What are you brewing?

[nzbrewer]

Since this is the most popular thread on the RealBeer.co.nz forum I thought I would start it here just to see what happens

[Mike Neilson]

Im doing a 1.090 Baltic Porter, for winter I wanted to do it in Jan but oh well it looks like I will be doing over Christmas.

[Michael]

It sounds like a hard life mate. ;)

[Matthew]

Getting sorted for the Christmas/New Year brew this weekend. It's a bit mental but then again it's the silly season...

Santa's Little Hopper

20L
4.50 kg Kolcsh 81.82 %
.50 kg Global Munich 9.09 %
.20 kg Carared 3.64 %
.20 kg Light Crystal 3.64 %
.10 kg Dark Caramel 1.82 %

15gm Sauvin @ 60
45gm Motueka, Cascade, Sauvin @ 20 {equal quantities}
70gm Motueka, Cascade, Sauvin @ 10 {30 Mot, 20 Cas, 20 Sauv}
55gm Motueka, Cascade, Sauvin @ 2 {25 Mot, 20 Cas, 10 Sauv}

US05

20gm Cascade (Dry Hop 5 days)
30gm Motueka (Dry Hop 5 days)

70 IBU --//-- IBU/SG 1.195 --//-- 6% ABV

[JoKing]

I was wondering what you had brewing up.

Looks like a very nice beer... Monks Habbit meets Nelson Sauvin.

Very nice.

[Matthew]

:D Gotta love the Monk's Habit!

I'm still a bit undecided about the quantity of sauvin around the 10min mark, I don't want it to dominate too much. Maybe 10gm will suffice...

[Martin Bridges]

Beautiful Auckland day, so it feels a bit odd to be brewing Oh To Be In England!, an English Ordinary bitter.

3.3kg Maris Otter
0.2kg Crystal 60L
0.08kg Crystal 120L
0.05kg Torrified wheat
Mashed at 67 degrees with my standard pale bitter water adjustments

10g Target @ 60 mins
20g UK Fuggles @ 30
20g UK Fuggles @ 15
20g East Kent Goldings @ 3

Wyeast 1768 PC English Bitter, fermenting at 19 degrees

Mashing at the moment while trying to do a thousand other jobs, which is probably asking for trouble.

[JoKing]

Did you get that yeast off Brett in the end? I still have the white labs version down here.

[Martin Bridges]

Sorry mate, meant to let you know. Yes, I have the 3522 safely in my fridge, so I don't need the White Labs version.

The invitation to drop in at my place next time you're in AKL still stands though. And look out for a Liberty order soon.

[JoKing]

I'll definately visit next time I come up. It wont be in Jan... but the fresh hop Saison is a brew I never miss out on at Hallertau. So, early Feb - I'm taking a week off to harvest the local fares and maybe even dig out the odd mash tun.

When I have this kind of time up my sleve... I can definately affford the time to visit friends.

Especially when they have good beer!

[Doublehoppy]

"standard pale bitter water adjustments"

Martin,

I've forgotten what you said at the BBQ, what are your adjustments?

[Martin Bridges]

OK, just dug out my figures:

For 10L of strike water I add (to the mash): 4.0g CaSO4, 1.7g CaCl, 0.8g MgSO4, 0.7g NaCL, 4.0g CaCO3
For 25L of sparge water I add (to the kettle): 10.1g CaSO4, 4.2g CaCl, 2.0g MgSO4, 1.6g NaCl (no chalk)

These figures were calculated using the Jim's Beerkit water calculator, set to the Bitter profile. As my input water I average the values for Ardmore and Waikato, as that's where Watercare says the East Coast Bays get their water from.

Once I get the output from that calculator I pop it into John Palmer's Residual Alkalinity spreadsheet from How To Brew in order to work out the pH adjustment (which is where the chalk amount comes from). As an input colour I use 7.0 SRM as this seems mid-range for most of the Ordinary bitters I brew.

Since I've been brewing a lot of very similar beers recently I've just been re-using this water profile.

I'm not saying it's perfect, but I get nice clear wort, good efficiency and a nice level of bitterness, so it works for me.

[jt]

All weighed and ready to crush, a repeat of the last cascade ale recipe, but in with a KG of Global Kolsch (out with a KG of Malturop)
So
67.5% Malturop
25% Global Kolsch
7% Pale Crystal
0.5% Choccy
1.040 and 25IBU Super Alpha / Cascade with uh-oh 5

Looks like the Mild could be pulling up early again too - thick SO4 yeast cake in the bottom of the fermenter like last batch.
I don't think it likes it at 15-16-17, seems to drop out and leave the FG a bit higher - any other SO4 users found this ?
This'll be two malt Tonics in a row by the look of it