Tuesday, August 20, 2013

#35 - Wai-iti Belgiƫ [All Grain]

This beer was designed with the upcoming "Summer Session Beer" competition in mind. The format of the competition is that it is run at club level first where the top three beers are selected and sent forward to the finals. The competition is not BJCP based but instead must conform to the following theme:
Summer Session Beers of <4%, The beer should reflect the following - Summer in a glass. Light, refreshing, medium body, thirst quenching, balanced beer of low ABV (a lawnmower beer)
The ability of a brewer to formulate a balanced beer with sufficient body below 4% ABV is the real challenge and also prevents people from chucking in any beer that they simply had lying around the house. I had originally planned to brew a Belgian IPA and this competition gave me that opportunity. I felt that going down the IPA route was a bit much for something that is supposed to be a lawnmower beer so I went for a lighter style that suited the 3944 yeast strain I already had in my yeast bank. The Witbier strain will impart fruity flavours into the beer as a summer fermentation without temperature control will see it go to the limit of its recommended temperature range. I already had a slant of this yeast but I didn't want to use the entire slant so I took a small sample from my newly constructed inoculation loop.
Sterilising the loop before taking a sample

Unfortunately this yeast is a good attenuator resulting in a generally dry beer so the mashing temperature was increased to ensure that some residual sugars are left behind. I also included flaked oats and torrified wheat in the recipe to increase the perceived body in the beer, wits are generally cloudy so I'm not too worried about using too much wheat.

While browsing on my local brewing supply website I noticed that they had just got in stock of a New Zealand hop known as Wai-iti which has very prominent citrus fruit flavour profile. The citrus flavours will blend with the fruity esters produced by the yeast to produce a flavour similar to a fruit juice. I have used Hallertau Mittelfruh hops whose spicy, floral and hay-like flavours/aroma should counteract the excessive fruitiness from the NZ hops. Given the low alcohol and flavour in the beer I was extra careful with mash temperatures and PH to ensure the beer was as well rounded as possible before the boil. I added some Chloride and Epsom Salts along with lactic acid to add some minerals to my water which is very soft while lowering the PH into the appropriate range (5.4 to 5.6).
Measuring out water additions
I did a short protein rest for 20 minutes at 50 degrees C to reduce chill haze slightly and then ramped up to 70 degrees C for 40 minutes to try and maintain as much body as possible in the beer. There were almost 200g of hops used in this recipe with the majority of them towards the end of the boil to maximise the contributions towards flavour and aroma. The orange peel and coriander will only contribute to the fruitiness of this beer.
Chilling the muddy looking beer

Despite the murky looking beer in the previous image, the beer which flowed into the fermenter was very clear as the huge pile of hops served as quite a good filter. The OG of the beer was 1.035 which should result in a beer of approximately 3.5 to 4% depending on how far it attenuates. Once the initial fermentation has died down another 20g of hops will be added for dry hopping.



BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: Wai-iti Belgiƫ Ale
Brewer: Shane Phelan
Asst Brewer: 
Style: Witbier
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0) 

