What's in Your Fermenter? 2021

[stquinto]

I knocked up two 9 litre tins of Belgina Dubbel (InterBrew - a Belgian company).
The recipe only suggests 500g sugar.

In brew # 1 I used a 16oz (454g) pack of 180 dark candi syrup  and 100g of dark malt powder instead. I made it 9.5 litres as last time I lost a bit to the hydrometer tests (I seemed to do about 5 of them as it took a month to ferment out). OG ended up at 1.063 (should have been 1.070). I used the kit yeast and half a pack of MJ47.

In brew # 3 I steeped 100g of crushed chocolate malt overnight. Then boiled it for 10 minutes with 8g Saaz and 8g Tettnanger, with 250g LDM. I added almost 200g dextrose and 50g maltodextrin, for an OG of 1.062 (again, 9.5l). Same yeast profile.

Hoping for either a Chimay Blue or a Westmallen Dubbel clone. Normally I get a decent Chimay from that kit.

 

Edited November 10, 2021 by stquinto

[stquinto]

The big one in the middle is an Old Perc clone, I mentioned on another thread

Edited November 10, 2021 by stquinto

[Shamus O'Sean]

5 hours ago, stquinto said:

I lost a bit to the hydrometer tests (I seemed to do about 5 of them as it took a month to ferment out)

How about trying the - leave the sample in the tube trick.  It will ferment out very similar to what's in the FV.  You can check it as often as you want.  Once it looks like reaching FG, take a fresh sample.  Note the reading, keep it and check it daily.  Once it settles, it is probably your FG.  I usually take a final fresh sample on bottling/kegging day as a final FG reading.

[stquinto]

1 hour ago, Shamus O'Sean said:

How about trying the - leave the sample in the tube trick.  It will ferment out very similar to what's in the FV.  You can check it as often as you want.  Once it looks like reaching FG, take a fresh sample.  Note the reading, keep it and check it daily.  Once it settles, it is probably your FG.  I usually take a final fresh sample on bottling/kegging day as a final FG reading.

Cheers Shamus, I took that tip from you from a previous post

I have kept the one from the latest brew.  I’ll have to get another couple of test tubes as I only have one hydrometer. Last time I tried (I only had one brew on the go and not three) it was pretty accurate so it’s a decent system. In any case I rarely look to bottle before at least two weeks ao they tend to be fermented out (except for some of the strong ones)

[stquinto]

Got another question concerning brew days, and how long it takes. Would there be a problem to do a mash one day, cover the wort, and do the boil the next ? I mainly have time at the weekend for a brew, but only maybe a couple of hours. I would think that if infection is an issue it wouldn't mattter so much since you're going boil it the next day anyway.

Anyone tried this ? If I could split the brew day in half I would probably be able to get a brew done mid-week rather than the weekend when all the household stuff has to be done (lawn, recylcling, shopping etc.)

Edited November 11, 2021 by stquinto

[kmar92]

Interesting thought @stquinto. Not sure that I am qualified to answer, but it seems to me if this was something that could be done as you suggest, then I am sure that someone would have talked about splitting mash and boil days but I have never seen any such conversations. Of course I am familiar with cubing boiled wort and storing it but I haven't heard of people storing just the mash. As you say if you did a subsequent boil you would think there was little chance of nasty stuff surviving.

 

[Shamus O'Sean]

1 hour ago, stquinto said:

Got another question concerning brew days, and how long it takes. Would there be a problem to do a mash one day, cover the wort, and do the boil the next ? I mainly have time at the weekend for a brew, but only maybe a couple of hours. I would think that if infection is an issue it wouldn't mattter so much since you're going boil it the next day anyway.

Anyone tried this ? If I could split the brew day in half I would probably be able to get a brew done mid-week rather than the weekend when all the household stuff has to be done (lawn, recylcling, shopping etc.)

