Sunday 21 October 2007

Hookey Street - The Finished Product

I brewed Hookey Street a while ago, this is the finished product it's 6% and a proper dark winter warmer.

Thursday 18 October 2007

Glug

This morning the kitchen is very noisy, all four airlocks are going crazy - everything that I brewed yesterday has got off to a flying start, the krausen on the AG brew is nice and clean, hopefully a sign that I managed to avoid too much trub getting in there.

Wednesday 17 October 2007

The Storm After The Calm

Well after not brewing for a while, I got stuck in today and did an all-grain brew, a kit brew and two wine kits.

The AG brew was Grumpy Bum, I altered my usual recipe to add in some carapils which should give the finished beer a bit of a better head and head retention, I also went back to using Oregon Fuggles rather than Northdown I preferred the taste from the Fuggle.

The Grain Bill & Hop Schedule was as follows :

4130gm Pale Malt (MO) 86.40%
410gm Crystal Malt 8.58%
240gm Cara-Pils 5.02%
85gm Oregon Fuggles [4.70 %] (90 min) Hops 40.3 IBU
35.00 gm Styrian Goldings [3.30 %] (15 min) Hops 5.4 IBU

I also mashed a little hotter this time, targeted 68 degrees got 67.5 this is to try to give the brew a little more 'body' and maltiness, previously I'd mashed at 65 degrees and it may have left the beer a little 'thin'.

I also got my head around hot and cold breaks with whirlfloc today, boiling hard with both elements when the whirlfloc tablet went in at 10 mins from the end then chilling right down to 20 degrees to get a good cold break, there was lots of trub left behind and the wort that I transferred to the fermenter was quite clear.

The mash and boil were both 90 minutes. This beer should be around 4.2% and 45 EBU's and a nice deep golden colour. The OG of this beer is 1042. Fermented with Gervin English Ale Yeast.

The kit that I brewed was a Brupaks Almondbury Old, not tried this one before but have read good things about it, I replaced the kit yeast with Safale S04.

I also started off 2 wine kits both California Connoisseur, Liebfraumilch and Cabernet Merlot, these only took 10 mins each to do and produce great wine for about £1.50 per bottle.

This is a picture of the 'trub' that was left behind in the boiler, filtered out by the hop bed, I wonder if it is this that has been giving me chill haze problems with some brews?



The wort that went into the fermenter was nice and clear.







The end result of the day, from left to right, Brupaks Almondbury Old kit, Grumpy Bum AG brew, Cabernet Merlot, Liebfraumilch.

Tuesday 9 October 2007

It's been a while...

Well it looks like things might just be settled for me enough to do a brew a week tomorrow, i'm down to my last ~90 pints so to make sure I have some properly conditioned beer i'll probably brew an all grain, most likely "Mr Grumpy Bum" and also do a kit to turn it into a double brew day, just need to decide which kit to do...?