biggerk
Member
Hello all!!!
I'm Kirk from Colorado Springs. New to the HomeBrewTalk.com forums. I found this place looking for recipes/tips for pumpkin ale (currently fermenting!) and a soon-to-be-brewed Belgian Wit.
I've been extract brewing for around 15 years, since my college roommate and I bought our first extract, two-bucket homebrew kit. Anyway, I though I'd leave the story from my blog of my first all-grain brew. I use a "Zapap" type system (bucket-in-bucket) to mash and lauter. So here goes:
I made my first all grain homebrew yesterday (27 Jan 07.) Brewed a basic lager, categorized somewhere between a Standard American Lager as a Premium Lager (as identified by the Beer Judge Certification Program.)
Brewers: Kirk Bigger, and Joachin (JJ) Juatai.
Ingredients: 8.5 lbs-ish of English 2-Row Pale Ale Malt
2.5 OZ total hops: Cascade 6.5%-alpha. (1oz boiling, .75oz flavor, .75oz aroma.)
Yeast: Wyeast 2112, California Lager
1/2 tspn Irish Moss (finings)
Original Gravity (O.G.) 1.040
OK, so why the name, "Catastrophic Failure (aka: Dutch Boy's Revenge)?" After I doughed-in the grains with the water, the mash temp was still a little high, so I drew off some wort to chill and add back in. After recirculating a couple of quarts, I notice a 'drip-drip-drip' coming from the tube at the bottom of the mash/lauter tun. When I went to push the hose in, it came out with hot wort pouring all over me!!! New Orleans' Ninth Ward got's nothing on me. I struggled to get the hose back in!!! I grabbed a bucket to catch the flowing wort. In good Dutch-boy fashion, I used my finger to plug the hole. Let me tell you: 155 deg water is HOT!!! When I got the tube in, I used a hot glue gun to seal the leak.
JJ showed up right after I got done sealing the leak, saw the mess everywhere and asked what happened. While he missed all the "fun," his help was absolutely vital to the rest of process, especially when lifting hot sparging water!
Luckily, this happened early in the process. After I recycled what was lost and added some more grains, the rest of the mash went well. We relaxed and had some hot coffee and cold homebrew. Sparged off around 6.5 or so gallons, boiled for about 90 min. Chilling the wort with the rather nifty copper tube coil worked like a champ. Ended up with 4.5 gallon of wort in the fermenter. We pitched the yeast and are waiting for for activity.
1 Week primary; 1 week secondary, then bottle. Tune in to hear how it went at the homebrew competition and what it tastes like.
***************************
Update on the Catastrophic Failure (Dutch Boy's Revenge) homebrew. JJ and I bottled the beer last night!!!!
I moved the beer to the secodary fermenter on Sunday. A lot more yeast dropped out in the couple of days after that. I tasted a bit of it then. Not too bad, a little hoppiness noted on the back of the toungue and no off-flavors.
Got about 40 bottles out of it. Three will go the judging team. The rest go to Brewfest for tasting.
If you live in Colorado Springs and can get to the Peterson AFB All-Hands Club, come to "Brewfest 2007" where the winners will be annoucned. There you can sample the homebrews and several local Microbreweries will be there sampling their wares (Arctic maybe?)
Gravity when racked to secondary: 1.010
Final Gravity: 1.080
Estimated Alcohol 4.5 - 5 %
I'm Kirk from Colorado Springs. New to the HomeBrewTalk.com forums. I found this place looking for recipes/tips for pumpkin ale (currently fermenting!) and a soon-to-be-brewed Belgian Wit.
I've been extract brewing for around 15 years, since my college roommate and I bought our first extract, two-bucket homebrew kit. Anyway, I though I'd leave the story from my blog of my first all-grain brew. I use a "Zapap" type system (bucket-in-bucket) to mash and lauter. So here goes:
I made my first all grain homebrew yesterday (27 Jan 07.) Brewed a basic lager, categorized somewhere between a Standard American Lager as a Premium Lager (as identified by the Beer Judge Certification Program.)
Brewers: Kirk Bigger, and Joachin (JJ) Juatai.
Ingredients: 8.5 lbs-ish of English 2-Row Pale Ale Malt
2.5 OZ total hops: Cascade 6.5%-alpha. (1oz boiling, .75oz flavor, .75oz aroma.)
Yeast: Wyeast 2112, California Lager
1/2 tspn Irish Moss (finings)
Original Gravity (O.G.) 1.040
OK, so why the name, "Catastrophic Failure (aka: Dutch Boy's Revenge)?" After I doughed-in the grains with the water, the mash temp was still a little high, so I drew off some wort to chill and add back in. After recirculating a couple of quarts, I notice a 'drip-drip-drip' coming from the tube at the bottom of the mash/lauter tun. When I went to push the hose in, it came out with hot wort pouring all over me!!! New Orleans' Ninth Ward got's nothing on me. I struggled to get the hose back in!!! I grabbed a bucket to catch the flowing wort. In good Dutch-boy fashion, I used my finger to plug the hole. Let me tell you: 155 deg water is HOT!!! When I got the tube in, I used a hot glue gun to seal the leak.
JJ showed up right after I got done sealing the leak, saw the mess everywhere and asked what happened. While he missed all the "fun," his help was absolutely vital to the rest of process, especially when lifting hot sparging water!
Luckily, this happened early in the process. After I recycled what was lost and added some more grains, the rest of the mash went well. We relaxed and had some hot coffee and cold homebrew. Sparged off around 6.5 or so gallons, boiled for about 90 min. Chilling the wort with the rather nifty copper tube coil worked like a champ. Ended up with 4.5 gallon of wort in the fermenter. We pitched the yeast and are waiting for for activity.
1 Week primary; 1 week secondary, then bottle. Tune in to hear how it went at the homebrew competition and what it tastes like.
***************************
Update on the Catastrophic Failure (Dutch Boy's Revenge) homebrew. JJ and I bottled the beer last night!!!!
I moved the beer to the secodary fermenter on Sunday. A lot more yeast dropped out in the couple of days after that. I tasted a bit of it then. Not too bad, a little hoppiness noted on the back of the toungue and no off-flavors.
Got about 40 bottles out of it. Three will go the judging team. The rest go to Brewfest for tasting.
If you live in Colorado Springs and can get to the Peterson AFB All-Hands Club, come to "Brewfest 2007" where the winners will be annoucned. There you can sample the homebrews and several local Microbreweries will be there sampling their wares (Arctic maybe?)
Gravity when racked to secondary: 1.010
Final Gravity: 1.080
Estimated Alcohol 4.5 - 5 %
