Festbier BierMuncher's OktoberFAST Ale (AG)

[wheatgerm]

What yeast did you use?

 

[stubbornman]

I brewed this about 2 months ago and just started drawing from the keg. The beer doesnt have much carmel taste and is not as sweet as sam adams o-fest (side by side comparison). I also am getting somewhat of a weird smell and taste. I cant really describe it other than it smells like my grandma's house. I know that when i brewed it i missed my mash temp and mashed at 150-152 (bad thermometer). I pitched on a yeast cake of S-04 and did primary for 2 weeks at 68F (hit 74F for about 6 hrs while i slept) and secondary for 4 weeks, keg for 3 weeks. Am i correct assuming the low mash would account for lack of malty carmel and sweetness? I do not understand the weird taste and smell however. I used about 75% RO and 25% hard tap water, ph 5.2 and batch sparge. O-Fest is my fav beer any help would be AMAZING!

My guess would be the combination of low mash temps (more ferment-able) and high ferment temps, the beer over attenuated. Did you take any gravity readings?

 

[ekjohns]

Yes the OG was right on and the FG was 1.015 (little low). I was hoping that pitching on a yeast cake would compensate for the mistake of having the temp during ferm. get a little high but maybe that hurt it since there was so much yeast (i was bubbling like crazy about 1 hr after pitching). I will brew this again next weekend and was looking to using WLP007. I will aim extra high on my mash temp and i have since modified my swamp cooler so I should hopefully keep ferm temps down. Would I be better to error on the side of lower ferm temps that try and keep it right at 68F?

 

[stubbornman]

Yes the OG was right on and the FG was 1.015 (little low). I was hoping that pitching on a yeast cake would compensate for the mistake of having the temp during ferm. get a little high but maybe that hurt it since there was so much yeast (i was bubbling like crazy about 1 hr after pitching). I will brew this again next weekend and was looking to using WLP007. I will aim extra high on my mash temp and i have since modified my swamp cooler so I should hopefully keep ferm temps down. Would I be better to error on the side of lower ferm temps that try and keep it right at 68F?

Yeah I would shoot for the low side of the temp range with a swamp cooler as they do have temp swings. I have used 007 @ 64 with good results.

 

[Brewenstein]

Bottled this on 8/13/10 after 4 weeks in the primary. It it awesome :rockin:! Thanks again BM.

 

[grahamfw]

Brewed this last night, hit an OG of 1.053, and put it on top of the yeast cake for a two hearted clone (used US-04). This will be served at my wedding in October and I'm sure the guests will love it!

 

[mashman]

I think mashing this at 156-158 was too warm......I brewed a version of this on Kolsch yeast finished at 1.022 and would not budge....gonna offer a keg up to our neighborhood labor day block party (on sunday) and maybe re-brew it on Monday..(mashing at 154) and dropping it right on a kolsch yeast cake

 

[dmbnpj]

Did you rehydrate the dry yeast or just pitch directly from the packet?

 

[ekjohns]

it was on a full yeast cake

 

[dmbnpj]

When i brew this tomorrow, should i just pitch the packet of yeast on it, or should i rehydrate it first?

 

[Kharz]

Finally had room in my fermenter, so did 20 gallons of this over the weekend. Some minor tweaks -but it is fermenting at 67 degrees using a Kolsch yeast right now .... I will report back on the results! (last year I did the proper oktokfest in March and it was the best beer I ever tasted when we tapped for our oktoberfest party ... I hopethis is good!)

 

[ekjohns]

brewed this up on sunday and got it fermenting at 60F with some S-04. Cant wait

 

[BullFrog]

Alright - I am 6 batches into my AG experience and have a quick question on this brew.

I have this Oktoberfast 45 minutes into the mash @ 152. I was shooting for 156-158, but in a rush to get brewing after work, I forgot to adjust the mash temp in beersmith and followed the instructions as per the brewsheet. It was not until I read that beersmith said to now let it sit @ 150 degrees that I realized my mistake. I added another gallon of 185temp water in an attempt to bring it up, but only got it to 152. I made a decision to leave it there @ 152 instead of putting more water in the mash tun.

All that to say... can someone tell whether I should have added even more water at higher temp and what impact that would have had vs my decision to leave it at the lower mash temp of 152?

 

[Jbt]

Anyone try California Lager yeast?? How did it turn out?

 

[ekjohns]

Alright - I am 6 batches into my AG experience and have a quick question on this brew.

I have this Oktoberfast 45 minutes into the mash @ 152. I was shooting for 156-158, but in a rush to get brewing after work, I forgot to adjust the mash temp in beersmith and followed the instructions as per the brewsheet. It was not until I read that beersmith said to now let it sit @ 150 degrees that I realized my mistake. I added another gallon of 185temp water in an attempt to bring it up, but only got it to 152. I made a decision to leave it there @ 152 instead of putting more water in the mash tun.

All that to say... can someone tell whether I should have added even more water at higher temp and what impact that would have had vs my decision to leave it at the lower mash temp of 152?

