Black & Extra Mild

Today's brew completes the trifecta of session ales. First I brewed an extra hoppy Bitter American clone that was like a hop shot to the brain. Then I brewed an extra funky and spicy session Saison with a strong yeast personality but low alcohol presence. This time I will be highlighting some sweet and roasty malt by brewing an English Mild.

My first attempt at brewing an English Mild in early 2013 was less than stellar since I bottled either before fermentation was complete or with too much priming sugar. Either way it was very overcarbonated and made me feel not so 'Mild.' I was very excited having the opportunity to brew with Mad Fox's house yeast but this time I decided to go with the more familiar Nottingham ale yeast. I do intend to try brewing again (maybe several more times) with the yeast from Mad Fox but that will be a yarn for future tales.

I wanted to double the amount of chocolate malt in the recipe to give it more charred flavor than a typical mild but without the harsher bite a black malt can contribute. So the extra chocolate will put the 'black' in 'black and mild.'

Recipe Notes
Style: Mild

Batch Volume: 4 gal.
Color: 28 SRM
Target Bitterness: 24 IBU
Target OG: 1.035

Grist
3 lb. 2-Row
1 lb. Crystal 60L
11 oz. Crystal 40L
8 oz. Special Roast
8 oz. Chocolate Malt

0.5 oz. Fuggles 5.3% (60 min.)
0.5 oz. Fuggles 5.3% (30 min.)

Nottingham Ale Yeast

Brew Notes
Brew Date: 8/3/14
Mash Temp: 152F
Mash Time: 75 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 4.75 gal
Measured OG: 1.030
Brewhouse Efficiency: 71%

The big mistake I made with this brew regarded water calculation. I decided to do a 4 gallon brew instead of a 5 gallon to help speed up the process and to go through the keg a little faster. However I used the same amount of mash water that I usually do anticipating I would add less water after the mash.

So I started with 5.5 gallons of water and after the mash ended up with 5 gallons of wort, losing about 0.1 gallons per pound of grain. The hour long boil only reduced that by 1/4 gallon so I ended up with 4.75 gallons of wort for the yeast to munch on. This lowered my gravity from the calculated 1.035 to 1.030 turning this into an English EXTRA Mild. On this up side this might be my first brew the clocks in at under 100 calories per bottle.

So for an average 4 gallon brew I should be using slightly less than 5 gallons in the mash. For these session ale's I've been brewing a lot of lately it'll be maybe 4.75 gallons.

Update 8/13/2014 - Racked the now 1.009 SG Mild to secondary - my 'ole oak whiskey barrel. Put a 1/2 gallon of water in the whiskey barrel (which hasn't seen use for a few months) and it was leaking all over the place. I guess this enforces the importance of rehydraing your barrels. Brought 5 gallons of water up to 180F, dumped it into the barrel, and let it sit for 60 minutes. This should help sanitize the barrel and swell the wood to seal up any gaps. It worked like a charm. The water I dumped out of the barrel smelled great. Nice and woody with the sweet whiskey/bourbon aroma and a bit of roasty char. Hated to see it go down the drain. Racked the mild into the barrel and plugged with a rubber stopper. No airlock.

Update 8/18/2014 - Pulled a sample with Mrs. DrewsBrew's autosiphon. Nice and roasty with a little char character. Not much contribution from the whiskey yet. Will sample again in another week. Gravity is 1.008.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.008
ABV: 2.9%
Calories: 98
Carbonation: 2.3

Update 8/26/14 - Kegged today after 13 days in the whiskey barrel. Tastes oak-y and with a dry aftertaste but roasty and sweet initially. Definitely enough time for this petite mild. Tastes pretty good uncarbonated at room temperature. I'm actually afraid of losing some of the flavor once it's chilled and carbed.

Hoppy French Saison

Yeast-tastic

This French Saison will be my first attempt at pitching yeast saved from a previous brew. After racking the saison I made in January to secondary I saved two pints of yeast slurry in two mason jars in the back of the fridge for 4 1/2 months. I almost forgot about it until I came across this recipe by the Mad Fermentationist, Michael Tonsmeire. The wife and I had the opportunity to meet Michael at the AHA conference last weekend during his book signing. Since he's a DC local I can't wait to run into him soon at a BURP meeting.

I made a yeast starter to wake the yeast back up from its prolonged slumber. I boiled 100g of pilsen DME in 600mL of water for 5 minutes, cooled the wort down to 75F, then pitched the top of both of the mason jars until I had 1000mL in the flask. I put the flask on the stir bar thing-y over night.

