Two (almost) Beer-Free Weeks

Two weeks of work, errands, chores, a cold that made the thought of drinking beer very unappealing, and a 12 mile hike over Mt Pico and Mt Killington in VT left me with very little time or inclination to drink beer. I had a few, but nothing to write about. I hope I've turned the corner though, things have slowed down a bit and I can breathe out my nose again. I have a fridge full of good beer that I can't wait to drink.

In the meantime, my Porter experiment seems to be a failure. Too hoppy, tannic, and astringent. I'll give it a few months to see how it ages, but I'm not hopeful. On the bright side, my Centennial IPA is probably the best beer I've ever made. Very tasty. Also, my first attempt at a partial mash, a Hefeweizen tasted very promising going into the bottles this weekend. A nice clovey taste with banana in the finish. Can't wait to try it carbonated

Random Homebrew Stuff

I finished my first partial mash experiment on Saturday. It went...ok. I made a Hefeweizen using the following recipe:

2 lb 2-Row
2 lb White Wheat Malt
3.75 lbs M&F Wheat DME
.75 oz Hallertau 3.2% (60 minute)
.5 oz Hallertau 3.2% (30 minute)
WYeast 3068 Weihenstephan Weizen

I mashed the 4 lb mini-mash in a little more than 4 Qts at 152F for an hour. Then I sparged with 2G at 170. I ended with a 63% efficiency, which doesn't seem great but also seems in the ballpark...especially for my first effort. Plus, I have a feeling partial mashes will always have lower efficiencies than real all-grain methods because the sparging will never be as good. I used grain bags and poured the water (slowly) over and through the bags, but I think it would be better to be pouring over an actual grain bed. Maybe next time I'll work out a method involving a strainer or colander. Thanks to Daniel's book I was able to take a gravity reading after the mash and calculate exactly how much DME I would need to hit my target. It worked well, as I hit 1.050-1.051 when I was shooting for 1.052. My brewday lasted much longer than I'm used to, but much of it was figuring out logistics regarding the process (plus I broke a thermometer and had to go out and buy a new one) and it should run much more smoothly next time. Overall, I was please with the results and look forward to exploring this new method.

I tried one of my Centennial IPAs on Saturday after about 2 weeks in the bottle. Carbonation level was still a bit low, but not terribly so...a bit of a head formed. It tasted great. The bitterness was a little restrained compared to what I wanted, but I can attribute that to my soft water and hops that must have been from last year's harvest (they were in a nitrogen flushed package and stored properly, but still). Still, it has plenty of bitterness to let you know you're drinking an IPA, it's just a little softer. Contributing to this is a touch of sweetness provided by the Crystal malt, which gives it a nice complexity. Mandy seemed to love it since she drank most of it!

I bottled my Porter last night (or should I say India Dark Ale?). Mandy and I have started calling it "The Thing" and I labelled it with an X on the bottle caps. Two weeks in secondary have mellowed out the hops a lot and allowed some of the more traditional porter qualities to come out. Still, it has quite a bit of bitterness and hop flavor. I liked it, but I'm anxious to see how a few weeks of bottle conditioning will affect it. Will it be more of a porter, or more of an experimental hoppy beer? I think it will be drinkable (because it's drinkable now), but will I truly enjoy it?

Centennial IPA

Bottling the Centennial IPA went smoothly. Finished with a FG of 1.014, right where it was when I transferred to secondary. It had an OG of 1.060, so it's got about 6.1% ABV. I was successful in making a lighter colored IPA, which was one of my goals. This was very apparent in the sample sitting in the hydrometer reading tube (unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture), but hard to tell in the carboy where beer always looks darker than it does in the glass. I don't want to get too excited, but I think it's going to be really tasty after it carbonates and bottle conditions for a bit. It has a very nice bitterness to it and a nice hop flavor and aroma.

Carboy:



Bottles on the tree (I was too lazy to take the labels off):



The Haul (16 in front are 12 oz, 10 in middle are 22 oz, 3 in back left are 1L, 2 in back right are 16-20 (?) oz):

Centennial IPA and Future Partial Mashes

I've been doing a lot of thinking about my brewing recently and I've come to the conclusion that I need to simplify things. I don't mean my methods, as I actually think I need to become a bit more sophisticated, but in my ingredients and recipes. After learning about German brewing methods that produce fantastic beer with the simplest of ingredients (1-2 types of grain, 1 type of hop, and a house yeast strain) I realized that you don't have to have a complicated grain bill nor a complicated hop bill to make truly great beer. Most of the recipes I've been brewing I've taken from the internet and to be honest, I have no idea what the various pieces contribute to the final beer in terms of taste. In fact, many of the grains I've been using to steep actually require mashing.

As such, I've decided to simplify my recipes to better learn what the various ingredients actually contribute. As part of this decision, I've also decided to move to partial mashes. I don't want to continue steeping grain that isn't supposed to be steeped, but I also don't want to limit myself to a fairly small sample of specialty grains for my recipes. The answer is partial mashing. After doing some extensive reading on the subject, I won't need any extra equipment and it will only add a 1/2 hour or so to my brew day (I already steep for 30 minutes). It seems like mashing is simply steeping for a longer period of time under more strictly controlled temperatures. I already have the materials for an extract/specialty grains porter, which will be my next brew, but after that I intend to make a wit using the partial mash methodology. Who knows, maybe I'll see such a large difference in my beer I'll be inspired to go all grain.

My first brew under my new simplified philosophy was a one hop IPA brewed on Saturday:

5 Gallons, 4 Gallon boil

.5 lb Crystal 20L
6.5 lbs Light DME
1 oz Centennial Hop Pellets 8.8% (60 minutes)
.5 oz Centennial Hop Pellets 8.8% (45 minutes)
.5 oz Centennial Hop Pellets 8.8% (15 minutes)
1 oz Centennial Hop Pellets 8.8% (5 minutes to flameout)
1 oz Centennial Hop Pellets 8.8% (Dry Hop)
1 tsp Irish Moss (15 minutes)
WYeast 1272 American Ale II

I made a 1 qt starter the Wed. prior. My usual procedure is to make a starter on Wed., then put it in the fridge on Friday night to drop the yeast. On brewday, I pour the liquid off the top and make another 1/2 quart starter. By the time my wort is ready for the yeast, my new starter will have a nice krausen. It worked on Saturday with a lag of less than 3 hours. The next morning I woke up and I was maybe an hour away from having to clean up a huge mess as my airlock was completely clogged and the lid on my fermenter was starting to bulge!

I'm hoping that this simple IPA recipe will teach me about crystal malt specialty grains and centennial hops. A pretty simple request considering they're basically the only ingredients in the beer! My SG was 1.060. I don't have the stats on me, but I do remember the IBUs on the high side and the color on the low side. I'm sick of my IPAs looking like mud compared to things like Smuttynose IPA. I purposely shot for a lighter color.

I'm excited about trying a partial mash brew, but first I need to make my porter...hopefully in a week or two. Fortunately, October is shaping up to be a relatively slow month so I should have plenty of brewing opportunities.

-Dave