Best Bitter Special Bitter (1st place HBT Comp)

[Boar Beer]

I am sure you will be pleased. let us know what you think of it. are you bottling or kegging it

 

[cshamilton]

I'm going to try a 5 gal partial mash version of this - hopefully this weekend.

I'm using 5 lbs MO for the base + 3 lbs of LME

I've got Crystal 15 so I'm planning to add a few oz of C40 too for color.

I'll let you know how it turns out in 6-8 weeks

 

[Boar Beer]

That should work our just fine good luck

 

[brasse-camarade]

Hi! It's my first post in the forum! :fro: I'm a french canadian and i'll try to speak better i can in english! So i brew your (All Grain) recipe yesterday with little bit more malt (2 row) en little bit less hops. I cant wait too bottle and taste that beer!

Thanx for the recipe and i will keep in touch!

 

[Boar Beer]

Bonjour bon ami

I think that small change will be fine.
and welcome to HBT

 

[cshamilton]

I'm going to try a 5 gal partial mash version of this - hopefully this weekend.

I'm using 5 lbs MO for the base + 3 lbs of LME

I've got Crystal 15 so I'm planning to add a few oz of C40 too for color.

I'll let you know how it turns out in 6-8 weeks

Mine has been bottled about 3 weeks now - pretty good so far, a bit of residual sweetness is present. I've also got a hint of something, maybe astringency? Or it could be that it needs a bit more time to condition in the bottle. I carbed it to about two volumes of CO2 in the bottle, so maybe that's part of it - I know on cask the bitters are fairly low in carbonation.

 

[PJM]

Sorry if I missed it but what yeast are you using?

 

[crusader1612]

OP: When bottling how much Priming did you use?? I'm making this next week as my first AG with my new cooler.

thanks for posting what looks like a great recipe too.

 

[mgc1]

I guess this is posted for anyone who has experience:

I was going to split these ingredients in half and use a mixture of northern brew and EKG for hops. If I had half of each which would you used 1st? Also I will probably use Safale English Ale Yeast. I also wanted to point out that my LHBS only has Caramel to use as crystal. I believe that makes it is Breiss product. Is this an even swap?

Do you think This recipe will work out?

 

[crusader1612]

I'm making this on the weekend, but using wyeast 1028, looking forward to it with my first AG

 

[mgc1]

I was going to brew this using the exact recipe but I am very interested in being a parti-gyle brewer. I did not have the correct hops on hand but I did have 2oz. of EKG and Cascade. I thought why not experiment so I made recipe on hopville to create 8 gallons with a OG of 1.057, SRM of 8 using a larger amount of Marris Otter and Caramel 40L.

I split this into two beers, I was shooting for an ESB and and APA. If anyone has knowledge of parti-gyle a 1/3 and 2/3 batch would throw my one third way high with OG and SRM and the 2/3 does not fit the APA bill. I ended up boiling one 3 gal batch and one 5 gal batch but I ended up swapping wort between the two to try and raise the OG and SRM in the 5 gal a bit. I also planned to add boiled water to the 3gal (my reasoning is I only have two pots and my original extract pot is only 4 gal.) I ended up hopping each with one hope all the way thru. I have been doing this for a little while so I know enough to be crazy but not full of knowledge or experience. I ended up boiling the 3 gal with 1.4oz hop 60, .4 hop 30 and .2 hop 1min using all EKG and the 5 gal was the same schedule of Cascade. I am in the primary with each and ended up with close to 4 gal of each. The EKG used Safale 04 and the Cacade used the 05.

I am not sure of the actual gravity but feel I am fairly close and read up on how to recalc FG to see if I was correct with my OG. It was my 1st time using my new refractometer and had no distilled water to calibrate and halfway though noticed it was sitting at .005OG while clean? In any case I think I hit 1.053 ESB and 1.043 APA (maybe I will consider this just a pale ale since it is a low OG.)

Sorry this is winded but I thought I would put this all out there since I don't see many posts on Parti-Gyle and with that said, I read up as much as I could and thought I would just go ahead and start off with trial and error. I will try to post back to say how things turned out but I am sure I put enough information on here to have more experienced people pick me apart or question me. The only thing I am still unsure of on this forum is how to actually post items for all to see?

 

[crusader1612]

bOTTLIUNG THIS WEEKEND, USED wYEAST 1028. DOWN TO 1.011.. I HIT 1.048, BUT USED A LITTLE EXTRA GRAIN, AND HAD TOO MUCH WATER/SPARGE. THANKS FOR THE RECIPE.

 

[surtur]

would something like Nottingham yeast work well with this?