Recipe Notes
Style: Saison

Batch Volume: 5 gal.
Color: 3 SRM
Target Bitterness: 38 IBU
Target OG: 1.044

Just pilsner and wheat malt

Grist
6 lb. 4 oz. Pilsner Malt
1 lb. 12 oz. Wheat Malt

0.6 oz. Nugget 13.9% (FWH)
1.5 oz. Saaz 3.5% (10 min.)
1.5 oz. Saaz (0 min.)

0.2 oz Black Pepper Corn (0 min.)

French Saison Yeast (Wyeast 3711)
- 1 L yeast starter

Brew Notes
Brew Date: 6/21/14
Mash Temp: 155F
Mash Time: 75 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 4.75 gal
Measured OG: 1.039 @ 80F (1.040 corrected)
Brewhouse Efficiency: 62%

Mashed for a little longer than usual just because I wasn't paying attention. Didn't stir the grain at all during the mash. I even forgot to after the mash. Retain 155F mash temp throughout the 75 min. mash with just a sleeping bag wrapped around the kettle.

During the mash I decided to add some pepper corn I had left over from the previous saison. It was completely unnoticeable last time. I decided to add a little more this time and to measure by weight. I don't think 0.2 oz. is too much. I'm reading about people using 0.5-4.0 oz. online. Don't mind it much if it isn't peppery but it would be horrible to use too much. I gave the pepper corn a few pulses in the coffee grinder to bust it up before adding it to the kettle.

Well it looks like I did something wrong because I missed the target gravity by 10% and my efficiency dropped to 62%. Maybe I should have stirred more throughout the mash and just before pulling the grain bag. I poured the cooled wort through a strainer to pull out most of the hop material. I thought maybe the hop junk was artificially raising my gravity on previous brews. I added a bunch of hop crap to the hydrometer tube and that didn't change the gravity reading at all.

With the wort chiller running full steam I could only get the wort down to 80F. Decided to pour the wort into the fermenter at that temp and put it in my new keezer which is set at 45F. After four hours the temp dropped to 72 so I pitched the yeast starter, aerated, and went to bed.

6/22/14 - By 10AM (9 hours later) the fermenter temperature has reached 82F and fermentation is vigorous. Debated putting the fermenter back into the keezer but decided to let it ride.

6/23/14 - Temperature is down to 80 and fermentation is slightly less vigorous.

6/24/14 - Temp is down to 79

6/25/14 - Temp is at 78. Gravity reading is all the way down to 1.004. No more visible signs of fermentation. Beer tastes great. Has a lot of warm farmhouse/belgian aroma and is very light. Will go down very easy. No real fusel alcohol aroma detected and feel no alcohol burn when drinking despite high ferm temps. A little buttery/oily taste persists after swallowing and lasts only a second or two. Obviously young but a sign of good things to come.

6/29/14 - Racked to secondary. Gravity reading is still 1.004. Smells very Belgian-y with a strong bubble gum aroma and flavor. Saved two pint jars of trub/yeast to reuse for a Gen #3 saison brew. Trub was much cleaner this time after filtering out all the hop matter while transferring to primary. Left the mason jar lids on loose this time to prevent pressure build up from continued fermentation. Labeled the jars with strain, generation, and harvest date.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.004
ABV: 4.6%
Calories: 125
Carbonation: 2.5 volumes

Bitter American Clone

Next up on my list of session brews is the Bitter American by 21st Amendment brewery. I love this ale for contributing a big malt character in a class of otherwise thinner 'hop water' ales. I'd love to nail down *my* perfect session ale and always have some variation of it on tap. Bitter American, it's your turn to shine. Show me what you're workin' with.

Recipe Notes
Style: American Pale
Batch Volume: 5 gal.
Color: 8 SRM
Target Bitterness: 41 IBU
Target OG: 1.042

Grist
3 lb. Golden Promise
3 lb. 2-Row
1 lb. Munich
1 lb. Crystal 20L

0.5 oz. Warrior 15% (60 min.)
1.0 oz. Cascade 6.6% (15 min.)
1.0 oz. Centennial (Dry Hop)
1.0 oz. Simcoe (Dry Hop)

1 pkg. US-05

Brew Notes
Brew Date: 5/26/14
Mash Temp: 154 °F
Mash Time: 60 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 5.0 gal
Measured OG: 1.042
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72%

Today was a 'quad brew' day with the wife and two close friends. All together we made 17 gallons of beer! Used my propane tank that read 'empty' with the intention of finishing it off and swapping it out with the tank on my friend's grill. Well I'll be damned if the tank didn't last through the whole brew day! I can't recall how many brew days I've gotten out of this tank but it's far more than I expected. Had a little bit of a boil over because I wasn't paying attention but it was an otherwise flawless brew day. Nailed my target OG which always makes you feel good.

