Renaissance Oaty Pale

[jimp2003]

Its been a bit of a wet and windy afternoon here with no plans to do anything particular so I decided to try a small batch of pale ale based on some historical grain bill info that Seymour dug up HERE.

I was intrigued by the high levels of oats used in some of the towns. I have gone for something based on 1536 Antwerp (kuit) grain bill which had 8% wheat, 49% oats and 43% barley.

Note that this is not an attempt to recreate a historically accurate brew. I just wanted to see what 49% oats would do in a brew.

Anyway here is the recipe:


Brewlength: 4L
Original Gravity (OG): 1.048 (°P): 11.9
Final Gravity (FG): 1.012 (°P): 3.1
Alcohol (ABV): 4.72 %
Colour (SRM): 8.5 (EBC): 16.8
Bitterness (IBU): 35.1 (Tinseth)

47.85% Golden Naked Oats
43.92% Belgian Pale Malt (Dingemans)
8.23% Torrified Wheat

7g Cascade (6.8% Alpha) @ 60 Minutes (Boil)
7g Cascade (6.8% Alpha) @ 10 Minutes (Boil)


Single step Infusion at 64°C for 60 Minutes. Boil for 60 Minutes

Fermented at 18°C with Gervin Ale Yeast


I put the mash in a low oven to keep it warm for the hour. It sort of worked with the mash starting at 63.7 C and ending just over 60 C.

The brew is murky as expected but having been a BIABer (and still am now and then) I don't worry too much about clarity at this stage. We are about halfway through the boil and I have been taking pics throughout so will post more later.....

Cheers!

Jim

[a-slayer]

Jim,I reckon with all those oats forget trying to make beer out of it and just put on some milk and sugar and eat it!

[jimp2003]

Jim,I reckon with all those oats forget trying to make beer out of it and just put on some milk and sugar and eat it!

Well Richard, the wort looked like it had a pint of milk thrown in it it was that murky. Still at least the house now smells of hoppy cookies!

[a-slayer]

Oatcakes after the mash then. New sideline for you, beer and cookies all in one.

[jimp2003]

Finally I have sorted the photos out so here goes......

I had a couple of packs of Golden Naked Oats so decided to use them instead of the rolled oats I would usually choose. Here they are with the Belgian Pale malt..



Here is the good old corona mill loaded up with the pale malt. The hopper holds about 500g but I keep meaning to knock up a bigger one.




The grains after milling plus the ready crushed torrified. I wasn't sure if I needed to mill the oats but put them through anyway just to break them up.



Weighing out the hops on my newly acquired small scales:




Usually I am out on the drive brewing but the small scale enabled me to do it in a stovetop stylee:



Just short of the target 64 degrees C mash temp but I was just relieved not to have to fit in more water adjusting the temp:



Mash ended at just over 60 degrees - clearly I have work to do in getting used to keeping the mash warm in the oven...



The grains were put in a fine nylon bag and sparged through it in order to keep out any large chunks. It worked pretty well and gave a similar result to a BIAB brew:



Up to the boil and the hops go in for 60 mins (I tried to be clever and photo them in mid air but just captured a few flakes ):



Post-boil chilling in the sink and the cold break starts to form:



Ended up with just under 4l at a slightly higher OG of 1.050/1.051. I had based my calcs on 60% efficiency so the result was about right.



And here is the muck at the bottom of the sample. Most of the break material would have made it into the FV but that's no problem.




I pitched a couple of grams of Gervin at about 22 degrees and now let's see what the morning brings.....

Cheers!

Jim

[6470zzy]

Note that this is not an attempt to recreate a historically accurate brew. I just wanted to see what 49% oats would do in a brew.

Jim

Looks like an interesting brew If you want to experiment with oats any further you should try an Oat Malt Ale, with 50% Thomas Fawcett Oat Malt.

Cheers

[seymour]

Woo-hoo, how fun! I'd say 60% efficiency is impressive. I'm pretty sure the historical brewers malted all their cereal grains, so it just goes to show the enzymatic power of your Belgian pale malt. It did a pretty good job of converting a complicated grainbill twice it's weight! I can't wait to hear all about how this turns out.

Cheers,
-Seymour

[jimp2003]

Cheers Seymour. I was surprised at the result also. I did a bit of research on how to mash the naked oats and references were made to them being a crystal oat with some people saying that you could just steep them. I wasn't totally convinced by this as there were a lot of mixed messages out there. Still, maybe some of the conversion had taken place in the processing of them...

[jimp2003]

Looks like an interesting brew If you want to experiment with oats any further you should try an Oat Malt Ale, with 50% Thomas Fawcett Oat Malt.

Cheers

Sounds interesting. Have you attempted it yourself?

[Hanglow]

Interesting recipe, hope it turns out good!

Maclays used to make an oat malt stout, I think they started rebrewing it at Clockwork too, but it's a brewpub really so hard to produce much. Oat Malt is supposed to be able to convert itself so you could do a 100% oat malt beer. The historic oat malt stout that ron posted on his blog only had 14% oat malt though

[6470zzy]

Looks like an interesting brew If you want to experiment with oats any further you should try an Oat Malt Ale, with 50% Thomas Fawcett Oat Malt.

Cheers

Sounds interesting. Have you attempted it yourself?

I have indeed brewed it before, I can't find the finished recipe but the notes of the grain bill were 63% Oat malt, 25% 2 Row. 6% Cara Pils and 6% Golden Naked Oats

I believe I used EKG hops and S-33 yeast. Not a bad beer as I recall but not one that I have endeavoured to brew again

Cheers

[a-slayer]

Well I hope to look forward to trying a pint .. with an oatcake of course.
All in all an interesting experiment.

[orlando]

Thinking about the clarity there was no mention of copper (er cooking pot) finings, would protafloc be appropriate.?I know that eventually everything clears but you might have got a cleaner wort into the fermentor and got yourself closer,no?

[barney]

A great brew idea, I cant help thinking that it will be wonderful but in a weetabix kind of way.

[jimp2003]

I have indeed brewed it before, I can't find the finished recipe but the notes of the grain bill were 63% Oat malt, 25% 2 Row. 6% Cara Pils and 6% Golden Naked Oats

I believe I used EKG hops and S-33 yeast. Not a bad beer as I recall but not one that I have endeavoured to brew again

Cheers

Thanks for the recipe - that must have been a sticky old mash.

Well I hope to look forward to trying a pint .. with an oatcake of course.
All in all an interesting experiment.

I will save a bottle for you Richard and bring along some of my oatmeal stout experiment for you to try in a few weeks after I have bottled it.

Thinking about the clarity there was no mention of copper (er cooking pot) finings, would protafloc be appropriate.?I know that eventually everything clears but you might have got a cleaner wort into the fermentor and got yourself closer,no?

Hi Orlando. I used a small pinch of irish moss in the last 10 minutes. In a full size batch I would use half a protofloc tablet but could no be @rsed to try to shave off a tenth or twelfth of a tab

A great brew idea, I cant help thinking that it will be wonderful but in a weetabix kind of way.

Cheers barney. Some people say that golden naked oats have a sweet berrylike flavour but I am hoping for something more cerealy if that makes sense..


The gervin has taken off nicely with the airlock bubbling away. I usually use plastic bucket FVs so with a glass demijon it is interesting to see the hypnotic motion of the yeast swirling around...