AG#1 - Electric Pale Ale [Lots of Pictures]

[och29]

Some of the regular members might be aware that I have been building an electric brewery... which is now finished! (or at least enough to brew). Since it's based of the design of Kal at TheElectricBrewery.com I decided that it would be fitting to brew one of his recipes as my first all grain, Electric Pale Ale. The original recipe can be found here:
http://www.theelectricbrewery.com/forum ... hp?t=24947. I imported to into BeerSmith 2 which made short work of converting the units and scaling the size down a bit.

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 40.54 l
Post Boil Volume: 32.14 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 25.00 l
Bottling Volume: 24.75 l
Estimated OG: 1.052 SG
Estimated Color: 5.7 SRM
Estimated IBU: 37.7 IBUs
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
25.00 l RO Water
9.13 g Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash 60.0 mins
4.56 g Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Mash 60.0 mins)
1.31 g Calcium Chloride (Mash 60.0 mins)
1.02 g Salt (Mash 60.0 mins)
0.66 g Chalk (Mash 60.0 mins)

3.87 kg Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3.0 SRM)
0.87 kg Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM)
0.19 kg Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM)

17.10 g Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - Boil 20.0 min
17.10 g Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 20.0 min
0.55 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins)
34.20 g Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - Boil 10.0 min
34.20 g Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 10.0 min
34.20 g Amarillo Gold [8.50 %] - Boil 0.0 min
34.20 g Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 0.0 min

2 pkg Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05)
31.20 g Citra [12.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days

Brewed on 27/12/13

[och29]

Since the brewery build has taken so long I have to admit that I brewed before everything was completely finished. None the less things went mostly to plan:


Made up a starter 24hrs before pitching

Which looked pretty good once left overnight


Grain bill


Rather than easing into all-grain I decided to do everything! So here's the water filter than produces reverse osmosis water. For those that don't know it removes almost all the dissolved mineral salts giving you an almost clean slate that you can build a water profile around.



Since the filter doesn't get used everyday you have to discard the first few litres of water produced. This ensures the filter membranes are 'clean' and the water you are collecting has been 'purified'



Here's my setup:


Set the HLT controller to 75.6C and recirculate to ensure the water heats evently and the temperature probe gets an accurate reading


I'm using 24V pumps from MrLard powered by a 24V DIN mounted power supply inside the control panel. It takes a couple of hours to produce the 50 or so litres of water I needed and then another couple to heat it up to strike temperature. This gave me plenty of time to make up some StarSan (using more RO water), measure out the grain, hops and mineral salts:





Once the HLT was up to temperature I transferred to the mash tun. The temperature was about 5C and so a lot of heat was lost even before the grain was added. I decided to try recirculating through my HERMS but in the end it was quicker to drain the water back in to the HLT and then re-transfer 14.85l of water at 74.3C. Despite the pre-warming I was still a bit low on the initial temperature of the mash - 61C rather than the 66.7C I was aiming for. Having a HERMS meant that wasn't too much of a problem as I could circulate the wort through the HERMS and warm it up.



I have the PID read the temperature coming out of the HERMS coil; there is a separate temperature probe in the mash tun. My thinking is that there will be enzymes in the wort as it goes through the HERMS and you don't want to heat it too high and denature them.
In practice I had to set the HERMS PID two degrees above my target mash temperature in order to warm the mash back up.



Throughout the process I took refractometer readings to make sure things were heading in the right direction and pH reading to make sure the enzymes would be happy. I started off a little low at 5.44 and then with a slip of a syringe ended up a high at 5.11 so I had to correct with calcium hydroxide to bring it back to 5.2
I low/acidic pH gives a drier beer so I guess that's what I'm going to get!



After 90 minutes I raised the temperature on the PID to 75.5 to mash out. This took about 30 minutes. The next step was to fly sparge... where I realised I was one hose short of a brewery! The plan was to pump water from the HLT to the mash tun at the same rate as I was pumping wort from the mash tun to the boil kettle until I had 40.54l. Being one hose short this is what I had to do:



Luckily I had a spare, clean vessel available! Before I started this I added a little phosphoric acid (0.1ml) to the HLT to ensure the pH was around 5.8 - this helps to reduced tannin extracting from the mash. You can go as low as 5.6 but as I was already quite low on my mash pH I decided to stick at the high range.

The problem with this setup was trying to balance the sparge water going in and the sweet wort coming out. Of course once I had it almost perfect it was time to pause everything and empty the water cooler bottle into the boiler. The upshot of this was that I don't think I 'washed' the grain that effectively.

I came up short on my preboil gravity: 6.8 rather than 9.8 brix... very disappointing. I think it was a combination of:

1. Initially low mash temperature
2. Acidic mash
3. Poor 'washing' of the grain

Anyway no time to dwell on that time for the boil:




I got a good rolling boil on 80% power, given the cold temperature and lack of insulation I'm happy with that:



Foop successfully scooped!


Hops added at 40mins, 50mins and flameout. Whirlfloc at 45mins.





I ran the wort straight through the wort chiller at flameout... at last the almost freezing temperature was an advantage!



The bottom right indicator is on the wort out port of the plate chiller. This was taken just after I turned the pump off, I need to pump it up into my fermenting vessel so no gravity feed. To overcome the fast pump rate (I need to add a valve!) I pulsed the pump. Most of the time it was around 24C straight from boiling which is pretty damn impressive!

Took a quick sample:


Looks like a good cold break and a nice clear beer!

