First Extract Brew

[amiller]

Hey guys,

I started my first extract Brew the other night and was wondering what you guys think of the recipe used and what I should be able to expect. Here's how it went

Total 60 min Boil in a 12 Qt Pot

3.3 lbs Bavarian wheat LME (60 min)
3.3 lbs Golden LME (60 min)

1.0 oz Hallertau Hops (60 min)
0.5 oz Cascade Hops (15 min)
1.0 oz Sweet Orange Peel (15 min)
0.75 oz Cooriander Seed (15 min)
0.5 oz Cascade Hops (5 min)

Boiled for total of 60 mins, with 2 hot breaks (pot almost boiled over).

Mixed to 21L in primary fermenter. Pitched one pack of Safale US-05 at 28 Degrees Celsius. Had OG reading of 1.047.

Currently been fermenting away for 3 days, very active in first 24hrs.

Thoughts and what I should be able to expect?

 

[flars]

28°C was way to warm to pitch the yeast. Hopefully you dropped the temperature very quickly after pitching. Ale yeasts at high temperatures will produce fusel alcohols. These harsh alcohols can make the beer undrinkable for years, at the best. Never at their worst. US-05 ferments the cleanest at 65°F to 68°F. For your beer as low as 62°F would work.

Looks like a Wit Bier clone? Recipe looks pretty good.

 

[amiller]

28°C was way to warm to pitch the yeast. Hopefully you dropped the temperature very quickly after pitching. Ale yeasts at high temperatures will produce fusel alcohols. These harsh alcohols can make the beer undrinkable for years, at the best. Never at their worst. US-05 ferments the cleanest at 65°F to 68°F. For your beer as low as 62°F would work.

Looks like a Wit Bier clone? Recipe looks pretty good.

Yup was aiming for Blue Moon clone or something relatively close. I figured I pitched the yeast high but didn't want to leave the wort uncovered for too long. The yeast was hydrated before pitched, would this help things out?

 

[flars]

What was the wort temperature each day of the fermentation?

 

[amiller]

What was the wort temperature each day of the fermentation?

I didn't measure it each day, but it has been sitting in a dark room in a basement apartment with an air temp of 18 degrees Celsius at the maximum

 

[flars]

You might be okay if the wort cooled quite a bit before active fermentation began. A 1.047 OG beer may not increase in temperature more than 5°F from the heat produced by the yeast working.
The stick on thermometers for carboys and buckets are good to have. They will be accurate within 1°F.
Give your beer 10 to 12 days before taking the first SG sample. Check the sample for aroma and taste. It will be green flat beer, but will give you an idea if anything terrible happened.

The 10 to 12 days is to let the active fermentation finish and then let the yeast clean up any off tasting by products of the fermentation. Take another SG a few days later. You might find you are at Final Gravity, but don't be in a rush to bottle. Time in the primary is good for the beer. Three weeks in the primary is a optimum amount of time for low to mid gravity beers to finish and drop clear.

 

[amiller]

Awesome, thanks! I'll be sure to let you know how it turns out. For now I'm going to focus on what I'm going to attempt to brew next 🍻

 

[joshesmusica]

i ferment at about 17c. but i usually pitch somewhere around 20-22. some people recommend pitching lower than fermentation temps, but there are others who pitch higher and have it in a lower temperature fermentation chamber/room. i've been going with that method so far and it's worked out great (13 brews in).

keep working on those extract brews, maybe even step into the steeping grains on your next brew. it's very easy and gives you a slight idea of what doing a partial mash will be like. read as much as you can in these waiting times. learning is key to improving your beer.

with that said, unfortunately you'll never be able to exactly replicate a blue moon until you at least partial mash (from what i've read). it's actually what forced me to try partial mash for the first time, because my wife wanted me to brew that one!

 

[amiller]

I'll definitely be looking into some other brewing methods. This was only my 4th batch and my first actual extract batch.

I'd definitely like to get into steeping grains or partial mash at some point. How did your partial mash blue moon clone turn out?

I picked up an awesome book the other day for in the waiting times, "Homebrewing for Dummies" it actually contains a lot of useful information for all types of brewing. Haven't been able to put it down so far.

 

[joshesmusica]

awesome! i also recommend looking up (or finding in the newest edition, even better) john palmer's "how to brew."

i'm actually drinking it right now. it turned out pretty dry. but not too bad as it let the flavor from the yeast shine through. i'm drinking it without an orange squeezed in, although my wife has squeezed a normal orange and a mandarin orange in, and commented that the mandarin orange was best because it's a sweeter orange.

here's my recipe for when you get into PM brewing (p.s. i also highly recommend investing the little money it costs for beersmith.):

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 17.33 l
Post Boil Volume: 17 l
Batch Size (fermenter): 19.00 l
Bottling Volume: 18.17 l
Estimated OG: 1.050 SG
Estimated Color: 9.6 EBC
Estimated IBU: 18.7 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 65.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 90.0 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
0.50 kg Pilsner (2 Row) UK (2.0 EBC) Grain 1 15.9 %
0.50 kg Wheat Malt, Ger (3.9 EBC) Grain 2 15.9 %
0.25 kg Oats, Flaked (2.0 EBC) Grain 3 7.9 %
15.00 g Saaz [4.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 4 6.9 IBUs
1.50 kg Wheat Dry Extract [Boil for 5 min](15.8 Dry Extract 5 47.6 %
20.00 g Saaz [4.00 %] - Boil 5.0 min Hop 6 1.8 IBUs
28.00 g Orange Peel, Sweet (Boil 5.0 mins) Spice 7 -
21.00 g Coriander Seed (Boil 5.0 mins) Spice 8 -
0.40 kg Sugar, Table (Sucrose) [Boil for 5 min]( Sugar 9 12.7 %
10.00 g Nelson Sauvin [12.00 %] - Steep/Whirlpoo Hop 10 3.4 IBUs
10.00 g Saaz [4.00 %] - Steep/Whirlpool 15.0 mi Hop 11 1.1 IBUs
1.0 pkg Belgian Wit Ale (White Labs #WLP400) [35 Yeast 12 -
20.00 g Nelson Sauvin [12.00 %] - Dry Hop 5.0 Da Hop 13 0.0 IBUs
20.00 g Saaz [4.00 %] - Dry Hop 5.0 Days Hop 14 0.0 IBUs


I guess i forgot to mention that i was going for more of a hoppy witbier.

 

[amiller]

Awesome! I'll have to give that one a shot sometime. I may shy off on the hops just a little to make sure I don't go beyond my liking.

 

[joshesmusica]

honestly, if i were to do it again (and i likely will, cause it's a very drinkable beer), i would actually take away the saaz on the hopstand and the dry hop. it kinda counteracted the nelson sauvin, and therefore i didn't get much from that, which what i was hoping for was a witbier that had great aroma. that said, there's not too much hop-forward-ness going on with this one. i might even substitute out the saaz for something like cascade next time.
but simply taking out the hopstand and dry-hop hops will give you a great witbier, in my humble opinion.

 

[amiller]

So last night I opened the primary fermenter for the first time after 7 days at 18 degrees Celsius , foam had dissipated. I sanitized all my equipment, took a sample and had a gravity reading of 1.014, right on the calculated final gravity value. Had a taste and it was awesome! (Obviously flat and warm, but had a great smell of Rickards White and a nice hop taste and aroma). So I racked it to the secondary and plan on bottling it this coming weekend. Super excited to try this beer!