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 26.21 l
Post Boil Volume: 22.71 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 19.00 l   
Bottling Volume: 17.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.039 SG
Estimated Color: 8.1 EBC
Estimated IBU: 22.1 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 65.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 74.7 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
30.00 l               Ballymore Eustace (South Dublin)         Water         1        -             
4.00 g                Calcium Chloride (Mash 60.0 mins)        Water Agent   2        -             
4.00 g                Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Mash 60.0 mins)      Water Agent   3        -             
4.00 ml               Lactic Acid (Mash 60.0 mins)             Water Agent   4        -             
2000.00 g             Pilsner (2 Row) UK (2.0 EBC)             Grain         5        52.6 %        
500.00 g              Oats, Flaked (2.0 EBC)                   Grain         6        13.2 %        
500.00 g              Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC)         Grain         7        13.2 %        
500.00 g              Wheat, Torrified (3.3 EBC)               Grain         8        13.2 %        
300.00 g              Amber Malt (43.3 EBC)                    Grain         9        7.9 %         
25.00 g               Hallertauer Mittelfrueh [2.00 %] - Boil  Hop           10       6.1 IBUs      
20.00 g               Wai-iti  [4.00 %] - Boil 30.0 min        Hop           11       7.6 IBUs      
1.00 tsp              Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins)              Fining        12       -             
30.00 g               Wai-iti  [4.00 %] - Boil 10.0 min        Hop           13       5.3 IBUs      
35.00 g               Hallertauer Mittelfrueh [2.00 %] - Boil  Hop           14       1.7 IBUs      
20.00 g               Coriander Seed (Boil 5.0 mins)           Spice         15       -             
40.00 g               Hallertauer Mittelfrueh [2.00 %] - Boil  Hop           16       1.3 IBUs      
20.00 g               Wai-iti  [4.00 %] - Boil 0.0 min         Hop           17       0.0 IBUs      
20.00 g               Orange Peel, Bitter (Boil 0.0 mins)      Spice         18       -             
10.00 Items           Black Pepper (Boil 0.0 mins)             Spice         19       -             
1.0 pkg               Belgian Witbier (Wyeast #3944) [124.21 m Yeast         20       -             
1.00 tsp              Yeast Nutrient (Primary 3.0 days)        Other         21       -             
20.00 g               Wai-iti  [4.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days     Hop           22       0.0 IBUs      


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Light Body, No Mash Out
Total Grain Weight: 3800.00 g
----------------------------
Name              Description                             Step Temperat Step Time     
Protein Rest      Add 12.00 l of water at 54.1 C          50.0 C        20 min        
Saccrification Re Add 8.00 l of water and heat to 70.0 C  70.0 C        40 min        
Mash Out          Add 6.00 l of water and heat to 77.0 C  77.0 C        10 min        

Sparge: Fly sparge with 6.52 l water at 75.6 C
Notes:
------
Hallertauer Mittelfrueh adjusted to 2% to take into account age (2 years approx).
Wai-iti adjusted to 4% to take into account age (1 year approx). 

Mash in with 10L of water at 56C for protein rest at 50C and hold for 20 minutes.
Raise temperature to 70C(158F) with 8L of boiling water and hold for 40 minutes. 
Mash out with 7.5L of boiling water to reach 77C(171F) and hold for 10 minutes.

Sparge with 8L of water at 77C(171F)

Created with BeerSmith 2 - http://www.beersmith.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Wednesday, June 26, 2013

#33 - Seal Hunter IPA [All Grain]

I was recently given some 'Mauribrew Lager 497' yeast for my part in helping out in a recent brewing competition and my initial thought was, well, this is of absolutely no use to me whatsoever as I don't/cant brew lagers. It was pointed out to me and it can be seen on the specification that despite being a lager yeast it can actually ferment at room temperature to enhance malt, hop and spice aroma. The recipe is generally bog standard but with a fairly large dry hopping addition. 

In the end I had so much hops for dry hopping that I ran out of bags...



BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: Seal Hunter IPA
Brewer: Shane
Asst Brewer: 
Style: American IPA
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0) 

