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ajaxisarobot posted:I'm a fairly new brewer, on my own, but have been brewing with friends for a couple of years now. Since I've started doing my own, I've been missing my OG by .01 or more almost every time. Original problems with using too much water in mash/sparge have been resolved, and today my brew day was nearly perfect, yet I still came under. My main concern is that today's brew was a SMaSH with Munich. I know Munich doesn't have the diastatic power to convert adjuncts but I thought it could take care of itself. Would love some answers! Are you coming in low on the FG as well? If that's the case, your hydrometer could simply be off. Also, in addition to Josh Wow's question, could you post the mash temperature? It could be that you're mashing higher than normal, either accidentally or due to an inaccurate thermometer. That's another measurement-type thing to check.
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Feb 15, 2014 23:40
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BLARGHLE posted:Yeah, when I said to err on the side of caution with the carbonation, I really meant it! If mine even go a day longer than I think they should, then I don't pasteurize. It sucks that you lost so many...I hope that batch wasn't too expensive. transfatphobic posted:What recipe did you use? I'm intrigued by your final results. It's tasty. I used straight TreeTop with a little bit of Turbinado sugar added to bring it up from 1.05 to 1.055ish. Then I added enough maple syrup just to carbonate and bottled half the batch. With the remaining half, I added a bunch of apple juice concentrate and more maple syrup to backsweeten. Considering how much maple syrup I added it doesn't taste hardly maple-y at all, I was worried about making it disgustingly so. I haven't tasted the dry one yet and the maple might be more pronounced there without the tart apple concentrate also influencing it.
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Feb 16, 2014 00:37
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I used 7 lbs of Munich and 1.75 gallons of water for the mash. As for the sparge, I don't calculate a definitive amount. I keep a few gallons at temp, ready when I need it, but when I got close, I just ran it dry. Boil volume was 4 gallons, post boil volume was about 3.25 gallons. But the .25 was left behind with the sludge. OG should have been 1.054 but came out to 1.042. The hydrometer isn't the issue, we tested it with water and it was fine. It also shouldn't be the temperature. I mashed at 155 and at the end of the mash it was still going strong at 155.
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Feb 16, 2014 01:05
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ajaxisarobot posted:I used 7 lbs of Munich and 1.75 gallons of water for the mash. I feel like this is most likely your problem. You're water to grain ratio is right at 1:1, which is a really thick mash. Try using a 1.5:1 water to grain ratio next time. So if you have 7 lbs of grain use 10.5 quarts of water.
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Feb 16, 2014 01:43
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Internet Celebrity and *-my girlfriend-* just won gold and silver medals respectively at the biggest regional homebrew competition. Just sayin, I know some cool people who make awesome beer. Also IC has a cool dog and a cooler kegerator. Dude is legit!
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Feb 16, 2014 02:39
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BLARGHLE posted:Whatever floats your boat! Aside from the cider, they're all probably about as good as they're going to get. Started with the brown ale (smooth necked bottle with gold cap). Carbonation was a bit light; almost no head retention. The beer was incredibly dark, almost black, with fantastic clarity and a nice red tinge to it. Flavor wise the profile was pretty good; a bit watery (I prefer my beers very malty), but with lots of coffee and roasted notes. Very drinkable. Good job.
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Feb 16, 2014 04:00
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internet celebrity posted:Just a small warning for using chocolate, try to find something with as close to 0 fat as possible. I made a chocolate stout with some Baker's chocolate a while back and it ended up greasy and rancid. To date it's the only batch I've completely dumped. I found Cocoa nibs are great, they're 54% fat but they're the most raw form of cocoa, littlest processing and nothing added. Been great in my chocolate porter and chocolate stout. I use them over cocoa powder etc But I guess you're talking about chocolate bars for baking etc which have butter or something in it right? Also congrats on the beer competition!
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Feb 16, 2014 04:08
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Beer4TheBeerGod posted:Started with the brown ale (smooth necked bottle with gold cap). Carbonation was a bit light; almost no head retention. The beer was incredibly dark, almost black, with fantastic clarity and a nice red tinge to it. Flavor wise the profile was pretty good; a bit watery (I prefer my beers very malty), but with lots of coffee and roasted notes. Very drinkable. Good job. That was pretty much the conclusion I came to. Both that and the ESB ended up with very little carbonation and not a whole lot of head retention. I think the thin-ness of the brown ale might have been related to the propane tank running out right at the end of the grain steeping, and then me leaving the grain bag in the pot for the half hour it took me to run to home depot and back with more propane? I really don't know!
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Feb 16, 2014 14:53
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Anyone have a good Mild Ale recipe? I've brewed the all-grain conversion one in brewing classic styles a couple of times and haven't really been happy with it. Or maybe a proven good ESB? Trying to put together a good house ale to keep around at all times. At least until it hits Belgian summer temps.
