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

[Mark Kessell]

as long as the wort has finished fermenting, shouldn't bee too much of a problem.
infact, if you wanted to experiment some, while it was thawing, when it gets to a sludge type consistency, filter out the ice, and bottle 1 or 2. kick ass!

[Stu H]

Hahah good call!

[Tom C]

Did the same myself and was pointed in this direction:

http://www.forum.realbeer.co.nz/forum/topics/accidentally-frozen-be...

Mine was only slushy ice, but is still taking a long time to carbonate in the bottle (4+ weeks). Either a fresh starter when priming, or kegging could be the answer.

[Reviled]

lol, sorry to laugh stu but it does amuse me how often this seems to happen to people

edit : I bet after typing that my next crash cooled batch will freeze :P haha

[Stu H]

I know!!!! The beer is in a fridge, not a freezer! Struth! Thankfully the temp controller is going in tonight!

[Nicholas Jones]

been a while since I posted, great reading about everyones lower grav beers, funnily enough as summer creeps on in I too have been experimenting at the lower end, after a spout of noobie enthusiasm with the high grav beers, am now something like 12 mash brews deep and starting to put it back in my pants, so to speak. Have also isolated some variables which have been leading to inconsistency in the process, all fun, Im on about a once a week brewing schedule so trying to concentrate on specific areas each time.....consumption however is only just lagging behind supply..,, Nice bunch of supplies from gladfields and liberty in the last week so summer brewing is shaping up to be awesome (my god how good does Amarillo smell!!!)

Last week was a 1.046OG pale ale using Gladfield Pilsener malt, a suprisingly rich coloured wort and lovely malty aroma, very nice

4KG Gladfields Pils
300G Crystal 150EBC
Nelson Sauvin all 30g additions @60, 30, 5 and 0
SO4
Mashed at 68, 75 Min boil.
This is smelling amazing through the airlock at the mo, I really aerated the shit out of it too and it seems to have had a really vigourous and long ferment as a result. Am really looking forward to tasting this in a week or 2.

Last weekend, a golden ale dubbed 'The remnants of a worthy cause', such was the lack of ingredients left kicking around...

1.1kg Gladfeilds Pale
2Kg Veinna
100G Wheat
100G Thomas Fawcett pale crystal 68EBC
S04, again - am only using dry yeasts atm, and mainly S05, so thought should have more of a play with 04....

Pacific Gem 30g @60 (now typing this this sounds quite heavy......doh!)
NZ Golding 10g@50, 10g@40, 20g@30, 20g@15, 20g@5

my god, maybe I was a bit generous with the hops....110g all up...moslty early additions..

69 mash temp (overshot target), 75 min boil.
Is in secondary, will fine tomo with gelatin and bottle sunday hopefully. Dont know the OG, as completely forgot to measure......

The grain and hop stocks are full, now what to brew this weekend.......

Brew 13, I shall call it 'something unlucky'...

[denimglen]

Brewed a Wit last weekend.

20L, 1.050, 21 IBU, 3.2 SRM, 67C mash

2.10 kg Pilsner, Premium (Weyermann) 45.21 %
2.00 kg Wheat, Torrified 43.05 %
0.45 kg Oats, Flaked 9.69 %
0.10 kg Munich I (Weyermann) 2.06 %

23.00 gm .Hallertau Aroma [7.00 %] (60 min)

1.00 gm Chamomile (Boil 5.0 min) Misc
1.00 tbsp Flour, Baking (Boil 5.0 min) Misc
11.00 gm Coriander Seed (Boil 5.0 min) Misc
60.00 gm Citrus Zest (Boil 5.0 min) Misc

1 Pkgs Belgian Ale (Wyeast Labs #.1214) Yeast-Ale

Zest was 2 grapefruit, 2 valencia oranges, 2 manderin ortanique, with 2 chamomile teabags, and the coriander lightly crushed with mortar and pestle.

Smells great fermenting, the fresh citrus character is amazing, hopefully too much wasn't scrubbed out during fermentation. I'm considering dry zesting/spicing if it's a little lacking. Hopefully the 1214 will through a nice little spin on it, I'm not a big fan of overly spicy Belgian strains.


And tonight brewed an APA, all late hopped and probably no dry hop unless it really needs it.

20L, 1.056, 41 IBU, 7.3 SRM, 67C mash.

4.40 kg Pale Ale (Weyermann) 84.65 %
0.30 kg Biscuit Malt (Dingemans) 5.77 %
0.30 kg Munich I (Weyermann) 5.77 %
0.20 kg Wheat Malt (Weyermann) 3.80 %

10.00 gm .Centennial [9.20 %] (30 min)
10.00 gm .Amarillo [8.20 %] (30 min)
10.00 gm .Centennial [9.20 %] (20 min)
10.00 gm .Amarillo [8.20 %] (20 min)
10.00 gm .Centennial [9.20 %] (10 min)
10.00 gm .Amarillo [8.20 %] (10 min)
10.00 gm .Centennial [9.20 %] (5 min)
10.00 gm .Amarillo [8.20 %] (5 min)
30.00 gm .Centennial [9.20 %] (10 min whirlpool)
30.00 gm .Amarillo [8.20 %] (10 min whirlpool)

1 Pkgs Safale American Dry Ale (DCL Yeast #.US-05) Yeast-Ale

Has been a long time since I've brewed anything citrusy and American that has no dry hop. The first couple of pale ales I ever brewed didn't have a dry hop and I remember the hop character being fuller and rounder and a little less grassy, I'm hoping to get the same with this batch. I've used almost half again weight was that I usually use in my APAs so fingers crossed I won't need that dry hop.

