I thought I'd have another go at a mild, because the last one came out incredibly hoppy. First of all I thought I had a stuck fermentation, then it hadn't primed after a fortnight in bottle, and the LAB-ers said it was sweet, then after a few more weeks it has primed OK, and is quite drinkable but as a hoppy dark-ish ale. Definitely not a mild.
Mild 22/6/2008
3kg Mild Ale malt
2kg pale malt
500g crystal malt
Using HERMS system -
Mash schedule:
½ hour @ 50 ̊C
½ hour @ 60 ̊C
½ hour @ 67 ̊C
heated to about 80 ̊C for sugar solubility before sparging with 78 ̊C water down to 2̊ Brix
NB mash liquor and sparge liquor each had 0.4g metabisulphite added (= 1 Campden tablet) to kill chloramine.
Boiled 1 hour with 15g 2007 home-grown Hallertau hops and lidful of Irish Moss
Boiled 15 minutes with 15g 2007 home-grown Hallertau hops
Force-cooled to 23.5 ̊C
Pitched SO-4 starter made with wort
OG 1066 @ 23.5 ̊C = 1067.6 @ 15.5 ̊C
28/6/2008
Racked to fermenter using peristaltic pump. Racking gravity 1020 @ 22.8 ̊C = 1021.4 @ 15.5 ̊C. so 6% ABV at this point using HMRC fudge factor of 1.3.
Doughing-in (you can see I'm now using the giant pasta strainer and grain bag, after the problems I had with the Vienna Ale):
Mashing with HERMS:
I turned down the flow on the heat exchanger outlet valve, so the wort coming out of the grains could keep up with the pump taking it away. Now I could walk away, relying on the timer (mobile phone - you can't nudge the buttons if you lock the keypad) on my belt. I'm pretty happy with the new pasta strainer, and I can lift out the whole thing, grain and all, when the mash tun becomes the boiler.
Sparging:
Quite a lot of wort to have to boil (I topped-up the boiler in stages):
Cooling:
Aerated and pitched:
Spent grains and hops on the compost heap:
Note the chicken wire for keeping-out the larger rodents.