6/8/14 - Racked 4.3 gallons to secondary. Gravity reading was 1.008 for an ABV of 4.5%. Looks pretty dark for a pale ale just like Bitter American. Kind of tastes like generic beer and has only faint hop aroma. These should both change w/a 2 oz. dry hop addition.

6/17/14 - Dry hopped with simcoe and centennial in two sanitized hop bags weighed down with a couple of shot glasses each. Hopefully they can give this bland beer some character.

6/20/14 - Kegged today because impatience. Transferred the two hop bags from secondary into the keg to get the 'keg hopped' flavor. Put it in the kegerator at 45F under 10psi.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.008
ABV: 4.5%
Calories: 137
Carbonation: 2.1 volumes

6/21/14 - Let the keg chill for a day under pressure then shook it back and forth for five minutes in attempt to speed up carbonation and to increase beer contact/flow through the two hop bags. Excited to see if/how this changes the flavor and aroma.

Guinness Clone (Batch #3)

Brings a tear to my eye.

Oh dry Irish stout. No matter how hard I try I can't quit you. I'd like to always have a dry stout on tap at Casa Drews and this will be the first batch to meet the new keezer. I'm going back to basics with this recipe without any hops or yeast substitutions. I've used Willamette in the past instead of East Kent Goldings because they were available, cheaper, and fairly similar. I've also used a dry English ale yeast (S-04) for my previous two batches. This one's getting the real stuff - Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast. Sometimes you just gotta kick it old school.

Brew Recipe

Brew Date: 4/12/14
Style: Irish Stout
Batch Volume: 5.25 gal.
Type: All Grain
Color: 32 SRM
Target Bitterness: 38 IBU
Target OG: 1.040
Estimated FG: 1.010

Grist
5 lb. American Two-Row
2 lb. Flaked Barley
1 lb. Roast Barley

2 oz. East Kent Goldings 5.1% (60 min.)

1 pkg. Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast

Brew Notes

Mash Temp: 152 °F
Mash Time: 60 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 5.0 gal
Measured OG: 1.040
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75%

It was a beautiful day today so I took the brew outdoors. First outdoor brew of the year! The old propane tank had about a brew's worth of propane left so I let it ride. Turned out to be enough but need to exchange before the next brew day. Post mash I squeezed the grain bag to get every drop out and dumped it in the boil kettle. No sparging today - too messy and complicated. Just added water to get kettle volume up to 5.5 gal. 

Busted the smack pack in the Wyeast package a little late in the day (during the mash) so the package only swelled a little. While pitching the yeast I noticed there was a ton of nutrient still left in the inner package so I squeezed it all out into the fermenter. Why not? Looking forward to a great stout a few weeks from now. I just need to acquire a third keg so this guy has a home after he gets evicted from the fermenter.

Left about a quarter of a gallon in the boil kettle that couldn't fit in the fermenter. With better volume management the OG could have been a little higher.

Update 4/21/14 - Racked to secondary today. Gravity reading was 1.012 for an ABV of 3.7%. Tastes like a light bodied toffey flavored stout. Julie says it tastes 'smokey.' Whatever it is it'll definitely be an easy drinker.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.010
ABV: 3.9%
Calories: 131

Carbonation: 2.1 Volumes CO2

Update 5/11/14 - Kicked my first keg of beer a couple days ago so I finally had an opportunity to move the Irish stout from secondary into the keezer. I chilled at at 45 for a day then decided to do a little carbonating trick. I pulled the keg out of the keezer with 10psi attached to it and rolled it back and forth on the ground for 10 minutes. The idea is to create more surface area allowing the keg pressure to carbonate the beer more quickly.

I'm excited to see if this speeds things up a bit. I'm a little less excited if I discover this process creates a carbonic acid bite from rapid carbing. I'd like to call this process 'turbo carbing'. I've read about the process be never came across a name so I'm coining one now.

It tastes great so far. Not much different than previous brews so I may just stick with S-04 dry yeast in the future. However, the FG did end up exactly where I want it with the Irish ale yeast.

The Lost Mitten v2.0

I lived in the blue one!

After a two month brewing hiatus (putting together a sweet 3-keg keezer system) it was strongly suggested that I rebrew The Lost Mitten. I'm excited to see how this version turns out using a malt bill I can actually procure instead of the Bell's homebrew competition wort. The first Mitten was a hop monster but it had a good amount of malt character to back it up resulting in a fairly balanced beer. I think this recipe will turn out lighter bodied than the first and can't wait to do a side-by-side tasting once it's all ready. I also can't wait to drink this brew a week earlier than usual w/the new kegging system.

