I'm scared to take it off the yeast so fast. I know you said the monks let it ferment for 4-6 days then cool it to 50 degrees to condition. Do they rack it off the yeast when they cool it or chill it without racking? I'm not sure I would want to pull it off without letting it clean up at all, especially with the warm fermentation.
Well at 50f the yeast isn't doing anything. They put it at that temp to get the yeast to drop out. So yeah, they rack off the yeast after 7 days.
Alright man, I'll do it but I'm probably going to be twitching the whole time! My batch has hit 84, now it's a matter of checking on it periodically to see whether it looks like it will try to go over. I'll have to move it to a colder room in that case. It's also going gangbusters right now. The s-type airlock has a constant flow of CO2 coming through. I think I'll go ahead and add the homemade candi syrup tonight and the dark candi sugar tomorrow.
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After doing a shot at this I think adding the dark candi syrup early in the boil will increase the darkness of this beer by letting it caramelize some more. I'm going to add the sugar off the bat in the "traditional" recipe next weekend and see how it comes out.
I'd be worried about all that boiling time changing the flavors slightly. Probably me just being paranoid though. I just added 2 lbs. of my homemade dark candi syrup. Temp has been holding steady at 84, I was worried about it going over but it seems to have plateaued. Hopefully it doesn't go crazy with the candi syrup and heat up some more. Gravity was 1.032 before I added the syrup. I was surprised at how far it had come. It will get a pound of dark candi sugar tomorrow and then it will be a wait for it to get down to 1.011. I hope it stops there! I also pulled some yeast and added it to a bit or wort I saved yesterday diluted to 1.040. I've got it on the stirplate to use as the yeast added at bottling. Fun stuff.
Edit: Oh, by the way, the sample was surprisingly drinkable! No alcohol harshness, thank goodness. I was worried about that with the quick ramp up to 84 it did. Esters were present but subdued. There was a bit of a tartness from the yeast that was pleasant. Can't wait to try the finished product!
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Well, the beer had a nice 3 inch krausen all day. Being at a volume of about 5.5 gallons in a 6.5 gallon carboy, it had plenty of room. That is, until the candi syrup was added. Not 10 minutes after I had added the syrup did I go to check on it and krausen was shooting out the airlock and around the sides of the carboy cap. So on went a blowoff tube and a stopper. No more real time temp checks since the carboy cap isn't being used. I didn't realize it was gonna freak over the syrup quite so much!
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I'm too lazy and have too many beers going to keep updating this!
Well, the beer had a nice 3 inch krausen all day. Being at a volume of about 5.5 gallons in a 6.5 gallon carboy, it had plenty of room. That is, until the candi syrup was added. Not 10 minutes after I had added the syrup did I go to check on it and krausen was shooting out the airlock and around the sides of the carboy cap. So on went a blowoff tube and a stopper. No more real time temp checks since the carboy cap isn't being used. I didn't realize it was gonna freak over the syrup quite so much!
Ok, so tomarrow is brew day, and I'm doing a 3 gallon batch, it might be blasphomy, but I have to make some hop substitutions because I'm on a shoestring budget, and the hops I've got are the hops I've got (this is also why I didn't order candi syrup, making it myself)
4# Pale Malt (bel)
4# Pilsner Malt (bel)
1.5# Dark Syrup (sugar #5 from snick-a-saurs's post)
.7oz EKGs @ 120 mins
.5oz Williamette @ 25 mins
.5oz Hallertauer @ 25 mins
Mashing is a double decoct: 122, 145, 158
I did a 1.5L starter of the WLP530. We'll see how it turns out
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It already had 7 drops in it. I went ahead and added 5 more this morning since it was still blowing off. That's about all I'm comfortable with. I'm a bit worried I lost too much yeast though. I was blowing off into a quart size jar with maybe a cup of starsan in the bottom, and it was overflowing this morning. Fermentation also seems to have slowed down and temp was down to 80. Hopefully there is enough yeast left to finish this thing out!
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I'm too lazy and have too many beers going to keep updating this!
It already had 7 drops in it. I went ahead and added 5 more this morning since it was still blowing off. That's about all I'm comfortable with. I'm a bit worried I lost too much yeast though. I was blowing off into a quart size jar with maybe a cup of starsan in the bottom, and it was overflowing this morning. Fermentation also seems to have slowed down and temp was down to 80. Hopefully there is enough yeast left to finish this thing out!
My 7g conical with 5.5g in and quite a bit of fermcap barely managed to contain it w/o blowoff. What day into fermentation are you when the temp drops down some? By day 3 my beer was at 78% attenuation. Time to take a gravity check!
My 7g conical with 5.5g in and quite a bit of fermcap barely managed to contain it w/o blowoff. What day into fermentation are you when the temp drops down some? By day 3 my beer was at 78% attenuation. Time to take a gravity check!
I was at about 36 hours this morning. I still have one sugar addition left tonight. I'll take the gravity before adding it.
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I'm too lazy and have too many beers going to keep updating this!