Big Kenny - Turned out good

This is a pint of Big Kenny that I brewed back on 31st January, it's in perfect condition right now, and it's crystal clear. I think that this is my favourite of the beers that I've made to date, It's certainly going to be a regular in my tap (aka the garage). It'll be next on the to brew list after my SNPA clone which I now have all of the ingredients for, so hopefully that will be brewed tomorrow.

Brewday : Largs Thistle 80/-

Yesterday I managed to achieve 4 things that I've wanted to do for a while

1. Brew a Scottish Heavy, an 80/- (80 Shilling)

2. Do a brew of which all of it will go to bottle

3. Try a 60 minute mash

4. Try a 60 minute boil




The recipe that I used for this one was 'tweaked' from a fellow home brewer (thanks Mysty)

Brew length - 25L
Target OG - 1.046 (based on 75% BHE)
EBU ~30
60 min 69 degree mash
60 min boil

Brewlength - 25L
Target OG - 1.046 (based on 75% BHE)
EBU ~30
60 min 69 degree mash
60 min boil

Grist
4600gm Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3.0 SRM) Grain 83.33 %
240gm Amber Malt (22.0 SRM) Grain 4.88 %
240gm Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 4.88 %
240gm Wheat, Torrified (1.7 SRM) Grain 4.88 %
100gm Chocolate Malt (450.0 SRM) Grain 2.03 %
Hops
50gm Fuggles [5.50 %] (60 min) Hops 25.3 IBU
20gm Fuggles [5.50 %] (15 min) Hops 5.0 IBU
Other
1.00 items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
Yeast - Gervin English Ale

Originally I'd gone for just 4100gm Pale but concerned that I'd drop efficiency with a shorter (60 min) mash I upped it by 500g.

I had a great brewday, by only mashing for 1 hour and boiling for 1 hour I got my brewday down to 5 hours, which will help with the evening brews that I do. I needn't have worried about the efficiency, I got 25L at 1.052 which is a 76.7 brewhouse efficiency, I average 75%. The wort was a nice rich dark colour which I expect to be packed full of character.

This batch has been brewed to be bottled, so in a couple of week's I'll have 40 odd bottles of Largs Thistle 80/- conditioning.

About the name, I wanted to get the word 'Thistle' in there somewhere with the Thistle being the National Emblem of Scotland, when I looked into it I found an interesting story.

It is claimed that the Thistle became Scotland's emblem after the battle of Largs in 1263. Legend has it that during an attempted invasion of Scotland by Norsemen, the Norsemen tried to surprise the sleeping Scottish Clansmen. In order to move more stealthily under the cover of darkness the Norsemen removed their footwear. But as they crept barefoot they came across an area of ground covered in thistles and one of Haakon's men unfortunately stood on one and shrieked out in pain, thus alerting the Clansmen to the advancing Norsemen.

I think that's a great legend, so Largs Thistle 80/- it is!

I got (and 'borrowed') the above from HERE where there is lots more information.

SNPA clone

I had been reading for a while about how nice a beer Sierra Nevada Pale Ale is so, last weekend I went out a bought six 330ml bottles, well it was only fair to give it a good test! I really liked it, I served it quite cold and found it to be wonderfully bitter with a really prominent hop aroma and flavour. After some research on Jims Home Brew Forum. I found that the hops used are Magnum, Pearle and Cascade.

I'm going to have a try at cloning this beer hopefully next week.

This will be the recipe, i'm just waiting for some of the ingredients to turn up.

Brewlength 25L
Estimated OG 1.056
Estimated IBU ~40
Estimated SRM ~9
66 Degree Mash - 90 Mins
Boil Time - 60 Mins

5400gm Pale Malt Maris Otter Grain 91.5%
400gm Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 7.0%
100gm Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 1.5%
25gm Pearle [6.90 %] (60 min) Hops 14.5 IBU
25gm Magnum [11.00 %] (60 min) Hops 25.6 IBU
30gm Cascade [6.80 %] (10 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep)
50gm Cascade [6.80 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep)

Fermenting at 18 degrees with US-05

Friday Night...at last!

After a manic week at work and hardly any ale in the week I've been looking forward to this Friday night. This is a half-pint sampler of the (not quite ready yet) Wezerection Easter Ale, I'm very pleased with it, it's got real thirst quenching qualities, a lovely dry finish and a cracking aroma, the elderflowers have come through a treat, they actually need to mellow a for while, looking at my notes from when I brewed this in April 2007 it took a month to come good, this isn't that far off. It had 30g Styrians at 15 minutes along with 50g dried Elderflower also at fifteen minutes and a further 40g Styrians steeped after the boil for 45 mins once the wort had hit 80 degrees. I'm looking forward to tapping this keg for real in about two weeks I think.