The rest went into the FV:




Starter added and OG checked.... 1037 so again under my expected 1052 but probably could have been worse. I'll just have to see how it turns out!

[och29]

Bottle conditioned:







Tasting:
Tried a bottle 10 days after putting it in, aiming for 2.2 volume of CO2. Primed with table sugar, stored at room temperature

Fantastic US hop aroma, citrusy
Small head with sparse bubbles (I realise this is a bit early so probably not at 2.2 vols yet). Somewhat opaque SRM 10ish
Good balance between malt and hop although a little thin (explained by poor sparge technique)
6/10

Overall:
I'm really happy with how this turned out. Given a little bit longer in the bottle/from a force carbonated keg I think this will be a really good 'house' beer to have on tap. It really made me think about how my mistakes in brewing have affected the final beer and so is a fantastic thing to have made for my first AG (and to be honest my first homebrew ever!).

The most important thing is that I would happily pay for a pint of it in the pub and would definitely order a second. Roll on AG#2!

[Matt12398]

Well done on getting your brewery built and for getting to use it. You could probably make your water treatment infinitely simpler than your list of additions.

[och29]

I could do but wanted to give everything a go for my first brew to check the equipment/process worked. The second brew I'm going to aim for efficiency!

[Matt12398]

Personally I'd avoid the chalk addition because it's unlikely to do anything as it's so insoluble. You can probably get to where you want to with just gypsum and calcium chloride on your next brew and if necessary some sodium bicarbonate if you need some pH adjustment.

Looks like you had a good brew day. That an impressive setup to do your first all grain on. Hope you've brewed a good one.

[faeyd]

Fantastic setup !! Love the pics - top job !!

[och29]

Personally I'd avoid the chalk addition because it's unlikely to do anything as it's so insoluble.

TBH I was just aiming for Randy Mosher's Pale Ale with lower sulphate. I was planning to dissolve the chalk in carbonate water but never got round to it. To an extent I was lucky my pH was a bit low as it meant I could use calcium hydroxide to raise it with the added benefit of more calcium! As for the setup, thanks, it's been a long time in the making!

[fego]

Nice set up and enjoyable write up too. Thanks for sharing.

My advice would be to concentrate on getting a stable brew from the kit before trying to hit 100% brilliance. Seems to me that perhaps attempting to perfect the water profile with a quite complicated recipe with unknown potential outcomes and, I assume, limited general experience may have contributed to your outcome. And. the problem with trying everything first time round (as I did) means that if the results aren't what you are happy with, you may find it difficult to pin down the area to improve/address. Still, as a trial brew, you got through it and you've got beer to look forward to and now know how the various bits work together.

[och29]

Updated the first page to include the finished product/tasting .

[StickyCola]

Great Post!. I've never seen such a complicated recipe and such a sophisticated & expensive setup for a first brew!. There did seem alot of wort left behind in the boiler, maybe this contributed slightly to the low OG. Also I was wondering why you made a starter for the dry S05. How did the FG turn out? Well done though. I could never have gone to those lengths for my first brew!

[och29]

Great Post!. I've never seen such a complicated recipe and such a sophisticated & expensive setup for a first brew!. There did seem alot of wort left behind in the boiler, maybe this contributed slightly to the low OG. Also I was wondering why you made a starter for the dry S05. How did the FG turn out? Well done though. I could never have gone to those lengths for my first brew!

Thanks, I don't think I posted a picture of the boiler once it had drained. There wasn't that much left behind though, I'm almost certain that it was my sparging technique that was off hence the low gravity. I ended up with a FG of 1010 which was what was expected so to me that suggests the mash was good but I left behind lots of sugar during the sparge... which fits with what I thought after the brewday.

I made a starter mainly because I wanted to practice everything. While I know some people say putting dry yeast in a starter can be detrimental I'm not sure I agree. Also I was meant to pitch 2.2 packets worth and so rather than doing that I thought 2 in a starter will easily equate to 2.2!

[och29]

I'm a few months, a few brews and quite a few pints down the line now and here's may take on things. I'm really glad I went all in and tried everything. I'm fairly sure the reason I missed my targets is the sparging. On my subsequent brews I got much better results, hitting my targets with a 75% efficiency. There's a lot to be said for starting out simple and that's what will work for most people. However if you do loads of research before you start you shouldn't be put off starting on an 'advanced' setup.

Remember though... shiny equipment doesn't make better beer ( but it just might make it easier)

[GrowlingDogBeer]

Great post.

I'm interested in what made you go down the RO route. It seems like a lot of effort to get your water right. If your water is terrible to start with I can understand it but most UK Water profiles I have seen can be fixed with less additions than you seem to be adding to your RO water.

I'm not saying what you are doing is wrong, looks like you have done your research just intersted as to what made you choose this route.

[och29]

The starting point is that I don't like the taste of the water where I live so I wanted to get a filter of sorts. Also the pipework to the brewery is quite old so I wanted a coarse filter to catch any flakes of metal/rust. As I started looking in to things I found out about 3/4/5 step filters and RO water. This gave me the nudge to seriously consider water chemistry and I found that my water comes from a couple of different sources depending on the time of year meaning although I have the average (mean) mineral values they don't perfectly represent the water coming out of the tap.
Since consistency and repeat-ability is king I thought RO would be a good option. It also gave me the option to build a water profile to match the beer and since the vast majority of beer is water why not start with the best you can get.

There are a few extra benefits of having RO water: making up StarSan with RO makes it last longer and guarantees that it will work. I also use it for filling up my windscreen washer fluid and diluting any cleaning chemicals.