Brewing season on the way

Well it’s getting cooler outside (and inside my house) – so ‘brewing season’ is about here.  As yeast needs to be between 23-18 or so (depending on beer and yeast obviously) when fermenting,  I have not way to brew in the hotter summer months really.  Plus there’s a lot more airbound bacteria when it’s warmer, which makes getting a brew done even tougher!

I’ve already bought some supplies.. and I intend to try again at a very strong (to original type) IPA – my last one failed (although it is a nice ale.. just not hoppy at all!).

This time I’ll try and get the flavour hops in at the right time (I went too early last time and they would have lost all the flavour in boiling off).  Plus i’m going to boil for longer overall now – from 60 to 90 mins as per the books I’ve been reading.

I’ll take pics of the kit and ingrediants and as I brew again – I’m going for 4.5k of liquid pale malt, two types of grain (crystal and pale malt), two types of hop (fuggles and goldings for traditions sake), got my irish moss this time (didn’t realise I needed it previously!), and 20+ green litre bottles for bottling later on.  the 2 Litre pop bottles I had used aren’t a good idea, mainly because of how much beer you need to drink in one go, and also the amount of yeast that gets stirred up from pouring multiple times!

More to come!

Beerfest day 3

My last day at this years beerfest – I decided against going again Friday, as my body couldn’t take it (and the Mrs was pleased to see me one night!).

some of the food tents - and the sun is out

A full thurs enjoyment – we got there about 2pm, and stayed until closing at 11pm.  Many, many ales tried – and some old favourites re-visited.  The great news was it was a really good day – the weather was on our side, and the sun was out.  It was the first festival in several years where the ground was rock solid and not all muddy and churned up.

Casks of beer... mmm

I ran into quite a few old friends – which is always a highlight of the festival!  It was also the ‘big night’ for work – so I wasn’t short of friends.  I also managed to spend more time in the music tent, as there’s always something great about live music and a large crowd.

Workmates enjoying the beer n sun

The only disappointment was that Oakham had rotated out their festival special (and my beer of the festival) – to save it for Friday and Saturday night.  I do hope they make it a permament feature of their ale selection!

Pboro Beerfest beerguide - showing my beer of the festival

Hats off to CAMRA and all the volunteers who run the who event – I did get tempted to help out myself this year – but it’s so much fun being a visitor – it’s very hard to see how I’d give that up.  Maybe next year…

Some of my favourites – those remembered anyway – if you see any of these in your local pub, why not give em a try?

Tar Bar’l (Allendale of Allendale) – a nice dry stout – which taste seem to grow in the mouth.
B.G. Sips (Blue Monkey of Ilkeston) – a really intense hoppy bitter – I love my hops. Tasted more like an IPA should, but bitter strength.
S.A. Gold (Brains of Cardiff) – you can get this in bottles in supermarkets – and why not?!
Punk IPA (Brewdog of Fraserburgh) – fantastic IPA – good and strong too (6%) so truer to style than many commercial IPAs.
Armada Ale (Harveys of Lewes) – a great easy drinking bitter.
Norfolk lager (Iceni of Norfolk) – a pleasant surprise this – REAL lager – and pretty damn good.  One for those who think they don’t like beer
Golden drop (Ufford ales) – great golden hoppy beer – anyone would like this.
Hop twister (Salopan of Shrewsbury) – hoppy bitter with a nice citrus flavour.
Hop devil (Rockingham of Blatherwyke) – six hops!? in this – only 3.9%, but plenty of flavour.

More mates enjoying the music ... and beer

Beerfest day 2

Well I’ve lived through Wednesday night at the Pboro beer festival – and a cracker it was.  I was joined by my Aussie mate Lindsay – and we drank our way through a good number of ales – one half pint at a time.

I think beer of the festival for me has been the Oakham Ales festival special – Akhenaten – a 4.9% golden ale, with lots of complex hop and citrus flavours.  It’s like a beefed up Bishops Farewell, which itself is a fantastic ale.

