Archive for category Home Brewing
Homebrew – Moved to Secondary, added oak chips
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Home Brewing on July 25, 2010
The lid on one of my plastic fermenter buckets is not the best. It does not make a seal so I am always hesitant to leave my beer in it for longer than a week. This is a good reason to move my beer to the secondary carboy, which will give me a cleaner looking final product.
I decided to take this as an opportunity to pitch 1/2 oz (about 10g) of french oak chips I had sitting in my bag of ingredients. I could not begin to guess how old they are, but being wood I doubt they go bad.
The gravity reading was a perfect 1.010. By the time I return from Japan this beer will be ready for bottling… Though I doubt I will have the energy to do this after the long flight….
Brew Day – Mild Manner PM
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Home Brewing on July 19, 2010
It feels like its been a very long time since my last homebrewed beer. So before I leave on vacation I figured I would get another English Mild ready. By the time I come back it should be ready for bottles and shortly thereafter ready for drinking.
Here is the recipe
- 3.75lbs of LME (Draught)
- 1 cup of Light DME
- 1 cup of Demerara Sugar
- 1/8lbs of Black Patent Malt
- 1lbs of Vienna Malt
- 0.5lbs of 2-Row Malt
- 0.5lbs of Brown Malt
- Tettnanger Hops @75min
- Liberty Hops @75mins
- 1/2tsp Irish Moss
- 1/2tsp Yeast Nutrient
- 11g S-05 American Ale Yeast
As this was an attempt at a partial mash, I sparged the grains as best as I could though I doubt I really gained much extract from this attempt. The sparge was done at 80c, for 30 minutes. According to Beersmith my efficiency is still below 40% which is terrible.
Everything else went according to plan. Pitched the yeast dry at around 26c. Original gravity was 1.036.
Bottled Mystery Cider
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Experiments, Home Brewing on July 12, 2010
I completely forgot about this one. Its been sitting in its fermenter since the end of May and I finally got around to bottling over a month later. This is the very first (and possibly last) beverage I have created by simply dumping the mixture straight on top of the yeast cake of recently bottled beer. If this turns out to be a drinkable cider I may start doing this for all of my finished beers.
I primed it with about a 1/2 cup of demerara sugar and managed to squeeze about 20 pints and 10 bottles of this odd-ball cider out of it. The final gravity was 1.000, giving it in ABV of about 5% and a very low calorie count of about 160kcal a pint.
Next week I will pop one of this concoctions into the fridge and try it out.
Bottling Day – Molasses Porter and English Mild
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Experiments, Hobbies, Home Brewing on May 29, 2010
Just a quick update on my last two home brews. I racked both of them today which required me to use every single bottle I own. I could not begin to tell you how many bottles I got, but its probably around 70 pints between the both of them.
Too be honest I kind of rush both of them and did not take an accurate measurement for the priming sugar. It should have worked out to about 1/2 cup of dextrose each, but I kind of eye-balled it.
Molasses Porter –
- Born May 2, Secondary May 16th, Bottled May 29
- Original Gravity: 1.056
- Final Gravity: 1.020 (S-33 SafAle yeast sucks)
- ABV: 4.7%, Calories/Pint: 250kcal
- Cost per pint: ~$1.00-$1.25
English Mild –
- Born May 8, Secondary May 16th, Bottled May 29
- Original Gravity: 1.034
- Final Gravity: 1.009 (S-04 SafAle yeast rocks)
- ABV: 3.2%, Calories/Pint: 150kcal
- Cost per pint: ~$0.70-$0.80
Finally I will give both 7-14 days to bottle condition. I have so much beer downstairs right now I do not even know what to do with it.
And here is the real crazy thing… I created an experimental cider today too. I used 2 gallons of cranberry cocktail, 1 can of frozen pineapple juice concentrate and topped it with water. Worst of all I just pitched this on top of the yeast cake from my molasses porter! What was I thinking!? Original gravity is 1.038 and god have mercy on my soul for this monstrosity I am creating.
Brew Updates – Dark Tower Graff Bottled and Molasses Porter moved
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Hobbies, Home Brewing on May 16, 2010
Today I spent the last two hours cleaning, bottling, cleaning, racking, cleaning and finally more cleaning. All for the sake of beer.
