Home Brew Forum

Aiming for a malty red ale with balanced hop bitterness, but lip smacking quaffability. This is a cross between an Irish red ale and an American Amber. It's a Red Ale that follows on from a discussion with spud on combining munich and amber malt. The name 'Viking Sunset' is after my mate who has got red hair. When people call him ginger, he replies it's not ginger it's 'Viking Sunset', sort of from the dulux range of shades of ginger.

Just mashed this in at 67C. Pics to follow later.

Viking Sunset

Fermentable Colour lb: oz Grams Ratio
Pale Malt 5 EBC 6 lbs. 13.3 oz 3100 grams 76.8%
Munich Malt 21.5 EBC 0 lbs. 7.0 oz 200 grams 5%
Vienna Malt 8.5 EBC 0 lbs. 7.0 oz 200 grams 5%
Amber Malt 60 EBC 0 lbs. 7.0 oz 200 grams 5%
Carared 70 EBC 0 lbs. 3.5 oz 100 grams 2.5%
Crystal Malt 120 EBC 0 lbs. 3.5 oz 100 grams 2.5%
Torrefied Wheat 4 EBC 0 lbs. 3.5 oz 100 grams 2.5%
Roasted Barley 1220 EBC 0 lbs. 1.2 oz 35 grams 0.9%

Hop Variety Type Alpha Time lb: oz grams Ratio
Northdown Whole 8.7 % 60 mins 0 lbs. 0.7 oz 20 grams 25%
Fuggle Whole 4.2 % 20 mins 0 lbs. 0.7 oz 20 grams 25%
Styrian Goldings Whole 3.8 % 10 mins 0 lbs. 0.7 oz 20 grams 25%
Styrian Goldings Whole 3.8 % 0 mins 0 lbs. 0.7 oz 20 grams 25%

Final Volume: 23 Litres
Original Gravity: 1.042
Final Gravity: 1.010
Alcohol Content: 4.1% ABV
Total Liquor: 32.3 Litres
Mash Liquor: 10.1 Litres
Mash Efficiency: 80 %
Bitterness: 27.3806740354818 EBU
Colour: 33 EBC

Might have to rethink the hops. I wanted to use up 1/2 a bag of fuggles and 1/2 a bag of northdown from the freezer, but they both smell a bit cheesy.

First things first. Get a brew on!



The weigh in - Some people like to keep it simple but I like to put a bit of everything in a recipe



The obligatory grain shot


Mash in: 1 tspn CaCl2 in the mash




I was aiming for 67C. Close enough!



All boxed up. Left it for an hour and a bit.


Filled the boiler to 23L for the sparge.



Sorting the hops in the freezer.



Weighing out the bittering hops. Decided to bin the northdown and fuggles. They smelt a bit old. Went with Northern Brewer on the bittering. EKG & bobek on flavour & aroma.



Oops! Broke one of my hop bowls. I'll give the missus a week before she says didn't we use to have 6 soup bowls.



Mash out. I love this igloo mash tun. Only lost 0.3C in 1 1/2 hours. Looks like this might be an evil brew.



The first runnings looked very dark. Thought I might have to rename this one "Ten minutes after Viking sun has set"



First wort hop



Forgot to take any pics of sparging. I jug water from my boiler on to the top of the grain bed covered in tin foil with holes in. I love this new temp probe (thanks for the link Jim ) You can prop it against the side of a jug and it doesn't fall in!



On the boil for 1 hour.



New hop schedule
Northern Brewer 60 mins 20 grams
Golding 20 mins 20 grams
Bobek 10 mins 20 grams
Golding At flame out 80C steep 20 grams
Bobek At flame out 80C steep 20 grams

Flavour / aroma hops and brew sheet



Immersion cooler in with 20 mins to go



Aroma hops in



Draining the wort off to the fv



Before aerating



After aerating



Using Safale us05 - Yeast pitched at 18C - 1042 OG



Jobs a guddun!! Colour looks more like it now the SG is where I planned it. Gonna ferment this with an aquarium heater set at 19C. Pretty smooth brewday apart from the soup bowl. All breakages must be payed for in cholates and flowers in our house. Oh well! You can't make beer without breaking crockery, I always say!

Excellent brew day and i love the use of the had blender!!!!!

Plus one for the blender! Do you whizz it up I'm starsan (or similar) first? Is it dedicated to brewing or not?

leedsbrew wrote:Plus one for the blender! Do you whizz it up I'm starsan (or similar) first? Is it dedicated to brewing or not?

Hi LB! Just leave the removable whizzy bit to soak in bleach for 1/2 hr. Then whizz it up in boiling water to rinse.

Never had a stuck ferment since I've been doin this!

Nice one! I'm brewing up on wednes day so will have to give it a whirl!

Looking good HH, that'll be one tasty brew for sure.
I brought my munich/amber brew to a tasting night last week, went down very well!

HighHops wrote:

leedsbrew wrote:Plus one for the blender! Do you whizz it up I'm starsan (or similar) first? Is it dedicated to brewing or not?

Hi LB! Just leave the removable whizzy bit to soak in bleach for 1/2 hr. Then whizz it up in boiling water to rinse.

Never had a stuck ferment since I've been doin this!

Excellent brewday, very organised How long do you aerate with the blender?

Never thought of using an hand blender, good thinking , i`m gonna use ours from now on.