“Tom's" Pumpkin Ale

Brew date: Jan. 26, 2014

#25 - 5 gal

It's nothing pretty, but chilling by a sink is a breeze.

My father-in-law received the gift of homebrewing from a friend -- a pumpkin beer kit -- but no equipment with which to brew, ferment, or bottle. So he left it to me. We were all set to spend the day brewing together, but he had to cancel on account of the godawful weather we're (still) having this winter.

Yet, we must leave no beer behind.

Even though it was disappointing that I couldn't illustrate my homebrewing hobby obsession to Tom -- I suppose I can come off as a little crazy about beer making -- it was kind of fun working on my kitchen stove again with only a partial mash and some malt extract. Not freezing my ass off outside was definitely a nice change of pace.

I altered the kit recipe slightly. Since Tom had the kit for sometime before I was able to use it, I decided to add some aromatic malt, and threw in about a pound of 2-row to up the starch conversion in the pumpkin. I also added a 15 minute hop addition and held off from pouring in the malt extract until about 30 minutes into the boil in order to increase the bittering from the tettnanger.

On the whole, it was a relaxing brew day. Chilling the wort to pitching temperature was a snap with the sink nearby. Again, the good old days. Since then, it's been fermenting at about 64/68F each day.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb Pumpkin pie mix, canned
• 1.25 lb 2-row malt (Briess)
• 1 lb Aromatic malt
• 1 lb Caramel 60L
• 7 lbs  LME (30 min)
• 1.5 oz Tettnanger (pellet) (60 min)
• 0.25 oz Mt. Hood (6.1%, pellet) (15 min)
• 1 t Irish moss (15 min)
• White Labs WLP008 East Coast Ale yeast starter

Target OG: 1.064

Target FG: 1.016

Target ABV: 6.27%

Target IBU: 28

Schedule:

• Mash 3.5 gal water @ 155F
• Sparge 1 gal water @ 168F
• Boil 60 min
• Chill to 72F, add 1 gal cold water to fermenter, and pitch yeast
• Ferment @ 64-68F

Observations:

• Mash @ 1.027
• Pre-boil 5 gal @ 1.023
• Post-boil 4 gal @ 1.079
• OG 1.065

Poutin' Stout Jr

Brew date: Jan. 20, 2014

#24 - 6.5 gal

Prepping a stout for St. Paddy's Day. It won't be an "Irish" dry stout, but rather one that is (hopefully) both semi-sweet and darkly rich. Having never worked with lactose and just read about cold-steeping dark grains, I can only guess.

This brew takes some inspiration from AHA's Triple-X and Chai Milk Stout recipes, with hopes of submitting this to a local competition in March. In the meantime, I'll split the batch and secondary half of it on some whiskey barrel staves from the Old Sugar Distillery -- great local rum and whiskey if you're in the Madison area.

A smoother brew day overall, with one exception: During sparging, one hose came loose and sprayed wort every.where. I can't wait for warmer weather to fine tune my set up, and better prepare the garage for beer making.

Ingredients:

• 11 lbs Maris Otter
• 1 lb Chocolate malt
• 0.75 lb Flaked barley
• 0.75 lb Roasted barley (cold steeped)
• 0.5 lb Black malt (cold steeped)
• 0.5 oz Columbus (16.3%, pellet) (60 min)
• 0.5 oz Magnum (14.3%, pellet) (60 min)
• 0.5 oz UK Goldings (5.0%, pellet) (30 min)
• 0.5 lb Lactose powder (15 min)
• 1 t Irish moss (15 min)
• Wyeast 1728 Scottish Ale yeast starter

Target OG: 1.058

Target FG: 1.015

Target ABV: 5.76%

Target IBU: 49

Schedule:

• Cold-steep roasted barley and black malt in 3.5 qts water, 36 hrs before brew day. Strain and add steeping wort to boil 15 min before flame out. Add bag of steeped grain to mash, but remove before mash out. Doing so to help raise the acidity of the mash, but pulling before risk of tannin extraction during mash out.
• Mash in 5 gal @ 152F for 60 min
• Mash out @ 168F for 10 min
• Sparge 4.5 gal for 10 min
• Boil 60 min
• Add steeped wort 15 before end of boil
• Chill to 68F and pitch yeast
• Ferment 66F for 36 hrs, raise to 68F after peak fermentation

Observations:

• First runnings: 1.069
• Second runnings: 1.028
• Steeped wort: 1.035
• Pre-lactose: 1.055
• OG: 1.058
• Use 50/50 RO and filtered water

“Poor Lyla" Belgian IPA [bottled]

Bottle date: Jan. 23, 2014
5.25 gal

Superb citrus, piny hop aroma, very bitter. Too bitter to really taste the Belgian characteristics of the yeast. Some breadiness in the aftertaste. Nice golden clarity, very slight haze. Hoping the hoppiness will recede slightly and open up to the Belgian fruitiness.

