Youngs Special clone

[Pegasus]

Hi Folks,
as a fan of the above I thought I'd give it a go based on Graham Wheeler's BYO British Real Ale recipe (latest ed). BUT not impressed with the outcome so wondering if I've done something wrong

Protocol was:
in 17 litres treated water that became about 14 litres in the FV:

2000 g (92%) LME heated to 68C, steeped 250g (8%) crystal malt (EBC 140) for 20mins in bag. pH was 5.4 +/- 0.2. OG 1.040. Calculated EBU = 26

Heated to boiling, added hops (1st used 1 month earlier, stored in airtight containers in bottom of fridge) left with a rolling boil for 90 mins with lid off:
Golding, AA 6.6%, 10g, 90mins, EBU 13.0
Fuggles, AA 6.7%, 11g, 90mins, EBU 14.3
Golding, AA 6.6%, 10g, 15mins, EBU 4.0
Irish Moss, 2g, 15mins.


Total EBU 31-32.

Added to FV (less trub) and left to cool overnight. Added DLS to get mineral content for "bitter". Drew off 750ml hot wort, cooled to about 23C and added Wyeast 1318 (this link says it's actually Young's) smacked 3 hours earlier. Left starter overnight, vigorous bubbling next morning, added to FV after 15hrs. This was based on calculated 46% viability of contents since manufacture date so should have added about 105 billion cells to FV (slightly less than Mr Malty's optimum of 118B).

OG of cooled wort 1.048. EBU/OG = 0.65 (instead of target 0.70)

Fermented at 20-21C which slowed/stopped after 4 days. Left for another 10 days. Then added 75 DME in 150 ml water, boiled then added to FV. After 15 mins bottled.

The FG was 1.017 (i.e. 65% attenuation) which is lower than I expected (1.014-1.012, 70-75% att). So ABV 4.1% instead of 4.5+%.

I've waited 4 weeks from bottling before sampling and the problem with this brew is that all I can taste is the malt (nice flavour) but can't taste any bitter so it's more like an alcoholic malt drink instead of beer and nothing like 'Special'

On the plus side, the beer (malt drink) has a good head and the yeast drops like a stone so can pour almost all liquid into glass. Also, tastes OK when mixed with a pint of dry and bitter beer.

So folks, any ideas what could've gone wrong?

I'm beginning to get worried as this is my 3rd extract brew and not been impressed with any of them! Doubts are starting to creep in.
Comments and suggestions welcome.

[Wonkydonkey]

As I cultured , yeast from a bottle of youngs London special bitter, I have noticed that it takes a long time to ferment, compared to other yeasts. And yes it's very malty, and ends up a bit sweet, although it did seen to fade with time ( still slowly fermenting I think) the way I got more hops in subsequent brews, was to dry hop.
I guess if you want more bitterness then try more hops in the boil, ie, aim a bit higher ibu's

I. Have just done an IRS sg1.075 . Which took a long time 3wks instead of two and finished @ 1.020, although this does not taste very malty at the mo, just sweet with a warming after taste. it's only been 4wks and it is a IRS.
past brews have finished around the 1.012-15 and starting SG was 1.050-5


Although I do not do extract, I would have used heated water to steeped the grains, not used heated extract. Although I can only see it would make a difference it the fact that you would not loose any extract in the grains.
I'm not sure what temp I fermented at but it would have been between 18-20


Ps, I'm doing a 4lt DJ of the gales yeast from a bottle of HSB, see how that performs to the youngs yeast, starting SG 1.045, it is the gales yeast.

[Muckinfuggle]

To OP 1318 is a great yeast and makes some wonderful stouts and porters however tends to finish slightly sweet in my experience. It sounds like your beer hasn't fully attenuated which could be for a number of reasons: 1) not enough healthy yeast pitched, just because your starter was fermenting doesn't mean you had enough cells. It is hard for home brewers to estimate cell counts but personally I would have let your .75l starter ferment out then pitched that into a 1.5l starter, let that go for 36 hours and then pitched that into the wort 2) yeast nutrient, when brewing with liquid yeasts in extract based beers it is well worth adding a little yeast nutrient to the boil both in the main batch and when making starter wort. 3) most important for yeast growth is aeration or better still oxygenation. After you have cooled your wort shake the living daylights out of it for at least 45 seconds or until your arms drop off. Better is to inject oxygen through a stone for a minute or so. Alternatively after shaking and pitching yeast, let the beer work for 6 to 10 hours and then drop it via your fermenter tap from a good height into a new sanitised vessel placed below to create as much aeration and splashing as possible. Then place back into your temp controlled environment. So to recap pitch a good amount of healthy yeast into well oxygenated wort for a well attenuated clean beer.

[pete69]

Sounds like you need to compensate for the maltiness of your extract. I'd add more hops, or if you have hard water treat it so it has a more soft profile so the hops not the malt come through.