Two celebrations, two beers

[TheMumbler]

I had planned to brew today to celebrate one year (to the day) of AG brewing with a double pale ale brew. I also found out that I have been recommended for the award of my PhD yesterday so it is two celebrations, two beers.

The idea is to mash enough grain for a 40l brew and then split into 2 20l boils for two different beers. I'm thinking two pale ales one hopped with English hops and one with NZ hops. It is a user-upper so the grain bill is a touch odd but I think it should work.

Recipe Gravity 1.050
Estimated FG 1.012
Alcohol by Volume 4.8%

Recipe Color 12 SRM

Ingredients
6.25 kg Maris Otter Malt
1.00 kg German Munich
0.50 kg Flaked Maize
0.40 kg Imperial Malt
0.25 kg Crystal Rye

English Pale Ale (20l) - 51 EBU
Green Bullet (13.7%) 20g @ 60 min
EKG (6.8%) 50g @ 15 mins
EKG (6.8%) 50g @ 0 mins

NZ Pale Ale - (20l) 51 IBU
Green Bullet (13.7%) 22g @ 60 min
Pacific Gem (14%) 20g @ 15 min
Pacific Gem (14%) 30g @ 0 min

The HLT is heating the water and I'm checking mash volumes, making sure that the aa of the hops in the packet matches the figures I put in qbrew and considering minor changes.

[WishboneBrewery]

Congrats I wonder when my first AG was....?

*Edit*
http://pdtnc.wordpress.com/2009/06/28/a ... chars-ipa/ I think I missed my AG Birthday!

[TheMumbler]

All in all a long day, made longer by me faffing about too much in the morning and the weather preventing a parallel boil. Also the boiler cut out on the second brew. The NZ version slightly exceeded the expected OG at 1052 with 20l in the fermenter. The EKG version was 1060 with 19l possibly because the boiler cut out a bit after it got to the boil so I had to shift the wort around and clean the element. I then boiled for 60 mins so there will have been more evaporation. I bottled up 27 or 28l of a bitter using Northdown the next day and these are going into cornies for sure

The grist and doughing in and mash temp


Mashing, before wrapping up in a sleeping bag and putting a coat on it. Then time to knock up a new hop filter as the old one was rubbish


Recirculating and then running off the first batch. Followed by
second batch (about the limit of the MT) followed by second batch run off


NZ hops: Green Bullet, 15 min Pacific Gem, 0 min Pacific Gem


The boil (indoors due to rain), trub and the NZ wort. I did boil down 2-3l of wort for each brew but didn't take any pics, I'm sure you can imagine a pan of wort boiling.


The Green Bullet for the EKG brew looked the same so I won't duplicate. There were two 50g addtions at 15m (shown below) and 0min

50g of EKG, trub and wort for the EKG brew

[WishboneBrewery]

Good stuff

[TheMumbler]

Just took gravity readings although I am not totally certain which beer is which (note to self label in future) I am fairly confident

GB/EKG - down to 1010 and tasting weirdly sweet for a beer fermented so low
GB/PG - down to 1012 not so sweet tasting but fruity with a hint of ginger

Seems strange that the stronger wort has fermented lower. There is still a thick yeast head from the US05 so i guess it may go lower unless I crash cool. The wort is now pretty opaque so I guess there is plenty of yeast in suspension.

[Deebee]

looks good. tell me.. what is the holed plate you are sparging throgh and where did you get it?

thanks

[TheMumbler]

BBQ grill sheet from Wilkos, I think you have asked me about that before, so no new leads I'm afraid. Also they don't stock them at the moment, maybe next summer.