Maybe look into overnight mashes.  The Home Brew Challenge YouTube channel did one.  It seems like another option to spread the brew day over a few sessions.  It sounds a bit similar to doing a mash on day 1 then doing the boil on day 2, although I have not heard/read of doing exactly that.  Your logic, regarding a next day boils, seems reasonable though.  I have also seen/read/heard brewers do the boil, wrap the boil kettle in glad wrap or similar, then transfer to FV the next day.

[Malter White]

On 11/8/2021 at 8:46 AM, MUZZY said:

After returning from our little jaunt around Tasmania and drinking more pub beer than usual, I reacquainted myself with the pleasures of draught beer and decided to mix together a Coopers Draught with BE2 and a bittering of Nugget hops. I probably should have used a lager yeast for a better result but I didn't have any on hand and I was quite keen to get a brew going as soon as possible because I was down to my last 75 long necks of drinkable stock. With warmer weather approaching I knew they wouldn't last too long.

Got this one bottled this morning and made another Draught tin with BE2 and reactivated Coopers European lager yeast (below).

Currently down to 49 drinkable bottles plus the 30 from this morning. Reckon I might have to ease up a bit and have a few no beer days to avoid drinking green beers. This current brew will a little time being a lager.

 

[Classic Brewing Co]

Looks good Muzzy, developing a nice Krausen.

[Malter White]

11 minutes ago, Classic Brewing Co said:

Looks good Muzzy, developing a nice Krausen.

I reckon that was mainly froth from mixing it up, Phil. The yeast starter was also a bit foamy but there was already some signs of activity in the wort. Hopefully I don't have to wait too long for it to finish.

[Classic Brewing Co]

2 minutes ago, MUZZY said:

I reckon that was mainly froth from mixing it up, Phil. The yeast starter was also a bit foamy but there was already some signs of activity in the wort. Hopefully I don't have to wait too long for it to finish.

I have never done a yeast starter but I know what you mean about the froth I beat the hell of my last few brews & even sprinkling the yeast on top it activates within a few hours apart from the ones with US-02 in of course.

[Stickers]

my craft kit finally cleared the wild west of sunshine delivery centre, looking ahead i want to level up my skills a bit and do some stovetop 9lt batches, in the short term though i want to crank out some of the mr beer kits, keep the standard FVs for kegs and bottle the brews from this one so i can build up a bit of a stockpile again. only having to wash/bottle 11-12 PETs at a time sounds ideal to me, i don't think i can go back to full 28-30 bottling days again after kegging for 6 months.

[Classic Brewing Co]

I love those Craft Kits I have a Mr Beer North West Pale Ale going ATM, beautiful beer. 

[Stickers]

as a double plus, it fits inside a freezer i bought on a whim last year sight unseen. the freezer wont fit a standard FV but i can get 2 of these smaller ones to fit inside. i'll be able to do temp controlled small batches :))

[Classic Brewing Co]

2 minutes ago, Stickers said:

as a double plus, it fits inside a freezer i bought on a whim last year sight unseen. the freezer wont fit a standard FV but i can get 2 of these smaller ones to fit inside. i'll be able to do temp controlled small batches :))

I have only ever brewed with them at ambient temperatures as the standard STC-1000 Temp Controller dosen't fit it anyway.

[Stickers]

50 minutes ago, Classic Brewing Co said:

I have only ever brewed with them at ambient temperatures as the standard STC-1000 Temp Controller dosen't fit it anyway.

i reckon my inkbird will work. this opens up the world of lagers (and lagering) for me

[Frosty Chop]

Just getting back into the game, it's been about 5 years or more since I posted here.

So I was rooting through some junk at the back of my shed the other day and found a couple of boxes of brew in Coopers glass bottles dated March 2016. I thought hmm that's probably dead but put a few in my beer fridge for a day to try and to my surprise it was absolutely bloody fantastic and I'm still drinking it at almost 6 years old.

