Jamil's ordinary bitter recipe

[laporterouge]

I was thinking of brewing this recipe: (see link)
Jamil's Ordinary Bitter

Minus: the dry hops.

I'm worried the Crystal 120 is going to overpower the beer. Is 0.5lbs too much for crystal 120? I want to make sure I can detect the contribution of the special roast malt.

 

[Danek]

Is 0.5lbs too much for crystal 120?

Don't think so - that sounds fine to me.

 

[Freezeblade]

I've brewed this one, but they were out of special roast at my LHBS, so I replaced it with biscuit, turned out awesome.

 

[Beerthoven]

I brewed Jamil's ordinary bitter once; didn't like it. I think it was the tang from the Special Roast that I didn't care for. I prefer traditional recipes when it comes to making English beers, but that's just me.

 

[Boerderij_Kabouter]

I brewed this but substituted 90º for the 120º. It was an awesome ordinary bitter.

 

[menschmaschine]

I use about that much in my bitter recipe as well. It's delicious. There seems to be a bit of an unjustified fear of Crystal 120 in the homebrewing world. I've used up to 11% without any "raisiny" flavors.

 

[Aspera]

I'm trying the best bitters recipe later on this week and it seems spot on to me. If anything, I would criticize Jamil's exclusive use of EKG and narrow selection of yeasts. Personally, I like a bit of Fuggles in my ale.

 

[snailsongs]

I'm trying the best bitters recipe later on this week and it seems spot on to me. If anything, I would criticize Jamil's exclusive use of EKG and narrow selection of yeasts. Personally, I like a bit of Fuggles in my ale.

Yeah, almost every english, scottish and Irish recipe in that book calls for EKG only. it does get a bit boring after a while, but I can pick EKG out of a line-up now thanks to Jamil.

 

[Cugel]

I'm trying the best bitters recipe later on this week and it seems spot on to me. If anything, I would criticize Jamil's exclusive use of EKG and narrow selection of yeasts. Personally, I like a bit of Fuggles in my ale.

On the other hand, I was able to save some $$ due to buying EKG in bulk when planning for this years brewz.

 

[Laughing_Gnome_Invisible]

+ yet another one on the exclusive use of EKG not being great in a bitter. Being a low gravity beer, bitter needs a degree of complexity in it's ingredients to make it work well IMO. EKG is a terrific all rounder, but would be better of with some of the rawness that fuggles can offer. Just my opinion of course.

As to the original question, yes, the crystal 120 seems a little over the top to me, It looks like he is compromising taste to get the colour. I reckon you could go half a pound on that, especially if you are dropping the dry hopping.

 

[laporterouge]

OG: 1.038
FG: 1.000!!!

I don't understand how this happened. Has this happen to you before?
This puts me out of the style guideline doesn't it? (about 1.007)

 

[ChemE]

Are you sure you didn't you pitch montrachet into apple juice?

What was you mash temperature and was that reading taken with a properly calibrated thermometer?

 

[laporterouge]

mash temp was 152F with a thick mash of 1 quart of water per pound. I did do a rough test on my thermometer a while back comparing it to my fridge thermometer. However, this wouldn't validate the 152F range. It was a flawless brew day as far as I could tell. Do you think maybe my mash temperature went too low and made the wort more fermentable? I was wondering if I over-pitched. I didn't make a starter but I had the smack pack inflated nicely. I had just under 5 gallons of wort for fermentation as my boiling pot wasn't big enough to use all the wort I extracted.

 

[ChemE]

mash temp was 152F with a thick mash of 1 quart of water per pound. I did do a rough test on my thermometer a while back comparing it to my fridge thermometer. However, this wouldn't validate the 152F range. It was a flawless brew day as far as I could tell. Do you think maybe my mash temperature went too low and made the wort more fermentable?

That is exactly what I suspect but 1.000 is still amazingly dry even with a very low mash temperature. I very highly recommend a two-point calibration of your thermometer every few months. Take a nice big glass and fill it up with crushed ice and then water and pop it in the back/bottom (coldest spot) of your refrigerator for an hour or so. Then get some water to a roiling boil in a pot on the stove. Bounce the thermometer back and forth between the two all the while adjusting it until it reads 32F in the ice slurry and 212F in the boiling water. This will give you pretty decent confidence that 152F is actually 152F on brew day.

For anyone that wants to be totally thorough, a three point calibration with a calibration curve is the way to go and the midpoint should of course be in the range of interest which is likely somewhere in the 149F to 159F range. I haven't gone to this extreme yet but likely will in the near future. 192 proof grain alcohol boils at 172.6F which is in the ballpark of the sach rest. I'm sure there is a better around the house material which boils at 150F though.

 

[laporterouge]

I verified my thermometer against a calibrated thermometer at work using a glass of water at various temperatures and found that my thermometer measured about 4 degrees higher than the calibrated one. So I guess my mash temperature was more like 148 degrees.

 

[laporterouge]

I have to correct myself. I misread my hydrometer. After kegging my beer and letting some go flat in my hydrometer the final gravity was 1.010 not 1.000. I must have been drunk when I read 1.000.
One thing I find wierd is that I did not get any noticeable fruity easters form my wyeast 1968 and I fermented at 20C.
None the less, I find my bitter extraoridinarilly drinkable. I got a 7/10 on my beer review at a bru-off contest.