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 26.38 l
Post Boil Volume: 22.88 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 19.00 l   
Bottling Volume: 18.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.047 SG
Estimated Color: 14.2 EBC
Estimated IBU: 79.0 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 65.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 75.3 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
4.00 g                Gypsum (1 - Strike) (Mash 60.0 mins)     Water Agent   1        -             
4.00 g                Gypsum (2 - Sparge) (Mash 60.0 mins)     Water Agent   2        -             
3000.00 g             Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC)         Grain         3        67.4 %        
600.00 g              Wheat Malt, Ger (3.9 EBC)                Grain         4        13.5 %        
300.00 g              Amber Malt (43.3 EBC)                    Grain         5        6.7 %         
300.00 g              Caramel/Crystal Malt - 30L (59.1 EBC)    Grain         6        6.7 %         
250.00 g              Cara-Pils/Dextrine (3.9 EBC)             Grain         7        5.6 %         
25.00 g               Centennial [10.30 %] - Boil 60.0 min     Hop           8        29.6 IBUs     
15.00 g               Centennial [10.30 %] - Boil 45.0 min     Hop           9        16.3 IBUs     
15.00 g               Centennial [10.30 %] - Boil 30.0 min     Hop           10       13.6 IBUs     
25.00 g               Centennial [10.30 %] - Boil 15.0 min     Hop           11       14.7 IBUs     
1.00 Items            Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 mins)        Fining        12       -             
25.00 g               Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - Boil 5.0 min    Hop           13       4.9 IBUs      
25.00 g               Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - Boil 0.0 min    Hop           14       0.0 IBUs      
20.00 g               Centennial [10.30 %] - Boil 0.0 min      Hop           15       0.0 IBUs      
2.0 pkg               Mauribrew Lager 497 (Mauri Yeast Austral Yeast         16       -             
50.00 g               Cascade [5.50 %] - Dry Hop 14.0 Days     Hop           17       0.0 IBUs      
50.00 g               Centennial [10.00 %] - Dry Hop 14.0 Days Hop           18       0.0 IBUs      
50.00 g               Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - Dry Hop 0.0 Day Hop           19       0.0 IBUs      


Mash Schedule: JJJ Batch Sparge Light
Total Grain Weight: 4450.00 g
----------------------------
Name              Description                  Step Temperature       Step Time       
Mash In           Add 14.11 l of water at 164. 153.0 F                60 min          

Sparge: Batch sparge with 2 steps (4.79l, 14.44l) of 175.0 F water
Notes:
------
Bottled 68 deg 5 gal 4 oz. sugar

Created with BeerSmith 2 - http://www.beersmith.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#30, #31, #32 - Triple Brew Day for Barrel Project [All Grain]

The 10kg+/ bucket grain allocations for the 3 brews
The NHC recently acquired a bunch of old whiskey barrels from a friendly man in northern Ireland. These barrels had reached the end of their life and were several decades old. Most of the barrels were distributed to the brewing clubs around the country with each club brewing their own recipe. Each barrel took approximately 200L of beer to fill and most already had about 1L of 60% whiskey still in the barrels to keep them wet. Given that my location overlaps between two clubs I ended up contributing beer to two barrels. The first recipe with (South Dublin Brewers) is an imperial porter which has plenty of brown malt, to help make up the volume for the barrel and as I love porters, I volunteered to produce 40L of imperial porter for that barrel. The second barrel with (Capital Brewers) is going to be an imperial stout with a large emphasis on roasted malt and early hopping. Both recipes were light on late hop additions as hop aroma was expected to be non existent after ageing in the barrels.

The Mash tun at its absolute limit!
Paint strainer bag to for the pellet hops
The amount of grain used to make three 10% beers is like nothing I have ever dealt with before. I had anticipated this and bought an electric drill to aid the grinding process but even at that it took hours! I ground the grain the night before the brew day to reduce the workload. I mashed in one of the brews that night to speed the brewday the following morning but at that point I had not planned to do all 3 brews in the one day. My mash tun was push to its absolute limits, I even had to add pieces of wood beneath it to ensure it was level to get more water into it. I used a large paint strainer bag in an attempt to contain the pellet hops used for the brew. For the first boil I started heating the wort immediately after the first runnnigs but this turned out to be a mistake as the highly concentrated wort must have caramelised and eventually scorched on the element towards the end of the boil. Luckily my kettle has two elements so I was able to finish the boil but I didn't heat the wort for subsequent brews until all the wort was in the kettle.


BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: South Dublin Brewers - Imperial Porter
Brewer: Shane Phelan
Asst Brewer: 
Style: Russian Imperial Stout
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0) 

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 28.13 l
Post Boil Volume: 22.88 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 19.00 l   
Bottling Volume: 18.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.108 SG
Estimated Color: 104.1 EBC
Estimated IBU: 105.9 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 60.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 69.5 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
8000.00 g             Pale Ale Malt (4.9 EBC)                  Grain         1        71.1 %        
1000.00 g             Amber Malt (118.2 EBC)                   Grain         2        8.9 %         
1000.00 g             Brown Malt (114.3 EBC)                   Grain         3        8.9 %         
500.00 g              Chocolate Malt (738.8 EBC)               Grain         4        4.4 %         
500.00 g              Crystal 55 (108.3 EBC)                   Grain         5        4.4 %         
250.00 g              Black Malt (985.0 EBC)                   Grain         6        2.2 %         
40.00 g               Magnum [14.10 %] - Boil 90.0 min         Hop           7        50.8 IBUs     
150.00 g              East Kent Goldings [7.20 %] - Boil 20.0  Hop           8        55.1 IBUs     
2.0 pkg               Safale American  (DCL/Fermentis #US-05)  Yeast         9        -             


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Single Batch Sparge [Shanes AG]
Total Grain Weight: 11250.00 g
----------------------------
Name              Description                  Step Temperature       Step Time       
Mash Step         Add 26.13 l of water at 166. 150.0 F                60 min          

Sparge: Batch sparge with 3 steps (Drain mash tun, , 13.70l, 2.07l) of 168.1 F water
Notes:
------


Created with BeerSmith 2 - http://www.beersmith.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: Capital Brewers - Imperial Stout
Brewer: Shane Phelan
Asst Brewer: 
Style: Russian Imperial Stout
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0) 

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 28.13 l
Post Boil Volume: 22.88 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 19.00 l   
Bottling Volume: 18.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.103 SG
Estimated Color: 225.1 EBC
Estimated IBU: 115.3 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 60.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 69.5 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
8000.00 g             Pale Ale Malt (9.7 EBC)                  Grain         1        74.8 %        
1000.00 g             Amber Malt (232.9 EBC)                   Grain         2        9.3 %         
700.00 g              Roasted Barley (1765.8 EBC)              Grain         3        6.5 %         
500.00 g              Chocolate Malt (1455.3 EBC)              Grain         4        4.7 %         
300.00 g              Black Malt (1940.5 EBC)                  Grain         5        2.8 %         
200.00 g              Crystal 55 (213.4 EBC)                   Grain         6        1.9 %         
30.00 g               Magnum [14.10 %] - Boil 90.0 min         Hop           7        39.5 IBUs     
150.00 g              East Kent Goldings [7.20 %] - Boil 20.0  Hop           8        57.0 IBUs     
150.00 g              East Kent Goldings [7.20 %] - Boil 5.0 m Hop           9        18.8 IBUs     
1.0 pkg               Irish Ale Yeast (White Labs #WLP004)     Yeast         10       -             


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Single Batch Sparge [Shanes AG]
Total Grain Weight: 10699.99 g
----------------------------
Name              Description                  Step Temperature       Step Time       
Mash Step         Add 24.97 l of water at 163. 150.0 F                60 min          

Sparge: Batch sparge with 3 steps (Drain mash tun, , 14.61l, 1.77l) of 168.1 F water
Notes:
------


Created with BeerSmith 2 - http://www.beersmith.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Saturday, March 30, 2013

#29 - East India Porter [All Grain]

I'm a big fan of porters and after seeing this brew-day and the enthusiastic tasting notes from one of the blog's that I follow, I was convinced to give it a go. I had tried to make a hoppy porter on a different occasion but that turned out to be a lot more 'choc' rather than 'hop'....probably due to lower than anticipated AA vales. Rather than make the same recipe again, which I don't like doing as I always try something new, I felt that this recipe would allow me to do something different. I bought 200g of foil packed EKG hops from the home brew store but noticed that they were 2011 harvest. I used the hop age tool in BeerSmith to make a (conservative) estimation that the AA values had degraded from the initial 5.5% to 4.5%. I erred on the side of caution as I would rather underestimate the bitterness than overestimate as there is always going to be plenty of flavour from the malt regardless.

