Latest Brew: Irish Red

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Doctor_Wily

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Greetings,

I just wanted to make a post about my latest brew I started today.

I went to my LHBS and picked up the following:

2x 3.3lb gold LME
12oz Crystal 40
2oz Special B
2oz Roasted Barley
1oz cascade
1oz fuggle
1 packet Nottingham yeast
Basically I copied the Midwest supplies kit, but got it locally so I could do it today.

I also got charged 22 dollars for the 12oz crystal! Needless to say, I called em and they're going to fix it next time I'm there (billed me for 12 lbs not oz, lol). I picked up an auto siphon while I was there too. Nice addition to the gear.

Anyway, the brewing process itself went fine, as it usually does. I did screw up and use my fuggle as bittering (60 min) and cascade for aroma (tossed em at the end) so I guess we'll see how that goes!

clocked in at 1.050 on the hydrometer.

My only big concern at the moment is temp. My house is really cold and I have a thermometer near the 2 brews I have going and it ranges between 56 and 67 throughout the day (and depending on if I cycle the furnace or not). I'm worried the temp swings are going to cause issue and that the low temp is too low. Oh well, what can you do, I should start a lager w/ the 50's temp, lol.

Anyway, end rant/ramble. Thanks to those who read!
 
I just brewed an Irish Red last Friday and used the Nottingham yeast as well. It works best at 57-70 degrees according to their website, so your house temp should be perfect!

Cheers!
 
Looks like a pretty solid recipe. Don't worry too much about the hop switch, I guess it'll be more of an American red than an Irish red with the cascade aroma/flavor :p

As for the notty yeast temps, those are PERFECT. Especially for a beer like this. You're gonna get a nice fermentation and a real clean, clear beer if you let it condition for a bit before bottling. Also remember too, that during fermentation the interior of your wort can be 5-10F higher than air temps ;)
 
Your beer had a lot of thermal mass, so it takes a fairly big temp swing over a fairly long time to affect the temp of the wort. Think of one gallon of water at 70dF in a refrigerator at 34dF, it takes like 8 hours to cool down. Now imagine 5 gallons of wort at 60dF, with an ambient temp near 74dF for short bursts of time. (this is why i swear by a swamp cooler, if a fermentation chamber isn't an option of course, it's not for it's cooling ability, but more for the extra thermal mass).

I can't say much about the hops, I'd imagine the crystal will over power much of the hop flavor.... And I'm not a real big fan of fuggles anyway.
 
well it got cold last night and when I checked the temp in the room today It was around 51 :-/. Hopefully you're right Matt and this wont cause anything to fail, lol.

Cheers
 
checked temp just now and it's around 57. Hopefully the low swing wont cause issues. I do see some activity from the airlock (yay) and so far it smells good, so a good sign there at least.
 
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