-
Notifications
You must be signed in to change notification settings - Fork 1
/
Copy pathbrewlog_2012-02-25.txt
125 lines (83 loc) · 4.09 KB
/
brewlog_2012-02-25.txt
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
== Brew day ==
Rikard helped out. Very convenient to have an extra set of hands. We
started around 11:30 and were completely finished (including cleaning
up) around 15:10.
=== Recipe mods ===
I used Safale Fermentis S-05 dry yeast instead of White Labs
California Ale. Instead of American Crystal 20L, I used Weyermanns
Carared (EBC: 40-50). And instead of American Crystal 60L, I used
Muntons Crystal Malt (EBC: 120-140).
Also replaced the 1.5g of LME with 1.2kg of DME.
I bumped up the Ginger from 30g to 40g and the Honey from 225g to
250g. Not sure why. =)
=== Brew ===
Steep and boil went smoothly. No hickups.
Cooled to 20C in 15 minutes or so. Strained to bucket and poured in a
couple of litres of preboiled and cooled water. We still came out a
few liters short so we panic boiled 3 litres extra and cooled it to
20C with the wort chiller. Bumped up to 10.5l.
OG: 1.062 @ 20C
I suspect that lack of aeration was the cause of the previous batch
(Double Your Pleasure IPA) ending up with such a high FG. With that in
mind I sanitized an extra bucket and poured the wort back and forth a
few times. It sure looked aerated to me.
Yeast hydration was well planned this time around. Sprinkled the dry
yeast over water at ~25C. Stirred it a bit 15 minutes later. Poured
over wort 15 minutes later.
=== Primary fermentation ===
Inspected fermentor at 01:30, i.e. roughly 10 hours after pitching
yeast. Lots and lots of bubbles.
== Sample ==
Took a 100 ml sample 2012-03-10, i.e. 2 weeks after brew day.
SG: 1.009
I suspect that'll end up being our FG.
The beer had a nice dark yellow colour. Pretty hazy, but I took the
sample with my wine thief and must have stolen quite a bit of yeast,
so no worries.
The smell was very similar to that of Sjätte Tunnan's mead. There was
a certain spicyness there, but I didn't really interpret it as
ginger.
The taste was more beery. A clear bitterness, similar to what I'd
expect from a wort sample prior to pitching yeast. Guessing it needs a
couple of weeks on bottle to get a good balance.
Very promising.
== Dry hopping (2012-03-13) ==
Boiled a hop bag. Filled with 20g of Chinook whole hops. Dropped into
fermenter. Finger's crossed. Also took the opportunity to do another
hydrometer reading.
FG: 1.009
== Bottling (2012-03-17) ==
About 11 litres in bucket. Dissolved 51 grams of sugar in 3 dl of
water. Put roughly 1 dl into a 5l party keg and filled it up directly
from fermentation bucket. (loving the spigots, they rock).
Transfered the rest into a spigot-less bucket holding the remaining 2
dl of disolved sugar. Siphoned to bottles. 5.33 litres in total: 1x1l,
6x0.5l and 4x0.3l.
I didn't bother tasting it at this point since I have a bit of a cold
and would probably not really pick up any flavours.
== Sampling (2012-04-06) ==
I've tried several bottles by now and this is a delicious beer. Would
love to drink it on a warm summer day.
The colour is a dark yellow, a bit red, almost orange. Pours with a
very nice head. The beer is very hazy and I should perhaps try
clearing it with gelatine next time around.
The smell is very distinct. Slightly gingery, but mostly spicy. Again,
it reminds me a lot of the mead at Sjätte Tunnan in Gamla Stan.
In the taste I find the same spicy notes, but to a lesser degree, and
given more balance by the hop bitterness. There's a lot of juniper in
there.
My main issue with the beer is that I'd like it to have a bit more of
a malt character. Guessing that the early honey addition only served
to make the beer dry. Could be a good idea to use less honey and more
extract next time.
Still, this is definitely the best brew so far. Very tasty. No
off-flavours. Very different.
== Note on carbonation (2012-05-26) ==
A month ago, or so, I had some friends over for some homebrew and
Street Fighter 2 on SNES. We finished the 5l mini keg in 3 hours or
so. It was _delicious_.
I remembered after writing the previous notes that I accidentally
poured out some of the sugar solution from the keg, so carbonation was
way lower than on bottle. Similar to a very weakly carbonated british
ale. Turns out that that was a good thing. The beer was very
drinkable.