Other good things that have happened today, managed to acquire some Magnum pellets (courtesy of a fellow home brewer) and also managed to get an order in for some Cascade and some US-05 yeast, all of this means that I'm looking good to go on an SNPA clone brew late next week. I might try to fit another batch of Big Kenny in before that though, maybe Sunday? I also ordered a bottling stick to try to make me enjoy bottling, I hate bottling this had better work, I need to start bottling more of my beers!

Brewing Again (Randy Sparrow)

After the success that was Randy Sparrow I've decided that I want another keg of it, so I've brewed it exactly as I did before :

25L Brewlength
Target OG 1.046 at 75% efficiency
Target IBU ~40
13L Mash Liquor, 90 Min Mash at 67 Degrees
90 Minute Boil

4400gm Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3.0 SRM) Grain 89.80 %
250gm Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 5.10 %
250gm Wheat, Torrified (1.7 SRM) Grain 5.10 %
57gm Challenger [7.10 %] (90 min) Hops 39.1 IBU
30gm Fuggles [5.50 %] (15 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep)
30gm Fuggles [5.50 %] (0 min) (Aroma Hop-Steep)
1 Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs SafAle English Ale (DCL Yeast #S-04) Yeast-Ale

This evening brewing is thirsty work so the brew is to be accompanied by a few pints of Big Kenny

I was origninally going to do a high gravity (1.090)version and diluting to 50L in my newest aquisition, courtesy of Steve F (cheers) a 66L coolbox but as yet I haven't got around to re-sealing the ball valve so that will have to wait.

Brewday : Red Sky Ale

With my heart set on producing a beer with good malt characteristics with a deep red colour I brewed 25L of Red Sky Ale. The hope was that by adding to a base of Marris Otter pale malt a reasonable amount of Crystal Malt (7%) and small amounts of Chocolate Malt and Roasted Barley (both 1.5%) I'd get what I'm after. As you can see from the trial jar at the end of the brew colour wise it turned out a bit darker than I thought although it is definitely red! I’ll see how it turns out but I might ease off or drop the Roasted Barley next time.

I overshot my target OG of 1.046 and ended up with 25L at 1.050, I've tried to bitter this one to around 36IBU using 55g of 6.8aa Challenger (a great hop) and following the pleasing results with "Big Kenny" of using a citrus aroma hop in a complex malt beer I've gone with 20g each of Styrians and Amarillo. St Peters do a beer called Ruby Red Ale, which use Styrians as the aroma hop, I’ll be pleased if it's anything at all like that.

It's fermenting away as it should be after pitching 11g safale s04.

An update or few...

It's been a while since I last posted for one reason or another. I've been quite busy brewing and bottling though!

Since my last post I have brewed and bottled Big Kenny v2 which seems to taste exactly the same as v1 so thats good, the bottles that I am sending for Sampling are currently say in the beer fridge cold conditioning along with the 30 or so pints that made it into a King Keg. I won't find out until April what the tasting panel at the brewery think of it the worst that'll happen is I'll get constructive feedback so It's worth a punt!

Randy Sparrow turned out lovely, this is a picture of the finished beer, really happy with the clarity. It's got a nice rounded mouthfeel, well balanced bitterness and the fuggles really come through, I'm glad I put the torrified wheat in there the head retention is superb.

I've also brewed & kegged another all-grain brew, a recreation of the first ever AG that I did, it's for Easter and is called Wezerection Easter Ale this is the recipe for that one:

Wezerection Easter Ale
25L Batch
Target OG 1.042 (75% BHE)
Target IBU ~40

4200gm Pale Malt 90%
220gm Crystal Malt 5%
220gm Torrified Wheat 5%
50gm Northdown [7.90%] (90 min) ~40IBU
30gm Styrian Goldings [3.30%] (15 min)
50gm Elderflower (Dried) (Boil 15.0 min)
40gm Styrian Goldings (0 mins)
1 Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 min) Misc

This one is very potent, it's going to have ooodles of flavour, I just hope they have all mellowed out by the time Easter is here!

Finally...today I am brewing again Red Sky it's an adaptation of Big Kenny but I've upped the dark grains to try to get a reddish beer, I'm also using some Amarillo late hops with the styrians to see how it works out. The recipe for this one is:

Red Sky

Brewlength 25L
Target OG 1.046
Target IBU ~36

4500gm Pale Malt - Maris Otter 90%
350gm Crystal Malt - 60L 7%
80gm Chocolate Malt 1.5%
80gm Roasted Barley 1.5%
55gm Challenger [6.80 %] (90 min) ~ 36 IBU
20gm Styrian Goldings [3.30 %] (15 min)
20gm Amarillo Gold [4.00 %] (15 min)

Fermenting with S04

I'll try to take some pics to add on through the brew.