Recipe Advice Thread

[denimglen]

Thought it might be handy to have a thread for some of the more advanced brewers to give some advice on recipes.

Let's see how it goes eh...

[JoKing]

I've decided to get a new fermenter so as to aid in my overall upkeep in production. I have considered many options, but the main one sticking in my mind is the 60 Liter plastic job... you know the one I'm talking about.

I have an issue however that I reckon I need clarification on. That's right... take a photo - I'm asking you for advise!

I was gonna brew the monster again, but scale it up to a total volume of 40 Liters (previous versions have been 24 L) The quandry is, my kettle is 40 Liters, and after a boil off of about 3 - 4 Liters, I'm guessing that I will need to add 6 Liters of Water into the fermenter to adjust the wort volume up to 40 L. So I have adjusted my recipe to compensate for this water adjustment (Post Boil SG is 1.065 and wort S.G is 1.055 after water addition) The bittering hop addition has been adjusted for high sugar concentration in the kettle, and the late hop additions have been increased to compensate for the water addition. The water being added into the fermenter will be sterile too.

My query is - who has added water to their fermenters to adjust the gravity? This is something I've never done before - so I'm quite interested to learn everyones experiences here. This process is called a partial wort boil... And I have adjusted everything to compensate for the difference in volume, so all I want to know is how your beers have turned out when you have done this.

Here's the adjusted recipe any ways...

Yakima Monster
10-A American Pale Ale
Date: 5-08-09

Size: 40.95 L
Efficiency: 86.0%
Attenuation: 80.0%
Calories: 183.19 kcal per 12 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.055 (1.045 - 1.060)
Terminal Gravity: 1.011 (1.010 - 1.015)
Color: 16.74 (5.0 - 14.0)
Alcohol: 5.82% (4.5% - 6.2%)
Bitterness: 66.0 (30.0 - 45.0)

Ingredients:
8.4 kg Koelsch Malt 8 ebc
0.5 kg Caramalt 33 ebc
60.0 g Nugget (11.6%) - added during boil, boiled 60 min
42.0 g Amarillo (8.5%) - added during boil, boiled 10.0 min
42.0 g Simcoe (12.3%) - added during boil, boiled 10.0 min
42.0 g Amarillo (8.5%) - added during boil, boiled 1 min
42.0 g Simcoe (12.3%) - added during boil, boiled 1 min
84.0 g Amarillo (8.5%) - added dry to secondary fermenter
84.0 g Simcoe (12.3%) - added dry to secondary fermenter
US-05

Schedule:

00:03:00 Mash In - Liquor: 22.24 L; Strike: 75.33 °C; Target: 67 °C
01:03:00 Sacc Rest - Rest: 60.0 min; Final: 66.1 °C

Cheers.

[Stu McKinlay]

Fantastic results here.
I did it with the second homebrew version of PKB i made (have done it a couple of other times too). This example was split into 20L at full strength and 20L with a 50/50 water/wort mix. the "PKB mild" was awesome. It got polished at a party, off the handpump, and is one of the best beers i've ever made. And possibly the quickest to be finished.

And Emerson's did it for M'Lord Mild. I seem to remember you liking that...

the other thing you need to think about it that acidity of your wort. I have read that in England the brewers who do this actually pitch more yeast into the lower gravity wort to ensure a good strong fermentation takes place. i guess you could acidify the water that you are going to mix in.

[JoKing]

Some fantastic points there Stu. I was considering dropping the water pH to 4.2 and putting some late hops in it while I am steralising it.

As far as M'Lord goes... I didn't like it.

I LOVED IT!

Thanks Stu... that's all I needed to hear / read.

[MrC]

Not sure if this helps, but I've been looking into this recently:
SWIG

I was planning a smoked barleywine and a smoked porter both from the same base wort/grist.

[jt]

I always add water - but for two reasons.
First to get the volume I want
And second to get the gravity I want.
I don't want only 18 litres in the fermenter and I don't want 1.047 beer either

[Mike Neilson]

Are you guys thick or am I a half wit? Collect your last runnings and boil them into your final 3-4L across how many pots and pans it takes and add that to the fermenter. got to be better than water right?

[MrC]

That would work, you'd just need to make sure your runoff gravity doesn't get too low and you start extracting tannins, etc.

[Mike Neilson]

Yeah but you would of had a grist for a 40L beer so you would be pretty sweet. Some would even debate the 1.010 rule if your Ph is spot on.

[John]

I've just brewed the recipe below. It was a really good day and the water calculator worked perfectly However, the SG was 1.045 though and the recipe was for 1.055. Is this important to rectify?

http://www.brew365.com/beer_ss_oat.php

[Mike Neilson]

Yeah its good to hit your gravities as this is what makes your beer balanced. To remedy this take a pre boil gravity and adjust your bittering units to suit.

[denimglen]

Or if you have any malt extract on hand you can add that to hit your target gravity.

[James P]

It also means your efficiency was a little lower, maybe around the 57% mark (55/70 * 57 = 44.7), thus you didn't get full conversion of the starches to sugars, it happens.

Adding more grain (another 1/2 - 1 kilo) can make up for it! If you have access to one of the beer calculators (beer smith, promash or beertools (online)) you can sort your recipe to take into consideration the lower efficiency.