American Pale Ale Bee Cave Brewery Haus Pale Ale

[SKMO]

Well I finally got on board and did one of these this morning. I've been doing AG for over 10 years, so I am not the little cowboy at his first rodeo, but I had to give this a shot to see what all the whoop-dee-doo was about. Or what the "brew-ha-ha" was about?

First off, all the instructions are dead-on, correct and simple. I hit all my numbers right on the nose, volumes, temps, and gravities. I am not real big on following directions but since this was a tried-and-true recipe I did my best to follow directions and see where the chips fell.

Plugging everything into Beersmith gave me almost exactly (within a percent or two) the Edwort recipe, but a little short on IBU's. I put 1.053 into the fermenter with no jacking around, thats just how it boiled out, and I got exactly 5.5 as per the Beersmith volume recommendations.

I did make a couple changes due to what I had on hand: Crystal 40 instead of C20, and Marris Otter instead of Vienna. Also added 1/2 pound of Carafoam, just because I always do, and a big handfull of rice hulls. For yeast I went with Wyeast 1056 because I somehow accidently "smacked a pack" of this last week in the fridge and it was swollen and awake and ready to find some wort. I made a 2 quart/48 hour starter with the 1056 and I think I pitched some real worker-bees. I also added another .5 ounces of Saaz at the 15 minute mark hops addition, just to get rid of them. And I like a bit of Saaz.

Anyway I think this ended up pretty true to form to the original intent. I anticipate an awesome brew out of this.

This is a perfect recipe for a person's first all grain. Again, all my numbers were absolutely dead on the mark just following the directions given by EdWort. I actually was right proud of myself. I have never had the numbers go as perfect with any other recipe.

EDIT/UPDATE: I pitched the 1056 starter about noon, and by 8PM it was rocking at a temp of 72 degrees.

Thanks EdWort !

 

[r8rphan]

Well, my efficiency is a lot lower than Eds.. so I ended up with 1.045 OG... even after boiling an extra 10 mins before adding hops.. So I reduced the two bittering additions by about 10% and added the unused hops back in the with the last two additions..

I aerated for about 10 mins in each bucket (first time using buckets instead of carboys), and pitched the yeast without hydrating.. I pitched pretty cool, because in my house, pitching at 68 tends to cause some fusels.. however, I pitched even cooler than I had intended.. about 63-64 instead of the 65-66 I had intended..

It's been about 17hrs and no noticeable ferment yet (I hate not being able to see the yeasties).. but fermometers read 63.. So early this morning, I set them on some pieces of styrofoam to get them off the cold floor, and turned the heater up from 68-70.. Threw a few logs in the fireplace to see if I can raise the temp in the laundry room.. It's the coolest room in the house, and why I ferment in there now..

If I see no evidence of activity at the 24 hr mark, I might risk taking a peek, and at the very least, point a work lamp at the buckets to heat them up a couple three degrees...

Because I'm pitching lower temp wise, I'm starting to wish I had at least rehydrated the yeast first.. Eventually, I'll get this stuff fermented..

As far as the efficiency goes, I guess I better figure on adding about 10% to my grain bill from now on.. at least until I figure out how to improve my efficiency..

I see a water test in my near future..

 

[jgourd]

Well, my efficiency is a lot lower than Eds.. so I ended up with 1.045 OG... even after boiling an extra 10 mins before adding hops.. So I reduced the two bittering additions by about 10% and added the unused hops back in the with the last two additions..

I aerated for about 10 mins in each bucket (first time using buckets instead of carboys), and pitched the yeast without hydrating.. I pitched pretty cool, because in my house, pitching at 68 tends to cause some fusels.. however, I pitched even cooler than I had intended.. about 63-64 instead of the 65-66 I had intended..

It's been about 17hrs and no noticeable ferment yet (I hate not being able to see the yeasties).. but fermometers read 63.. So early this morning, I set them on some pieces of styrofoam to get them off the cold floor, and turned the heater up from 68-70.. Threw a few logs in the fireplace to see if I can raise the temp in the laundry room.. It's the coolest room in the house, and why I ferment in there now..

