First off the latest EKA turned out ok. Not great. It got entered in the National Homebrew competition so we will see what the world thinks of it. Results come in next week. I will say it had a little bit of apple easters. Not as bad as usual. So I may need an even lower starting pH then what my el cheapo measuring device says. Perhaps I should look into just computing what I should add and go with that. For fun, I think I'll continue to measure mash and pre-ferment pH values. It's just another number to track and check out.
Second off, I think I'm going to make a run at the home-brew competition at the Antelope Valley Fair. I'm thinking to enter three beers. I'm hoping to bring home some hardware so wish me luck.,
Third, got a brewery upgrade. Check it out.
That's a plate chiller. It should chill the beer very quickly. I'll be sure to write up a bunch about that as the brew day goes on since there should be a lot of firsts here.
That takes us to the fourth and final thing, our brew day. Ellie and the baby have left for the March of Dimes in LA and I'm left here home alone. So I've got all the time in the world. The first beer I intend to send to the competition is an Oatmeal Milk Stout. To this day I feel it is the best beer I've ever made. There are so many variables in making beer that is seems impossible to capture lightning in a bottle twice, I tried to re-make mead once. It went awful.
Anyhow here's the particulars:
9.5lbs English 2-row
1lb flaked oats
0.75lbs Chocolate malt
0.75lbs Victory malt
0.5lbs Crystal 75L (they didn't have 80)
0.5lbs Roasted barley
1lb Lactose
2oz East Kent Goldings 4.8%AA
Whirl floc
Servomyces
WLP002 x2 MFG: Mar29 2017 LOT: 1036332 w/ 1 Liter starter (decanted)
I began the starter a day sooner than normal and then put in the fridge the day before brew day. I plan to decant the liquid, add fresh wort, stir and add to fermenter.
2:22 - O2 stone has been boiled. I will measure out the grains now.
3:32 - Measured grains. Calibrated pH sensor. Put mash tun together. Heating up strike water now. I also ground up the grains and had little trouble with the mill. It was as if the one roller rolled but not the other. I picked it up and just moved the other roller a little and then everything was fine.
3:47 - Mashed in at 156. Was a little high at first. Used some cooler water. Backed up the temp reading with the pH sensor which has a built in temp sensor. The pH measured at 5.45 which is a lot higher than I would have thought. I'll measure it again during the first runnings. Going to see Matt Gross now an deliver a present.
4:52 - Running off now. The pH measured 5.4ish so mashing really has no effect on the pH it would seem. The wort tastes great!
5:05 - Second runnings measures 5.6. I seem to remember EKA second runnings being much higher.
5:27 - Pre-boil gravity is 1.052. The pH is 5.45.
6:30 - 40 mins into the boil now. The silicon tubing was really dirty. So I made up a bucket of PBW and am soaking it in there for a few minutes. I came in to decant the yeast. I've sampled some of what came out of the starter. It tastes like beer. There's definitely some easters and such in there. It doesn't taste good. I wouldn't have more. It does taste similar to my last batch. Maybe the next EKA I should buy three packets and just pitch directly without making a starter.
8:51 - Brew day done. It went badly. The beer is sitting in the fermentation chamber at 88F. The yeast is already in there so it's not like I can just wait until it cools and pitch. Now I'm worried that my chest freezer will be cycling like crazy all night. Not sure what to do. For what it's worth here's a picture of the setup.
You can see I had a prechiller in there. It was meant to chill the water from the tap but it just didn't chill it enough. I think the future looks like pushing ice water through the plate chiller with a pump.
I'm a little down right now as this was meant to be competition beer. I've also never lost a batch pre-fermentation. There's a first for everything I guess. While getting the beer supplies from under the bar sink I found a bottle of wine Ellie's sister left. I think I'm going to go drink that now and then go dump the beer so that the chest freezer compressor isn't on all night.
Edit:
10:51 - I added a crap ton of ice to help the compressor. I got it from the fridge. Which is real bad.