I made a small change to the hopping schedule. I moved more of the Simcoe up front in the boil to do the bulk of the bittering and moved the Crystal addition to later in the boil. I'll also be doing a full 3 oz. of dry hopping making for an even 2 oz. of each of the three hop varieties. Simple.

Brew Recipe

Brew Date: 3/23/14
Style: American Pale Ale
Batch Volume: 5 gal.
Type: All Grain
Color: 6.2 SRM
Target Bitterness: 54 IBU
Target OG: 1.056
Estimated FG: 1.014

Grist
9 lb. American Two-Row
1 lb. Crystal 12L
12 oz. Flaked Oats
4 oz. Pale Wheat

1/2 oz. Simcoe 13% (60 min.)
1/2 oz. Amarillo 8.7% (20 min.)
1/2 oz. Crystal 4.3% (20 min.)
1/2 oz. Simcoe 13% (20 min.)

1/2 oz. Amarillo 8.7%(5 min.)
1/2 oz. Crystal 4.3% (5 min.)

7-Day Dry Hop Addition (Leaf Hops)
1 oz. Amarillo
1 oz. Crystal
1 oz. Simcoe

1 pkg. Safale US-05 Ale Yeast

Brew Notes

Mash Temp: 152 °F
Mash Time: 60 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 5.25 gal
Measured OG: 1.055
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72%

I tried to mash this one a little hotter but it ended up not working out. I heated the mash water to 160F and dumped in the grain. Unfortunately I had a few dough balls to break up and all the mixing ended up dropping the temp to 152. Well, whatever. Near the end of the mash I heated 1 gal of sparge water to 170 and put the grain bag in the sparge pot, mixing for a couple of minutes. Then dumped in the sparged wort and started the boil. The Amarillo + Simcoe + Crystal hop addition at 20 minutes smells amazing. It took everything I had to pull it away from my nose and dump it in the kettle. Pitched the yeast at 70F and aerated.

Update 4/8/14 - Dry hopped with an ounce each of Amarillo, Simcoe, and Crystal loose leaf hops in separate hop bags. Added a sanitized shot glass to each bag to help weigh it down. Drew a sample which weighed in at 1.009 SG for an ABV of 6.1%. Smelled and looked great. I thought the sample tasted a little too bitter though so maybe moving to a 1/2 oz. addition Simcoe at 60 minutes was a little agressive.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.008
ABV: 6.2%
Calories: 179

Carbonation: 2.1 Volumes CO2

Update 4/13/14 - Kegged the mitten. I squeezed the three hop bags with my sanitized hands back into the fermenter to try to get every drop. The overly bitter taste from the last sample was gone. Tastes pretty good but a little young. Had a fair amount of yeast still in suspension that I hope will settle below the keg dip tube. Gravity ended up at 1.008. Cleaned and sanitized keg and beer line before racking into keg. Set at 10 psi and about 45 degrees F. Will sample again in a week and see how she's progressing.

French Saison

Start that Yeast!

Mad Fox's new Saison DuWha? has inspired me to attempt brewing my first Saison. Since this will also the first time I've used a liquid yeast I want to try my hand a making a yeast starter. I won a stir plate in a raffle during the Bell's Homebrew Competition kick-off and I've been waiting to put it to good use.

I created the starter on 1/18, the day before brew day. I smacked the smack pack and waited a few hours for the package to swell. Then I boiled 70 grams of light DME in 600ml of water for 10 minutes. Boiled in an Erlenmeyer with the stir stick in. After cooling the starter wort to 70 degrees I pitched the yeast packet into the starter, covered with a sanitized foam stopper, and set the stir plate to aerate overnight. 

The next morning I saw a bit more foam than the night before much not much other visible change. Kept the stir plate going until right before pitching. According to Mr. Malty this should increase the cell count from about 100 billion cells out of the package to almost 200 billion out of the yeast starter. I'm looking forward to fermentation kicking off pretty quickly, finishing fast, and finishing low.

Brew Recipe

Brew Date: 1/19/2014
Style: Saison
Batch Volume: 5.0 gal.
Type: All Grain
Color: 7.7 SRM
Target Bitterness: 45 IBU
Target OG: 1.058
Estimated FG: 1.008
Yeast Cells Needed: 202 Billion

Grist

8.5 lb. Pilsner

1.5 lb. White Wheat

8 oz. CaraMunich

8 oz. Flaked Oats

0.5 oz. Sorachi Ace @ First Wort (11.9% AA)

0.5 oz. Fuggles @ First Wort (5.3% AA)

0.5 oz. Fuggles @ 30 min. (5.3% AA)

1.0 oz. Fuggles @ 5 min. (5.3% AA)

1 lb. Orange Blossom Honey @ 5 min.
1.5 tsp Ground pepper corn @ 5 min.