If I see no evidence of activity at the 24 hr mark, I might risk taking a peek, and at the very least, point a work lamp at the buckets to heat them up a couple three degrees...

Because I'm pitching lower temp wise, I'm starting to wish I had at least rehydrated the yeast first.. Eventually, I'll get this stuff fermented..

As far as the efficiency goes, I guess I better figure on adding about 10% to my grain bill from now on.. at least until I figure out how to improve my efficiency..

I see a water test in my near future..

I had some similar results. My OG came in about 4 points lower than estimated. For my system, large sparges (which tend to go with lower OG brews) don't do so great. I have to nail it down. But it doesn't matter. It will still be a good beer I think. I also started to ferment cooler since my water is fairly cool this time of year (58F). It took about 24-36 hours to get going but then it was down to business. After about 4 days, fermentation has slowed.

 

[r8rphan]

I see evidence of fermentation in one of the buckets now.. Gas is starting to move water out of one of the blowoff tubes, and a small layer of krausen is visible through the wall of the bucket...

I suspect the other bucket will follow suit fairly soon.. Should all be chugging along nicely within a few hours...

I'm gonna have my water tested to see if I need to adjust the PH.. Otherwise, I guess I'll just add some grain to my bills from now on...

This beer should be fairly close, although slightly watered down, as I reduced the bittering slightly to compensate...

If I have all my hops and what not by next weekend, I'm probably gonna try brewing that centennial blonde that is also pretty popular..

After that, I might take another stab at a stone IPA clone... the first time I tired it was during the hops shortage, and the recipe was altered due to not having the right hops.. So it was nowhere close..

Trouble with that clone, is that there's a million different recipes out there for it, and I have no idea which ones will get me closest..

 

[r8rphan]

A little concerned about infection on this batch..

One of the buckets, had a pretty significant leak where the blowoff tube was attached to the bucket lid..

So I decided to pull the lid and fix the problem (the fittings were overtightened, causing the o rings to deform...)

I sanitized the crap out of my hands by washing them in the blowoff bucket (has five gallons of star san solution from last night).. and pulled the lid...

I saw something floating in the thin layer of krausen that looked like a bug.. So I got my stainless steel stir spoon, dipped it in the star san, and pulled the object out of the beer.. It was the bar code label from the pvc fitting I used as a locknut on the bottom side of the bucket lid.. Now I soaked these fittings for an hour or so before I used them, so I'm hoping that there was no longer anything on the label that could cause infection...

Odds are good, that the label fell off of the fitting in the other bucket too... I didn't think the labels were a big deal, since they would be 4 inches or so above the beer... Won't make 'that' mistake again..

Anyways, I think I fixed the leak, and am now waiting for it to start clearing the 1" burp tube like the other bucket...

Man, I hope I didn't infect this stuff! I've never had an infected batch, and was hoping to keep perfect record... better brew another batch ASAP in case this one is bad so that the pipeline isn't interrupted...

Any way to tell in advance if a batch is infected?

I like carboys a lot better.. although the 'handle' on the buckets is sure a nice thing...

 

[r8rphan]

Dang.. Leaking worse now...

 

[smokewater]

New brewer here. Brewed up the extract version of this yesterday for my second batch. I was planning to follow the recipe exactly but accidentally used a pound of Crystal 10 instead of 8 oz. When I ordered the ingredients 1 lb was the smallest I could buy.

How will that change the final product?

I plan to do an all grain BIAB version next and wanted to compare them. I guess if I like it i could do the same thing again for comparison purposes.

 

[r8rphan]

How will that change the final product?

It will be fine..

Just drank the sample of this stuff during transfer to keg (kegged one, leaving the other on the yeast for a few more days)..

Pretty good.. Kinda reminds me of fosters bitter... It has a very lager like taste to me.... This is gonna be good.. can't wait to drink it... Gotta polish of a keg of IPA tonight, and then I can put this stuff under pressure/cold crash it...

