#18 - Ronk Torpedo [All Grain]

As I mentioned in brew #17, I got a lot of brewing presents for Christmas and this enabled me to buy the necessary equipment to transition to all grain brewing. My previous brew kettle was too small for full boils so I got a new boiler, mash tun and wort chiller. 

New All Grain Equipment and Ingredients

Another of my favourite beers is the Sierra Nevada Torpedo IPA. It has a relatively high alcohol content so can only really be drank sparingly. I only ever buy it as a treat or as the last beer of the night for 'dessert'. I found a clone for this recipe on one of the American brewing forums but I think that recipe is originally from BYO.

Mashing the grain

I first started by heating my strike water in the boiler and got all my grains ready. I poured 3 litres of boiling water from the kettle into the mash-tun to preheat it so that there wasn't too much of a temperature loss. 

Once my strike water was ready I emptied the mash tun and poured in the water. I then started adding the grain slowly while stirring frequently to ensure there weren't any dough balls or clumping of the grain. Once it was all added I gave it a good stir from the bottom to the top and into the corners to ensure an even temperature distribution. 

I then checked the temperature in each of the 4 corners and in the middle and the temperature was approximately 68 Degrees C (~153 degrees F).  I poured boiling water on the inside of the mash-tun lid which had cooled down in the mean time and closed the box. I put a folded heavy blanked over the box to ensure better insulation, this proved to be a useful addition as quite a lot of heat could be felt when putting my hand in between the blanked and the lid. 

Checking Mash Temperature

After a half an hour I checked the temperature of the mash and again after an hour. It didn't lose any more than 1 degree C/F over the mashing period. I was quite happy with this result as I would often read about brewers losing several degrees over the duration of their mash. 

I first got a jug, opened the tap slightly and began vorlaufing the first runnings. BeerSmith indicated that an initial sparge of 1 litre would be necessary using this liquid. Impressively it was quite accurate, as soon as I had accumulated 800ml of water, the wort had cleared sufficiently. I then gently (so not to disturb the grain bed) added this liquid back into the mash as it was quite cloudy and contained lumps of grain. 

I then opened the tap again to drain the first runnings into my old brew pot. I couldn't drain it into my boiler as it was in the process of heating the sparge water. Once the they were drained I closed the tap and emptied the sparge water into the mash-tun as I was doing a batch sparge as opposed to fly sparging. I have the mash a good stir from top to bottom to ensure all the grain got well mixed to wash out any residual sugars. 

First Runnings in the Boiler

The photo opposite shows the boiler containing the first runnings from the mash-tun. I left the sparge water to sit in the mash-tun for another 20minutes before collecting the rest of the wort and adding it to the boiler. 

The final boiling volume was just over 26 litres with about 3 litres being lost to evaporation and 4 lost to break material left in the end of the boiler. After finding the pre-boil gravity I found my mash efficiency to be about 61% which I was relatively happy with given that it was my first attempt at all grain. I will probably add an extra 500g of grain in future to counteract this inefficiency.  

This was my third brew in 3 days and yesterday I made an extract brew. The difference in the smell of the wort from grain compared to malt extract is unbelievable. The smell was fantastic and seemed very fresh. The whole process of mashing and boiling seemed physically cleaner overall as there was no messing around with grain bags for steeping or malt extract spilling all over the place. Usually the kitchen was a sticky mess after an extract brew but not after the all grain brew. All this was contained within the mash tun which was the only messy additional item to clean. Cleaning it in the bath seemed the easiest thing to do as I could use the shower head to wash down the sides etc.....

Ginger Beer, Ronk Island IPA and Ronk Torpedo IPA

The post boil gravity of the wort was 1071 so I would expect an alcohol content of at least 8% if the beer attenuates down to 1010 as it should with the WLP001 liquid yeast. The adjacent image shows the 3 brews from the last 3 days. I added a blow-off tube to the last brew as all grain batches are apparently known for their vigorous fermentations and the fermentation bucket is also quite small.

