Blonde Ale Centennial Blonde (Simple 4% All Grain, 5 & 10 Gall)

[xsists]

Brewed this tonight in a massive storm (three tornado warnings blew, but damnit, I was brewing!). My numbers were a little weird and the storm cut everything just a tad short. I ended up with 1.034 as my SG and I just pitched 1056. Planning on kegging this in about 2 weeks and serving a few days after kegging.

Tried my hydro post boil sample and it was quite tasty. Can't wait till its finished and kegged!

 

[elproducto]

I'm brewing a batch for a friends party in 3 weeks, and I thought I might do 10 gallons and keg half for myself. My pipeline is pretty full, so any harm in drinking this 6-8 weeks from kegging? I know it's not hoppy.. so I'm assuming it will hold.

 

[Guidry]

Kegged my extract version last night. O.G. was 1.043 and finished at 1.009. Not clear at all but the initial taste was nice and crisp. Only problem was a sharp bitter lingering.....and I like (D)IPAs. Odd lingering and I'm hoping it subsides.

Got it at 12psi in the fridge so I'll give it a test this weekend.

 

[RugenBrau]

Made this again last night My mash temperature was little higher than usual when I first checked it (157) Forgot to take in account that I preheated the tun this time,,,,duh. cooled it down for the last 40 minutes. Other than that everything when fine. Went with the SO 5 this time, next time I might try the SO 4

 

[chefcurt]

Just did an 11 gallon AG batch of this yesterday. I figured with 136 pages of posts that it has to be a good one. Only cost me $30 for the entire grain bill, yeast, hops and whirlfoc. It was bubbling away very fast and even got into my airlock a little by the next day. I was surprised about that for a 1.040 beer. I was going to take all of it to the cabin for vacation in a couple weeks but now I'm thinking I might have to "accidentally" leave one in the kegerator for when I get home.

 

[phidelt1499]

This was my first AG batch in my new electric setup. I also a̶m̶ ̶s̶t̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶d̶r̶i̶n̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ just had my first pull out of the keg - consequently right after I came in from mowing the lawn.

It's very crisp and light. Perfect summer beer. I might just finish this keg today. Not really. But maybe.

Damn good recipie BM!

 

[Guidry]

First pint from my first attempt kegging. Not bad for 2 days under pressure. Wouldn't say it's fully carbonated yet. After drinking a couple I'll turn the pressure back up for a few more days. Couldn't wait though.

Not clear at all though. Clarity reminds me of a bottle conditioned wheat. Next time I'll add a pinch of moss.

 

[Reno_eNVy]

It's only been 2 days dude! It'll clear up as the yeast settle to the bottom of the keg, as well as once chill-haze proteins settle to the bottom. I've had hefeweizens turn into kellerweiss after two weeks in the kegerator.

 

[Guidry]

Hey Reno, I'll take your word for it. I just expected it to be clearer after 2+ weeks in the fermenter.

 

[ttokar]

With more than 1300 posts and tons of positive feedback, I thought this would be a good recipe to try for my first all-grain brew. Despite sitting around a burner in 100 degree Texas heat, things went well. I brewed 5.5 gallons and split it between two primaries. In one I pitched US-05 and in the other WLP008 (east coast ale). I'm looking forward to comparing the two.

 

[jerdes]

ttokar, I did the same this weekend! First batch of all grain in that hot south Texas sun! Went well except for a chiller failure that turned it in to a no chill batch. Just hosed the outside of the keggle for a while and straight in to the ale pail. Pitched US-05 Monday afternoon and its bubbling heavily through the blow off. Can't wait to try it!

 

[Talljake6110]

This must be a popular brew in Texas! It was my second AG batch in the hot Houston sun. No less the day after attending the complete and utter failure that was the Houston Beer Fest. But i'm proud to report my batch is fermenting away. I'm hoping to have a short turnaround on this one.

 

[dgoldb1]

****5 Gallon Batch****

Batch Size: 5.50 gal
Boil Size: 6.57 gal
Estimated OG: 1.040 SG
Estimated Color: 3.9 SRM
Estimated IBU: 21.5 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.0 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount
7.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM)
0.75 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM)
0.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 10L (10.0 SRM)
0.50 lb Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM)
0.25 oz Centennial [9.50%] (55 min)
0.25 oz Centennial [9.50%] (35 min)
0.25 oz Cascade [7.80%] (20 min)
0.25 oz Cascade [7.80%] (5 min)
1 Pkgs Nottingham (Danstar #-) (Hydrated)


Mash at 150 degrees for 60 minutes.

[/b]

How do I determine how much water to mash and sparge with?

 

[sigurdur]

How do I determine how much water to mash and sparge with?

Just plug the recipe in beersmith or similar. The program will do the calculations for you.

 

[mrduna01]

How do I determine how much water to mash and sparge with?

A quick and dirty method. Multiply the total grain bill by 1.5. That's your mash amount. Drain that and whatever your total boil volume is, subtract what you got out of the mash, divide the remainder and sparge twice more with that amount. I did this several times and it worked well but whether it's a proper method I don't know.

 

[Snicks]

I brewed this as my second AG, just put it in the keg for force carb and conditioning. I tried to use Beersmith to calculate my water volumes, but I did something wrong and ended up boiling off way too much water. My OG was 1.052 and Notty chopped it down to 1.004! It's a much bigger beer then I had originally planned for at over 6%, but a sample after 3 weeks in the primary tasted fantastic. Going to have to be careful swinging back pints of this one. Can't wait for it to carb and chill for a couple more weeks, thanks for the recipe!

