Old Speckled Hen Clone

[KingBrianI]

Just got the OSH clone tucked away in the fermentation fridge and thought I'd share the brewday with you all. Everything went according to plan and it was a relatively uneventful affair. I did my part so as long as the yeast I harvested from some Hen's Tooth does its job, I think I'll have a nice pint in a few weeks.

Old Speckled Hen Clone from BYOBRA (with minor modifications)

OG 1.050
IBU 32
SRM 11 (differs greatly from that quoted in BYOBRA)

3300g Maris Otter
330g Medium Crystal
500g Invert No. 2 (Homemade - replaces table sugar and black malt listed in BYOBRA as I expect invert is what the brewery uses)

45g First Gold @ 60 min
14g EKG @ 10 min

Morland yeast harvested from Hen's Tooth

Strike Water Coming Up to Temp


Malt Conditioned and Crushed


Since switching from a propane burner and pots to a Grainfather, the thing I miss most is being out here while brewing. The sunrise was nice this morning.


Doughing In


Recirculation Started


Cleared up nicely after an hour


Sparging


Heating To a Boil


Homemade Invert No. 2


I added some of the sparge water and heated it up before adding to the warming wort


Hit preboil gravity spot on


Reached a Boil


In go the bittering hops


After the hour boil, recirculating the hot wort through the chiller for 5 minutes to sanitize


My cooling setup (my groundwater is around 76 F this time of year so I'm using an immersion chiller in a bucket of icewater to prechill that water before the counterflow chiller


Pumping into FV (came out looking good)


OG Spot on 1.050


Thought I'd give this a try since one of the things I like best about OSH is its beautiful appearance, due to it's rich color and clarity


In it goes


Oxygenating


Decanted and swirled Morland yeast starter


Pitching the yeast


Color came out nice and it looks pretty clear when the break material settles out


Looks a touch darker than the real thing but it might be due to the break material. Once it's fermented out and clear we'll have another look


Tucked away in the fermentation fridge

[VANDEEN]

Cheers KingBrianI, I do like a good brew day thread

Can fully appreciate you missing that view now you're not outdoor brewing though, maybe time for a long extension lead

[KingBrianI]

Cheers KingBrianI, I do like a good brew day thread

Can fully appreciate you missing that view now you're not outdoor brewing though, maybe time for a long extension lead

Cheers, Vandeen! I have an outlet out there, as well as several extension cords, but the Grainfathers they sell in the US are underpowered and I'm afraid I'd never get to a boil with the additional resistance. It's hot enough here that it may not matter, though, so maybe I'll give it a try.

[Fuggled Mind]

Looks like a great brewday. Enjoyed the photos not to mention the view of the pond.

Cheers

Jason

[KingBrianI]

Fermentation appears to have wound down so I pulled a gravity sample - just a hair under 1.010. The sample was cloudy with yeast and I think it was affecting the flavor. Didn't taste horrible but definitely green. Which is funny because I stopped having green beer a long time ago. Usually my low gravity beers taste great as soon as fermentation is over, if maybe in need of a diacetyl rest in the case of some yeasts. But the hot fermentation has definitely thrown some fusels and maybe a touch of acetylaldehyde. Nothing another week in the fermenter won't fix though - I hope! Some slight fruity esters apparent as well as a subtle sulfury flavor. I think once it cleans up and clears it will be a decent pint, but still too early to tell how close to OSH it will be.

Edit: Realized my fermentation temperatures were recorded in the thread on Morland's yeast I created, so to make sense of the above reference to fermentation temperature, I thought it would be a good idea to repeat that here. I pitched at 20C then let it rise to 22C after 24 hours. It stayed at 22C until fermentation was winding down, then I let it rise to 24C. This was to hopefully get the yeast to produce the same favors as it does in the commercial product, since it was mentioned in the other thread that a brewer for Morland stated they ferment OSH at 24C, but I didn't have the nerve to pitch at that temperature. Even so it seems the fermentation produced some off flavors without getting the esters I was hoping for.

[Secla]

im due to do a very similar recipe on the weekend albeit with dark crystal and golden syrup
Im not to bothered if it tastes like speckled hen but im brewing it for someone else and there brief was "something like speckled hen" so i figure it should be somewhere close

[VANDEEN]

Cheers, Vandeen! I have an outlet out there, as well as several extension cords, but the Grainfathers they sell in the US are underpowered and I'm afraid I'd never get to a boil with the additional resistance. It's hot enough here that it may not matter, though, so maybe I'll give it a try.

Big heavy duty copper cable is your friend got to be worth a shot for that view

...But the hot fermentation has definitely thrown some fusels and maybe a touch of acetylaldehyde. Nothing another week in the fermenter won't fix though - I hope! Some slight fruity esters apparent as well as a subtle sulfury flavor. I think once it cleans up and clears it will be a decent pint, but still too early to tell how close to OSH it will be.

Edit: ... Even so it seems the fermentation produced some off flavors without getting the esters I was hoping for.

I wonder if the "hot fermentation" is partly to blame for my Summer Quaffer "dry taste" the max recorded in the bedroom it was fermenting in over the 17 day period was 26.5, so if the yeast was burning along, goodness knows what it reached inside my FV. Like you say hopefully everything turns out OK