Just started the pre heat mash water for the centennial blonde..

So I should have 20G of session beer for the super bowl....

kegged a 5 G batch of extract columbus IPA today too... but gonna let that sit at room temp for a week or so yet before I put it in the fridge...

The pipeline is a rollin'...

 

[redm18]

Did this today as my first all grain and third batch ever. Got about 3 gallons on my stovetop with a brew in a bag. Got about 72% efficiency with a final gravity about 1.046. I had to use a bit more 2 row since I didn't have quite enough Vienna. I wonder if I ground my grain too fine as the finished wort was quite cloudy. I hope it settles out.
Tasted the wort was bitter and sweet should be good.

 

[Kayos]

@ R8RFAN: You have a very different way of brewing doing it over 3 days. You also are not getting your grain up to temp when you are sparging. You need to be closer to 170 (168 actually), not just the mash temp. That will definitely affect your efficiency. You are also VERY prone to infection if you let the wort cool and not aerate or add the yeast until another day. Not trying to be a jerk, just trying to help.......

 

[Kayos]

Did this today as my first all grain and third batch ever. Got about 3 gallons on my stovetop with a brew in a bag. Got about 72% efficiency with a final gravity about 1.046. I had to use a bit more 2 row since I didn't have quite enough Vienna. I wonder if I ground my grain too fine as the finished wort was quite cloudy. I hope it settles out.
Tasted the wort was bitter and sweet should be good.

No worries. It will, just let it sit for a month.

 

[SKMO]

As a follow up I made post #1712 about 10 days ago, my first Bee Cave brew. It fermented with gusto, and seemed to finish right at 7 days. It is already probably the most clear and brilliant all grain beer I have made.

The Ferm was done Fri or Sat as far as I could tell. I moved it to the garage today to cold crash during the arctic front coming through MO the next day or so. Out of habit I tossed in some gelatin finings, absolutely unnecessary as it is already crystal clear. I think I this beer may suck in all all known light in the universe, and create a Black Ale-Hole. If that happens, I am to blame. Actually blame EdWort because I will be at the epicenter of the inverse-light destruction phenomena and perhaps he will survive.

Man this brew is looking and smelling really fantastic, hope I live long enough to drink it.

Oh, almost forget to ask... Should I be worried ? Is this The Infection or a just simple light-wave apocalypse? My beer should not beer this clear. I fear my yeast cells have been transported to another dimension.

 

[elproducto]

Should post my tasting notes I guess.

Drinking after 3 weeks in the bottle, and it's quite tasty. I wanted a sessionable beer, and I followed the recipe verbatim. It's a great beer, but I'm a hophead, so I think next time I would dry-hop with some Cascade or Centennial. My non hophead friends think it's great.

Thanks Ed.

 

[r8rphan]

@ R8RFAN: You have a very different way of brewing doing it over 3 days. You also are not getting your grain up to temp when you are sparging. You need to be closer to 170 (168 actually), not just the mash temp. That will definitely affect your efficiency. You are also VERY prone to infection if you let the wort cool and not aerate or add the yeast until another day. Not trying to be a jerk, just trying to help.......

I used 5.2 for the first time this weekend... My efficiency went up from 64% to 73%....

As far as the three day thing goes.. I have never had infection.. You have no idea how anal I am with the sanitizing...

As things get streamlined, I'm sure I can speed things up.. but I do what I can with the energy ad time I have... I'm getting to the age where energy is definitely not what it used to be...

That being said.. I did a brew marathon yesterday... started off, transferring two batches into kegs, then cleaned the fermenters for use, and mashed, and then brewed.. 9 hours in total, and I was sore and tired this morning... I was sick all of last week and not feeling well enough to start the process on friday or saturday, so I did the whole mess on sunday...

I've got the boil thing down pretty god now that I have my PMBS operational... So it's unlikely I'll be waiting till the next day to pitch yeast anymore.. But the mash thing is still clunky for me..

What could possibly happen to the wort over night, that an hour of boiling won't kill?

