AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

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wfr42

AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Tue Apr 05, 2016 11:37 pm

I made use of geterbrewed's custom AG kit, and ordered the ingredients for GH's vanilla bourbon stout, but plan to add coffee instead of the vanilla and bourbon. I chose to brew this a bit long (was aiming for 25 litres), after bottling AG3 (the HBC's double ipa) at 7.1% (0.9% above expected strength...).

Chose the lucky name as:
- this is my 13th brew.
- I'm combining the additions of one recipe with the grain bill and hops of another.
- I'm reusing yeast for the first time (that has already chewed through a 1.060 brew )
- I was planning to brew a bit long and therefore reduce the head space in my FV
- I needed the weather to hold off during the duration of my mash, sparge and boil.

(Not sure if I can share the GH grain bill, so won't unless a mod tells me it's worth doing).

I BIAB using the HBC peco boiler kit.

Mixing just over 7kg of various malt - doughing in single handed was quite slow. 22 litres of strike water dropped from 72 to 62 degrees, so i topped up with 2 kettle loads (3.5 litres) of boiling water to get back up to 65 degrees. Temperature held well during the 60min mash.

Had to move inside as the rain started up again, before sparging with another 10 litres of water (which I collected in my 15 litre pot I got for my first 2 ags) which cooled to 80 degrees boiling the kettle throughout the mash.
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Draining the mash liquor to my bottling bucket.
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Collected 27litres according to the bottling bucket's scale and transferred this back to the boiler to give 29litres with the dead space left in the boiler.
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Yeast - US-05 reclaimed from my last AG batch, a first for me!
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Cooled wort reading
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Yeast pitched in just under 25 litres - fingers crossed for a clean ferment, I've started with a blow off tube just in case.
GH recipe has a target gravity of 1.070 for 23 litres so quite happy with just under 25 litres at 1.060.

Thanks for reading - good luck with your brews!

Clibit
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Location: Old Trafford

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by Clibit » Wed Apr 06, 2016 8:40 am

Good luck with that! Looks great, has the fermentation kicked in?

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Wed Apr 06, 2016 9:08 am

It looks like I have a small krausen back up to the foam from aeration height, the foam had broken up before bed last night and the lid is bowed out (I always squash it down to start).
Tempted to swap the blow off tube for an airlock for a better indication, resisting temptation to peek (at the moment). I do miss fermenting in demijohns for that reason.

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Wed Apr 06, 2016 1:11 pm

20160406_125529.jpg
Approximately 20 hours in.

I peaked...it looks good. :-)

Clibit
Under the Table
Posts: 1631
Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 8:46 pm
Location: Old Trafford

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by Clibit » Wed Apr 06, 2016 2:11 pm

1060 coffee stout coming your way. How you adding the coffee?

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Wed Apr 06, 2016 2:31 pm

Was going to add a strong* cafetiere next week and give it at least another week before moving to the shed for 48 hours prior to bottling.

*planning 25% stronger than how I normally drink it and then let it cool to 20 degrees. Need to check the volume of our large cafetiere.

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Fri Apr 08, 2016 3:36 pm

It's had a wee attempt to escape...big big krausen.

Has quite a strong coffee nose already, so I may try it without any additions.

Chug

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by Chug » Fri Apr 08, 2016 8:25 pm

your yeast harvesting works ok then! has it got coffee in it?

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Fri Apr 08, 2016 9:13 pm

No coffee yet, it smells great already, I may wait until I take another sample and see how it tastes.

I top cropped some yeast yesterday so have a dark and light version of US-05 in the fridge now.

Chug

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by Chug » Fri Apr 08, 2016 11:28 pm

Can you maybe give us the grain bill in percentages?, I'm curious.

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Thu Apr 21, 2016 9:29 pm

Moved this out to the shed (at 10 degrees c at the moment) for 48 hours before bottling.

Added a 3 scoop single person cold brewed cafeteria and the sample tasted great although it has dropped down to 1.006 (approx abv of 7.2%...)

Chug

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by Chug » Thu Apr 21, 2016 9:35 pm

3 scoop single person?

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Thu Apr 21, 2016 9:43 pm

I have a 1 person cafeteria which I normally brew with one of the scoops it came with and a larger cafeteria which I brew with 3 or 4 scoops.

I read that when adding coffee to homebrew it's best to brew it with cool tap or pre boiled water to limit harsh burnt flavours.

wfr42

Re: AG4 - Lucky 13 stout

Post by wfr42 » Sat Apr 23, 2016 5:38 pm

1.010 while bottling not sure where the 1.006 came from so just below 7%.

Gh raspberry wheat beer cooling now

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