I decided to rack the Dark Tower Graff to bottles early for two reasons. First was that I want to have them ready for drinking before the long weekend, which happens to be the next weekend. Secondly I wanted my other glass carboy freed up so I could move the stagnant Molasses Porter into it.
The Dark Tower Graff read a final gravity of 1.010 which is no change from when I moved it to its secondary one week ago. The ABV is 5.5% and its 230k/cal a pint. I managed to get 37 and a half pints of graff from this batch which works out to about $1.10 a bottle. That is a guesstimate at best as I did not track how much the ingredients actually cost me for this batch. That 1/2 pint will most likely be ‘tested’ tonight as there is no point in carbonating a half-bottle as there is too much air space, which will leave it flat anyway.
I still have high hopes for the Molasses Porter. I am hoping that racking it to the secondary will awaken the yeast and get me at least a few more points of gravity. I want to see it hit a final gravity of 1.010 to 1.014, but that is a long way off in the world of home brewing. This will be getting at least two weeks in its new home as I will not be racking anything next weekend, rather I will be busy drinking my work.
Brew Update – English Brown and Molasses Porter
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Home Brewing on May 16, 2010
Today I took the specific gravity for the English Brown Ale and the Molasses Porter.
The English Brown had a near targeted gravity of 1.012/2.9% ABV (shooting for a 1.008-1.010). I also took the time to move it to a secondary as I felt the primary it was sitting in did not have a very good seal on it. I made sure to suck up some of the trub from the bottom so there was some active yeast in kicking around for its duration in the secondary.
The Molasses porter on the other hand was not looking so good, sitting at an SG of 1.020/5% ABV, which is quite of bit off from the goal of 1.010/6%. I left it where it was and gave it a good hard swirl to stir up the yeast, but I doubt it will have any effect. I may move it to a secondary in June or I may pitch some yeast nutrient to try to awaken this batch of lazy yeast.
Brew Day – English Brown Ale and Graff to Secondary
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Home Brewing, Photography, Recipes on May 8, 2010
It’s like a horrible rash I cannot rid myself of. The Brewer’s Itch. I now have three batches of homebrew sitting downstairs waiting which all need to be bottled in the near future. That is nearly 60L (or 120 pints) of potential beer sitting in my basement.
Today I began my Brew Day by moving the Dark Tower Graff to the secondary fermenter and taking an specific gravity reading. It seems to have attenuated to 1.010 which is exactly what I was aiming for.
Right on target!
Following that I cleaned up the primary and began brewing my next batch which is an English Brown Ale.
Ingredients -
- 3.75lbs of Pilsner LME
- 0.5lbs of Light DME
- 0.5lbs of Demerara Sugar
- 0.5lbs of 120L Crystal Malt
- 0.25lbs of Black Patent Malt
- 0.5oz of Fuggles @ 60 min
- 0.5oz of Fuggles @ 30 min
- 0.5oz of Fuggles @ 15 min
- 0.5oz of Fuggles @ 5 min
- 1tsp of Irish Moss @ 10 min
- 1tsp of Yeast Nutrient @ cold break
- SafAle S-04 English Yeast
Steps -
- Steeped the grains for 30 minutes in 7L of water at 75c
- Added the sugars and malt extracts to the pot and brought to boil
My favorite part - Watching a pot boil
3. Added hop additions at the times listed above, babysitting the boiling wort, stirring frequently
I love the smell of hops in the morning.
4. Removed from the water and placed into an ice bath to bring the temperature down to 45c
Achieve a quick cold break prevents "chill haze" which creates a cloudy beer
5. Moved into the fermenter, topped off with cool water and pitched the SafAle S-04 English Dry yeast onto the wort at around 26c.
The Original gravity was 1.034 which is exactly what I was aiming for. The beer is a bit darker then I wanted, but that is not a big deal. I plan to give this one 3 weeks in the primary and then straight into bottles for 2 weeks of bottle conditioning. The total cost of this batch was around $25.00.
I swear this is the last batch I am making for a long while. I really hope I have enough bottles…