 

[sigurdur]

Just plug the recipe in beersmith or similar. The program will do the calculations for you.

There is a program out there called BrewTarget, which has this recipe as one of the default recipes in the program.
It's designed by a HBT member called rocketman768 and it's free and open source.

If you don't have a brewing program yet, you can check this program out, http://brewtarget.sourceforge.net/

Best of luck.

 

[blip01]

Brewed this AG - BIAB a while back, added some Cherry extract and vanilla beans during boil and a but more in the secondary. Tried it last night.....the extract unfortunately has that medicine taste. Bummer. i should have heeded the warnings I saw regarding that.

It's drinkable, but I'm already planning on doing this again and sticking to the straight recipe.

 

[cmw6300]

Just ordered the ingredients for the extract recipe last night! Going to be brewing this one next weekend hopefully! I'm thinking about splitting this batch and letting half sit on some strawberries for a few week or two.

 

[KozHops]

Only a week in the bottle and this brew is very tasty. I brewed, let it sit in the primary for 2 weeks and bottled and this is the clearest, cleanest beer I have ever brewed.

Thanks for the recipe BM. Many gallons of this brew to come!

 

[Reno_eNVy]

Brewing this one up today! I do this at least once a year and every time it's fantastic. This time will be even nicer as it'll be the premier running of my new freezer-turned-fermentation-chamber. S-04 at a constant 60*F? Yes please. Gonna be the best one yet!

 

[blip01]

Brewed this AG - BIAB a while back, added some Cherry extract and vanilla beans during boil and a but more in the secondary. Tried it last night.....the extract unfortunately has that medicine taste. Bummer. i should have heeded the warnings I saw regarding that.

It's drinkable, but I'm already planning on doing this again and sticking to the straight recipe.

any thoughts on smoothing out the extract taste at this point? It's kegged and chilled. Maybe brewing another batch and mixing them together?

 

[BierMuncher]

any thoughts on smoothing out the extract taste at this point? It's kegged and chilled. Maybe brewing another batch and mixing them together?

Time cures many ales. Let it sit a while and I bet it cleans up nicely.

 

[blip01]

Time cures many ales. Let it sit a while and I bet it cleans up nicely.

good advice. Honestly though I'll likely power through this 5 gallons to free up the keg! haha!

 

[Dgonza9]

Mine is not a success so far. Probably just needs more time in the keg. Only kegged it a week ago, but it seems to be developing an astringent quality, more so than when it was in the fermenter. Don't know what could be wrong. Hit all temps and gravity readings dead on. Fermented for two weeks at 68 degrees. Then I filtered and kegged.

This happened the last time I made this as well, only that time my sparge water got the mash way too hot, up to 180. That time beer was astringent going into the fermenter and never changed. I wound up dumping half of it.

Hopefully this will mellow out. I just dry hopped half with more centennial.

 

[Guidry]

This should get you a very similar beer:

Batch Size: 5.50 gal
Boil Size: 6.57 gal
Estimated OG: 1.044 SG
Estimated Color: 3.2 SRM
Estimated IBU: 16.8 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70.0 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
5.00 lb Extra Light Dry Extract (3.0 SRM) Dry Extract 83.3 %
1.00 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 16.7 %
0.25 oz Centennial [9.50%] (45 min) Hops 7.8 IBU
0.25 oz Centennial [9.50%] (20 min) Hops 5.1 IBU
0.25 oz Cascade [7.80%] (10 min) Hops 2.5 IBU
0.25 oz Cascade [7.80%] (5 min) Hops 1.4 IBU
1 Pkgs Nottingham (Danstar #-) Yeast-Ale

OK, I followed the above recipe except that I did a 3.5 gal boil and topped to 5.25 gals to quicken the cooling phase as my chiller was not quite finished. As I planned for the brew, I learned that with partial boils, the hop additions need to be upped.

Can someone who knows what they are doing in that aspect please let me know what the adjusted hop additions for a 3.5 gal boil need to be. I wanna know how bad I screwed up and what to adjust next time. (I'll reveal my numbers after)

My batch seems to be a bit more bitter than it should be.

Thanks

 

[cincybrewer]

You probably won't notice much of difference by leaving the hop additions the same. You definitely didn't screw up the beer.

My extract seems to be a little bitter (I did full boil) but I can't tell if it's bitterness from the hops or something else. It just has some sort of aftertaste.

 

[mrduna01]

Just brewed up 10 more gallons of this beer over the past couple weeks. The first two batches I made several months ago were a bit off but since then I've worked toward lowering my fermentation temps and this brew is tasting awesome now! Hopefully Revvy won't see this but I was out of brew and cracked one after 4 days in the bottle just for the hell of it and it's even an awesome flat beer!

 

[Reno_eNVy]

Time cures many ales.

MAN, I love puns

Got this bad boy in the brand new freezer-turned-fermentation-chamber at it's chugging away nicely at a constant 62* :rockin:

Sadly, I wasn't able to check OG considering the tube I use for gravity readings got a crack in it. Oh well, I can always get one in time to take FG and calcuate OG based on average attenuation of S-04 at 62*F. SCIENCE!

 

[smokewater]

I just bottled this one up yesterday. Fermented 19 days in primary.

Got 58 12 oz out of the batch and hit the gravity numbers dead on. Hydro sample was delicious. Looking forward to this one. I am leaving on a 2 week plus road trip so this will be waiting for me upon my return. Think it will be carbed by July 4? That will be 4 days shy of 3 weeks.