I think with it being 45 min in adding hot water is too late anyways. If you were only lets say 15 min in, adding hot water would have raised the temp and you would get a sweeter brew. I have missed mine before and if i didnt want to add extra water I would take small amount out boil that and put it back in to raise the bed temp. That being said i missed my temp on this same brew at 150-152F. It is still very drinkable just not as sweet and malt as the sam adam O-fest cause of the lower temp.

As far as adding water i would get it boiling that way you can add as little as possible with the highest impact on raising the temp. Also if you would have added more water that would be extra time boiling so you would have to adjust for hops addition and someone please correct me if i am wrong, but i think you dont want to boil for over 2 hrs

 

[BullFrog]

So I realized after I added that additional gallon that I should have made it as hot as possible, as you said. Any concern here of "shocking" the grain?

Back to the original question though. What would having nearly 5 gallons in the mash tun do to impact this brew? I started with about 3.5gallons following the 1.25 qt/lb rule. After adding that extra gallon @ 185, I came up to 4.5, then to put say another 1/2 gallon boiling would bring me up to 5 gallons in the mash tun. Any issues with that?

 

[Phunhog]

Just finished brewing this!! It should be a great beer for my Oktoberfest party!! Prost!!

 

[carl_g]

My OG was 1.057 - Mashed at 157*F
I just transferred to the secondary tonight. After a month in the primary mine only got down to 1.022. I wish it would have attenuated a little more. Oh well.. I used S-04 @ 67*F the entire time in the primary. It tasted good! I can't wait to serve this in a couple of weeks. Thanks for the recipe.

 

[brokenanchor]

How much do the hops come through in this? Really what I'm asking is would I be able to get away with using Cascade or Amarillo as those are the only two that I have in stock.

 

[bad coffee]

WHOOOOTTTTers.

OG 14.2 bx
FG (degassed) 7.0 bx.

According to This Calculator: I get 1.009 FG!

Which makes this a 6.4% beautiful beer. It's going to an O'Fest party this weekend, next to a keg of Spaten. We'll see how it goes.

Broken Anchor, I get NO hop flavor/aroma in my beer. There's a whole lotta malty goodness and no hop gunk. Go with the Amarillo.

B

 

[brokenanchor]

Excellent, Amarillo and an early brew day tomorrow. Hopefully there will still be some fall left by the time this is done.

 

[IPAAAA]

Just bottled this after 4 weeks in the primary. Came out to be 1.017 fg so I was pretty close. Can't wait to try it in a few weeks.

Thanks again for the recipe.

 

[Slowfro]

Just mashed in...hit 153°, now just going to figure out what to do with the hops since mine are 4.7% where the listed hops say 3%. Don't want to over-do it with the style here. Basement is sitting around 62-64° so should be good there!

 

[IPAAAA]

4oz corn sugar sound about right for bottling?

 

[jwible204]

i racked this last night. i overshot my OG because i only ended up with 5.0 gallons, so it started @ 1.064 and ended @ 1.015 so i'm @ 6.1%. I fermented between 62 and 66. this beer tasted unbelievable even after 10 days. US04 was in a firm cake on the bottom that didn't loosen at all during racking. the beer is so malty and has some serious lager characteristics. i can't wait to keg!

 

[ekjohns]

I had this in the primary for 3 weeks around 62F. Transfered this past weekend to the secondary. Do i need to do a full 2 weeks or is one week good enough since i did a longer primary?

 

[IPAAAA]

Popped one open after carbing for about ten days. Not enough carbonation and still tastes a little bit of what I would call watered down.

That just mean the beer is still a little green and needs to age a bit?

 

[carl_g]

I bottled a couple up using the BM beer gun.

 

[Jbt]

Nice Label!!

 

[lyacovett]

Went to the lhbs to get the ingredients I needed for this. All I needed was yeast and Aromatic malt. The guy I talked to talked me out of a lb of aromatic saying it was way to much for 5 gal, and talked me in to trying the Kolsch yeast. He also said that I should use Melanoiden in an Oktoberfest. So this is the recipe I came up with after the last minute chenges. Does this seem like it would be good:

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 5.50 gal
Boil Size: 7.00 gal
Estimated OG: 1.054 SG
Estimated Color: 10.3 SRM
Estimated IBU: 23.1 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
3.50 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) UK (3.0 SRM) Grain 31.78 %
3.00 lb Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 27.24 %
2.00 lb Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 18.16 %
1.01 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 9.14 %
0.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 4.57 %
0.50 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 4.54 %
0.25 lb Aromatic Malt (26.0 SRM) Grain 2.28 %
0.25 lb Melanoiden Malt (20.0 SRM) Grain 2.28 %
0.75 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] (60 min) Hops 11.7 IBU
0.50 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] (30 min) Hops 6.0 IBU
0.50 oz Hallertauer [4.80 %] (25 min) Hops 5.4 IBU
1 Pkgs German Ale/Kolsch (White Labs #WLP029) Yeast-Ale


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Full Body, No Mash Out
Total Grain Weight: 11.00 lb
----------------------------
Single Infusion, Full Body, No Mash Out
Step Time Name Description Step Temp
45 min Mash In Add 13.75 qt of water at 167