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Feb 16, 2014 14:58
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LeeMajors posted:Anyone have a good Mild Ale recipe? I've brewed the all-grain conversion one in brewing classic styles a couple of times and haven't really been happy with it. Or maybe a proven good ESB? It's not really a Mild, nor an ESB, but my house beer is the Colt .177 v.2: http://www.brewtoad.com/recipes/colt-177-v2 For some reason, Asheburne Mild and Wyeast Thames Valley / White Labs Burton Ale make some crazy deliciousness. I made a brown version of it yesterday (it's in the SA group as v.3), but I think I may have hosed it up - it got too hot in the sparge. We'll see what happens.
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Feb 16, 2014 17:14
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fullroundaction posted:Internet Celebrity and *-my girlfriend-* just won gold and silver medals respectively at the biggest regional homebrew competition. Just sayin, I know some cool people who make awesome beer. Hey thanks man, you and your friends are all cool people and I had a great time, congrats again to your girlfriend too. Can't wait for my headache to go away so I can break into some of these beers.
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Feb 16, 2014 17:47
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I rarely do big beers but my whiskey barrel has been empty for a while so two weeks ago I brewed up a RIS. I always have terrible efficiency with big beers since my mash tun isn't that large forcing me to mash thicker than I like to, so this time I decided I was going to do two seperate mashes and just boil it down. Everything went well, I boiled for around 8 hours to get my 14 gallons down to 5 and I threw it in the fermentor at 1.093. I had a yeast cake of WLP002 from a 3.8% English IPA I had done a few weeks prior that I used and I aerated with pure 02 for 45 seconds. My house is pretty cool this time of year so I threw the fermentor in front of a heating vent and it fermented between 66* and 72*. I went to check the gravity today (two weeks after brew day) and my SG is only at 1.032. This is on the low end of the attenuation range for this yeast, with the range being 63-70% and me getting 64%. It's not the end of the world since I'm at 8% ABV and I did want this beer to be thick since I find that aging in a semi-fresh barrel thins the beer out pretty well, but it's a fair bit higher than I expected. Clearly I'm in the attenuation range so I didn't do anything terribly wrong, but I just wanted to see if anybody had any ideas on what could have caused this high finishing gravity. I'm thinking possibly that my massively long boil caramelized some sugars leading to a less fermentable wort. I also realize this yeast choice wasn't the greatest, but I like the yeast and my intended OG was closer to 1.082 than 1.093. The grain bill is as follows for anyone curious: 80% maris otter 10% roasted barley 5% english crystal 77 2.5% pale chocolate 2.5% chocolate My standard beers are in the 3.2-4.5% ABV range so I'm used to using a fairly large percentage of specialty malts. I did want this beer to be thick to stand up to the barrel but I didn't think I was going to overboard with 20% specialty malts. Any comments from you folks that do high gravity stuff?
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Feb 16, 2014 20:41
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Threw my BW recipe into the Group Brewtoad database. Enjoy!
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Feb 17, 2014 01:38
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http://www.brewtoad.com/recipes/nockeipa Ok so this is what I'm thinking about doing. I have no idea how much hops I should use though. I want it to be a bit bitter but not extreme. How much should I use for dry-hopping? Should I do any between 60min and dry hop? I've got 100g Mosaic and 100g Galaxy. Should I use both for bittering and dry hopping? I wouldn't mind making it hoppy like Dead Pony Club or something like that, though maybe that takes a lot more hops?
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Feb 17, 2014 01:41
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Sistergodiva posted:http://www.brewtoad.com/recipes/nockeipa Not sure about exact quantities or time distribution, but you'll probably want an addition or two during the boil sometime between 20 and 0 minutes. Maybe 20 g of each at 15 and 1 minutes as a starting point?
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Feb 17, 2014 02:44
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OK dudes, I need a new book to read. I've already read 'Farmhouse Ales,' 'Wild Brews,' 'How to Brew,' 'The Complete Joy of Homebrewing,' 'Radical Brewing,' 'The Compleat Meadmaker,' and 'Yeast.' I'm reluctant to buy 'Hops' or "Water,' because, you know, why? I'd really like to maybe get deep into the chronological history of beer or something pretty out there. Anyone have any suggestions? e: MadFermentationist finish your loving sours books already, poo poo!
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Feb 17, 2014 04:11
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hellfaucet posted:OK dudes, I need a new book to read. I've already read 'Farmhouse Ales,' 'Wild Brews,' 'How to Brew,' 'The Complete Joy of Homebrewing,' 'Radical Brewing,' 'The Compleat Meadmaker,' and 'Yeast.' "Brew Like a Monk"? IIRC it's similar in format to "Farmhouse Ales".
