home brew day for a few friends next week and this one was on the list for missus anyway so I figured I'd do a an extra bit for the party and a keg for the missus. Sadly I'd manually scaled some it and then managed to use the automatic scaling on top of that and made a bloody mess of it all.

Then the Mash and the Sparge got a bit stuck so I had to free this up with the paddle and then I ended up with a lot of wort. I should have adjusted the boil length but instead I just went with it and ended up with 28 Litres of wort at about 1.064.

Ended up with 29L of Wort at 1.064. After 18 hours I added the high Krausen dry hop. After 3 days I'll pressure transfer to a purged secondary with the strawberry puree and remaining dry hop already before Kegging on day 7.

 

[Redwulf]

Idaho 7 New England IPA

Batch Size: 23L

3.8KG Pilsner Malt
1 KG Rolled Oats
0.2 KG Torrefied Wheat

Hop Additions
40g Idaho 7 - Hop Stand
60g Idaho 7- High Krausen Dry Hop
100g Idaho 7 - Dry Hop

Yeast
CML Voss Kveik

O.G 1.048
Expected F.G 1.010

 

[moto748]

Redwulf, can I ask? That Gumballhead; is it supposed to be clear? I would expect so, with US-05, but mine isn't, trying it for the first time after <checks notes> 19 days in the bottle, and doesn't look like clearing anytime soon. It's a nice bright, fresh-tasting beer, though, so I'm not too bothered.

 

[Redwulf]

Redwulf, can I ask? That Gumballhead; is it supposed to be clear? I would expect so, with US-05, but mine isn't, trying it for the first time after <checks notes> 19 days in the bottle, and doesn't look like clearing anytime soon. It's a nice bright, fresh-tasting beer, though, so I'm not too bothered.

Sorry, between work and self imposed projects I've not been online much this week.

That is what mine looked like.....I did cold crash and fine it with gelatine and below is the real thing

 

[moto748]

Thanks! That's about the same as mine looked like. I don't use finings. Well, put it this way, I never have, thus far.