Boiling the starter
Dark Starter

I made a 1L all grain starter with half the ingredients of my normal 2L starter with the yeast from a WLP005 slant. Initially I had decided on this yeast as it was a British Ale yeast and that seemed to be most appropriate given the historic style. On further investigation I noticed that this yeast is very highly rated for robust porter's and English brown ales which was a convenient coincidence. 

I have also started to make minor adjustments to my water profile in the last couple of brews. As I am a complete novice with adding these chemicals, I tend to be conservative with the size additions and generally aim for either a 'hoppy' or 'malty' profile to keep things simple. I'm using the EZ Water Calculator to help make these adjustments and once you know your water profile the rest is just a matter of plugging in the numbers to get a desired profile. 
Weighing out the mineral additions.
New mash paddle!
I weighed out everything using a cheap jeweller's scales which I got off ebay. Its able to weigh things with a 0.1g resolution which is accurate enough for this type of thing. The dominant addition was Calcium Chloride which generally enhances the perception of maltiness in a beer. Lidl were recently socking a range of Hurley's in an array of sizes from kids to adults and I thought that the smaller kids size hurl would make a perfect mash paddle! I drilled holes in it to make it easier to stir and the difference when mixing the mash with the paddle v the conventional plastic stirrer was huge. Not bad for €8.    

100g of EKG at 90min and another 100g later on!
I don't think I recall ever adding so much hops so early in a boil as I did this morning with 100g at the start of the 90 min boil and another 100g over the remainder of the boil. The original recipe called for some of the hops to be dry hopped but given the comments from the tasting I didn't bother and chucked in the last 20g of hops at 0 min instead. Overall the beer tasted extremely bitter after the boil but I expect this to mellow out a bit over the next month of fermenting in the bucket and bottles. Looking forward to trying this.


BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: East India Porter
Style: Specialty Beer
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0) 

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 27.96 l
Post Boil Volume: 22.71 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 19.00 l   
Bottling Volume: 17.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.059 SG
Estimated Color: 105.2 EBC
Estimated IBU: 83.9 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 60.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 69.0 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
30.00 l               Ballymore Eustace (South Dublin)         Water         1        -             
4.00 g                Calcium Chloride (Mash 60.0 mins)        Water Agent   2        -             
1.00 g                Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash 60.0 mins Water Agent   3        -             
4000.00 g             Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC)         Grain         4        64.5 %        
1000.00 g             Brown Malt (430.0 EBC)                   Grain         5        16.1 %        
500.00 g              Wheat Malt, Bel (3.9 EBC)                Grain         6        8.1 %         
300.00 g              Amber Malt (56.0 EBC)                    Grain         7        4.8 %         
200.00 g              Black Malt (Stout) (1333.0 EBC)          Grain         8        3.2 %         
200.00 g              Chocolate Malt (1050.5 EBC)              Grain         9        3.2 %         
100.00 g              Goldings, East Kent [4.50 %] - Boil 90.0 Hop           10       57.8 IBUs     
50.00 g               Goldings, East Kent [4.50 %] - Boil 30.0 Hop           11       18.9 IBUs     
30.00 g               Goldings, East Kent [4.50 %] - Boil 15.0 Hop           12       7.3 IBUs      
20.00 g               Goldings, East Kent [4.50 %] - Boil 0.0  Hop           13       0.0 IBUs      
1.0 pkg               British Ale (White Labs #WLP005) [35.49  Yeast         14       -             


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Single Batch Sparge [Shanes AG]
Total Grain Weight: 6200.00 g
----------------------------
Name              Description                  Step Temperature       Step Time       
Mash Step         Add 18.00 l of water at 166. 154.0 F                60 min          

Sparge: Batch sparge with 2 steps (Drain mash tun, , 18.67l) of 168.1 F water
Notes:
------
1 .5 year old EKG hops, reduced AA from 5.5 to 4.5%, a conservative reduction. 
Gypsum into mash only. 
Calcium Chloride to be split evenly between mash and sparge.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Sanitising Oak Chips

As part of my Coffin Ship Survivor imperial stout, I was planning on adding 50g of oak chips for a week to add a subtle oak flavour to the beer. I learnt my lesson making Oak chips myself....do NOT whittle them manually with a knife. The next time I will just use a wood planer to get the shavings off the pieces of oak barrel I have at home. After reading a multitude of guides various forums and websites I decided to steam the oak chips to sanitise them. Soaking them in spirits seems to be one of the more popular methods but I didn't really want any of those flavours in this beer. I might steep them spirits for a future barley wine or something similar but not this brew.


