A day in the life in the JoKing Brewery.

[JoKing]

It's been a couple of weeks since I've been and given a bit of insight to the brewery here so I thought I'd pop in and say hi... Yesterday was a massive day of home brew related activities. And I was mindful of a few of the discussions that were on the forum. First off for the day was bottling off the batch of Barleywine that Mike and Reviled brewed here in my whare. It's been a while since I bottled a batch - so I thought I get the assistant brewer to give me some help with this. I had about a pint of this beer (due to spillage) and I must say... not bad! However - a was half pissed at 11am... not good.

We had a bit of a production line going on... it worked out well, but I have to admit that this is my least favourite aprt of brewing. I think that if I was still bottling instead of kegging, I would probably brew a lot less. I mean... there were 38 Bottles, each one was individually cleaned, rinsed, steralised, rinsed and then primed even before the Assistant Brewer came over to help. It took about an hour and a half to get these bottles filled. Christina was the filler, I was the passer and capper: Christina hates capping! Anyway... after lunch I got into the business at hand. I thought it would be interesting to write a brew log for this session... so here goes. Naked_______ Blonde 6-B Blonde Ale Author: J Wood Date: 18/04/2009 Size: 24.24 L Efficiency: 84.0% Attenuation: 78.0% Calories: 169.89 kcal per 12.0 fl oz Original Gravity: 1.051 (1.038 - 1.054) Terminal Gravity: 1.011 (1.008 - 1.013) Color: 4.85 (3.0 - 6.0) Alcohol: 5.25% (3.8% - 5.5%) Bitterness: 26.1 (15.0 - 28.0) Ingredients: 4.75 kg Pilsner Malt 0.250 kg Melanoidin Malt 10.0 g Nugget (11.6%) - added during boil, boiled 60 min 42 g Home Grown Hops (8%) - added during boil, boiled 12 min 42 g Home Grown Hops (8%) - added during boil, boiled 1 min 1.0 ea Fermentis US-05 Safale US-05 12:00 Set up brewery 12:16 Start filling Mash Tun 12:18 Start Weighing Malt / Start heating strike water 12:25 Finish heating strike water - 75.2 degrees / Start milling malt into strike water. 12:27 Finish Milling malt / Stirring mash 12:29 Dough in Complete - 67.5 degrees 13:00 Start filling HLT 13:01 Start Heating HLT 13:02 Start Recirculating HLT 13:12 HLT Full 13:13 HLT up to temp - 78 degrees 13:14 Flush water out of pump with wort 13:15 Start recirculating the mash 13:29 Turn off pump, change mash outlet hoses over to the kettle 13:30 Start transfer wort to kettle 13:31 Connect hoses to pump and HLT 13:38 Turning kettle on / Start Sparging 14:08 Sparge complete: 29L in kettle / Start pack away empty HLT / Check SG of final running: 1.006 14:33 Rolling Boil observed 15:03 10g of Nugget added to boil 15:48 Chiller placed in Kettle and start whirlpooling. 15:51 42g of Danscade added to kettle with .7g carageenan and .2g servomyces 16:02 42g of Danscade added to kettle 16:03 Cold water on / Turn Kettle off 16:18 Turn whirlpool off 18:33 Start transfer to fermenter / pitch yeast 18:43 Transfer complete / pack away brewery 18:45 Check SG of wort: 1.051

So that's some nice clear wort there... a little bit darker than I expected - still blonde though... maybe a golden blonde! After I finished with the brew, I went into the fermenting room to check on the Red Ale that is fermenting in there and took a photo of the yeast sitting atop the clear wort for Studio1. This is the 2nd brew in a row with that yeast that it behaving like this! Honeslty... if you didn't have temperature control, it must be extremely difficult to get the yeast to drop out from its krausen!

Patience Grasshoper... it will drop when it's ready...

[Reviled]

So when can I expect my bottle? ;o)

[JoKing]

Of what...? there's 3 beers in this post! I'll bring all my goods with me for the WBC meeting in May... can you wait until then?

[Reviled]

Of the barley wine :oP But yeah I guess I can wait untill the WBC, as long as you dont try and make me open it then :oP lol

[JoKing]

I can send a bottle up to Alisters place... You can meet him at Hallertau with Studio1 on Thursday... there is a bit of a tasting going on then?

[Reviled]

Hmm, not sure if ill be able to get to Hallertau this week, its cool bro I can wait till may...

[JoKing]

Oh welll, no worries - looks like Studio1 has a prior anyways. I'll keep trying for another time...

[Reviled]

Could allways post em to my place ;o) lol