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

[studio1]

quite a full on brew day and a few changes to the above recipe - but just moving a few things around.

What was awesome - was keeping my mash at a constant temp (first time since BIAB for me) using a burner under the mlt when necessary and recirculating with the pump. I recently had to move my HLT too so today I used 2 pumps for fly sparging. Choice!

First 90min boil in this rig and I over estimated my evap so I ended up with 44L (an extra 2) and OG of 1.062 - my efficiency on that basis was a tad under at 78%

Yesterday I started a 2l starter with a vial of WLP001. A week ago I had done the same thing and fermented out. I decanted the first starter and added the yeast into the new starter at hugh krausen a couple of hours before pitching (to mix) and went out. Bad idea - I came home to find yeast all over my kitchen bench and not in the starter!. Oh well - I hope there's enough in there to take care of business.

Also kegged my Riwaka/Motueka Bitter. I'm fucking stoked - it tastes awesome and just what I was trying to emulate from the Murrays 'Punch n Judy' I tried in Sydney. 21L was fermented with WL Burton (Thames Valley) and 21L with WLP002 (1968). I think I prefer the WLP002 which has a bit more body left.

[jt]

Just flicked the switch on the kettle, first drainings on the light, late hopped brown are on their way to boiling wortiness

[JMB]

A clone of Sierra Nevada Celebration but with NZ hops, with same AA%
Just finished a Smoked IPA
Drinking a Smoked Scotch Wee-Heavy

[JMB]

Next a Belgian Tripple

[Martin Bridges]

I know I normally like my balanced beers, but you only turn 40 once so here's the first of my beers aimed at being ready for my birthday in early August:

Hoplivion - American Double IPA. Based on Tasty McDole's winning Longshot recipe.

7.75kg Maris Otter
0.4kg CaraPils
0.18kg Crystal 60L
0.15kg Wheat malt
55g Torrified wheat (added because I was a little short on wheat malt.)
0.71kg Table sugar (added to boil)

Mashed at 68 degrees for 90 minutes. Water adjustments as per my normal APA (i.e. good whack of gypsum). 90 minute boil.

25g Chinook mash hop
30g Chinook @ 90
50g Warrior @ 90
31g Simcoe @ 45
36g Columbus @ 30
31g Northern Brewer @ 15
47g Centennial @ 1
31g Simcoe @ 1
57g Cascade @ 0

Will be dry-hopped with a mixture of Centennial, Columbus & Amarillo to a total of 170g.

Yeast is Wyeast 1764PC Pacman. I've built up a 4 litre starter over the course of a week. It's champing at the bit ready to go.

Aiming for an OG of about 1.094 with calculated IBUs of 272.

Damned expensive brew, but hopefully it will be memorable!

[studio1]

looks pretty awesome! 23l batch? are you pitching all 4l of the starter?

[Martin Bridges]

21 litres batch. I've put the starter in the fridge to settle it out so I can pour the starter beer off and just pitch the yeast.

[Barry]

Looks amazing Martin!

[Martin Bridges]

Checked this morning and there's a colossal krausen almost leaping out of the top of the fermenter, so that PacMan yeast has rocked into life big style. Temperature has settled at 19 degrees which is what I was aiming for.

Not sure what the OG was as my hydrometer only goes up to 1.080. Was well off the scale though so I'd reckon 1.090+ which is in the ballpark.

I got quite a bit of hop sludge into the fermenter. In hindsight I should have increased the allowance for kettle deadspace in my calculations and stopped the runoff before it dumped too much in there. Hopefully it won't hamper the ferment too much. I think I'll be racking this one to secondary for the dry-hopping, otherwise the tap will be totally gummed up!

[Martin Bridges]

Just checked this after 10 days of dry-hopping (100g for the whole 10 days, 75g for the last 5 days) and before it goes into the fridge for crash-cooling. FG was 1.019, which makes it around 9.3%. Big mouthfeel, quite a bit of sweetness but the savage bitterness is lurking in the background.

I suspect it will take a little while to mellow out and settle down, but I'm pretty happy so far. I'm going to give it a few days at zero degrees to try and settle out all the hop matter before I keg it.

[Ally Mcg]

Inspired by Studio 1s use of Mash Hops I'm doing an all Mash Hop Brown Ale of sorts

Its a cold and filthy day out there and I wish I had a brewing assistant to do the hard/cold yards in the garage.

Sour Times for Her Maj

Gladfields Pale, TF Dark Crystal, Melanoiden, Carafa Special II
Rakau
S05

Aiming for 1.042 with BeerSmith telling me I'll get 19IBU. Sample out the MT tasted quite a bit more bitter than I'd have expected with a nice hoppy thing going on. Time will tell what happens to the aroma/flavour after a 60 minute boil. Not a whole lot online about Mash Hopping with most people thinking its a bad idea. Figure an all Mash Hopped ale will give a clear indication one way or another.

[studio1]

excellent! look forward to your update