Ingredients:

• 108 g corn sugar
• 1.5 c water

Desired CO2: 2.3 vol (5.25 gal @ 60F)

“Poor Lyla" Belgian IPA [dry hop]

Dry hop date: Jan. 6, 2014

Added directly to the fermentor. Looking to add that nice grapefruit, citrus hop flavor and aroma to the slightly bready, Belgian-y IPA that I have now.

Ingredients:

• 1.5 oz Saaz (7.1% A) (pellet)
• 1 oz Cascade (3.0% A) (pellet)

“Poor Lyla" Belgian IPA

Brew date: Dec. 23, 2013

My office window for the day.

#23 - 6.5 gal

A beautiful, snowy brew day, but one beset by problems.

Lesson number one: Don't leave your pump outside during the winter. Mine froze, so I was forced to do some heavy lifting to transfer the wort between kettles during the sparge. No spillage, thankfully.

Lesson number two: Get a handle on efficiency. I was way off on this batch. Looking for an original gravity of 1.077, but came in at just over 1.060. What happened? That's less than 60% efficiency! In the future, I'll be doing an iodine test to check for starch conversion of the mash. I'll also give my batch sparge a little longer to sit. Maybe 15 min. Still not sure how my calculations were so far off the mark...

Lesson three: ALWAYS use a blow off tube the first 48 hours of fermentation. If you don't, you'll scare the piss out of your brother-in-law's dog when the airlock inevitably gets clogged, blows off the carboy and hits the ceiling like a gunshot. Needless to say, I was wiping yeast off my basement ceiling, while everyone else was cleaning the urine out of the carpet. Sorry, Lyla, this one's for you.

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Ingredients:

• 9.5 lb belgian pilsner malt
• 6.5 lb briess pale ale malt
• 0.5 lb aromatic malt
• 0.5 lb caramel 60L malt
• 1 t gypsum (pre-boil)
• 2 t Irish moss (10 min)
• 1 lb candi sugar (5 min)
• 1 oz cascade (7.1% A) (FWH)
• 0.5 oz saaz (3.0% A) (FWH)
• 0.5 oz columbus (16.3% A) (60 min)
• 0.5 oz centennial (8.7% A) (45 min)
• 1 oz cascade (7.1% A) (15 min)
• 1.5 oz saaz (3.0% A) (1 min)
• Wyeast 3522 Belgian Ardennes starter

Jan. 6, 2014

• 1 oz cascade (7.1% A) (dry hop)



Apple popsicles.

• 1.5 oz saaz (3.0% A) (dry hop)

Target OG: 1.077

Target FG: 1.019

Target ABV: 7.65%

Target IBU: 70

Schedule:

• Mash in 6 gal water @ 156F
• Rest @ 145F (60 min)
• Heat to 155F and rest (15 min)
• Mash out @ 168F (10 min)
• First runnings: 3 gal wort
• Sparge 4.5 gal
• Second runnings: 4.5 gal wort
• Total: 7.5 gal wort
• Boil 60 min

Observations:

• First runnings: 3 gal @ 1.070
• Second runnings: 4.5 gal @ 1.031
• Pre-boil: 7.5 gal @ 1.045
• Post-boil: 6.5 gal @ 1.060
• Added 0.25 lb candi sugar to bump OG to 1.063

“Polar Vortex" Saison [bottled]

Bottle date: Jan. 1, 2014

Saison - 3 gal

• 58 g corn sugar
• 1.5 c water

Desired CO2: 2.2 vol (3 gal @ 63 'F)

Saison with blackcaps - 2.85 gal

• 56 g corn sugar
• 1.5 c water

Desired CO2: 2.2 vol (2.85 gal @ 63 'F)

“Hackett" Irish Red [bottled]

Bottle date: Dec. 18, 2013

• 80g corn sugar
• 1.5 c water

Desired CO2: 2.1 vol (4.5 gal @ 64 'F)

FG: 1.016