First Brew Day on New Brew Scuplture
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I split the slurry into two 1000 ml Erlenmeyer flasks with a bit of fresh wort in them. After a couple hours on some new wort to roust the yeast the little buggers took off like a ….. bat out of hell? Yes, it took off too quick so I had to let it sit and add additional fresh wort to the yeast two hours before I planned to pitch it to the new batch. Now that it is sitting on the beer in the carboy’s they are very happy. 
My plan for the day was to brew up a somewhat simple American Pale Ale recipe from “Brewing Classic Styles” by Jamil Zainasheff and John Palmer of Brew Strong fame. On the new system plans don’t always go the way it use to. Maybe that’s the point of keeping it simple ….. trying to get an expected result. Well, it did not go perfectly and that is what I expected.
The Mash was perfect holding 152 degrees with a recirculation through the Hot Liquor tank heat exchanger. The Sparge was a little long at 90 minutes. I have been using a refractometer to check “the numbers” during the brewing process. Calibration of the instrument was the first thing I did this morning with distilled water. The Brix scale number that the Refractometer reading gave me after 30 minutes of boiling was 16 which equates out to about 1.066 on the hydrometer. My target was more like 1.050 after 30 minutes of boiling so I knew I was heading into IPA territory. No problem just add more hops, right? My American Pale Ale had turned into a bigger beer. Most likely the 90 minute Sparge and the fine crush of the grain was at fault. Next time I will take this into consideration. More later.
Beer Sculpture
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Today was an awesome kid at the candy store kind of day. I picked up the More Beer 2100 Beer Sculpture featuring 26 gallon stainless steel kettles and frame that was ordered in December during their 15 percent discount day. Despite the rain, Wolfie my Pal and I braved the 60 freeway to make our way to the Riverside B3.
OK, I know you are asking yourself now, What is a Beer Sculpture? No, its not a tower of beer cans. A Beer Sculpture is a welded metal piece of art that holds several brewing pots in the creation of Beer Wort. A typical Beer Structure holds three different kettles identified as the Hot Liquor Tank, Mash Tun, and the Boil Kettle. In a four kettle system there is the addition of a Lauder Tun but our Mash Tun functions as both. The Beer Sculpture not only holds the kettles but provides a frame for the burners and pumps that run the system. This sculpture is a right to left flat structure which runs on two pumps. Its totally awesome.
Prior to purchasing this 20 gallon system, I was using 15 gallon kettles (10 gallon system) on a make-shift rig consisting of two Banjo burners and an overturned metal trash can to hold the Mash Tun. It was a one pump system that worked very well but required two people to lift the Boil Kettle off the ground after the sparge to set it on the Banjo burner. This was a gravity sparging setup. Now of course that problem is solved in fine style due to the two pumps and multiple burners. Thank you More Beer.
This 2100 Brew Sculpture from B3, is managed through the use of two controllers that fire up and off to control the temperature of the Hot Liquor tank and the Mash Tun enabling fine management of the wort creation process.
In the morning I will fire the thing up, check all the fittings and clean the entire system with PBW. The next brew day will probably be next week sometime and I will post some pictures of the event.
Bottling Day
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Bottling Day at the Yeast Ranch today. Last Sunday Wolfie and I brewed up what was supposed to be an ESB (English Extra Special Bitter). Well I messed up the recipe again. This time cold stone sober too. Not that one beer during a brew day is going to mess things up, its just that I had my mind wrapped around a 6 gallon batch when I was doing a 12 gal thing.
Actually, the mess up happened the day before when I went to the grain store – More Beer in Riverside – the happiest place in the whole world, just like Disneyland! I won’t describe to whole messed up event but its just a matter of doubling the specialty malts for the recipe. Its like the story when God was handing out Legs and she thought he said KEGS and replied, “I’ll take two fat ones.” I was looking at the recipe thinking it was for 6 gal and doubled the specialty malts because we were brewing up a 12 gal batch. What was intended to be an ESB turned out to be an American Amber Ale. So no worries – I just adjusted to hopping rate and changed the yeast and bingo we are back in the style guidelines. Its just a different beer.
The bottles are sterilizing in the dishwasher and the coffee is perking in the pot so its off to bottling time this afternoon. Here is the recipe for 12 gal. batch of an American Amber Ale:
Malt Bill: includes 24 lb English Pale Malt; 2 lb C-15; 1 lb C-120
Hops: Magnum 1 oz. 60 min boil then East Kent Goldings 2 oz at 10 min and 2 oz at flame out. (This is on the fly changes OK because I messed up the grain bill remember).
Mash at 152 for an hour and Sparge at 170 degree to a total of 14.5 gal. Boil for an hour adding yeast nutrient and bingo its wort.
OG is 1.062 high than expected by a couple of points but whose counting?
FG is 1.012 pretty attenuated.
Tasty now before carbonation so we will see in a month how it came out.
Whose Woods?
By · CommentsToday I feel a little pensive like the Milton poem, “Il Penseroso“. You remember this from high school no doubt? Well I do and other great poems. Winter season is creeping in to southern Cal today with a little rain and wind wiping up all the news casters into a frenzy of adjectives. When California gets a little weather its a big deal. We get so little real weather that the broadcasters have work it hard.
Its just the gentle drizzle of fall and the promise of things to come we are all hoping for. Weather is great in Southern Cal. Now all the talk is about the potential mud slides, reminds me of “Mud Slide Slim and the New Horizon”. Maybe that’s what got me thinking about Robert Frost and his “Stopping by Woods” thing.
Another incidence that has got me into this somber mood is the return of a good friend from the East Coast following a funeral of a family member. Young man, 30 something, too tired to be driving. You know the rest of the story. He left a young wife and family behind him on that blind turn that he was too tired to pay attention to. He stopped by woods on snowy evening too.
So today is a good day to be alive and grateful of all the things around us that are exciting and new. Its also a good day to be pensive if necessary and read a little poetry; so I leave you with this classic by Robert Frost.
Nobel Peace Prize
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In an unexpected announcement this morning, sitting President Obama was elected the Nobel Peace Prize winner for 2009. Wow!
The New York Times Opinion section had a great statement today concerning this announcement,
“Mr. Obama has bolstered this country’s global standing by renouncing torture, this time with credibility; by pledging to close the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba; by rejoining the effort to combat climate change and to rid the world of nuclear weapons; by recommitting himself to ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; and by offering to engage Iran while also insisting that it abandon its nuclear ambitions.”
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