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What's in your fermenter? 2019


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4 minutes ago, Lab Rat said:

I dry hop at day 4 or 5 and rarely leave hops in for more than 3 days - especially if they are big flavoured hops like Citra

Thanks mate, just dry hopped on day 6 will bottle Thursday meaning day 9. I used cascade for this batch and have citra in the freezer for my next one.

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Hey guys, was out at coles the other day looking for something to contain my coconut additions to this sour. Was looking for muslin bags or the like and came across this item. Its a bag you wash your Bra in (if you wear one). And it could double as a hop bag for dry hopping. Only about $3 so not much lost if it dont work.

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1 hour ago, Beer Baron said:

Added 50 grams of orange zest along with 20 grams each of amarillo and citra today. Hopefully this beer will be nice with a nice hit of orange 

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I just realised that it looks like the picture on the bottom of the plate looks like a penis😂

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A few weeks off brewing - to catch up a Guinness clone all grain, the Coopers Raspberry wheat beer (as explained before it will have real fruit) & last week I had a can of MR Beer Amber Ale - so I threw a batch together with some Coopers Premium Ale grains & some cascade hops. It’s has been fermenting under pressure. I had to put the Raspberry Wheat in a Coolbag with ice ( still plus 30 in April!)

cheers

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On 4/1/2019 at 1:56 PM, Otto Von Blotto said:

If I had to guess I'd say between 1.010-1.014, maybe a little under 1.010. But yes stable for 48 hours in that range should be fine.

I would also crash it for at least a week. A slow ramp down will work better than a straight crash as well. Give it a couple of days after it hits FG, then drop it to 12. After that drop it 2 or 3 degrees each day down to 3-4 degrees and hold for a week, then bottle. Allow to carbonate then if possible store cold for a month or two. Should turn out well.

This finished at 1009. I started a CC yesterday, but now wondering if it is worth it? The beer was really clear and pale, and has now darkened considerably going back to 10C overnight.

My beer was already very clear, won't CC mean the 2nd Ferment will take even longer as more yeast will drop out? I've a mind to just bottle it off now and leave it for a few weeks. I'm not able to cold store this for a month after carbonation anyway.

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On 3/30/2019 at 10:10 AM, porschemad911 said:

I took a gravity reading on my Smoked Porter a couple of days back. It was down to 1.016 (so a tiny bit more to go) and tasted brilliant. I could see what each ingredient brought to the beer, and the overall balance of the flavours was very nice. Probably bottle it up one evening next week.

Cheers, 

John 

I bottled this up last night It only moved down to 1.015 in the end, but cleared up nicely and tastes beautiful. I can't wait to taste it in a month or two.

Hmmm I wonder what else would be good to ferment with the Edinburgh ale yeast slurry I saved?

Cheers, 

John 

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Just put my red ale into the fermenter and pitched the yeast. In the brew fridge coming down to 18 now. Ended up with 26.5 litres this time around so will definitely be putting the surplus into the little bastard keg. Didn't oxygenate this batch as the cylinder is empty and I haven't replaced it yet. Looking forward to it being back on tap again. Might put the stout keg in with it and the pale ale being done next, by the time they're both ready it'll be getting towards stout drinking weather. 

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2 hours ago, Otto Von Blotto said:

Just put my red ale into the fermenter and pitched the yeast. In the brew fridge coming down to 18 now. Ended up with 26.5 litres this time around so will definitely be putting the surplus into the little bastard keg. Didn't oxygenate this batch as the cylinder is empty and I haven't replaced it yet. Looking forward to it being back on tap again. Might put the stout keg in with it and the pale ale being done next, by the time they're both ready it'll be getting towards stout drinking weather. 

Whats your take kelsey on oxygenation through the cylinder v just splashing the wort into the fermenter? Do you see a benefit?

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On 4/1/2019 at 10:54 AM, Lab Rat said:

I put down a Black Rock Wakatu Pilsener kit a week ago. Going 1kg malt for a some body and will dry hop with 100g Perle.

Very little action at 10C for a few days, so have upped it to 13C. I'm using M84 yeast and it's suggested 10-15C is good.

Given it's a pils with lager yeast, is 10 days going to be long enough for this one? This is my first attempt at a proper pils + lager yeast. I've no idea what FG it should be getting to, as the BR kit says about 1014, but comes with an ale yeast, which I haven't used.