 

[Sudtirol]

I brewed this for the first time on January 22nd, it finished fermenting in six days!! I transfered to my carboy on Saturday because I needed my fermentor/bottling bucket to bottle a Jubleale that just finished dry hopping, 8.7ABV hydro sample was awesome!! I really need to get another fermenting bucket. While it was sitting in the carboy I could see it clearing but was still a bit hazy so I added some gelatin finings. Today I came home from work and could not believe the clarity and all of the extra stuff sitting on the bottom. Bottling this one up on Friday and then going to brew the Bee Cave Kolsch, these two are going to be my house beers, and I haven't even tried them carbonated and cold!!! Thanks EdWort for the awesome recipies, you are the man!!!

 

[Kayos]

What could possibly happen to the wort over night, that an hour of boiling won't kill?

I thought you were boiling one day, then aerating and pitching the yeast the next. I misunderstood that you said you mash one day then boil, cool and pitch the next. If that's the case.....go for it

 

[r8rphan]

Yeah, I did that one time when the brew day went bad.. Fought through it and was too tired and pissed to deal with it, especially seeing as I over cooled the wort, and needed to let it sit at room temp over night to warm up enough to pitch the yeast..

But there was a good several inch thick layer of star san foam sitting on top of the wort when I put the sanitized stoppers in the carboys... I'm sure that had to help protect it... I aerated just before I pitched the yeast (about16 hrs later)...

Anyways, I enjoyed the two kegs of IPA and noticed no problems with taste or whatever..

Once I get the mash thing streamlined, I'm sure it will become a 4-5 hour process that is stress free and straight forward enough to do in my sleep...

 

[briandickens]

I plan on brewing a 10G batch of this for my son's first birthday party (he likes to drink, what can i say?), and I need some advice on hops. I have about 5 - 5.5 oz of Fuggles in the freezer for about a year that I would like to use up. I plugged numbers into Beersmith and it said that now my 4.6%AA Fuggles are now more like 3.8%. So, I could do 3oz for the first addition and then follow along (1oz, .5oz, .5oz) but then I'm looking at around 27IBU. Should I get an oz or so of higher AA hop to use in the beginning and use some extra Fuggle at the end for aroma, or should I use more Fuggle in the beginning and then get a newer aroma hop for the end? Or just leave things the way they are and leave it with the low IBU?

 

[Kayos]

I plan on brewing a 10G batch of this for my son's first birthday party (he likes to drink, what can i say?),

I heard your son was 12. Please don't do this!

Kidding

 

[briandickens]

I heard your son was 12. Please don't do this!

Kidding

Heh. Just turning one! So not so much for him but for the other adult guests. Well 5 gal for them, 5 for me.

 

[r8rphan]

Drank a few glasses of this last nite... Pretty dang pleased..

Like I said earlier when I tasted the hydro sample.. It reminds me of fosters bitter.. Been a few years since I drank any, but it's similar to what I remember...

I fermented around 62-63 degrees, so that probably added to the lager like characteristic of this beer.. even has that initial slight metallic tone in the aftertaste like fosters..

When I first started home brewing and dreamt of the possibilities, I had been buying commercial kegs of fosters, heinekin, and stone... I hoped to someday have three taps with home made clones of each...

Well, I think I just found an ale version of the fosters (close enough)... Gonna be trying out the stone clone recipe that EdWort used in a week or two.. Now, if I can just find an ale that mimics the light euro/german lagers of the heinekin/grolsh/becks style, I may not have ever even mess with lagers...

Not to mention the fact that I've already made several beers that are not like any of those targeted, that I love also..

Ordered three perlicks and shanks from AHS tuesday.. so I'm well on my way!

Thanks Ed for the great recipe! I'll be making more of this one!

