I checked
the calendar and discovered that I hadn't brewed since mid-September. That
means it had been almost two months since my equipment had been used! Saturday
morning started out with a thorough cleaning of a wide range of equipment.
On
Saturday 11/10/2012, I brewed a German Hefeweizen using Hefeweizen IV yeast.
This will be the third time I've brewed this recipe (but I believe only the
second time using this yeast). On Sunday 11/11/2012 I tackled a recipe called
Jamil’s Chocolate Hazelnut Porter which I have brewed on one other occasion.
I’ll be replacing the Hazelnut with Dark Cherries. I also boiled the 2 gallons
of runoffs from the end of the mash on both brews. I boiled that Sunday night
without hops and threw in an unlabeled (probably CA Ale) yeast. So that’s a
total of three new things fermenting. Woo!
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| 2nd Gen Irish ale starter |
Since the
brew store didn't open until 10 AM, I organized a bunch of stuff and went and
got my automobile Smog checked for California Certification. Passing a test
first thing in the morning is a great way to start your day.
German
Hefeweizen IVA very simple grain bill of 6 lbs Wheat and 4 lbs pale malt with one hops addition of Northern Brewer makes this simple beer one of the best bang-for-buck. I added 8 oz of carapils and decided on a non-traditional yeast for this style (I guess the Hefe IV is commonly used for a style called Roggenbier). However, with the addition of the carapils and this yeast, I feel this wheat beer comes out very unique. I remember it being creamy and aromatic, light but highly flavorful with a mouthfeel like that of a creamy stout.
Saturday was
a very cold day and I made the mistake of using my notes from 2 month ago in
order to reach mash temperatures. The mash dropped from 154°F to 150°F in 15
minutes, so I moved it into the sun and it remained at 150°F for the rest of
the 45 minutes. This isn't that bad, in fact, it makes for a drier fermentation
which would be great for the wheat beer. The sparge lasted about 20 minutes and
I drained 6.5 gallons in the kettle. From that, I ended up with almost a gallon
of smallbeer from the end of the mash tun at OG 1.025. I put that in a bucket
and saved it. However, after boiling the main wort for an hour, I was left with
4.75 gallons which was well under my target volume. This happens to me time and
time again, so I made sure it didn't happen when I brewed the next day.
Jamil’s
Chocolate Hazelnut Porter
This
all-grain kit costs twice as much as the Hefe kit, but I am not making this
beer to save money: this chocolate porter is my favorite that I have brewed. But
this beer was a very different beast than the wheat beer I brewed the day
previous. The biggest difference between the two beers was the amount of grain,
which caused a few bumps in the road.
The first
problem I had was heating my mash water (yes, this was within the first 20 minutes
of the day). With a mash thickness of 1.5q H2O per pound of grain, the Choco
Porter calls for 5.7 gallons of H2O. Well, my HLT can only hold 5 gallons
exactly. So I had to heat my mash water in two parts, in lieu of going with a
thicker mash. I heated 5 gallons to 180°F, transferred 4 gallons of it to my
Mash Tun, and then proceeded to heat up about 3 more gallons to 180°F (I chose
such a high strike temperature because of my issues with unexpected drop the
day before). It really wasn't much of a setback because I started so early that
day. I had almost 6 gallons of 175°F H2O in my tun by 9:30 AM. The reason I
have detailed this is because, in the past, I have simply used the 5 gallons
and didn't heat up extra water. This presents a thicker mash, which isn't so
bad, but there are certain aspects of the conversion which are better done with
a thin mash. I don't know the details, but many homebrewers that I have talked with use the 1.5q per pound ratio. The MoreFlavor Inc. all-grain brewing instruction explains that, as a basic rule, you use 1.1q per pound.
At one point
during the mash, my digital thermometer started acting wacky. The temperature
started to go up! I checked the analog thermometer I had in there (I always throw
one in the mash for emergencies I guess) and sure enough, it was reporting in
the low-to-mid-50s while the digital thermometer was at 165°F. I used the
analog thermometer for the rest of the brew. I guess after two days of being
used at high temperatures, it sort of wonked-out. This happened one other time
to me and I almost threw the digital thermometer away. Good thing I didn’t
because it worked fine the next day.
Sparging, I dealt
with HLT volume problem again but I was prepared. I heated 5 gallons to 174°F
and did a vorlauf of about ¾ of a gallon. I ran the sparge until there was a
little more than a gallon of hot water remaining in my HLT (about 10 min), then
I closed the valves on the Mash and the HLT. I filled the HLT back up to about
4 gallons and turned the heat way up to get the new water to the 170s. My mash
only rested like this for about 10 minutes before the water was hot enough and
I finished off the Sparge (another 10 min). I sparged until I had 7 gallons of
wort. This left me with a gallon of extra wort at a low 1.025OG. I added this
to the Hefe runoffs and stashed it for later.
After
cooling, I hooked up the oxygen for a while then pitched my 2nd
generation Irish Ale yeast starter. A couple days later, the krausen as risen
and fallen and the beer is looking great.
The Little Things
On Sunday evening, my girlfriend and I sat by the heat of my small Bayou burner and boiled up the 2 gallons of 'small beer' wort we had gathered for the two days prior. We didn't use any hops and did a shortened 45 minute boil. We lost a good half gallon in volume. We pitched a mason jar of yeast (we didn't decant any of the liquid) that I had in my fridge. It wasn't labeled so I am going to venture a guess that it's about 3 month old 4th generation CA Ale yeast which may have been gathered from a blow-off. I plan to blend it with the 2 gallons of pale ale that I accidently froze and give it to a friend who has a still for a distillation run.
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