Just tried a 1 week tester bottle of this. So far I'm thinking, not worth the extra time and effort of managing the temp to make a Pils. Tastes pretty much the same as my two Pils experiments with ale yeast from a few months back - a bland, slightly malty lager. Can't see what a month in storage is going to do for this.

This got down to 1009 and I CC for a few days. Bottled nice and clear, but get chill haze from the fridge, so it doesn't look any better than other beers either.

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1 hour ago, Lab Rat said:

Can't see what a month in storage is going to do for this.

Try it and see😉

My lagers are at their best between 2 and 3 months. 

I think it takes quite an effort to make a good lager because there isn’t a heap of hops to hide behind like all these new highly hopped beers. 

I love a good lager and I usually always have one on tap. 

Good luck!!

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I think kit or extract lagers are a bit hit and miss personally. However, even my tried and true all grain pilsner isn't fantastic after only a week. They need time, and unfortunately there are no shortcuts to that. 

This time needed is why I'm not surprised that it doesn't taste great after only being cold conditioned for a few days then bottled for a week. It's nowhere near long enough. 

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I intend leaving them, but just curious how it turned out after a week. I haven't noticed any improvement in my ales from first to last, so that's why I remain sceptical time will do something radical to this beer.

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I suspect it won't improve a hell of a lot, but it should improve a little. It's longer storage at cold temperatures that really improves them. 

From experience of drinking them early after tapping kegs pretty much as soon as they were filled (after two weeks chilled in the fermenter), the flavour changed quite a bit over the 5 weeks or so they lasted (obviously being chilled the whole time), being noticeably better nearing the end of the keg than they were at the start. It is worth it if you're set up to do it, however, the recipe itself needs to be decent too. A bland recipe will always be bland no matter how long the beer is left. 

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1 hour ago, Otto Von Blotto said:

I suspect it won't improve a hell of a lot, but it should improve a little. It's longer storage at cold temperatures that really improves them. 

From experience of drinking them early after tapping kegs pretty much as soon as they were filled (after two weeks chilled in the fermenter), the flavour changed quite a bit over the 5 weeks or so they lasted (obviously being chilled the whole time), being noticeably better nearing the end of the keg than they were at the start. It is worth it if you're set up to do it, however, the recipe itself needs to be decent too. A bland recipe will always be bland no matter how long the beer is left. 

Cheers. This is what I thought - if a little improvement is the norm, then it's not worth the effort for me. I'll put some in the fridge and leave them, but I don't have enough room for the whole batch.

But after trying this, the Coopers, and std BR pils, I don't think a decent pils can probably be made from kits. You can get much the same from the pils/lager kits with ale yeast.

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It can be done but I'd suspect a short hop boil and steep would be the best way to improve them, and use pilsner malt extract. 

My kit lagers were pretty ordinary too but at the time I didn't really know anything about lager brewing. I just used the kit yeast at ambient in winter, along with the kit and a kilo of LDM. I didn't make another one until about 6 months after I moved to AG. By that stage I had temp control and an understanding of yeast requirements. From that first AG lager, they were much better. I reckon if I did a kit one now using the methods I now use, it would turn out a lot better than the ones I did early on. 

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45 minutes ago, Otto Von Blotto said:

It can be done but I'd suspect a short hop boil and steep would be the best way to improve them, and use pilsner malt extract. 

Maybe, but I already did hop addition to the previous one. It's a long time to wait and see if you can get something that isn't generic tasting. 

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So.....I have recently acquired a can of Thomas Coopers Golden Crown Lager.  This is about the only Coopers kit I have not tried.  I am looking at the Royal Lager recipe on the Coopers site.  Otto/Lab thoughts for improvement.  Saaz instead of Hallertau Mittelfrueh?  If I get the timing right I could age them in the garage in Melbourne during winter.  Like Lab I do not have fridge space to age them.

Cheers Shamus

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The Hallertau hop is quite nice. I brewed a number of lagers with it last year because I couldn't get hold of Saaz in the order I made from YVH at the time. These beers reminded me of the Helles beers I'd tried at the German beer joints here. I enjoyed them.

I'd probably stick with it but if I was going to change anything I'd add a short boil of 20-25g along with the steep, and replace the light dry malt with the equivalent in pilsner extract. I find pilsner malt is an important aspect of the flavour in a traditional European lager, be it German or Czech. 

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