Caledonian Malty Frog

[Kev888]

Well I thought it was time for something malty. Thanks to recomendations in a recent thread, I decided to go with a hybrid - the Caledonian 80 shilling that John kindly recomended sounds like something I'd enjoy, but also following Dave-O's suggestion I thought I'd swap out some pale malt for some Munich - though not 100% as I don't have that much.

Here's todays's recipe (aside from the munich the quantities also deviate slightly from the 80/- recipe; mostly for convenience and to avoid part packs of hops being left over):

Pale Malt (optic) 67.5%
Munich Malt 23%
Crystal malt 6%
Wheat malt 3%
Chocolate malt 0.5%

Goldings 100g 90mins
Fuggles 100g 90mins
Goldings 100g 10mins

I have some 2nd generation US-05 slurry that I'm hoping will work out okay for this one

I estimate around 1.047 OG and 36 IBUs

The mash is currently drawing to a close, so pictures will follow when I get chance.

Cheers,
Kev

[leedsbrew]

good luck matey! hope all goes well. Full brew length?

[Kev888]

Thanks LB! Yes, another 85L (more or less). Though its only going to be a modest gravity this time, so the MT won't be quite so stretched. Seem to be having quite a slow run-off for some reason, so time to post some pictures:

The Ingredients - I rounded the hops a bit to avoid leaving part packs. Less than 18kg grain bill for this one; at a predicted 1.047 its a fairly modest gravity recipe:


Got the Strike temperature right without any manual adjusting, which is rare for me - normally I overdo it a bit (its the bottom left readout - the top one is the HLT heating the top-up liquor I added after filling the MT).


Here's my secret weapon for doughing in; its only chrome plated but only takes a minute or so before I can rinse it off, and so far the plating has survived a couple of brews:


A bit of headroom in the MT this time, and its at 2.5L/kg too - the last couple of recipies have been higher gravity and needed stiffer mashes to fit:


Mash temperature - was aiming for 66c, so not too bad - think the grain was a bit warmer than last time.


And the mash PH. Its difficult to tell exactly but i'd say about 5.6, so not terrible but a bit high. This is happening all the time these days, yet I've double checked all the total alkalinity measurements and CRS additions on a number of brews and they should be coming out lower than I'm getting. Think I need to investigate the salt situation a bit - just a couple of tsp of gypsum in the mash is clearly a bit lacking in scientific accuracy if I want to hit it spot on.


Sparge is running at the mo, its a bit slow but seems steady so fingers crossed..

Cheers
Kev

[GrowlingDogBeer]

Looks good

I have about 60 Litres of GW's Caledonian 80/- that I kegged last weekend, the swapping out of some of the pale for Munich sounds as though it could be intereting, I may have to try that at some point.

[Kev888]

Thanks; I'll try to remember to report back on how it turns out - usually it'll be a few months from brewday before I'll be drinking it. Assuming it isn't drain cleaner, anyway!

Cheers
Kev

[leedsbrew]

Nice one Kev! I like your temp control box! very neat! I'm going to be trying mine out for the 1sT time on Thursday



LB

[WallyBrew]

And the mash PH. Its difficult to tell exactly but i'd say about 5.6, so not terrible but a bit high. This is happening all the time these days, yet I've double checked all the total alkalinity measurements and CRS additions on a number of brews and they should be coming out lower than I'm getting. Think I need to investigate the salt situation a bit - just a couple of tsp of gypsum in the mash is clearly a bit lacking in scientific accuracy if I want to hit it spot on.

And from Brewing Science and Practices we have....

Infusion mashes are best carried out at pH 5.2 - 5.4 (mash temperature), and so will give cooled worts with pH values of about 5.5 - 5.8.

That plate looks about room temp so stop worrying about it

[Kev888]

Looking very smart indeed, LB. I just noticed in my photo that I still haven't actually screwed the facia up properly yet..

Wallybrew; yes I agree its not a huge concern (which is probably why I've just carried on with it 'as is' for so long) its more that I'm consistently getting somewhat higher than I'm aiming for, which annoys me a bit. Though i guess as its fairly predictable I could just change my aim..

Cheers
kev

[WallyBrew]

The point is if you have read the pH at room temperature and got 5.6 then your mash pH is in the range 5.2 to 5.4 so why would you want to be any lower??

[leedsbrew]

Looking very smart indeed, LB. I just noticed in my photo that I still haven't actually screwed the facia up properly yet..

Cheers
kev

Doh!

It's been running my ferm fridge all week but Thursday will be the 1st time it'll controll the HLT

[Kev888]

The point is if you have read the pH at room temperature and got 5.6 then your mash pH is in the range 5.2 to 5.4 so why would you want to be any lower??

In this case I don't particularly, but I'd be happier if it were mid-way rather than towards one end of the scale as it only takes a slightly greater deviation from what I'd intended to start pushing it beyond, as has happened with some brews. I completely agree that its no biggie (I almost regret mentioning it!) but its annoying - I wouldn't expect to be spot on, but for it 'alway's to be higher than aimed for suggests I'm doing something consistantly a bit lax...

Cheers
Kev

[Kev888]

It's been running my ferm fridge all week but Thursday will be the 1st time it'll controll the HLT

The best of luck with it one! Did you need to to the external-relay thing? I'm forgetting who is doing what lately!

Cheers
kev

[Kev888]

Right, a few more:

Here's the sparge underway (the block of wood under the lid was removed once the photo was taken):


The last runnings and pre-boil gravity, both at 20c. I got a bit close/far for comfort with the last runnings - possibly because its a malty one but it didn't seem to taste as low as that:


The hops in the kettle. I've been trying them at this stage lately rather tha at the boil - not sure if it makes any difference that I can taste but it hasn't made things worse.


And the boil being reached. There's been some discussion about lid on vs off lately, so took a pic of how I have it as a compromise - admittedly there is a little condensation return to the boiler from the lid but steam can still escape happily and I've never detected anything I'd attribute to DMS with this level of venting.


Cheers
kev

[Kev888]

Hmm, thats not as expected; I seem to have an OG of 1.057 rather than the 1.047 I'd estimated..


Theres a lot of cack floating in there so maybe its not reading accurately, or maybe I'll be short on volume.. seems unlikely that my efficiency suddenly rocketed. I relied upon the scale on a new FV bucket to measure the runnings, and in retrospect not sure how accurate it is, but i'll know once its cooled and in the conical.

cheers
kev

[Kev888]

Well its done now - apart from hours of cleaning up :-/

Heres the after-math of the boil - lots of break as well as hops, which formed an excellent filter bed as I got a fast run off from the boiler.


And in the conical; it was slightly short on volume, but only by three or four litres out of an anticipated 85..


Most odd - I'll have to go back through the volumes and gravities, but I seem to have an extra 10 points of gravity and almost the volume I expected even after it cooled/shrank...

Cheers
kev