This recipe can be seen below:

Recipe: Ronk Torpedo IPA TYPE: All Grain
Style: American IPA
---RECIPE SPECIFICATIONS-----------------------------------------------
SRM: 19.0 EBC SRM RANGE: 11.8-29.6 EBC
IBU: 64.2 IBUs Tinseth IBU RANGE: 40.0-70.0 IBUs
OG: 1.068 SG OG RANGE: 1.056-1.075 SG
FG: 1.014 SG FG RANGE: 1.010-1.018 SG
BU:GU: 0.946 Calories: 427.1 kcal/l Est ABV: 7.1 %
EE%: 62.00 % Batch: 19.00 l      Boil: 26.21 l BT: 60 Mins
Total Grain Weight: 6.80 kg Total Hops: 148.00 g oz.
---MASH/STEEP PROCESS------MASH PH:5.40 ------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
6.00 kg               Pale Malt (2 Row) Bel (5.9 EBC)          Grain         1        88.2 %        
0.50 kg               Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (78.8 EBC)    Grain         2        7.4 %         
0.15 kg               Munich Malt (17.7 EBC)                   Grain         3        2.2 %         
0.15 kg               Wheat Malt, Ger (3.9 EBC)                Grain         4        2.2 %         
Name              Description                  Step Temperature  Step Time       
Mash In           Add 20.23 l of water at 72.5 66.7 C            60 min          
---SPARGE PROCESS---
>>>>>>>>>>-RECYCLE FIRST RUNNINGS & VERIFY GRAIN/MLT TEMPS: 22.2 C/60.0 C
Batch sparge with 2 steps (0.93l, 14.35l) of 75.6 C water
---BOIL PROCESS-----------------------------
Est Pre_Boil Gravity: 1.057 SG Est OG: 1.068 SG
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
35.00 g               Magnum [14.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min         Hop           5        53.5 IBUs     
0.25 tsp              Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins)              Fining        6        -             
28.00 g               Crystal [3.50 %] - Boil 5.0 min          Hop           7        2.1 IBUs      
28.00 g               Magnum [14.00 %] - Boil 5.0 min          Hop           8        8.5 IBUs      
---FERM PROCESS-----------------------------
Primary Start: 01/01/2012 - 4.00 Days at 19.4 C
Secondary Start: 05/01/2012 - 10.00 Days at 19.4 C
Style Carb Range: 2.20-2.70 Vols
---NOTES------------------------------------
Mash at 67 C,Ferment at 20 C,Dry hop for 10 days to 2 weeks

#17 - Ronk Island IPA [Extract]

My favourite type of beer at the moment is the IPA (India Pale Ale). I like it because it is relatively light in terms of malt flavour and heavy in terms of hop bittering and aroma. One brand of commercial IPA which has got my attention again and again is Goose Island IPA. I decided to make a clone of this beer using a modified extract recipe from one of the American brewing websites. It was modified due to availability of hops and grain in my main home brew supplier.  

Ingredients for Kit, Extract and All Grain Brews

Over Christmas I got plenty of brewing equipment and vouchers so I decided to finally make the transition to All Grain brewing.

This brew would probably be my last extract brew before I exclusively transition to all grain. The adjacent photo shows the ingredients for 3 brews (1016, 1017 and 1018) and pretty much represents my progress in learning brewing over the last 8 months.

Yeast Starter, Irish Moss and Hops

I made a yeast starter for this brew using Danstar Nottingham yeast. I made this with a small amount of malt extract and hops. The dust from the pellet hops can actually be seen on the krausen on top of the starter. 

I boiled the brew with my new boiler which is just a fermenter bucket with a 2kW (240V) kettle element and a hop strainer. The 2kW element is sufficient to achieve a good rolling boil but it takes quite a while to reach this point. A great improvement would be the addition of a second element to speed up the boiling process and then turn it off once a rolling boil starts. This addition would save nearly an hour on brew-day! The hop strainer consists of a copper pipe covered in holes which is then connected to a tap in the side of the boiler. This strainer simply does not work if pellet hops are used, I tried to use it and not even a drop came out it was blocked too badly. It works perfectly when only leaf hops are used. 

Steeping Grains

 The recipe calls for 3 different types of grain, 2 of which need to be mashed (Wheat and Munich Malt) and 1 which only needs to be steeped (Crystal). The recipe doesn't say that they need to be mashed so they are really only contributing some flavour. I decided to try and get a bit of conversion going and left all the grain steeping for an hour at approximately 67 degrees C (152 degrees F). 

As can be seen from the photo, the colour is beginning to change due to the contribution from the crystal grains. I found that the other grains were making the beer cloudy more than anything else which was probably mainly starch as there was not enough base grain for a good conversion to take place.  

Once the grains were steeped for an hour I brought the wort back up to boiling and started the timer for the hop additions. The hops were added as per schedule along with the Irish moss. I think I added too much Irish moss as there was a huge amount of break material generated while the wort was cooling. As stated earlier, the hop strainer was instantly blocked from the volume of material which must have taken up between 4 and 5 litres at the bottom of the boiler. I siphoned out the wort into the fermenter and it eventually got blocked once the wort drained to the same level as the break material. I got 18 litres instead of the anticipated 19 litres so I have updated the boiler losses in BeerSmith to take this into account.