[jt]

Something a bit bigger this week - a little black 1.035 - scaling the porter grain bill back and hopping with 1/3 sauvin and 2/3 hallertau to 30IBU
Yeast is from the 05 cake of the little pale
I know that grainbill can hold up a lot of hops, just hope it holds up with the distinctiveness of the sauvin

[Llew Bardecki]

I had quite the time with my brew tonight... My first brew ever using rye, so of course I had to go and pick something difficult.

It was a little 4L batch planned for fun/experimentation/the upcoming Welly brewers conference/competition.

Visco-Llama Roggenwein

4L batch

0.95kg Malteruop Pils (45%)
0.95kg Weyermann Rye Malt (45%)
0.10kg Baird's Dark Caramalt (5%)
0.05kg Baird's Dark Crystal (2.5%)
0.05kg Melanoiden (2.5%)

Mash Schedule:
30 mins @ 42.0C Beta Glucanase rest
60 mins @ 66.5C Saccharification

Boil for 120 mins
8g Chinook @ 60
1.5g each Chinook and Fuggles @ 20 and 5

O.G. = 1.100
60IBU

Ferment with US05

Especially for a tiny batch, the brew was very difficult and very messy...
Even with the beta glucan rest, even though I do BIAB, lautering was hellish. Forewarned as I was, I still couldn't believe how gummy and syrupy the wort was. I ended up basically wringing it out of the grain bag by hand. Ended up tearing my beloved bag in the process :(

I also had to used so much water to sparge that I collected a ton of runnings and had to boil for two hours to get back down to the volume I was looking for. There was a little scorching on the bottom of the pot, presumably having something to do with the viscosity.

The wort going into the fermenter more or less retained the syrupy nature of what went into the kettle. I hit my gravity spot on if I believe the hydrometer, but given the texture of the liquid, I'm not sure I should.

All the difficulties aside, it was a very interesting brew, and I learned a lot.

I now know that using this amount of rye needs a very good beta glucan rest.

The mash and sweet wort had a very interesting spicy/grainy/porridge-y aroma. The hopped wort tasted absolutely fabulous: Sweet, nutty, grainy and smooth. The taste and aroma of the hop combo were promising too.

And I now know that the 100% rye stout I had planned just isn't going to work... I'll need at least a bit of barley to get the glucanase I need to make this stuff manageable, and will probably need to sit it in that range for at least a couple of hours. Apparently Weyermann rye malt is just on the edge of being able to convert itself, so I'll also need a bit of barley to help with the flaked rye and roasted rye malt I'd planned to add.

A frustrating evening, but I'm sure this will be an interesting beer.

[warra48]

Put this one down yesterday.

Dunkelweizenbock
Batch Size: 22.00 L
OG 1.083 into the fermenter
Estimated IBU: 27.7 IBU
Mashed 65 minutes at 64ºC
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

4000.00 gm Wheat Malt, Pale (Weyermann) (3.9 EBC) Grain 57.14 %
2000.00 gm Premium Pilsner (2.5 EBC) Grain 28.57 %
300.00 gm Caraaroma (390.0 EBC) Grain 4.29 %
300.00 gm Munich I (Weyermann) (14.0 EBC) Grain 4.29 %
200.00 gm Caramunich I (Weyermann) (100.5 EBC) Grain 2.86 %
150.00 gm Chocolate Wheat Malt (1100.0 EBC) Grain 2.14 %
50.00 gm Roasted Barley (Thomas Fawcett) (1199.7 EBGrain 0.71 %
30.00 gm Hallertau NZ [8.10 %] (90 min) Hops 24.1 IBU
26.00 gm Tettnang [4.10 %] (10 min) Hops 3.6 IBU
0.50 items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
1.00 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Primary 0.0 days) Misc
1 Pkgs Bavarian Wheat (Wyeast Labs #3638) slurry of harvested yeast from a batch of Hefeweizen just bottled.

Probably one of the most difficult brew days I've experienced. Mashing 7 kg of grains in a 25 litre mashtun is not the best of ideas. Even though I used 400 gr of Rice Hulls, the drain and sparge took 2½ hours. It didn't stick, but was oh so slow.

Hope it's worth it, the wort tasted like malted chocolate mudcake.

[Daron]

Where did u get the rice hulls from?

Also, how is the 3638? I'm experimenting with 3068 and find it generates sulpur during primary that is out of control.

[jt]

Where did u get the rice hulls from?

he's in Australia, either they grow their own or have no import restrictions