I wondered why I stopped brewing back then and remembered I had two fridges, one beer fridge and an old Kelvinator I got from gumtree for $20 that I used as a temp controlled brew fridge. My Beer fridge died so the old brew fridge is (still) now my new beer fridge and I stopped brewing.

I dug out my brew log book and looked up the beer I found in my shed. It was a Canadian Blonde with 1kg LDM and rehydrated Safale US-05 yeast fermented at 19C , it came out at roughly 3.8% ABV by my measurements.

So, I dug out one of my old fermenters, washed it and nuked it for a couple of days with some of that horrid smelling sodium metabisulfite, rinsed it out well made up new batch of starsan and cleaned then sanitised everything then went and grabbed a can of Coopers Canadian Blonde and a pack of brew enhancer 3 and put on another quick brew Tuesday arvo while the weather is still cool. Now to find another brew fridge  

[Pints]

1 hour ago, Frosty Chop said:

Just getting back into the game, it's been about 5 years or more since I posted here.

So I was rooting through some junk at the back of my shed the other day and found a couple of boxes of brew in Coopers glass bottles dated March 2016. I thought hmm that's probably dead but put a few in my beer fridge for a day to try and to my surprise it was absolutely bloody fantastic and I'm still drinking it at almost 6 years old.

I wondered why I stopped brewing back then and remembered I had two fridges, one beer fridge and an old Kelvinator I got from gumtree for $20 that I used as a temp controlled brew fridge. My Beer fridge died so the old brew fridge is (still) now my new beer fridge and I stopped brewing.

I dug out my brew log book and looked up the beer I found in my shed. It was a Canadian Blonde with 1kg LDM and rehydrated Safale US-05 yeast fermented at 19C , it came out at roughly 3.8% ABV by my measurements.

So, I dug out one of my old fermenters, washed it and nuked it for a couple of days with some of that horrid smelling sodium metabisulfite, rinsed it out well made up new batch of starsan and cleaned then sanitised everything then went and grabbed a can of Coopers Canadian Blonde and a pack of brew enhancer 3 and put on another quick brew Tuesday arvo while the weather is still cool. Now to find another brew fridge  

What a great story thanks for that mate

[Tone boy]

Got a new world lager. Pitched the yeast 2 days ago, was relieved this morning when it finally started showing signs of fermentation 36 hours later. 
chugging along like a champion now though  

Think I will dry hop this one…

[stquinto]

Well that’s b*ggered up my brew day - I made a starter with a pack of WY1388 for a BIAB Duvel clone, went down to check it as excited as a kid on Christmas day, and look what I bloody well found?

 

[Tone boy]

1 hour ago, stquinto said:

Well that’s b*ggered up my brew day - I made a starter with a pack of WY1388 for a BIAB Duvel clone, went down to check it as excited as a kid on Christmas day, and look what I bloody well found?

 

What’s happened there Sainter? Was the starter in the plastic bottle?

[stquinto]

24 minutes ago, Tone boy said:

What’s happened there Sainter? Was the starter in the plastic bottle?

Yeah mate, in a PET fizzy drink bottle. It was still rock hard so I don’t know how it got out. I have a pack of MJ41 so will keep the brew schedule on. I don’t have much luck with WY1388 - I’ve lost two, and one stalled on me (admittedly I didn’t make a starter that time). Where I am they cost double too so if the MJ is any good, or one of the other powdered options works, I’ll go for that for future brews. Especially if I don’t have to plan three days in advance by making a starter 

[Stickers]

thunderbird 3 is go with the pack in mr beer bewitched amber ale and some good old melbourne water.

i love this little fermenter, so nimble when it comes to rinsing and it is going to be so easy to clean. already thinking i might grab another.

[stquinto]

Went through with the brew after all- Duvel clone. 
I used a Brewfather recipe but tweaked it a bit, with a 4 stage mash, and using light candi syrup as most of the fermentable sugars. I say used, I’m still on it….

 

[stquinto]

Continuing with my brew: