What's in Your Fermenter 2023?

[Red devil 44]

1 hour ago, Classic Brewing Co said:

RD do you find that method maintains your target temperature?

So far so good @Classic Brewing Co

[Classic Brewing Co]

3 minutes ago, Red devil 44 said:

So far so good @Classic Brewing Co

Yeah, I was just curious.

[Shamus O'Sean]

2 hours ago, Red devil 44 said:

Came up with a plan for my heat belt, simple hook, good to drill in the sides with a small tek screw as no coils.

Just keep an eye on where/if the heat belt touches the plastic side of the fridge.  I have one heat belt that gets hot enough to melt the plastic.

[Red devil 44]

10 minutes ago, Shamus O'Sean said:

Just keep an eye on where/if the heat belt touches the plastic side of the fridge.  I have one heat belt that gets hot enough to melt the plastic.

Cheers for the tip @Shamus O'Sean

[Red devil 44]

Took your advice @Shamus O'Sean, modified the hook and bent slightly, now sits on the roof of the fridge.

‘So doesn’t touch anything now.

[Shamus O'Sean]

I put together the Coopers Genuine Draught today.  Because I am kegging most of this, I wanted the ABV in the keg to be around the same as if I bottle primed.  Therefore, I added 500g of Coopers Premium Pale Malt and did a mini-mash with the CPPM, the Carapils and the Light Crystal Malt. 

Ingredients and equipment

Mini-mash about to start.

Mash - Snug as a bug in a rug - Only dropped about 5°C in 60 minutes.

Coming to the boil

Boil underway.

Tucked into the fermenting fridge at 12°C

[Kegory]

3 hours ago, Shamus O'Sean said:

Just keep an eye on where/if the heat belt touches the plastic side of the fridge.  I have one heat belt that gets hot enough to melt the plastic.

That's interesting. I've just got the 30W belts from Kegland. They don't even burn my fingers.

[Shamus O'Sean]

20 minutes ago, Kegory said:

That's interesting. I've just got the 30W belts from Kegland. They don't even burn my fingers.

I bought one of those recently.  Using it for the first time on the current brew.

I also have one from China.  It is the hot one.

[Kegory]

Devil's Brew Porter. Almost done at this point.

I put in a big shift at The O'Connorwery today.

First sanitizing and replacing the seals on the Grolsch bottles.

Then bottling.

The sawn off funnel nozzle was a lot more efficient.

But the lurking just below the surface hop sock looked bound to cause problems.

It did. Not big problems but it led to mistakes. More on that elsewhere.

Anyway, the job got done and now the conditioning cave is running at full capacity.

A late lunch break followed. Then back to the brewery.

I crushed the grains myself. For the experience. Some of them ended up over crushed, some weren't crushed at all, but boy it smelled chocolatey, like coco pops after steeping.

That's not really a problem. Once to learn, is fine. The problem is I bought grains for 5 different brews that day, all unmilled. I won't do that again.

I used the Krausen collar for the first time because I'm a bit wary of the Nottingham.

And hydrated the yeast. A last minute decision with subsequent concerns which are discussed elsewhere.

I asked the boss if there was any bonus for all the hard work I did today. I told me you can clean up tomorrow and help yourself to whatever's in the fridge tonight.

Edited June 18, 2023 by Kegory
Spelling

[Kegory]

I had to pop the lid for e sec to get a pic of this weird looking krausencano.

[Back Brewing]

1 hour ago, Kegory said:

I had to pop the lid for e sec to get a pic of this weird looking krausencano.

Looks like it congregated in the centre now it's subsiding its starting to keel over

[Classic Brewing Co]

1 hour ago, Back Brewing said:

Looks like it congregated in the centre now it's subsiding its starting to keel over

It should fall back into the FV & make a nice beer. I have had it happen before, especially with yeasts like S-04.

[Kegory]

2 hours ago, Back Brewing said:

Looks like it congregated in the centre now it's subsiding its starting to keel over

Quite the contrary, actually. 48 hours after pitching and it's climbing the walls of the FV now.

I hope the picture's clear enough. I didn't want to pop the lid again just in case it reached out, grabbed me and pulled me in.

Feed me. Feeeed me.

[kmar92]

27 minutes ago, Kegory said:

Quite the contrary, actually. 48 hours after pitching and it's climbing the walls of the FV now.