French Saison Yeast (Wyeast 3711)
- 1 L yeast starter

Brew Notes

Mash Temp: 152 °F
Mash Time: 60 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 5 gal
Measured OG: 1.064
Brewhouse Efficiency: Hard to tell w/honey addition

Update 2/1/14 - Racked almost 5 gallons of the saison to secondary. The yeast tore through this beer drying it out to a low 1.004 SG after two weeks. Tastes pretty good so far even though the fermenter smelled like butt. I guess that's just the saison yeast doing its thing. Tastes a little dank and farmhouse-y. Very cloudy.

After racking, I sanitized two 16oz. mason jars and funneled in a bunch of the yeast left in the fermenter. Tried just scooping it in w/o using a funnel and there was stinky yeast all over the place. Use a funnel! I plan on using this yeast to do a SMaSH saison in a couple weeks to use up the Hallertauer hops I got from the Bell's homebrew competition.

Kegging Notes
Measured FG: 1.004
ABV: 7.9%
Calories: 206

Carbonation: 2.26 Volumes CO2


Update 3/13/14 - Kegged my first batch of beer today! Set the keezer temperature to 45F and the CO2 pressure to 12 psi. In seven days I should have a saison carbonated to 2.26 volumes. Tastes a little bit cider-y but definitely has the saison aroma.

Centennial IPA

Delicious Centennial Hops

First brew of the new year, and 'tis the season for rebrews. Today I'm brewing up a second batch of the Bell's Two Hearted clone but with some minor changes. First, I'll be dropping the OG just a bit for a target ABV of around 5.5%. I'm becoming a big fan of these 'session IPA' type beers and find myself gravitating toward brewing them. However, I want to keep a little malt backbone around for the Two Hearted clone to hold up the big Centennial hops flavor. The second change is moving from an English to an American ale yeast, S-04 to US-05, possibly resulting in a cleaner flavor than the last brew. Lastly, I'll be jacking up the dry hopped additions from 0.5 oz to a big ole' 3 oz. The Centennial hops I've had since March of last year are burning a hole in my freezer and I gotta use 'em up so it's time to go big. No, bigger than that. BIG! YEAH!

Brew Recipe

Brew Date: 1/5/2014
Style: American Pale Ale
Batch Volume: 5.5 gal.
Type: All Grain
Color: 5 SRM
Target Bitterness: 49 IBU
Target OG: 1.055
Estimated FG: 1.014

Grist

7 lb. Two Row

2 lb. Vienna

8 oz. Crystal 20L

8 oz. CaraPils

1.0 oz. Centennial @ First Wort (8.7% AA)

1.0 oz. Centennial @ 15 min. (8.7% AA)

1.0 oz. Centennial @ 5 min. (8.7% AA)

1.0 oz. Centennial @ 0 min. (8.7% AA)

3.0 oz. Centennial Dry Hop

1 pkg. US-05 American ale yeast

Brew Notes

Mash Temp: 152 °F
Mash Time: 60 min.
Boil Time: 60 min.
Fermenter Volume: 5.25 gal.
Measured OG: 1.050
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72%
Measured FG: 1.007
ABV: 5.6%
Calories: 162

Soaked mashed grain bag in ~2 gal of 170 degree water. Stirred around and added most back to boil kettle to get 5.5 gal pre-boil. Didn't need quite that much sparge water. Maybe 1-1.5 gal next time. Pitched yeast at 70 degrees. Brew went off without a hitch.

Update 1/12/14 - Racked to secondary. Gravity sitting at 1.008. Plan to dry hop in a week with 3-4 oz. of Centennial. Tastes a little dry and base-malty but hope it forms a solid foundation for the dry hopping. This was fermented during the DC cold spell when temps dropped to single digits. Basement was pretty cold, possibly affecting ferm?

Update 1/19/14 - Dry hopped with 3 oz. of Centennial pellets. Swirled the carboy around a bit to mix them in. Smelling pretty dandy.

Update 2/1/14 - Bottled today with 3.5 oz. of priming sugar. Yielded 30 12oz. bottles and seven 22 oz. bombers. Smells and tastes terrific. Very centennial grapefruity. Covered both ends of autosiphon with hop bag to prevent dry hops from getting into bottling bucket. Had to restart siphon several times but the bottling bucket ended up very clear. Final gravity was 1.007.