OR/WA Group Brew v3.0

I had a hell of a brew day. Stuck sparge nightmare and I had my mash tun absolutely as full as I could get it (sanke keg). This is 1.29/qt per lb:



Thankfully I designed my rig so I can under-let with hot water and that got it to move although agonizingly slow... After that I was recirculating sparge water and forgot to close the valve on the HLT so I ended up with around 17 gallons at boil. Runnings were 1.039 for that single giant batch sparge. I could have just pulled 10 for you guys and 5 for a "small" beer I guess but i decided to break out "sputnik" for the first time. He's A little guy a got for doing decoctions:



so after a massive boil-off (in true belgian fashion I kept telling myself) and cooling I ended up with ~12 gallons @ 1.084 on two fresh s-5 cakes. 18 hours now and no activity so I gave it some more O2 and a fresh packet of yeast.

Its big and black and sickly sweet but like KB said not roasty, astringent or particularly "stout like"

All is well that ends well!

explosivebeer said:

Cool. Good to hear. I'm coming down this weekend and there's an outside chance I'll brew this up and bring it down in no chill containers. Otherwise it'll be a few weeks off or I may have to send it down with someone else if anyone else is going to be making the trip.

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I was thinking about going down on the 4th or 5th to drop it off, I hadn't arranged anything yet, though. If its the 5th I'll have to take a day off work(not a problem).

Edit for clarity: I can pick it up and drop it off on the way down if you don't get down there.

Nice work powering through a potentially frustrating brewday Chester.

Gplutt let's keep in touch and see what works. If I head down in early December I'll probably go for the 3rd and 4th to check out the holiday ale festival before the weekend crowd hits.

explosivebeer said:

Gplutt let's keep in touch and see what works. If I head down in early December I'll probably go for the 3rd and 4th to check out the holiday ale festival before the weekend crowd hits.

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Sounds good.

Shot, I wish I would have found this thread earlier... This would have been fun to get into.

ThreeSheets said:

Shot, I wish I would have found this thread earlier... This would have been fun to get into.

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Hey ThreeSheets. Several of us haven't brewed for this yet. I would actually prefer to do 10 gallons so if you want to do 5, go for it.

Just wanted to toss out a quick update. Went down to the basement last night and noticed that there is actually some airlock activity. We didn't have any on the last batch so I'd say it was a good plan to drop fresh wort in there.

And yeah, threesheets...a few folks are doing larger batches and I'd imagine at least one would be happy to cut back a little. Let us know for sure if your interested!

Just put your recipe into Beersmith, going to the LHBS pretty soon. Had to adjust the pale malt up to match my 70 percent efficiency. Actually, I've been getting closer to 74-75 lately, but with this high of a gravity, I'll shoot for 70.

Possible complication: I thought I had nugget, I don't.

I have:
1lb vacuum sealed 2008 hopsdirect
Crystal
Cascade
Centennial
Fuggle US
Golding US
Tettnanger GR
Willamette
Saaz
Perle
Loose freshops - not vacuum sealed but have been stored frozen - none smell cheesy:
Hersbrucker
Hallertauer (NZ)
Goldings (EK)

With almost 9# of hops on hand I'd rather not buy more at LHBS prices and I'm not positive that I can make it to the LHBS either.

Soo... with the nuggets being added at 60 they're mostly bitterness but different hops provide a different bitterness profile for a given amount of aa if I recall correctly. If I match the AA, which hops should I use? Also wanna make sure the others involved in this brew approve of a substitution...

curtis97322 said:

Soo... with the nuggets being added at 60 they're mostly bitterness but different hops provide a different bitterness profile for a given amount of aa if I recall correctly. If I match the AA, which hops should I use? Also wanna make sure the others involved in this brew approve of a substitution...

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Personally, I've got no problem with you using any of those other hops since it's only for bittering and it's only 10 IBUs.

I'm with explosive on this. It's a small addition and small IBU's. And honestly the only reason I choose nugget was I have 30+ pounds of it and need to use it.

Cool, cool. Brewday is either Tomorrow or Friday

30 pounds? That's F*n insane.

Kilted Brewer said:

I'm with explosive on this. It's a small addition and small IBU's. And honestly the only reason I choose nugget was I have 30+ pounds of it and need to use it.

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Rather than posting multiple times I'll update this single post with progress

6:23 am: Pre boiling water - hope to mash in at 7
7:07 am: Mashing in in a few - water at 175, beersmith says 170

Hope all is going well since we haven't heard from you since 7am!

Bah. Crappy brewday but I'm just about to start boiling. Missed temps, stuck sparge, etc. Wort tastes great though.

See ya tonight wort in hand.

Will update OP once hops are in.

Allright - heading out in a few. Will update and post some picks when in portland. It's been a LONG day.

Ok. Brewday went as follows:
6:23 am: Pre boiling water - hope to mash in at 7
7:07 am: Mashing in in a few - water at 175, beersmith says 170
7:40 am - Missed mash temp (didn't account for grain temp) 145 rather than 154 start Steam infusion to compensate (new this brew)
8:00 am Overshot temp - 160*F Stir like madman to bring down to 154
8:05 am - down to temp. Start preboil of sparge water.

Then I stopped taking notes because stuff REALLY started going down hill...

*I had a hell of a stuck sparge

*The copper elbow setup for siphoning sparge water out of the kettle fell off. I had to get it out and reatatch it - without burning myself.

Didn't get to the hop addition till 12:00

Boil went fine

Hops clogged up the input - knocked the elbow off when trying to fix. Clogged the CFC, undershot volume (happened to have preboiled water which I brought back to boil), kept on loosing things I needed. By the time I cleaned up it was 6.

Nothing huge - just a bunch of little crap that all went wrong at once. Wort tastes great though!

Once the boil was started I decided to oversparge the grain for starters (not thinking about the fact that this bill made for a DARK wort). Ended up with quite a few pints of 1.040 wort.

Pictures:
Pre strike grain


Ghetto fab SIM setup. Uses sparge manifold to inject steam. Worked great. Had the pressure cooker ($10 at goodwill years ago). Valve salvaged from a junk espresso machine. Eventually there'll be a more permanent handle than a hose clamp.


Picture makes the mash paddle I made of maple yesterday look much better made than it is...


Lots of pressure canned starter wort


Major problem: too many new variables in one brewday.

*Manifold was used with slits up, usually I use it with slits down.
*Hadn't ever used a pump on brewday
*Hadn't ever used the CFC on brewday
*Elbows (the ones that fell off) were cleaned up by yours truely - surely loosening fit
*Biggest beer (sg) I've ever done, though I've done larger bills - just 10 gal, not 5 gal batches
*New mill (monster mill) - had been using carona
*Conditioned malt

I guess I was begging for it...

Nice work Curtis. That looks like a messy brewday but it's good to break some things in. I might send my batches down in no chill cubes which will be a first for me. I've been waiting to make sure they don't have to sit for too long but can kick that batch out sometime this week. I like the idea of giving the roselare more to work with though so I think it'll be a good option.

Gplutt, are you still planning on heading down next weekend? I don't think I'm going to make it so if I could hand my 10 gallons off to you, that would be great. If that doesn't work, I think I can get them down to Portland later in December, although someone might have to pick them up at my friend's place.

Twas an interesting day.

Dropping off the wort with kilted in an hour or two. Had planned on dropping it off last night but left at almost 8 rather than 3 as I'd planned.

6 - 6.5 hours after adding Curtis's 5 gallon unfermented wort and the airlock has been brought back to life. Good to see.

explosivebeer said:

Nice work Curtis. That looks like a messy brewday but it's good to break some things in. I might send my batches down in no chill cubes which will be a first for me. I've been waiting to make sure they don't have to sit for too long but can kick that batch out sometime this week. I like the idea of giving the roselare more to work with though so I think it'll be a good option.

Gplutt, are you still planning on heading down next weekend? I don't think I'm going to make it so if I could hand my 10 gallons off to you, that would be great. If that doesn't work, I think I can get them down to Portland later in December, although someone might have to pick them up at my friend's place.