I hope the picture's clear enough. I didn't want to pop the lid again just in case it reached out, grabbed me and pulled me in.

Feed me. Feeeed me.

What is the brew @Kegory and what is the yeast that you used?

[Kegory]

9 minutes ago, kmar92 said:

What is the brew @Kegory and what is the yeast that you used?

Devil's Brew Porter with Nottingham, and the first time I've hydrated the yeast before pitching. I hydrated the yeast at 15 point something on the thermometer, which reads a little lower than the Inkbird, but I needed to warm up the wort so the yeast temperature was dropping. I pitched at 17.7 on the Inkbird.

It was really slow to get going. I held it at around 18 for 12 hours or so then bumped it up to around 19. I kept bumping it up a few points, it's really cold here at the moment and the yeast activity, of which there was little, wasn't pushing the temperature up very much at all beyond the Inkbird settings.

When I saw it had finally formed a funny little krausencano without pushing the temperature up I thought well that's it. I bumped the Inkbird up from 19.7 to 20.0 and went out.

When I came back a few hours later (48 hours or so since pitching) I had a squiz and discovered I'd created a monster.

It's a bit slow but it's huge. I may have to call it Milton (the monster).

[kmar92]

2 minutes ago, Kegory said:

Devil's Brew Porter with Nottingham, and the first time I've hydrated the yeast before pitching. I hydrated the yeast at 15 point something on the thermometer, which reads a little lower than the Inkbird, but I needed to warm up the wort so the yeast temperature was dropping. I pitched at 17.7 on the Inkbird.

It was really slow to get going. I held it at around 18 for 12 hours or so then bumped it up to around 19. I kept bumping it up a few points, it's really cold here at the moment and the yeast activity, of which there was little, wasn't pushing the temperature up very much at all beyond the Inkbird settings.

When I saw it had finally formed a funny little krausencano without pushing the temperature up I thought well that's it. I bumped the Inkbird up from 19.7 to 20.0 and went out.

When I came back a few hours later (48 hours or so since pitching) I had a squiz and discovered I'd created a monster.

It's a bit slow but it's huge. I may have to call it Milton (the monster).

Nottingham has a pretty large temperature range of 10° - 25° so pretty much whatever temp that you throw at it, within reason, it will handle. It is my favourite in ale yeasts, I find it better than US-05.

[Back Brewing]

On 6/18/2023 at 8:04 PM, Shamus O'Sean said:

I put together the Coopers Genuine Draught today.  Because I am kegging most of this, I wanted the ABV in the keg to be around the same as if I bottle primed.  Therefore, I added 500g of Coopers Premium Pale Malt and did a mini-mash with the CPPM, the Carapils and the Light Crystal Malt. 

Ingredients and equipment

Mini-mash about to start.

Mash - Snug as a bug in a rug - Only dropped about 5°C in 60 minutes.

Coming to the boil

Boil underway.

Tucked into the fermenting fridge at 12°C

I'm going to put this down in a few days

[Kegory]

1 hour ago, kmar92 said:

Nottingham has a pretty large temperature range of 10° - 25° so pretty much whatever temp that you throw at it, within reason, it will handle. It is my favourite in ale yeasts, I find it better than US-05.

Yeah, I understand. But I'm trying to make the best tasting beer that's in my capability to make. I'm not really aiming to make cheap beer, that's just a bonus, I want to make a beer that I would pay good money for.

The recipe says 18-20, with 20 being the ideal temperature. So that's what I'm aiming for.

Drinkable is ok, but I want my friends to ask me "have you got any more of that xyz?" That's my goal. I know it may take a while to get there, though.

[Back Brewing]

1 hour ago, Kegory said:

Yeah, I understand. But I'm trying to make the best tasting beer that's in my capability to make. I'm not really aiming to make cheap beer, that's just a bonus, I want to make a beer that I would pay good money for.

The recipe says 18-20, with 20 being the ideal temperature. So that's what I'm aiming for.

Drinkable is ok, but I want my friends to ask me "have you got any more of that xyz?" That's my goal. I know it may take a while to get there, though.