I emptied the oak chips onto a sieve and then sieved them over the sink to get rid of any small pieces that were in the contents. I brought some water to the boil in a pot and put the sieve on top of the pot but not submerged in the water. I used a lid that was slightly smaller than the pot to allow some of the steam out the sides and to cover the oak chips fully. I left them steaming for 30 minutes to ensure that any nasties were annihilated. The kitchen started to smell like a sauna with the smell of the hot, wet wood chips.  

Oak chips added directly to the wort

The initial fermentation of the imperial stout had finished a couple of days ago and it was ready to take the oak chips directly after the steaming. I was considering a hop bag to keep all the oak chips together but I still don't have any means of weighing down hop bags so I just dumped all of them in. Assuming they are still floating in a weeks time I will just siphon underneath them to get the wort into the bottling bucket.

Sunday, March 3, 2013

#28 - Coffin Ship Survivor Imperial Stout [All Grain]

I was really happy with how my previous imperial stout turned out despite its below average marks (31/50) in a recent brewing competition. I am down to my last two bottles so I decided it was time to make a new version to try out a few different things. The new version is going to use different hops, contain alterations to the malt bill and also will have oak chips added after the initial fermentation as ceased. I'm calling this one the "Coffin Ship Survivor" in reference to the coffin ships that would have brought Irish immigrants to America. The boat that would have brought them there would have been made of oak and the ancestors of those that would have survived the journey would have drank beer made with the Columbus and Cascade hops which give this beer its flavour.

Chocolate & Pale Malt
The 11kg Grain Bill

The malt bill is quite large for this brew as when I was originally making the recipe my efficiency was consistently in the 50% region or so I thought. Realising my errors in calculation I calculated my efficiency today to be 63%, I guess it would have been higher only I had to make a thicker mash so that I could fit all the grain into my mash tun.
Hop Bill
In the previous imperial stout I put in over 100g of hops at flame-out and dry hopped with another 100g.  Given that imperial stouts are meant to be aged for a while, this action is a bit of a waste of hops as the aroma would have diminished significantly in the several months that the beer would have been ageing. Instead I am putting in the hop additions earlier at 10 and 5 minutes with a small amount at flame-out to use up anything I had lying around. 

The Boil




BeerSmith 2 Recipe Printout - http://www.beersmith.com
Recipe: Oak Aged Imperial Stout 
Brewer: Shane Phelan
Asst Brewer: 
Style: Imperial Stout
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0) 

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 25.34 l
Post Boil Volume: 22.71 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 19.00 l   
Bottling Volume: 17.00 l
Estimated OG: 1.092 SG
Estimated Color: 105.4 EBC
Estimated IBU: 79.7 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 50.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 57.5 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
7000.00 g             Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC)         Grain         1        60.9 %        
900.00 g              Oats, Flaked (2.0 EBC)                   Grain         2        7.8 %         
900.00 g              Wheat Malt, Ger (3.9 EBC)                Grain         3        7.8 %         
750.00 g              Caramel/Crystal Malt - 15L (30.0 EBC)    Grain         4        6.5 %         
750.00 g              Vienna Malt (6.9 EBC)                    Grain         5        6.5 %         
500.00 g              Barley, Flaked (3.3 EBC)                 Grain         6        4.3 %         
500.00 g              Black Malt (Stout) (1333.0 EBC)          Grain         7        4.3 %         
200.00 g              Chocolate Malt (1050.5 EBC)              Grain         8        1.7 %         
60.00 g               Columbus (Tomahawk) [10.00 %] - Boil 60. Hop           9        48.4 IBUs     
30.00 g               Columbus (Tomahawk) [10.00 %] - Boil 30. Hop           10       18.6 IBUs     
60.00 g               Cascade [4.50 %] - Boil 10.0 min         Hop           11       7.9 IBUs      
60.00 g               Cascade [4.50 %] - Boil 5.0 min          Hop           12       4.8 IBUs      
10.00 g               Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 0.0 min      Hop           13       0.0 IBUs      
10.00 g               Columbus (Tomahawk) [10.00 %] - Boil 0.0 Hop           14       0.0 IBUs      
1.0 pkg               Irish Ale Yeast (White Labs #WLP004)     Yeast         15       -             
50.00 g               Oak Chips (Primary 7.0 days)             Flavor        16       -             