 

[LowerMillHillBackyardBrew]

Hi!
I brewed this today! Or, kinda. I wanted to make it as close to the original as possible, to have a base recipe for developing my own house pale ale, but ended up deviating a bit from the original. Since I didn't do a full boil (boiled 4 gals), I used 1 oz Centennial for bittering, and then Cascade all the way through, but I upped the amounts slightly. BeerSmith calculated the IBU to be 38-39, so I hope it'll match. And my LHBS here in Norway is ****ty, and I haven't gotten into partial mashing yet (this was my 6th batch), so I substituted the Vienna for 1 lb of medium DME. I know it's not the same, but I hope it'll turn out a good beer anyway! For crystal malt I used my homemade crystal, which I don't really know the Lovibond of... - the various "make your own crystal" instructions I found were confusing - but I think it's approx 10-40 L... I don't really know what 10 or 40 L crystal is supposed to look/taste/smell like, since I'm so new to this hobby. But we'll see!

But the brewing went oh so smoooth!! No ****-ups! Finally!
Now let's just hope the Nottingham yeasties are happy with their new home!

OG ended up a bit high at 1.056, which I think will be great.

I named this brew (and effectively my house ale) "Helter Skelter" since I had this song on my mind today for some strange reason, and it seemed to fit this beer quite well. And it's lyrics fit nicely for a homebrewer in many ways I think!
"I'm coming down fast, but I'm miles above you!" :rockin: :rockin:
(i'm thinking this beer will go down fast, and was fast to make, while being miles above macrobrewery crap!)

Thanks & good night to Ed & everyone!

 

[Toecutter]

this is up next to brew this weekend. down to 1, 5 gallon corny left in the cooler.

question for Ed Wort, if you read this. had you thought of increasing the amount of vienna to say 50/50 vienna/2-row ??

 

[HillWilliam]

Kegged this last night after the Super Bowl had finished. The hydro sample tasted lovely. I fermented this around the 62-64 degree mark. I am really looking forward to getting this carbed up and tapped!

 

[Mishkan]

Made my own partial mash version of this on January 18th and brought a 5 gallon keg over to a Super Bowl party, the thing disappeared by the beginning of halftime! Had to do some quick calculations at the store so this is what I can remember

3.3 LME Muntons Light
3.6 lbs 2-row
2 lbs Vienna
0.5 lb Crystal Malt

Hops were exactly the same. And used WLP001

Ran a batch sparge and I guess our efficiency was unusually high, we had to add water to increase our total up to 5 gallons after we had measured the gravity. So estimated 1.066 fermented out to 1.011. Came out absolutely delicious, cheers!

 

[platypotamus]

man... this is one seriously tasty pale ale. I made mine with my first-year homegrown cascades and nuggets. deeeeelicious. goes down so smoothly, has some almost lager-like qualities to it. That Vienna malt character comes through so nicely. Great clarity and color, too. I will definitely be making another batch in time for the heat of summer.

 

[kellynm]

Anyone else's mouth watering while at work???

Looks great man!

 

[jgourd]

man... this is one seriously tasty pale ale. I made mine with my first-year homegrown cascades and nuggets. deeeeelicious. goes down so smoothly, has some almost lager-like qualities to it. That Vienna malt character comes through so nicely. Great clarity and color, too. I will definitely be making another batch in time for the heat of summer.

I also got serious lager qualities out of mine. So next I will be making this again but with noble hops, heavy on the spalt and mittelfrueh.

 

[HillWilliam]

Here is mine. Wife had a glass tonight and gave it glowing reviews. Excellent brew!

 

[LowerMillHillBackyardBrew]

Looks delicious! My take, extract version, done pretty much by the book, except not using Vienna, and using Centennial for bittering, is now 13 days in the primary. Took a hydrometer test yesterday, it was at 1.014 and tasted great (albeit green)! Wonderful hop aroma!

Question: I'm a newbie. How much more hop aroma will dryhopping with, say, 1/2 oz of cascade, give? If that's possible to describe? Will my BMC drinking friends still like it? I myself love a well-hopped beer, but I also want to serve this to my friends and not scare them away with too much hops. (On the other hand, I served them a great microbrew IPA once which they dug very much, so maybe I should stop worrying and hope they'll learn to love the hop bomb?) (Not that this will be a hop bomb, I just couldn't help the Dr. Strangelove reference )