Dreddit Dark

So, my buddy is an avid player of the Sci-Fi MMORPG EVE Online. He's also an avid Reddit reader. There is a corporation (group of players in game) run by a bunch of reddit folks called Dreddit. As part of the application process for joining the group he has to do an 'Arts and Crafts' submission related to the corporation. He asked me if I'd help him brew a beer for it. I said sure, and worked out a recipe for him. I give you 'Dreddit Dark'. I wanted to basically do a Munich Dunkel without taking the time to make a lager. So I'll be mashing low to make the beer more dry and pitching US-05 at a low temp to limit/eliminate ester production. We'll be brewing it this weekend. If this turns out well it'll be another in the recipe box.

Dreddit Dark
Recipe Type: All Grain
Yeast: DCL US-05
Yeast Starter: None
Additional Yeast or Yeast Starter: None
Batch Size (Gallons): 5
Original Gravity: 1.050
Final Gravity:1.008 - 1.010
IBU: 19.2
Boiling Time (Minutes): 90
Color: 22.8 SRM
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 10 days at 65 F

Grain Bill:
9 # German Munich
1 # German Pils
.5 # German Carafa III
.25 # Melanoidin

Hops:
1 oz Hallertauer Mittlefruh 5% AA @60 Min

Water Treatment:
Start with 10 gals distilled water and add:
-- Chalk - 7.5g (~4 tsp)
-- Baking Soda - 1g (~1/4 tsp)
-- Epsom Salt - 1g (~1/4 tsp)

Single Step Infusion at 149 F

Fly Sparge to 7 gallons.

Boil for 90 minutes down to 6 gallons. Expect to lost .5 gal to wort shrinkage

Cool to 65 degrees and pitch.

Arts and craft submission, that's hilarious.... I love it.

Holy Crap! Crazy brew day. Made a 10 gallon batch of the above, so basically double everything. I had to double check the numbers, but we had ridiculous efficiency. I was shooting for OG of 1.050. Corrected for temp our Pre-Boil gravity was 1.053! Our actual OG wound being 1.064. We wound up with a mash efficiency of 95.4%! Instead of being a relatively sessionable dark ale, if this pans out this beer is going to wind up being 7.1%. Given that, we're going to rename it 'Dreddit Imperial Dark'.

Crazy.. You sure on those volumes? 94% seems a touch high

Yeah, I double and triple checked. Then I took another reading after the boil for OG just to make sure it that's how it came out. I checked the hydrometer for damage, and it was fine. I've used the hydrometer a bunch of times before and never had any sort of issues, so I have no reason to suspect the readings were off. I use a blichman boilermaker 20 gal bot form my kettle, and it comes with a nice site glass, so I know the volumes were right. My buddy said he normally gets between 80-85% efficiency out of his brews with 5 gallon batches. I guess the only way to be sure is to take a FG reading, and if they calculation turns out a 7% beer as I expect then I'll just have to see how fast I get drunk to verify

Krausen fell this morning after 10 days in fermentation. Took a gravity reading and a taste just to see where it's at knowing there's probably a few more days left. It's sitting at 1.016 right now making it about 6.3%. It tastes really damn good, but a touch sweet right now. I expect it'll probably finish at about 1.010 in the next few days removing some of the sweetness. I think this is going to be really damn good.

Took another reading today. Still at 1.016 so I figure it's done. Still tastes fantastic. Set the chamber to 37 to crash it. Planning to keg it on Wednesday and force carb. Using a carb stone as usual so should be drinking it by Friday.

Force carbed it for a few days with the carb stone and pulled the first pints today. Holy crap this beer is good. Going into the permanent rotation for sure!

Just as a final note, the more I drink this beer, the more I realize it's closer to a Schwarzbier than a Dunkel. A dunkel shouldn't really have any roasty character to it, and should be a little sweeter. This has some subtle roast to it, and doesn't have any residual sweetness.