The recipe for this brew can be found below:
Recipe: Ronk Island IPA TYPE: Extract    Style: American IPA

---RECIPE SPECIFICATIONS-----------------------------------------------
SRM: 21.6 EBC SRM RANGE: 11.8-29.6 EBC
IBU: 66.0 IBUs Tinseth IBU RANGE: 40.0-70.0 IBUs
OG: 1.060 SG OG RANGE: 1.056-1.075 SG
FG: 1.014 SG FG RANGE: 1.010-1.018 SG
BU:GU: 1.093 Calories: 427.1 kcal/l Est ABV: 6.1 %
EE%: 70.00 % Batch: 19.00 l      Boil: 26.21 l BT: 60 Mins
Total Grain Weight: 4.20 kg Total Hops: 105.00 g oz.
---MASH/STEEP PROCESS------MASH PH:5.40 ------
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
0.50 kg               Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (78.8 EBC)    Grain         1        11.9 %        
0.35 kg               Munich Malt (17.7 EBC)                   Grain         2        8.3 %         
0.35 kg               Wheat Malt, Ger (3.9 EBC)                Grain         3        8.3 %         
---SPARGE PROCESS---
Remove grains, and prepare to boil wort
---BOIL PROCESS-----------------------------
Est Pre_Boil Gravity: 1.050 SG Est OG: 1.060 SG
Amt                   Name                                     Type          #        %/IBU         
3.00 kg               Light Dry Extract (15.8 EBC)             Dry Extract   4        71.4 %        
37.00 g               Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min     Hop           5        42.7 IBUs     
38.00 g               Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 30.0 min         Hop           6        15.2 IBUs     
1.00 tsp              Irish Moss (Boil 20.0 mins)              Fining        7        -             
22.00 g               Fuggles [4.50 %] - Boil 15.0 min         Hop           8        5.7 IBUs      
8.00 g                Cascade [5.50 %] - Boil 15.0 min         Hop           9        2.5 IBUs      
---FERM PROCESS-----------------------------
Primary Start: 01/01/2012 - 4.00 Days at 19.4 C
Secondary Start: 05/01/2012 - 10.00 Days at 19.4 C
Style Carb Range: 2.20-2.70 Vols

#14 - 60 Minute IPA (Continually Hopped) [Extract]

Ingredients for first extract recipe

After brewing with kits and experiments I finally moved up the ladder to extract brewing. I purchased a small 4 gallon stock pot and finally got round to using BeerSmith to its potential! My first brew was initially meant to be a Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA clone based on this recipe but none of the Irish home brew stores had all the hops so I had to substitute. I think most hops were substituted quite well other than the Amarillo Hops which seem to be quite unique. I also had to get a slightly different type of grain (Crystal 60L) for the same reason as the hops. I'm thinking that with the amount of substitutions it is no longer a clone. :)

Steeping the grains, Crystal 

Initially I brought the water up to 65 degrees and put 

in the grains to steep for around 20 minutes. As my stove is so slow to heat the water, I was able to turn it down to the lowest output and that kept the temperature relatively constant. The colour change from a couple of minutes of steeping the grains can be seen in the adjacent image. 

After steeping, I removed the grains and didn't sparge them although I have read in several places that you should, so I might do that the next time. I then brought the water to a boil which took AGES due to the poor cooker. The length of time that it takes to bring it to a rolling boil really made me understand while all the yanks are using propane burners or huge elements in their kettles. It really is a time saver to have a decent source of heat.  

Once boiling, the endurance test began. The recipe calls for the wort to be continuously hopped for the full 60 minutes. I had two timers going, one for the total 60 minutes and the other which went off every minute to signal a hop addition. The idea behind this is to add a few pellets/cones every minute so that you end up spreading out the whole lot over 60 minutes. I was extremely paranoid about a boil-over so I had 2 tea towels ready to grab the handles and take it off the head at the first signs of boiling over. Thankfully the boil-over never really happened, probably due to the length of time it takes for the cooker to bring the wort to the boil.  

Once the 60 minutes had elapsed, I took the pot off the head and lowered the pot into a sink of cold water. I then ran down to my local store and got 2 bags of ice which I then dumped into the pot. The ice is surprisingly effective at getting the wort down to pitching temperatures. I have seen arguments about putting ice about whether it is a good idea or not but it is safe to assume that the ice is completely sterile as otherwise people would be getting sick when consuming it with their drinks.

High Krausen!