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Single Batch Sparge [Shanes AG]
Total Grain Weight: 11500.00 g
----------------------------
Name              Description                  Step Temperature       Step Time       
Mash Step         Add 22.05 l of water at 169. 152.0 F                60 min          

Sparge: Batch sparge with 3 steps (Drain mash tun, , 13.29l, 4.02l) of 168.1 F water
Notes:
------
Columbus hops adjusted to 10% Alpha from 14% as they are more than a year old. 
Cascade hops adjusted to 4.5% Alpha from 5.5% as they are more than 5 months old.

Created with BeerSmith 2 - http://www.beersmith.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunday, February 24, 2013

All Grain Starter

I'm going to say this now, I love the process of brewing. This ranges all the way from the recipe formulation, buying ingredients, making the starter and the brew-day but not bottling upon which I hate. This was one of the main reasons I eventually went all grain as I wanted more challenges and more things to do for a brew day. This should go some way to explain why I am going to the extra hassle of making an all grain starter when I could just as easily use DME instead.
Approx 400g of pale malt.

Heat water to 152F


I weighed out 400g of crushed maris otter malted grain, bear in mind I have over estimated the amount needed to take into account my normally poor mashing efficiency of 50%. Using the kettle and a thermometer I heated 1.5L of water to 155 degrees F and added it to the grains. The temperature dropped a little bit after adding the water to the grains to I brought it back up to 152F on the stove. I recently purchased an infra-red thermometer for quick and clean temperature measurement. If you look at the image below, you can see how far out it is! I wont be using it for any precise measurements that is for sure...

Infra red vs Digital ?
Oven Thermometer
While raising the temperature of the mash to the correct temp, I preheated the oven to approx 150F or as close to that as I could get. I don't  trust the temperature dial on my oven so I also put a metal thermometer into the oven with the pot of grain. I set the timer for 60 minutes and left it to do its thing.I had to adjust the oven temperature dial a few times to get the temperature to settle around 155F. After an hour I took out the grains and rinsed them with 1L of 165F water. This left me with approximately 2L of wort with an OG of 1036 which will climb a bit after boiling.
Boiling the starter with 5g of Hops
Beware of boil overs when bringing the wort up to the boil. I added a handful of hops to the boil as a few times I have had starters smell a bit sour before pitching. The reasoning is that the antibacterial properties of hops tend to act as a preservative keeping the starter fresher for longer. I also like that it makes the starter making process a bit more like a brew day too. :) 
Non contact measurement
 While the wort was boiling I put water in my conical flask and brought it to the boil with the funnel and stir bar in it also. The boiling water and steam will sufficiently sanitise the equipment so that it can take the wort which was strained as it was added.  This was added to a sink full of cold water for cooling and I was able to keep a (very rough) eye on the temperature of the wort with the infra red thermometer. This allows me to get an idea of the temperature without having to worry about sanitising a thermometer. When the wort had cooled to pitching temperatures I poured out a small amount into the slanted vial of yeast. I then shook it for a few minutes to dislodge the yeast from the slant. That mixture was the pitched into the conical flask and put onto my stir plate for a minimum of 48 hours.
Mixing wort in the slant