hoegaarden tips?

[awalker]

Did the temp drop over night

i.e. Was it in a heated room or in a cold garage?

If it was in a cold garage the yeast might have dropped out over night

[slim34]

i was in the bathroom without heating. The temperature might have dropped to below 18c i suppose

what do you think i need to do to rectify that?

[awalker]

Try keeping it in a slightly warmer room until it kicks in, as the ferment will generate a bit of temp on its own. There should be enough temp so that it kicks in during the day today depending on ambient.
I had a similar problem when I ferment in the conservatory great during the day but too cold at night. So the yeast kept waking up during the day then dropping out at night.

I now keep my fermenter in a water bath with an aquarium heater for cheap temp control. It seems to keep the temperature up overnight, when it drops in the garage.

[steve_flack]

It will be slow as you didn't do a starter - that bit about being pitchable is only true if the tube is fresh from the factory and hasn't flown across the atlantic, sat in a fridge then been in a warm courier's van.

[slim34]

phew .. sounds like it's not going to be a non starter if I can give it a warmth boost.

I've got all the gear to do a second brew of the same beer so I'll be sure to do it properly next time.

At least if this one doesn't work I know I'm still getting close to that elusive wit bier brew that got me into this in the first place

[slim34]

woohoo she's alive!

she's fermenting away nicely now.

i must pull myself together it's only beer.

even my bass is starting to taste half decent after 3 weeks in a keg

[prodigal2]

woohoo she's alive!

she's fermenting away nicely now.

i must pull myself together it's only beer.

even my bass is starting to taste half decent after 3 weeks in a keg

Result

The one thing I have learnt from this brewing lark is patience

Any chance of some pictures of the next brew you do?

[slim34]

i didn't take any this time, beacuse i was trying to get a lot of other unrelated tasks done at the same time and it was just too much multi-tasking to take pics too.

I did take pics when I did my previous mash of BASS but I'm not sure there would be anything to learn from them anyway what with me being quite an amateur compared to most people here who know for example, what stuff like this means:

Min IBU: 15 Max IBU: 22
Min Clr: 4 Max Clr: 8 Color in EBC
Wort Size (LTR): 15.00
Anticipated OG: 1.050
Anticipated EBC: 9.4
Anticipated IBU: 18.2

it was on a wit bier recipe i saw on the net

i've got a lot to learn

[slim34]

it was suggested that i brew a scheider weisse as my first witbier so last night I had the perfect excuse to drink a bottle or two to remind me of the taste, which is very important.

Anyway I think it's delicious and easily as nice as hoegaarden but I don't think my missus would like it. It definitely is a bit more bitter and less sweet/fruity fresh. I partly thought hoegaarden would be good because it's about the only beer she really likes., though she is trying really hard to get into beer.

My local pub, a past camra derbyshire pub of the year winner, does some nice stuff and when we go there she tries her hardest to develop a taste for beer after years of palette abuse with alcopops and fruit drinks.

[prodigal2]

IBU refers to International Bittering Units

EBC refers to the colour of the wort(I'm stil to get my head around that one, but at the mo I am more interested in taste)
wort size refers to size of batch
OG= Original Gravity

If you spend a night pouring overs DaaBs site it will all become clear

And the photos are great for us all as we learn from each other what is possible, but also members are able to pick over stuff and I like others have improved our technique because of it

[slim34]

righto some advice on the setup would be excellent, but i'll post them on friday because the pics are still on my wifes camera which i can't get back till then.

[bconnery]

it was suggested that i brew a scheider weisse as my first witbier so last night I had the perfect excuse to drink a bottle or two to remind me of the taste, which is very important.

A schneider weisse and a hoegaarden are two very different beasts.
A belgian wit, like hoegaarden, is traditionally made with a proportion of unmalted or raw wheat and spiced with small amounts of coriander and dried orange peel. The yeast strains used are nothing like the traditional german weizen yeasts.

A hefeweizen, or weisse beer, like schneider weisee contains somewhere between 50-70%, although there are ones that are higher, malted wheat and uses a yeast strain that produces the flavours generally described as clove, banana and bubblegum.

A wit and a weisse beer may both be wheat beers but they are very different things.

[slim34]

bubblegum?


i do always get confused between a wit, a wheat and a weisse.

[awalker]

Glad to hear its alive
Just dont let it get to cold before it finishes fermenting

One of theses helps to keep an eye on the temp Ref: 102637 B5 from http://www.thermometersdirect.co.uk/

I have one in my garage now so I can keep eye on ambient temps while fermenting.