Almost a brewing birthday

My first AG recipe from some years ago. Recently found "the brew book".
A simple ale which ended up with low efficiency due to:
- some first runnings on the floor.
- poor temp control with the electrim boiler/mashtun.
Attenuated out pretty poorly but tasted great (of course!).

How much does it cost to go All Grain

(with apologies to those on the biab offenders register)
I have been playing with a Google spreadsheet to look at some options for new systems. Hope fully the following link will le you see the calc's for a basic (need), moderate (mine) and bling (nice) system.



Won't scroll sideways so link.....

The Reset Ale

Kegged on Saturday having only gone down from 1042 to 1014.  The dry hops have come through quite grassy which I hope will tone down a bit with time.

Also the Windsor yeast not only pooped out early but also was a pretty ordinary floculator - hence a fairly cloudy beer went into the keg which again hopefully will drop out quickly.

Otherwise should be a good, light, quaffer.

Naming the New Ale

A bit obscure for those who don’t work with me but the mildish brew shall be known as the Reset Ale.

A strangely compelling brew.

Slack Brewer

When I looked at the blog it seems I have been a bit tardy on the brewing front. Well I have finally done another ale - a sort of mild basically Pale malt with a smidge of wheat malt (5%) and roast barley (2-3%) and a strange combo of fuggles and simcoe for hopping.
Did at least take a few of the rig photos during the brew.


















The Boiler

And the mash lauter tun.

Following the high temp ferment of last brew I decided to try Jamil's recirculation of the wort through the chiller and back into the boiler.

Got it down to 18C with the assistance of an HLT full of ice which I ran through the outside of the cwc later in the piece - uses a lot less water but next time will make the ice in ice cream containers rather than milk jugs as the ice didn't melt much. Also a submersible recirc pump for the ice water would be good (rather than gravity).

Produced a fine looking and tasting brew with a plug of fuggles in for a dry hop to boot.

Looks pretty good in the fermenter but OMG the fridge had been left shut and turned off for a few months - I have never seen so much $%^$%ng mold in my life! A major clean was required...

What's inside those sexy taps?

Dumb brewer trick (or hot day brewing)
With the new fridge I now have a spare fridge for fermenting so brewing during the hot weather is now possible. Brewed a stout on Saturday when it was only 38C on the back verandah.
I kegged the ale during the mash and decided to pitch onto the yeast cake - normally not a problem.
Ran the wort off through the wort chiller and decided to save the water by putting it on the garden via some sprinklers - mistake. The back pressure meant the cooling water flow was way less than I thought and becasue it was so hot when I checked the temp of the wort coming out I thought it was cool enough and that the sticky thermometer on the CWC outlet was lying when it said 28-30C (picking up the high ambient thought I).
When I put the fermenter in the fridge with the thermocouple strapped on it said 29C - shit. Fridge on flat out didn't pull it down quick enough and the ferment went balistic overnight before I got it down to 22 or so. 5 or more litres of wort, yeast etc out the air lock and lord knows what impact on the flavour (fusels anyone).
Time will tell and a leason learned.

Australia Day Brew
Did another amarillo ale on Australia Day.
8kg of Pale, 500g of wheat malt, 200g of crystal for target of 45litres at 1044.
Bittered to about 34ibu with amarillo and flavour and aroma hop additions.
The brew system worked without fault which is great. Currently in the fridge at 17C having belted away with a couple packs on Nottingham yeast.
Should be in a keg on the weekend which is just as well as I emptied the last keg this afternoon in the big fridge move. Next weekend's brew is a Guinish Stout.

Have finally done temporary setup in the big fridge. Some fairly ugly sisalation on the inside of the glass to keep the sun out (still on the back verandah)

and a tap mount inside the middle door with some foam below to minimise the cool air loss.

The New Fridge
Santa has been especially kind this year and now have a new (2nd hand) fridge - 3 door commercial variety.



A bit OTT at 2m long and 1.9 high but should comfortably allow for the 3x45 litre kegs.

Still not sure where to put it or where to fit the 3 celli taps Santa also bought.

Such problems.

The new Celli Taps
Well the new taps from Craftbrewer arrived the day after ordering and are a revelation.

Click forward for beer, if gas is breaking out adjust the compensator on the side. Need some extra head? Push back and a fine Guiness head is dispensed.

Some new toys for the Brewery



 

It's been a While...
Have had a few issues which have precluded brewing for a while including a recently diagnosed coeliac partner. O'Brien's Gluten Free Lager is apparently better than nothing but is fairly bland (sweet and low hop) and expensive -$80 a case. I guess I will be rereading Milletman's posts to make my own for the SO.

The Lager ended up pretty average - the slight autolysis went away with lagering but so did the snappy hop flavour and aroma I was after - back to ales for me!

To this end an ale with amarillo hops should go down this weekend. To save a bit of time I am intent on employing the new instantaneous hot water service for preheating the required mash and sparge water. Adelaide tap water tastes OK at the moment without filtering and the HW can be set to 60C which should save a good 40 minutes on heating mash water and another a bit more on the sparge (although sparge water normally heats in parallel with the actual mashing)

Moved the Lager to Keg
Finally did it - but had to bottle a couple dozen stubbies as only had a 45 litre keg available.
A hint of autolysis in the yeast sludge which I hope wont make it into the beer flavour - leaving it on yeast cake for three weeks not so bright even if it is cold then lagering.
Kegged beer can lager for another week or so then gas it up.
Bottles are out of the fridge to gas then will return them to lagering after a week or so.

The Lager is lagering
Have finally put the lager in the fridge down stairs for a few weeks of lagering at low temp.

Will rack into a big keg (45 litre) once the yeast drops out. I guess that will be the weekend. I think I have more than 45 litres so may bottle a few - first time in about five years.

On the espresso front have started stripping and cleaning bits of the Bezzera. A couple descale soak and flushes of the big (13 litre) boiler and a few semi blocked pipes off and cleaned. Managed to overtighten and break part of the steam valve - luckily its interchanable with the water valve which to me is superfluous.

Oh no - a new vice...
I bought a big old Bezzera 2 Group Espresso Machine on Ebay. Needs a bit of a clean up but will leave that until after my birthday (just in case I break something).














Yes it does have a top and both sides.

Diacetyl Rest and a cool Toy
The lager is in adiacetyl rest at ~17c to deal with any precursors to diacetyl (image!). Will hold for a day then let it cool back to 11c and think about racking into a 45 litre keg for lagering in the studio fridge.
Cool toy - check this out at Makezine.