It took about 5 minutes for the wort to cool once the ice was added so I then transferred it to a freshly sanitised fermenter through a couple of sieves. There was a lot of debris in the wort due to the large amount of pellet and whole hops so the sieves got clogged repeatedly. I topped up the fermenter to the 19L mark with cold tap water and pitched the yeast. I had previously made a 1L starter with a sachet of Safale US-05 and some malt extract. Due to my experience of using kits I wasn't familiar with the necessity of using a blow-off tube.....It was necessary this time.....for several days in fact! Part of the problem was due to the fact that the capacity of the fermenter was only 23L (as opposed to the normal 30L) so the head-space was quickly filled with Krausen. It is due to reactions like this that I have added this  brewing t shirt  to my Christmas list. :)

#12 - Brewers Choice Traditional IPA [Extract]

Since my original coopers IPA in brew #3 had completely run out I decided it was time for another IPA. I so impressed with the process of making the Weissbier in brew #11 that I went with another Brewers Choice kit. When making kits you never have any experience of steeping grains (at least not initially) but this IPA had several types of grains to be steeped and a couple of types of hops. They were all contained in their own tea bag things but you could smell that "IPA smell" from one of the grain bags and I was really impressed with that. I didn't realise that certain types of grain could have such an affect on the taste.

Please excuse the apparent filth of the cooker but it was rusting before I moved in here. :P  I have the grains and hops steeping in a pot of boiled water which is sitting on a wooden board to keep in some of the heat. This steeping is done 3 times. The coopers malt extract is also heating up in the back along with a Alexander's Pale Kicker which I later dumped as it was old and smelt disgusting.

When bottling the brew I used dextrose for the fist time without a bottling bucket. If there is one method that makes the misery of bottling worse then this has to be it. It was an awful mess, when adding the dextrose to the beer, it foamed out of the bottles. When adding the dextrose first it then foamed meaning it took twice as long as it required waiting till the foam died down. I was also conservative with the amount I put in with slightly less than 1 teaspoon. I opened a bottle earlier in the week and it wasn't carbonated yet which has quelled my previous worry that the whole batch would start exploding. : /

I will update this as the picture changes.


Stats:
Started - 28.8.11
Racked - NA
Finished - 08.09.11
Bottled - 08.09.11
Code - 1012
Yeast Brand - B.C Yeast
Yeast Code -  DZB 6G
Y-Temp -  22.0
Beer/Product Type -   Brewers Choice Traditional IPA
Malt/Sugar Type - 1.5kG Coopers LME Amber
Volume -  23.0 L
OG - 1058 
FG -  1017
Proof  - 6.00 (Including 0.5% Priming)

#3 - Coopers IPA [Kit]

While getting into brewing I was simultaneously getting into craft beer. In fact it was during a few drinks in one of  my favourite pubs, Mulligans, where I decided to start brewing. Previous to this my only real taste of anything out of the ordinary was an occasional Erdinger, Paulaner or Hoegaarden.  I enjoyed these beers immensely of course but regarded them as a treat rather than something I would drink frequently. I was hoping to achieve an Erdinger-type taste with brew #2 and it was fine flavour-wise...Yet by the time it came to drinking it I had already been frequently drinking a massive range of hoppy beers while it was conditioning. I felt it tasted very bland (which I now unfortunately think of Erdinger now too) after experiencing the roller-coaster of flavour from the craft beers.

Getting to the point.... this was why I decided to brew an IPA which at the time and still is now, my favourite type of beer. Given that I was getting a bit snobby with my tastes I didn't want to settle for the "standard" coopers ale yeast and went for an apparently fancier 'Safale US-05'. I chose to use 1kg of dry malt extract which wasn't a bad decision but I feel that a future brew using 1.5kg of liquid malt extract would make a better brew with a higher alcohol content.

This is an image of the beer after 2 weeks in bottles. I was blown away by the taste and head retention after such a short period of time. This brew was one of the best kits of I made and one of the few I would make again repeatedly for a delicious session beer. I found that the hop flavour definitely faded over time. The last remaining bottles after a period of about 4/5 months seemed very lightly hopped when compared to the original taste I remember from the first month.

Stats:

Started - 13.5.11
Racked - NA
Finished - 16.5.11
Bottled - 16.5.11
Code - 1003
Yeast Brand - Safale US-05
Yeast Code - 022013IWB
Y-Temp - 24.5
Beer/Product Type -  Coopers Selection IPA
Malt/Sugar Type - Spraymalt Light 1kg
Volume -  24.0
OG - 1042
FG - 1016
Proof  - 4% (Including 0.5% for priming)