Brown and Porter Update

These were brewed back in August but I never wrote an update. Both turned out pretty well. I like the porter the best but I like like porters more than browns anyway. One thing that is a little irritating about these batches is that about half have a funky taste. I can only assume its from the bottles. Also I am still not getting quite the head retention that I would like. I think I am going to have to scrap the dish washer and go back to traditional sanitation methods. There must still be too much anti-streaking stuff in the machine. Oh well.

Farmhouse Ale

Bobby's been into farmhouse ale's lately so we decided to try one. The sour mash thing is pretty weird and it definitely went the way it was described in the recipe. That stuff stunk.

Anyway, the process for the sour mash is pretty easy. Bring 1 pint of water to 150 F then add 3 oz pale 2 role malt. Let sit covered for three days. It gets stinky.

Recipe

3.5 lb ultralight LME
2 lb Bavarian Wheat DME
.5 lb wheat malt
3 oz Carapils malt

Again steeped the malt at 155 F for 30 minutes. The sour mash was added the malt bag.
Boil for 60 minutes.

Hop additions:
.25 oz Willamette with extracts
.5 oz Perle initial boil
.5 oz Willamette - 30 min remaining
.25 oz Willamette - 2 min remaining

Added water to 5.5 gal and pitched yeast. This stuff tasted pretty funky so we might be on the right track.

original gravity 1.038

Bitter with Bobby

New Year's Day Bobby and I brewed two beers, a bitter and a farmhouse. I'll cover the bitter here and the farmhouse in the next post.

The bitter is a fairly straightforward British Bitter with the exception of the hops. We had to substitute Fuggles and East Kent Golding for Willamette and Glacier. Hops are still a bit hard to get.

Recipe

2 lb Amber DME
2 lb Light DME
.5 lb ultralight LME
1 lb 40L crystal malt

Steeped the grain at 155 F for 30 minutes. Boil. Add extracts. 60 minute boil time.

Hop additions:
1 oz Willamette with extracts
1 oz Willamette - 30 min remaining
1 ts irish moss - 15 min remaining
1 oz Glacier - 7 minutes remaining
1 oz Glacier - 1 minute remaining

I added water to the fermenting buckets earlier that morning and put them outside (its was in the low 30's that day). After a short ice bath for the brew pot, the wort was dumped into the cold water and it went right to yeast pitching temp. So after topping of to 5.5 gallons and aerating, the yeast was pitched and bucket sealed.

original gravity 1.040

Porter

Ingredients
6 lbs dark malt extract liquid
1 lb dark malt extract powder
10 ounces chocolate malt
1 ounce Perl
1 ounce Willamette
dry ale yeast

Procedure
Steep the malt at 155 F for 20 minutes. Add malt extracts, stir, turn on heat. Add Perl when wort starts to boil. Boil for 40 minutes. Add 1/2 ounce Willamette, boil for 20 minutes more. Add 1/2 ounce Willamette, turn off heat, let wort sit, covered for 10 minutes. Ice bath for kettle. Pout into fermenter, top with filtered water to 5 1/2 gallons. Pitch yeast at 80F.

Brown Ale

I have been feeling dark lately so I decided to brew a brown and a porter.
I learned something new about why my last couple beers have had no head. I sanitized the bottles in dish washer which works great but I used standard dish soap. Apparently, the stuff in dishwasher soap that makes glasses look clean and streak free ruins head retention. So the trick is to run the dishwasher with no soap, the hot water with sanitize. I might add a little instant sanitizer, just to be safe.

Ingredients

6 lbs extra light malt extract syrup
8 ounces English crystal malt
8 ounces dextrine malt
6 ounces chocolate malt
2 ounces Kent Golding
1 teaspoon Irish moss
dry ale yeast

Procedures

Steep grains at 155 F for 20 minutes. Remove from pot. Add malt extract, stir thoroughly, turn on the heat. Once up to a boil add 1 ounce Kent Golding. Boil for 20 minutes. Add 1 ounce Kent Golding and Irish moss. Boil for 25 minutes more.
Ice bath for the pot. Add to fermenter, top with filtered water. Pitched yeast around 80 F.

Checked the fermenters this morning and they are bubbling strongly.

Bottling Wheat & Update

I finally bottled the wheat. It had been a while, tho I did rack it.
Anyway, pretty light and fairly hoppy. I am hoping this develops a little more flavor in the bottle.

I have had an IPA and a stout from a few weeks ago. The IPA is pretty good. Too low carbonation and I am not thrilled with the taste of the hops. The stout is not very good. I am hoping longer in the bottle will bring it back but I think its a long shot. Oh well.

New Blog Site

I am getting sick of MySpace, it seems to be down more than up so I am moving the blog over to here, much better blog site.
The wheat seems to be doing well. The little room in the basement where I keep the fermenting beers had a nice fermenting oder when I went in a few days after setting it in there.
I also wanted to mention that I was very happy with morebeer.com the shipping was fairly fast, but more importantly free. I got a bunch of parts that I have been needing for a while. The ingredients are a lot less expensive than Barry's. I feel bad about not shopping locally, but its nice to be able to try whatever I want without having to "okay" it with Barry. Also the selection is a bit better. Makes me have to plan a head a little more.