T.O.R’s Brewday

[Theoriginalrich]

Today was the day I popped my BZ cherry. ‘Er indoors took the boy to football which helped me start early.
Strike water heated while breakfast was taken, Golden Promise was mashed in. At that point I realised I needed more water so I added 1.5l to the sparge and hoped it would be enough (should of used a bigger pot to heat the liquor).
Started the boil and added my hops at the right time and cooled to 80c for the whirlpool. I then found my protflac, I’d forgotten it. Rather than leave it out I added it it and started the whirlpool. It wasn’t long before I realised things weren’t right. The whirlpool arm wasn’t doing anything. Both the tap and circulation pump were blocked. After cooling I had to used my syphon to transfer the wort to the FV, that didn’t work out too well as the flow was too slow. Eventually I had to tip the wort out though a sieve.
It’s sitting in the fermentation fridge sitting @19.5c and when I put a torch to the side I can see proteins (maybe) floating in suspension. I assume they’ll drop after a cold crash. I just have to wait and see.
Grain bill was as follows
4500g Golden Promise
10g Nelson Sauvin @60 mins
20g NS @30 mins
20g NS @10 mins
20g NS @whirlpool
1/2 Protoflac @whirlpool (obviously wrong)
1 Campden liquor addition.
18l strike water
9.5l sparge
OG 1.060 (was hoping for 1.047)
18l in FV
I know I’ve made mistakes, not using enough water and the protoflac timing.
I’ll learn from these and future brewdays will get easier, I hope. Just need to sit back, drink beer and keep everything crossed todays effort tastes ok. I’ll be happy with that.

 

[Theoriginalrich]

Update.
The beer finished at 1.014, by my calculations make it 6.03%. I’m having a little QC as it an anniversary or my mums passing. It’s still very young but promising, I’m quite pleased with it and looking forward to trying it again in a few weeks.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

One of my first brews was a nelson sauvin smash, I found it a little too 'wine' like for me at first but after a few months it was absolutely lovely.

 

[Theoriginalrich]

Yeah I’m finding that, it’s nice not to have a home brew ‘twang’ to my beer. I’m looking forward to using the BZ more and brewing better beer. Onwards and upwards!

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Whats up next?

 

[Theoriginalrich]

I did a CML TT Landlord kit on Sunday and everything went well. OG ended up 1.052 instead of 1.043, I’m not too sure what happened but I’m not losing any sleep over a few points.
I’m planning the next brew using Golden Promise again with some Citra and Mosaic. I’ve got Harlequin and Centennial as well so things might change.

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Nice one, Citra and Mosaic would make a lovely beer, not used Harlequin at all, in fact not heard of it!

 

[Theoriginalrich]

Neither had I but I won a hop raffle, saw it and thought it looked interesting. I read this Harlequin Hops: Substitution, Flavor, Aroma - Beer Maverick.
after reading it again I might use this instead.