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I'm still planning on it. That reminds me, I should probably start getting addresses and time frames together...

edited for change of plans, again.

I'm hoping to brew tomorrow night after work. I'll let you know when it's ready to pick up. I think the no chill cubes will fit in a box that's out of sight on my porch so you can come by whenever is convenient.

By the way, gplutt or whoever else is in the area, I'll probably be heading to the Big Wood festival at Brouwers on Thursday if anyone wants to meet up.

What time is that? I'm dropping off that beer on thursday...dammit..

It looks like the madness starts at 11am: http://brouwerscafe.blogspot.com/

If I get back in time I might be up for it, it'll probably be kind of late, though..I wonder if Kilted has a place I can just drop everything off at...get down early, lunch at the HUB and back to Seattle in time for Brouwer's...my life is so hard...

That'd be a long day but more power to you if you're up for it. And if you change your mind and want to make the trip another time, no worries. That's a lot of miles in one day.

SWMBO works from home, and my bro-in-law and his SWMBO are staying with us for the week so someone would probably be home if you just want to drop off. Let me know though so I can warn everyone.

Kilted Brewer said:

SWMBO works from home, and my bro-in-law and his SWMBO are staying with us for the week so someone would probably be home if you just want to drop off. Let me know though so I can warn everyone.

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If I could, that would be best for me. Get in and get out early.

Hey Guys,

I'm in the middle of my batch right now. Gplutt it'll be in the box on my porch tonight or by 5am.

KB I'll pick up my cubes the next time I'm down. Please give them a quick rinse for me.

-B

Sounds like a plan. I'll be there tomorrow, hopefully early! What time are you going to be going to Brouwers, by the way?

I'm probably going to be there in the early afternoon, go through as many as beers as I reasonably can, go get some dinner and watch some football, then either head home or meet back up with some friends for a second session at Brouwer's around 9:30 or 10.

For the record, I just want to say it's scary as **** to put boiling wort into no chill cubes.

So gplutt...are you stopping by today? I didn't get a chance to check here yesterday and didn't see any PM's. Need to warn the wife if I can. I don't have anything ready to do the transfer over. Is it OK to just drop the beer off and I'll get you your containers at another time???

Hoping you have some way of checking HBT...There is a chance my wife will not be around some this afternoon. Kinda wished we would have solidified a drop of time, etc before you took off. She's going to leave a note on the door and hopefully you can just drop of the batches...Sorry man...poor planning.

Hey guys...again my apologies for not planning a little better on the drop off. The contents of the two cubes and the carboy are now in the barrel. The cubes and the carboy are all getting a quick oxy bath and will be kept safe until you guys can get them.

I think right now we should have about 35gallons in the barrel (if I did my math right). Evil and Chester are the two remaining batches that have not been put in. Chester I know you brewed. You can drop off whenever you're ready. PM me and will set up a time. Evil, where you at brother!?!?

Planning was probably more my fault than anybody elses! I saw your post yesterday about it PROBABLY being okay to go early...so I did. Thanks for taking care of the carboy, I won't be missing it anytime too soon, figured I'd pick it up later.

explosivebeer said:

I'm probably going to be there in the early afternoon, go through as many as beers as I reasonably can, go get some dinner and watch some football, then either head home or meet back up with some friends for a second session at Brouwer's around 9:30 or 10.

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I did stop at HUB for lunch, so I may be ready for some more food by 930 or so, we may show up there.

Just a quick update...within probably less than 90mins of adding the new batches the airlock was again brought back to life. I'm thinking the addition of the unfermented batches was a good choice on this one.

Great to hear the dropoff and addition went well. Thanks again for taking my batch down there gplutt and for cleaning those cubes KB. There was about 12 gallons between the two but very little trub left in the kettle so I'm sure there was a fair amount of sediment that dropped out as they cooled down.

On a side note, Brouwer's was ridiculous. The highlights were definitely the Hair of the Dog beers. They always do very high quality stuff but the Matt and Bourbon Fred were spectacular.