 

[bink00]

Ok... Just read all the replies. What did the original poster use for yeast... Or did I miss it.

 

[cshamilton]

I used Safale 04 in my batch, turned out nice with a bit of residual sweetness. I might try it again with Nottingham and see what it's like, since it attenuates a bit better. It might be nice a tad drier - though I did use 3lbs of LME which may not ferment out as well.

I was really happy with beer overall, easy drinking no problem having 2-3 in a night.

 

[FlyDoctor]

Ok... Just read all the replies. What did the original poster use for yeast... Or did I miss it.

I would think wlp002 or Wyeast 1968 ESB would do great, though I have no idea what the OP uses.

 

[Soilworker]

Would it be possible to do this as an extract brew? I was thinking of doing the following for a 5 gallon batch:

Fermentables:
6lbs Marris Otter LME
1lb Extra Light DME

Steeping Grains:
0.5lbs Crystal 20L

Hops:
2.00oz East Kent Goldings (60min)
0.5oz East Kent Goldings (30min)
0.5oz East Kent Goldings (1min)

Any feedback is appreciated.

 

[BoBoBenton]

Just ordered my ingredients and l I've been growing some Adnams yeast from a mini cask of Broadside so I'm looking forward to seeing what that'll spit out!

 

[crusader1612]

Would it be possible to do this as an extract brew? I was thinking of doing the following for a 5 gallon batch:

Fermentables:
6lbs Marris Otter LME
1lb Extra Light DME

Steeping Grains:
0.5lbs Crystal 20L

Hops:
2.00oz East Kent Goldings (60min)
0.5oz East Kent Goldings (30min)
0.5oz East Kent Goldings (1min)

Any feedback is appreciated.

Looks good to me

 

[goodyx7]

I know it's old but chose this one for my first AG. Been reading for a year first post. My LHBS only had 2 oz EKG so went with First Gold late editions OG was 1.048. Also went with 04 been a hour already have movement in air lock. Tasted sample be hard to wait for this one.

 

[Boar Beer]

I know it's old but chose this one for my first AG. Been reading for a year first post. My LHBS only had 2 oz EKG so went with First Gold late editions OG was 1.048. Also went with 04 been a hour already have movement in air lock. Tasted sample be hard to wait for this one.

Welcome to the world of home brewing. just sit tight and let the yeast do their job

This is a great beer to start with good luck brewing

 

[goodyx7]

Thanks easier said than done. Been extract brewing for about a year now finaly making the jump to grain. Made a bitter last spring was OK. So in a few weeks we'll see about this one. Sample tasted better already.

 

[FlyDoctor]

You can make a great bitter with NBs Maris otter syrup. Depending on time I will either do it all grain or go with this extract.

 

[belgariontheking]

Had to jump in and say I've been interested in this style of beer for some time now, but never tried making one. I made an extract kit that was close to this and really liked the result.

This will be my next batch. I'm sure your technical merit exceeds mine, so the recipe will have to overcome my ineptitude.

 

[Jette]

I'm brewing the original posted recipe as the first run with my Braumeister 20L. (The machine makes AG so easy!) BS2 says that OG, Bitterness, and ABV is spot on for an Extra Special Bitter or Strong Bitter. It's not right for a Special. I also noticed the color with the 20L is not dark enough for the standard on BS2. I see 60L or 80L Crystal would bump it up.

 

[goodyx7]

Just cracked my first bomber great beer. Thanks for the recipe.

 

[belgariontheking]

I made a 5 gallon version of this and ended up with an OG of 1.048. Not terrible for only 9 pounds of grain, IMO. It'll be a 5% max and I'm comfortable with that.

It was a brutal day for brewing (never got above freezing), but I survived, even though I had to thaw out my garden hose to use my immersion chiller.

I'm considering kegging this, since I just blew my keg the night before brew day. I'm pretty excited. This is the one "tame" brew in the midst of a bunch of IPAs I'm making to get me out of porter/stout winter.

 

[belgariontheking]

Just bottled tonight. The sample tasted great! I'm really really excited about this beer.

FG of 1.016, which I'm happy with. I generally like it a little lower but AFAIK this yeast does that.

Only question is that I generally add (and this case was no different) dry yeast to the bottling bucket. This time I used Cooper's. Since I ended a few points higher on the FG, am I risking bottle bombs with the Cooper's consuming the few points that the WLP002 left?

Thanks.

 

[Boar Beer]

Why are you adding yeast to the bottling bucket? You have plenty of good yeast in your brew already.

 

[belgariontheking]

I've had issues in the past with bottles not conditioning because all the yeast settled out in secondary. So now I protect against that by adding yeast to the bottling vessel.

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