The music stage has had a lighting improvement

Talking of hops – now I thought I loved hops in beer, and there was no such thing as ‘too much hop’.  I’ve since discovered there is!  We took a break from the ale to go for a bottled ‘world beer’ – and rather than try my usual belgium favourites, I thought I’d try an American IPA – and picked the Snake Dog IPA 5.6% (Flying Dog brewery).  Wow it was so heavy on hops it was amazing – but unbalanced really – my mouth this morning still feels a bit numb from the effect of those hops.  A bit much – I think the brewer just needs to find a bit more balance in the beer!

Food wise – we went for the standard issue Charters BBQ – burger with cheese.  Hit the spot.

The festival itself was far quieter last night than the opening night – possibly due to the light drizzle that was falling half of the time – and the dark cloud there’d been all day.

As for tonight – the ‘big one’ as I call Thurs night (because it’s the traditional night that a lot of people from work go) – here’s hoping for a great night.  Well afternoon and night in fact, as it opens at 12… although we’ll probably get there more like 2pm – there’s no rush!   Hopefully the bands are on form, the ale doesn’t warm up too much, and it doesn’t get TOO busy.

New brew – Krispy IPA

I’m in the process of brewing another ale, probably the last of this batch (due to it getting to warm to brew in my kitchen!).

It’s all my own recipe this time, so fingers crossed!  I’ve gone for an IPA style ale – and a proper one, rather than some of the beers which use IPA in the name and end up nothing like the style should be (Green King IPA for starters – what makes that an IPA?).

So into the boiler went;

• 90g of crystal malt grains (crushed) – steeped at 65c for 30 mins (for colour and body)
• 3 x 1.5 kg of light malt extract (to give the ale a good strength.. 6.5-7% probably)
• 80g of Northern Brewers hops, 60 min boil
• 20g of Northern Brewers hops, 40 min boil
• 50g of East Kent Goldings 5 min boil (for the hop aroma)

Once boiled and chilled down using my wort chilller, I transferred to my fermenter, with the air pump on getting loads of oxygen in (make sure the wort is 25-20c during this process).  The wort definitely had a much stronger hop smell than any ale I’ve made so far – it really did smell good (I LOVE hoppy beer).

Then pitched in two 11g packets of Nottingham yeast (double up to make sure.. as this is going to be an expensive beer to make.. nearly £40!).  From what I’ve read, the Danstar Nottingham yeast is a real beast – has a high attenuation (can turn more sugar to alcohol than a lot of other yeasts), and is very good at its job.  I’ve read it’s pretty neutral, and won’t add much personality of its own to the ale, but I’m not too worried at this stage in my brewing.  Anyway it’s fermenting fairly warm, which will add a little bit of a ‘fruity’ note, which might be welcome in such a strong and hoppy beer.

The first 24 hours saw an explosive ferment – I had to swap from normal airlock to a blow off tube (some tubing stuck in the rubber bung to a container of water) – as the head was blowing through the airlock, and it looked like a scene from a horror movie   Airlock re-fitted about 36 hours in.. and its calming down now, only 3 days in.  Seems a little early, for so much sugar to get through, but it might be ok, as this yeast does its thing pretty quick I’ve read.  I’ll take a gravity reading tonight, and if needed, stir up the yeast from the bottom to wake it up a bit.

I’m thinking about dry hopping the beer when I transfer to the secondary fermenter (adding a small bag of hops to the ale ‘dry’), to add even more hop aroma… but I’m worried I could introduce some external bacteria and spoil the beer.. tough call!

EDIT: Well I’ve transfered to the secondary fermenter.. I mis-calculated on the darkness (or lack of) of the crystal malt, so the beer is a lot lighter in colour than I expected, looks like it will be quite a golden IPA rather than a dark colour.  The beer transfered looking like toffee – which should change as the yeast falls out (it better!).  I did add a small bag of aroma hops to the fermenter.. so fingers crossed that goes well, and just adds a nice hop aroma to the beer, rather than a bucket load of bacteria!