You know many times when I look back at these posts I see little nuggets of life. This one is interesting. This will be the last batch of beer brewed at my house. I will be moving to a new house.
The homebrew club thought it would be cool to fill a barrel. So we picked a stout to brew and collectively we need to brew 14 batches. I can't leave them hanging.
I'm typing this now in the night many hours after the brew day as I no longer have access to a computer. It's packed. Cause I'm moving.
I remember picking up the ingredients the night before from Vic. The mash went ok. It filled the mash tun. I used Arrowhead spring water. I mashed at 155F. The instructions said to vorluf for 15 mins. I did it for more like 5. The run off went ok.
The boil was 90 mins. I filled that kettle. Lots of turbulent spills to clean up. The cooling went ok as well. In general I was pretty messy. I spilled a whole bunch of wort transferring from kettle to fermenter. I lot on me and my shirt. In the driveway. I had to hose that down. I tried to use a cheese cloth but I burned the draw string and then tried to tie it off but failed and all the hops just ended up in the boil kettle anyway. When I removed it, I just got wort everywhere. I had to clean that up. I forgot to put an air lock on the fermenter lid and ended up putting the thermistor in that hole and got it covered in wort. I was just a mess. Not sure why.
OG was 1.100ish. The wort tasted a little bitter.
One thing I want to point out. I've been stressing about why my beer has been so bad lately and I have an idea. The hose I use in the basin to clean it soooo smelly. I but that's it. I need to replace it.
Below I've pasted the details of the stout from Vic's email.
Ingredients:
13.75 lb 2-Row Pale Ale malt (US)
1 lb Black Barley - 500 SRM (US)
1 lb Caramel 120 malt (US)
1 lb Flaked Oats (US)
1 lb Special B (BEL)
10 oz Chocolate malt - 350 SRM (US)
4 lb DME into boil [differing opinions – do some research]
1 oz Cluster, 8.1% a.a. (FWH)
1.25 oz Nugget, 14.9% a.a. (60 min)
1 oz Cluster, 8.1% a.a. (20 min)
1 oz Cascade, 6.9% a.a. (whirlpool)
2 pkg Nottingham Dry Yeast [no starter/do rehydrate per Dylan]
Specifications:
Yield: 5 gal (18.9 L)
Original Gravity: 1.111
Final Gravity: 1.031
ABV: 10.70%
IBU: 81
SRM: 53.5
Directions:
Target Water Profile:
Calcium: 97 ppm
Magnesium: 8 ppm
Sodium: 36 ppm
Sulfate: 46 ppm
Chloride: 68 ppm
Bicarbonate: 257 ppm
Single infusion mash at 154° F for 60 minutes. Vorlauf for a minimum
of 15 minutes. Add first wort hops (FWH) to kettle. Fly sparge and
collect wort. Boil for 90 minutes. After boil add whirlpool hops and let
stand for 20 minutes. Chill to 67° F. Pitch yeast and aerate with
oxygen for 1 minute. Primary fermentation at 67° F for 21 days.
Transfer beer to keg and carbonate with 2.0 volumes of CO2. Age in
keg for 30+ days. Alternatively, add necessary amount of priming
sugar and bottle the beer for longer storage. A fermentation vessel
with more head space than usual is a good idea. Use a blow-off tube
and be careful to control the fermentation temperature, especially
during the first several days when fermentation is very active.
