Homegrown Saaz Bohemian Pils - Brewday 02.May.2011

[bosium]

This is the third and latest in my homegrown hop series. These hops have been sitting in my freezer since about last October, and I actually feared the worst - ie that they were past their prime, but I pulled them out yesterday and happily they seem to be fine! They still smelled fresh and aromatic so quite pleased with that. I had packed them into a ziplock back, pressed all the air out and then put the bag in an air-tight tupperware thing.

I also had 5KG of the Malt Miller's finest floor-malted bohemian pilsner malt that has been sitting around for months. I tasted some of the grains and while they were not as crisp and crunchy as fresh malt, they still tasted fine so I decided to brew with it. I wanted to keep it as simple as possible to let the flavour of the homegrown hops shine through. I decided to do a protein rest as this malt is quite undermodified.

I had a pitch of Belgian Lager slurry (WLP815) lying around from my last lager. It was getting a little old but still looked creamy and light tan coloured, and smelled fine so I used it. I decided to warm-pitch to kick start fermentation, so will need to do a diacetyl rest at the end of primary fermentation.

OG 1.048
FG 1.0xx
IBU 36
EBC 10

Recipe
100% Weyermann Floor-malted Bohemian Pilsner Malt

20g - 28.3 IBU - German Magnum 12.7% @ 60 min
30g - 5.5 IBU - Homegrown Saaz 2% @ 30 min
30g - 2.2 IBU - Homegrown Saaz 2% @ 10 min
30g - 0 IBU - Homegrown Saaz 2% @ 0 min (15 minute, 80°C steep)

Mash Schedule
50.0°C - 10 minutes (Protein rest)
68.9°C - 60 minutes (Saccharification and dextrinisation rest)

Calcium Chloride added to adjust source water to a balanced sulphate to chloride ratio, lactic acid added to correct mash pH and acidify sparge water. 1 minute pure oxygen at 1l/min. Large repitch of WLP815 (Belgian Lager) slurry, repitched at 14C and chilled to 9C within 3 hours. Ferment at 10C, will do diacetyl rest near to end of primary.

Weighing out my 'omegrown


80°C steep addition

[Manx Guy]

Hi!

Looks like a nice recipe and a good brew day!

Those hops look great, I'm sure they are fresher than some of the hops we buy via merchants...

Guy

[simple one]

That looks good enough to drink from the boiler!

[bosium]

Thanks boys, finger's crossed! Only annoying thing about making lagers with homegrown hops is the amount of time they need before you know if they're any good or not!

[phatboytall]

Looks good, what temp are you planning to ferment at?

[196osh]

Your lagers always look so enticing. Wish I had another fridge so I could lager properlly.

[WishboneBrewery]

Your home grown looks in good condition

[bosium]

Thanks lads!

@phatboytall - I'm fermenting at 10C. I usually pitch at 7C and let it rise naturally to 10C, but this time I've pitched warmer as my yeast cake is a little old and I want to give the yeast a bit of a kick start. Naturally, I'll do a diacetyl rest near to the end of primary fermentation just to make sure it finishes up cleanly.

@196osh - Cheers mate, I can really recommend you pick one up. I got a small chest freezer off ebay for £26 and it's such a pleasure to be able to ferment and lager beers at the same time. I like to serve my ales at 10C, so it works out well to serve from the same fridge that I ferment my lagers in.

@pdtnc - I'm also amazed how well it's kept. I'm hoping I'll have a lot more this year though, and I'll know better when to harvest them as I was pretty much winging it last year. Also, this has to be the first time anything I've 'home grown' has stuck around for so long :p

[phatboytall]

Cheers!

You say you keep it in a chest freezer at 10c, does the dial go up that high or have you had to convert it?

[bosium]

Nope, I have a TC-10 connected which controls the freezer, with the probe in a thermowell in the FV.

[lancsSteve]

Hops look grand - how are thy looking for this year?

Will be interested to hear how clarity and flavour are with a protein rest rather than decoction wth this malt. I ***love*** it in my helles and the incredible clarity and maltiness and wonder if that's from decocting or just the malt itself as I have NO DESIRE AT ALL to do another decoction schedule like the one we did, 4 hour mashes of constant work are not fun!

Really liking the normal bo pils malt as well...

Got a pic of your thermowell or any tips/warnings on making and using one? should start doing that myself...

[bosium]

Thanks! Hops are growing like stink this year, the American ones (Mt Hood, Willamette, Sterling and Cascade) really stand head and shoulders above the rest when it comes to vigour - they grow much faster and stronger than my Hallertau and Saaz, but I guess that's to be expected. They're all looking very good though, in their second year now. I think I'm in for a bumper harvest this year.

Can't wait to see what this hop's flavour is like, my Cascade and Mt Hood definitely tasted interesting! Also I've been meaning to try out this malt, 80% of what I brew is Pilsner so the malt is so important. I absolutely adore the premium pils / extra pale for my German beers, I have no doubt this malt will be great. Really glad your Helles has come out well, I've been meaning to try brew one myself but have never gotten round to it.

The thermowells I use are these ones from MoreBeer in the states, they slide into an orange carboy cap which fits a better bottle FV perfectly. They also fit into a rubber stopper which fits a demijohn, or could be made to fit into a hole in a plastic bucket lid.

[Gricey]

Very, very nice!

Off to do a diacetyl test on my lager now, if its all good I shall be racking to lager it for 6 weeks tomorrow.

[bosium]

D-rested this at room temp for 3 days, now back in the chest freezer until I can find some keg space for it

[bosium]

I kegged this about a week ago, it's down at 1.009! So it's a lot drier and crisper than I was expecting, much more of a German Pilsner attenuation profile so I guess I must have messed something up with the mash when protein resting it. I did overpitch it, but I do that to all my lagers tbh so I don't think that's the issue. It's also way paler than I thought it would be, I guess even the floor-malted bo pils malt isn't really all that dark.

It tastes, well, interesting. The hops are hard to describe. I'm going to let the beer lager for a few weeks before deciding what it really tastes like. Will update then.