Brew Number Three: Smugglers Bramling Cross

[fivetide]

Now that the Wherry First Gold has been half drunk and the Great Eastern Cascade is in the barrel conditioning I thought I'd better kick off another brew before the summer hits too hard.

I've chosen Muntons Premium Gold Smugglers Special Ale, which I've heard one or two of you drinking very happily and thought I would give a try. I'm planning on dry-hopping this with an ounce of Brambling Cross, but that's a way off yet and I may change my mind.

I followed the instructions provided with just a few minor exceptions. I treated the 3 1/2 litres of boiling water used at the start with a crumbling of Campden, and treated the 16 1/2 litres of cold water with a half tablet. I aerated both stages very well, and also added the cold water into the wort from height via the tap on a spare sterile fermenter for added disruption even before the paddling.

I've put the Muntons Premium Gold yeast (XPB 6G Yeast Premium) to one side for now and instead made a starter using an 11.5g sachet of Safale US-56 American Dry Ale Yeast which I hope will provide crispness and allow me a contrast to previous yeasts. I've put the whole lot in my wine fermenter and put it in a 22 degrees cupboard.

The OG of the wort was a reasonably high 1053 at 25 degrees.

Fingers crossed...

[fivetide]

Just had my 24hr sneaky peak and yup, the fermenter is full of crusty looking krausen and smells great. The bubbler is continuous, about a hundred times a minute I'd say. Keep it up yeasties! You can do it! Will check again after another four days to see if head has subsided enough to check gravity.

[fivetide]

The pictures are pretty poor as it's in a cupboard. Those dark bits aren't wort...

I'll try a different camera at some point.

[fivetide]

Thanks. It seems okay right now, but I won't know until i take a reading at the end of the weekend.

Better camera is out of juice, but a flash helps a little. The head is pretty fluffy, but it has got darker brown scabs on it

Would be easier to see in my bucket fermenter probably...

[Garth]

hmm, not an expert like Uncle DaaB, but I thought that also, mine usually have a creamy-crusty head on them rather than a bubbly head

[fivetide]

Hmm, that's a shame. Yeah, I paddled the boiling water and the final wort for well over five minutes, and I also poured in the 16 odd litres of cold from height from my fermenter tap.

Maybe I shouldn't have made a starter as it was dried yeast then. I made this in the morning and pitched in the evening

[fivetide]

What I have done is add extract to fermenter. Add 3 1/2 litres boiling treated water to fermenter. Paddle for five minutes. Move fermenter to floor, put another fermenter with 16 1/2 litres of cold treated water in it on table above. Let this run through tap over a period of time into the main fermenter. Shake full fermenter physically, then paddle like hell for at least another five minutes until it's good and frothy. Check temperature, then pitch in starter, stir in well.

I said a while back I would add my paddle to a power drill but never did. I could do that perhaps, or adapt an old aquarium air pump and air bricks I have, but I thought I had it covered - ah well, there's always something!

[fivetide]

Well stranger and strangerer.

I had to go and have a proper look after this conversation, so I dug into the foam with an Iodophor sterilised paddle, found the wort not far under, maybe two inches max, and swirled the surface around gently, hoping to see bubbles rising nicely and so on.

The bloody thing started to grow like the head on a fizzy bottle of pop, only slower. After a minute it was over the top of the fermenter!

I'm at a loss frankly.

[fivetide]

I give up and will leave it alone. I'm a jonah.

[oxford brewer]

That head looks alot thicker now fivetide,i rarely get the yeast head coming up to the lid though....must aerate the wort more than i do already

[fivetide]

Just tested this one for the first time, six days in.

It's down to 1020 (what else?) from 1053, which would already already make it the strongest brew I've made in my very short career.

There's very little bubbler action, but rather a lot of lifeless looking foam still on the surface, maybe an inch thick. Needed to move this aside to test.

This feels a very different beer to the Wherry and Great Eastern, which were rather similar in the way they acted. Smugglers has a life of its own

[fivetide]

A new addition later this year will make aquiring, storing and making time to use the paraphenalia a bit tricky, but one day.

On the other hand I've had some useful handy recent experience in new methods of sterilising! Forget baby baths, I'll just dip the liitle mite in iodophor and drip dry.

[fivetide]

Tested today after eight days and it's still 1020, maybe 1019 if I was squinting optimistically.

I gave in, roused the yeast and added a half teaspoon of Yeat-Vit - damn I hope it doesn't wreck the taste.

The CO2 has gone up a bit now and the bubbler is back in action. I'll move this into secondary at the weekend regardless of gravity, as I don't want to use any more additives.

Some of the yeast heads on here have made me very jealous and despite all my best efforts at paddle action and the attractive laziness of adapting my aquarium pump, next time it's power tools or nothing!

Maybe I'll shove the petrol strimmer in there!

[delboy]

I think you want to put the yeast-vit/boiled up muntons yeast in at the start and not wait until the yeast stall before adding. Its a bit like waiting on someones teeth to fall out of their head with scurvy before you give them some Vit-C

[fivetide]

I did add a half tsp Yeast-Vit at the start

Ah well, the Wherry I had all these issues with is now crystal and a lovely pint (but only about 15 pints left!) so who knows, I hope this one will be okay too.