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Feb 17, 2014 04:23
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Brew Like a Monk was one of my favorite reads, though it's not going to help you improve your Belgian game any. Pick it up if you love Trappist/Belgian beers though. Hops had a lot of great technical info and the bulk of the "practical" information (the stuff we are all looking for) comes in the form of interviews with big time craft brewers, which is awesome. Unfortunately no one agrees on anything so the lesson is "figure out what works best for you on your own".
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Feb 17, 2014 04:27
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Thirding Brew Like a Monk. Fantastic book, especially if you're interested in Trappist and belgian styles.
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Feb 17, 2014 04:31
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hellfaucet posted:e: MadFermentationist finish your loving sours books already, poo poo! Coming out 30th April 2014 (or so amazon.co.uk says)! I've preordered mine!  Fourthing Brew Like a Monk. Got to say though I'm kind of stuck for books now, I've been stung a couple of times by really bad books [Brew Your Own British Real Ale (Camra) by Graham Wheeler]. Was wondering if there was a database (or if should make a database) on books to get or avoid etc? Fluo fucked around with this message at 04:48 on Feb 17, 2014 |
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Feb 17, 2014 04:44
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E: ^^ His blog says realistically to expect it May/June You could always read Mosher's Tasting Beer. Might help you analyze and figure out your own beers better while helping your general appreciation. ChiTownEddie fucked around with this message at 04:47 on Feb 17, 2014 |
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Feb 17, 2014 04:45
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Josh Wow posted:I feel like this is most likely your problem. You're water to grain ratio is right at 1:1, which is a really thick mash. Try using a 1.5:1 water to grain ratio next time. So if you have 7 lbs of grain use 10.5 quarts of water. I was using 1.5 qts/lb because that's what every how-to-brew book I've read says, but I was having the OG issues every time. My friends always do well using 1.1 L/lb, so that's what I did this time.
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Feb 17, 2014 04:53
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ChiTownEddie posted:E: ^^ His blog says realistically to expect it May/June Ordered, Estimated delivery: 20 Feb 2014. Spent the night just sorting the bottles of the ones I know are easy - medium effort to delabel and the ones which are a nightmare. Delabelled 120 bottles and its almost 4am  , I will have to put bottling off another day (don't worry its in secondary). Going to put time aside tomorrow to bottle both smoked porters, and transfer the american pale to secondary to dry hop! Thinking of dry hopping 5 gallons with 22grams simcoe/22grams nelson (total 44grams / 1.55oz), the other 5 gallons with 30grams cascade. A bit worried though because 5gallons looks like its fully fermented and gone a paler colour in the fermenter, the other one is kinda still deep dark. Think when I transfer tomorrow and check the gravity throwing some more yeast into that one might be useful if its clearly stuck at some stupidly high gravity?
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Feb 17, 2014 05:01
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'Brew Like a Monk' it is! This is pretty much exactly what I was looking for. Thanks!
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Feb 17, 2014 05:31
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hellfaucet posted:OK dudes, I need a new book to read. I've already read 'Farmhouse Ales,' 'Wild Brews,' 'How to Brew,' 'The Complete Joy of Homebrewing,' 'Radical Brewing,' 'The Compleat Meadmaker,' and 'Yeast.' Principals of Brewing Science is super spergy if you want that. Tasting Beer is a great book that every beer lover should read due to the amount of general knowledge in it.
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Feb 17, 2014 05:36
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ajaxisarobot posted:I was using 1.5 qts/lb because that's what every how-to-brew book I've read says, but I was having the OG issues every time. My friends always do well using 1.1 L/lb, so that's what I did this time. Have one of your friends come over and watch you brew, and see if they can spot what you're doing wrong. This kind of thing is pretty hard to diagnose online unless you're doing something really obviously wrong. It could be your thermometer is off and you're mashing +\- 10* or that you're getting really rapid temp drops during the mash. It could be your hydrometer is way off. It could be that you aren't properly mixing your grains or are having a ton of dough balls when you mash in. It could be that your grain isn't properly crushed. Next brew do something really simple that's like 90%+ 2 row and check your instruments. Check your thermometer in ice water/boiling water and check your hydrometer in plain water. Hopefully you can find a knowledgeable friend to come help and you can pin down what's going wrong.
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Feb 17, 2014 11:32
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Tried my hand at blending in tea yesterday! I made a cup of earl grey tea and pulled some of my Mr. Beer "American Light" and played with ratios until I think I got it right. Ended up making 5 cups of tea for the 2 gal batch and threw in another pound of honey for good measure. Then I added 2 heaping tbsp of maltodextrine, so the tea wouldn't hurt the body of the beer, though I had no reason to do that amount in particular. Next I'll try the earl grey in some mead or cider. My fiancee loves earl grey, so I'm trying to make something she likes and then perhaps scale up before our wedding!
