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

[JoKing]

Looks nice my bro... I'll have a taste of that while I'm up there dropping off your Rambo.

[Reviled]

Sounds good mate!! Bro I was wishing I allready had that rambo yesterday, that wouldve sorted my boil problem out ;o)

[JoKing]

A couple new products for you fella's to tinker with:

http://www.libertybrewing.co.nz/content/bairds-dark-caramalt - has a Lovibond rating of 37.5

http://www.libertybrewing.co.nz/content/bairds-flaked-maize

[Soren]

brewing up a quick belgian pale ale before work.

will split it in 2 and ferment with Wyeast Ardennes and Canadian/Belgian.

should be a good quaffer over summer and a good yeast builder for bigger beers to come next week:



Belgian pale ale

A ProMash Recipe Report

Recipe Specifics
----------------

Batch Size (L): 45.00 Wort Size (L): 45.00
Total Grain (kg): 8.20
Anticipated OG: 1.045 Plato: 11.13
Anticipated SRM: 8.6
Anticipated IBU: 23.7
Brewhouse Efficiency: 85 %
Wort Boil Time: 60 Minutes


Grain/Extract/Sugar

% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
85.4 7.00 kg. Pale Ale Malt Gladfield NZ 75.81 2
6.1 0.50 kg. Aromatic Malt Belgium 73.35 25
6.1 0.50 kg. CarAmber Germany 69.19 30
2.4 0.20 kg. Special B Malt Belgian 60.88 120

Potential represented as % Yield, Coarse Grind As Is.


Hops

Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
50.00 g. Goldings - E.K. Pellet 4.75 15.8 60 min.
50.00 g. Goldings - E.K. Pellet 4.75 5.3 20 min.
50.00 g. Goldings - E.K. Pellet 4.75 2.6 1 min.

[Soren]

Does anybody have some experience with these yeasts (Ardennes and Canadian/belgian)?

I pitched at 20 C, maintained that temp for 36 hours until I had a good ferment going and now free-balling up to a max of 25C which I expect them to hit by the moring.

Does that sound like a good temp-profile or is it getting too hot?

[MrC]

I think Mike Neilson and/or JoKing are the right men for this question.

I've brewed with Ardennes and started at 18c and slowly raised to 22c over one week. Results were excellent, yeast character very similar to La Couffe. Not sure whether 25c would be OK but from memory Mike said that 28c is OK for Ardennes.

[Mark]

I'm brewing with Ardennes at the moment, and followed a similar temp profile to yours (maxing at 24), although my OG was a little higher at 1.071. It went gang busters to start with but slowed at about 1.020. From there it's been a crawl to 1.008ish, I'll probably rack it off this weekend. Apparently La Chouffe ferment pretty warm so you should be ok.

[Soren]

Cool, I think I may let it go at 24 C for 24 hours and then ramp it up to 26C for the remainder to make sure it finishes off.

Any comments on the canadian/belgian (unibroue)?

The trouble is that I only have one fermentation chamber so both of these have to have the same fermentation profile.

[Mark]

Sorry, no idea about that one, can't imagine it would be too different though. I'm definitely a fan of ramping them right up at the end to dry em out

[JoKing]

I've brewed with the Canadian strain a few times. It doesn't like getting too hot too soon, as it will crash hard and not attenuate fully. It's not the most attenuative strain full stop really. The solution for me was to increase the pitching rate by double and keep it at 19 for a few days (say 50% attenuation) then free ball it up to 25 if need be.

The Ardennes strain is less fussy, and can handle rediculous temps during active fermentation. It just gets fruitier and fruitier. Kinda like that juicy fruit chewing gum... mixed with that old school bubble gum flavour.

[Mike Neilson]

Just pitch cooler for the say 16 for the Canadian and 22 for the Ardennes let them free ball and it shall be sweet

[Stu McKinlay]

I've used Ardennes/Achouffe a lot and prefer it fairly cool early on... right around your temps Soren.