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Amarillo Cascade pale ale first time doing a first wort hop addition.
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Talking of firsts. I've only been brewing 23 years. Last weekend I did my first ever turbo cider. This weekend I brewed my first ever wheat beer. Next weekend (or the following) I'll be adding cherries to that, so that will be my first ever fruit beer. And only my second ever yeast starter in that. And sitting with my first ever blow off tube, as opposed to air lock. And I'm buying a fermentation fridge soon. The adventure continues!
 
FG 1.041 so 2 points below what I expected but if it finishes at 1.010 then it’ll still be 4.1%.

My new immersion chiller is phenomenal! My old one (which snapped mid chill back in November) took about an hour to get it down to 25C, this one had the wort at 16C in less than 35mins! Just to plug the seller, it’s this one: https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https://www.ebay.co.uk/ulk/itm/332561002417

Same as the one I bought ! Best purchase ever !


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Same as the one I bought ! Best purchase ever !
I couldn’t believe it. I went away to do some cleaning and left it for just over half an hour. When I came back it was 16C!

Great value as well, I worked out it would cost me about £25 and a fair bit of effort to make my own so £35 for someone to do it for me to a higher standard was a no brainier!
 
Chinook IPA. Wanted to make a SMaSH but I didn't have enough of one malt. So I threw some leftover malts into the recipe and started brewing. Four gallons of leftover IPA, and it cleared out my pantry a bit.
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Today I brewed James Morton's Belgian Blonde Bombshell. One of my smoothest brew days yet. All numbers hit, and the starter smelt incredible. Hopefully the beer retains some of the same properties.
 
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Bottled a Muntons Connoisseur Yorkshire Bitter 6.3% with a First Gold hop tea and dry hop. Then put on a Muntons Irish Style Stout, no hops added to this but 1kg BE and I grated 100g of coco ball (first press of thre coco bean, the outlaws send it to me from St Lucia) boiled, steeped and then sieved. Also added 150g of Frank Coopers marmalade mixed into boiling water. OG was 1051 and I re-pitched the MGJ M10 from the Yorshire Bitter and lastly, fitted a blow off tube. It tasted very chocolaty in the trial jar but as the pulp of the marmalade went in I'm hoping the Orange flavour will pick up during fermenting and conditioning.
 
Today? Nothing, and I'm getting twitchy!

For the next week I am looking at temperatures down to -4*C, winds gusting between 49 and 22mph and an "Amber Warning" for Snow in place for most of today!

We expect to be heading for France within the next five weeks and I need to get brewing so that I don't come home to a dry garage in June!

My suggestion that I knock out a Kit brew met with a colder reception from SWMBO than the weather outside, plus the comment "I thought you had bought all that grain so that you didn't need to spend money on kits!"

How the hell was I supposed to know that we were going to have nearly a month of rain and high winds, followed by two weeks of freezing weather and high winds?

Plan "A" is still two more 23 litre brews before the end of March.

Needless to say, the reasoned argument I practised for my plea to purchase of a Grainfather has been abandoned on the basis that there are some really sharp knives in the kitchen and I have to sleep sometime! :thumb:
 
Busy night of bottling tonight. I bottled the final tranche of imperial stout (bourbon barrel chunks and cacao nibs), a brown ale into PB and bottles (sample tasted quite like Newky Brown, which might not necessarily be a great thing but I guess it’s at least in style....) and two gallons of mead. Also racked a third gallon of mead off the yeast for bulk aging.

Either ready to drink or bottle conditioning, I now have 10L PB and 20 bottles of brown ale, 20 bottles of NEIPA, 10 bottles and 2 mini kegs of amber ale, 40 bottles of imperial stout and 24 bottles of Brewferm Abdij. Great to be at critical mass of beer and across a few different styles, but now I have empty fermenters. I’ve still got the grains to do a Belgian Dubbel, a Weiss and an Altbier.
 
Today? Nothing, and I'm getting twitchy!

For the next week I am looking at temperatures down to -4*C, winds gusting between 49 and 22mph and an "Amber Warning" for Snow in place for most of today!

We expect to be heading for France within the next five weeks and I need to get brewing so that I don't come home to a dry garage in June!

My suggestion that I knock out a Kit brew met with a colder reception from SWMBO than the weather outside, plus the comment "I thought you had bought all that grain so that you didn't need to spend money on kits!"

How the hell was I supposed to know that we were going to have nearly a month of rain and high winds, followed by two weeks of freezing weather and high winds?

Plan "A" is still two more 23 litre brews before the end of March.

Needless to say, the reasoned argument I practised for my plea to purchase of a Grainfather has been abandoned on the basis that there are some really sharp knives in the kitchen and I have to sleep sometime! :thumb:
Surely SWMBO will let you Brew inside.....

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Had a bash at the Guinness Extra clone from Wheeler's book last night, based on the recipe in the later editions of the book and not the one in mine which appears to be incorrect.

First time doing BIAB and did full volume version, did squeeze the bag a bit and also poured the wort back through the bag before the boil.

8.6 litres of water

1kg pale
130g flaked barley
130g roasted barley

7g Target @ boil

First time using liquid yeast - WLP004

Tried to mash for 60 mins at 150F which gave a pre boil gravity of 1.043, and then boiled for 90. Forgot about a sample and so ended up trying to take one from a jar that looked like it was mostly trub so not sure if it's much to go off (was 1.069). Got a full DJ, pitched at 20C and then into brew fridge at 20C although it's early days with it so I'm not sure how accurate that is but it's bubbling away nicely this morning.

Think the full volume BIAB might be the way forwards for me just seemed a lot smoother and simpler, might have another do tonight depending on how the footy goes this afternoon.
 
Used the "Craft Brew 50" book for the malt bill for a Siren Undercurrent clone (70% Maris Otter, 15% malted oats, 7% wheat malt, 7% carahell, 1% caraaroma) then hopburst Simcoe and Amarillo in it - 1:1 ratio at 50g in the last 15 minutes, 60g hopstand and another 80g dry hop, fermented with US05. Hoping for a big citrus / pine sessionable pale ale. Looks good so far.
 
Impulsive Smash.
Was bored so threw a Calypso Smash in.
4.5 kg MO Pale.
500g Munich Malt
200g Oats.
20g Calypso 60 mins
40g At 10
40g hopback

Aiming for 22l in FV.

Just heating up mash water now.

Edit... just realised, not technically a smash is it as I’ve used an additional malt...

Doh !... lets call it an impromptu Pale ale then ?

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Did the GH 60 minute IPA last night and the American IPA from the next page this morning, both doing full volume BIAB. Both of them had the same grain bill (1.3kg MO) and got boil gravity 1.040 and OG 1.060 last night and boil 1.044 and OG 1.064 this morning, but haven't made my mind up whether that's good/bad/indifferent yet.
 
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