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Feb 17, 2014 15:50
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I brewed yesterday and used a yeast starter made with the advice given in this thread a few pages back. Thanks thread! Does anyone grow hops? I'm considering it and looking for information on varieties and how much to plant. How many rhizomes should I plant in one hole? I've seen information saying anywhere from 1-3. Any tips or pointers are most welcome. Living in Oregon I believe I can plant just about anything and have it grow.
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Feb 17, 2014 19:29
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Jo3sh posted:It's not really a Mild, nor an ESB, but my house beer is the Colt .177 v.2: Thanks! I'll give it a shot. Looks good.
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Feb 17, 2014 19:29
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Economic Sinkhole posted:I brewed yesterday and used a yeast starter made with the advice given in this thread a few pages back. Thanks thread! You'll need a trellis support that faces the appropriate direction for sun, and the easy way would be to get sprouted rhizomes and just transplant. Yeah, Oregon can p. much support anything, though you'll need to do SOME variety swapping depending on if you're in eastern , Rogue River, or Wilamette. Coastal may be difficult.
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Feb 17, 2014 19:49
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Is there a time after which it's too late to plant hops? I'm in Chicago, and I'm moving into a new house in mid-April. I could plant pretty much immediately after that, and it's probably going to be no more than 4 weeks after last frost.
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Feb 17, 2014 21:55
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more falafel please posted:Is there a time after which it's too late to plant hops? I'm in Chicago, and I'm moving into a new house in mid-April. I could plant pretty much immediately after that, and it's probably going to be no more than 4 weeks after last frost. http://www.crannogales.com/HopsManual.pdf
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Feb 17, 2014 22:20
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LeeMajors posted:Thanks! I'll give it a shot. Looks good. I'm going to be making a similar version of this that Jo3sh posted a while back(along with one fluo posted) today, assuming I wake up early enough, and don't end up working on my day off like I usually do. Take now, for instance! The only reason I'm awake now is because I got called to run across town and rescue some dumbass. Whatever, I'm looking forward to a bunch of brewing and probably some daytime drinking. Gotta free up those bottles, after all!
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Feb 18, 2014 09:55
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It's a beautiful day for brewing! Sunny, high 40s, and nobody is calling me! Just another 7 hours to go...
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Feb 18, 2014 18:15
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BrianBoitano posted:Next I'll try the earl grey in some mead or cider. My fiancee loves earl grey, so I'm trying to make something she likes and then perhaps scale up before our wedding! I've got some really nice (sadly now getting quite old) Earl Gray that I've been itching to add to a saison or some such thing. Bergamot is pretty polarizing, but I love the stuff.
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Feb 18, 2014 18:27
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Jacobey000 posted:Bergamot is pretty polarizing, but I love the stuff.
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Feb 18, 2014 19:10
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I got bored last night so I weighed out some leftover ingredients and threw them into a pot. An hour and a half later and I had a 1 gallon pale ale batch in a little fermenter. GEEZ 1 gallon extract batches are fast. It was just some light and amber DME. Nugget for bittering. Simcoe, Chinook, Simcoe for the later additions. The weirdest part of the recipe was the fact that I pitched the yeast slurry from a batch of prison toilet wine that I had bottled that day. It was just a gallon jug of Welch's style grape juice that I put some Danstar CBC-1 into and fitted an airlock on top (like what they sell at SpikeYourJuice.com). The result was horrible and hilarious, as expected. I'm not sure what effect the purple, grapey sludge will have on the final product but I really don't care. It'll be funny, regardless. Behold the toilet wine: 
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Feb 18, 2014 19:46
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I'm thinking of brewing a beer this weekend with ~40% wheat and the internet suggests I should use rice hulls to help prevent a stuck sparge. How much should I use?
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Feb 18, 2014 19:48
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hellfaucet posted:Yeah, I'm on the opposite spectrum, I hate bergamot. It reminds me of weird Fruit Loops in both flavor and aroma. Does this mean you don't like leinenkugel sunset wheat? Becaue every now and then a beer that tastes like fruit loops is delicious.
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Feb 18, 2014 19:58
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Thufir posted:I'm thinking of brewing a beer this weekend with ~40% wheat and the internet suggests I should use rice hulls to help prevent a stuck sparge. How much should I use? A pound in the grist for a five-gallon batch has always worked for me. I account for their mass when doing temperature calculations, and I add them to the tun before the grain with the hope that they will be distributed toward the bottom of the grain bed.
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Feb 18, 2014 20:03
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