With all the work you put into this I really hope it brews as good as and more of what your aiming for

[DavidM]

Bottle and Brew day:

Bottled a Nut Brown Ale

Brewed a Coopers Pale Ale

Pale Ale Can, 1.2k Light Dry Malt

200g Maltodextrin

250g Golden Nacked Oats, Steeped for 40 min (while I was bottling)

25g Pride of Ringwood boiled for 10

In the brew fridge at 20deg 

 

[Classic Brewing Co]

I am going to try a quick & k & k Saison next week, here's the recipe, anyone made similar?

Saison (French for Season) is a very old southern Belgium beer style (possibly early 1700s), which was traditionally made by farmer-brewers in the late winter, stored until summer then.
provided to thirsty seasonal workers (les saisonniers). In those days, the supply of beer was often considered to be part of their payment. Working for beer – some things never change!

The diversity of brews from one farmhouse to the next probably explains why the BJCP style guidelines describe Saison (16.C.) as such a broad category, with variations across colour, alcohol, bitterness and late hop presence. Despite such variation, one could argue that the essence of Saison comes from the yeast. It’s a highly carbonated, bottle conditioned ale, which often displays quite funky characters such as fruity, spicy, peppery, cloves, etc. The Saaz hop addition, although not necessary and not the typical type of hop for this style, adds a little bit of extra spiciness to the finished brew.

You may choose to ferment warmer than the recipe recommends getting even more funk goin’ on!

Batch 23L, ABV 6.5 % ,EBC: 12 , IBU: 20

1 tin Australian Pale Ale
1 tin Preacher’s Hefe Wheat
500g Light Dry Malt extract
25g Saaz Hops
Belle Saison Yeast

1. Add the hops in a bowl of boiling water. Steep for 15 minutes.
2. Strain the hop liquid into the fermenter, using a mesh strainer.
3. Add the brew cans plus dry malt, with 2-3 litres warm water, and stir to dissolve.
4. Fill with cool water to the 20 litre mark, stir vigorously and check the brew temperature.
5. Top up to the 23 litre mark with warm or cold water (refrigerated if necessary) to get as close to 24C as possible. Sprinkle the dry yeast then fit the lid.
6. Bottle or keg around day 14, or as close as you can after. FG should be 1004-1008.

 

[Back Brewing]

Today had some Amarillo hops left so put down the Coopers Golden Ale recipe will dry hop it after about 5 days

[jennyss]

My ROTM Old Town Lager is now in the FV.  And what a to do! Cracked the 250g of Carahell grain in a mortar and pestle, which took about 30 minutes. Steeped the cracked grain in two big chux laid over the saucepan.  Heaps of grain husks removed. Next the Hallertau hops added in two stages, and the brew boiled for 30 minutes. Looked a baby poo greeny yellow by this stage! We strained the 'wort' through another two chux and into the FV.   Added the cans of Coopers European Lager extract and Light Malt Extract. Had lots of icy water waiting in the wings, and finally brought the brew up to 25 litres at 12 deg and pitched the yeast. OG is 1042.

If the brew does taste good and I wanted to repeat a partial mash, I think I would have to invest in a small hand mill or power mill.  Because the  process was new to me, I was 'worry worting' at every stage - are the grains cracked enough, OMG look at that colour, will we keep the temperature down etc.

[Kegory]

54 minutes ago, jennyss said:

My ROTM Old Town Lager is now in the FV.  And what a to do! Cracked the 250g of Carahell grain in a mortar and pestle, which took about 30 minutes. Steeped the cracked grain in two big chux laid over the saucepan.  Heaps of grain husks removed. Next the Hallertau hops added in two stages, and the brew boiled for 30 minutes. Looked a baby poo greeny yellow by this stage! We strained the 'wort' through another two chux and into the FV.   Added the cans of Coopers European Lager extract and Light Malt Extract. Had lots of icy water waiting in the wings, and finally brought the brew up to 25 litres at 12 deg and pitched the yeast. OG is 1042.

If the brew does taste good and I wanted to repeat a partial mash, I think I would have to invest in a small hand mill or power mill.  Because the  process was new to me, I was 'worry worting' at every stage - are the grains cracked enough, OMG look at that colour, will we keep the temperature down etc.

Nice thermometer, I like the way it sits over the edge of the pot. I may have to invest in one of those.

[jennyss]

33 minutes ago, Kegory said:

Nice thermometer, I like the way it sits over the edge of the pot. I may have to invest in one of those.

It's an old thermometer, actually designed for some use in dark room photography which my father was into. I did find it very useful for checking the steep and boil temperatures.