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...

[jt]

I can imagine that would be good Jacko.

I'm not much on brewing pils, pretty much given up after not too many attempts
What's more important, water treatment, mash schedule, pitching & ferment temp ?

[Andre Jaworski]

Thanks Jacko,

Beer smith tells me I need to keep the melanoiden below about 8% if want to keep to style colour wise.

I have never used it before and was wondering how much you would use?

[JackoNZ]

Others could probably pitch in as I've not used it much as I thought the 100% base was malty enough, personal tastes and all that. But maybe start with 3% melanoiden and then go from there for the next one?

jt - I'd say for a decent pils/lager the most important is pitching and ferment temp. And some conditioning time always helps. Pitch cold, ferment cold, and pitch lots of yeast so it gets the beer down to target gravity. I've had the odd one stall at 1.020ish and gets a bit sweet.

[jt]

I did a couple with 34/70 year before last. There was a fair bit of discussion about JamesP's hoprocker at the time
I managed the cold pitch and ferment ok, but I'm impatient and missed out on the conditioning time.
Banksy has the patience, he manages to condition for a month or three and that pays off

And I think Mark in Palmy has used the Malteurop a bit in pils too, it'd be worth checking his posts

[Mark]

Yup, used Malteurop a fair bit including a recent Dortmunder lager and a (currently fermenting) pilsner, both with 34/70. I did a single decoction  in both at mash out, it's definitely noticeable in the lager. I've used melanoiden in the past and I'm not a huge fan or it in lagers/pilsners, they end up tasting more like an English bitter. However it's probably ok in small doses.

I pitch fairly cold (7-10C) and ramp up the temp after a couple of weeks so it doesn't stall. The latest lot was lagered for a month or so and it definitely made a difference, seemed to tone down the grassy flavours a bit and bring the malts together. You can't go too far wrong though, just don't add too many malts that complicate the beer unnecessarily.

[Dan]

100% Boh pils with 35 ibu Riwaka and US05. Great summer quaffer! I did a 90 minute mash @ 65'c and 90 minute boil. Fermented low at 16'c it came out nice and clean.

[Stu H]

I've been brewing a Flanders Red Ale, as per the instructions of Jamil Zainasheff; He recommends initially fermenting with 1056, and then pitching the Roeselare Blend once the beer is down to 1.020... Unfortunately I missed the boat and got to the beer once it had gone all the way down to 1.012!

I've gone and racked and pitched the bugs anyway, do you guys think it will get sour enough? I was thinking perhaps feeding it some more wort in a few months once the Saccharomyces has died?

Anyone got experience with these beers?

[Mark]

I've got one that's been conditioning for about 8 months now. I ignored Jamil's method and just pitched the Roeselare blend without a pre-ferment, given that the blend contains 2 yeast strains as well as the bugs. So far the samples are tasting nice, plenty of sourness. You can control the sourness by exposing (or limiting exposure) to oxygen, so maybe a loose fitting top to your fermenter will help the situation. Extra wort will probably help a bit too, although from memory some bugs don't like too much alcohol.

[Stu H]

Yeah I wish I'd done what you'd done already. I think I'll just see what the story is in like 3 months and maybe pitch a little more wort. Have you got a pellicile on yours?

[Mark]

Yep, crazy moldy looking thing, but it took a while to form (2-3 months or so). The yeast strains did a fair chunk of the ferment first. Evidently there's a fair amount of variation of sourness to be had with oxygen levels etc, I'm just hoping to strike a nice balance.

[Paul Fraser]

I'm toying with this idea for a Scottish 80/-.. How does the grain bill sound? I want emphasis on the malts so was unsure of adding any late hops. Probably not i think. I am unsure of what yeast would work well with this. I probably want something clean tasting. Ideas??

OG-1.044

18 IBU's

19L batch

 

68% Maris Otter

12% Crystal 40L

6.5% Munich

6% Crystal 120L

6% Melanoidin

1% Pale Chocolate

 25g Goldings @ 60mins

 

Cheers

 

 

[Grant R Baker]

Sounds pretty darn good.

 I'ld probably go higher on the OG and IBU.  Late hops can add a lot of flavour... but true to form Scottish Ales are low on the hop bill.

 

I just brewed a Scotch Ale and used the Whitelabs Edinburgh Ale yeast.. first time so I can't recommend till late May... previously the good old SafeAle S-04 has been used on the same recipe base and I can't complain about it.