chromosphere

At long last I’ve managed to cut, solder, and re-fit my immersion chiller (pictured) in preparation for using my March May 809-HS-PL pump that was bought as a present for me at Christmas. These are excellent pumps, capable of pumping boiling liquids around all day.

I was having lots of issues in getting the wort to syphon out of the boiler post-boil, even when the level of the wort was higher than the top of the internal pickup in the kettle – seemingly defying the laws of physics, and resulting in me being beaten into submission by a simple syphon… (I think it’s basically an airlock being setup in the pipes before filling the kettle, and this never gets cleared out).

So my current setup, now tested and leak free, is to have the March May pump wort from the kettle back into the boiler via the new return pipe thus allowing a “whirlpool” type arrangement (though without the need to form the “cone” of trub since I use whole hops) which sterilises the piping with boiling liquid, and then aids in the cooling by keeping the wort moving around while the cold circuit supplies the cooling water (which at the moment is just mains tap water). It might let me get a bit more hop aroma out too from the late hops, and possible save on cooling water.

Then, when suitably cool, the return feed is disconnected and pointed into a fermenter and the whole kettle (bar the half litre or so deadspace) is pumped out at a rate I desire by setting the output valve on the March May. The hoses I’m using are platinum cured silicon hoses – not cheap, but reliable and food safe at boiling temps.

First brewday is hopefully going to be next week, and I’ll be making a lovely session bitter based on a commercial recipe supplied to me direct from a brewer in Wiltshire, with Challenger, Styrians, Goldings and Pioneer for hops, and the ever popular Wyeast 1968 to ferment with. The yeast is ready to go now, and is just settling out to let me decant the spent starter solution.

Warm Becks/Corona/Sagres/<insert tasteless lager> appears to be the drink of choice at Xmas socials – ours included.

I decided that this year I would offer to bring some of my own beer for people to try, so at the minute I have 3 kegs of beer sitting next to my desk at work – a Whitbread 1850 Porter (a real malty, roasty whack!), an American Pale Ale with Summit, Centennial and Cascade hops (aroma of citrus and pink grapefruit!), and a best bitter brewed with Progress, home-grown First Gold, 5% dark crystal malt and WLP002.

Slightly apprehensive about so many (non-brewers) trying it, especially since the lager drinkers will find the beers have too much flavour for them, most people have no idea that I make my own beer, and a lot will do the classic “Homebrew? That’s awful tasting rocket fuel!”. Ah well, there must be some proper beer drinkers in the department – more for me if not!

(In fact, I know I have one colleague whose father is a well respected professional  (head) brewer. My guess is that he’ll drink some of it and give a decent assessment… erk.)

…Chiswick.

The Vintage will be put into “store” for several (18…?) years. The XX (see Ron’s post for details), which I really didn’t expect to get my hands on at all, may not last quite as long, but it’ll be a long drawn out process of drinking them to see how they slowly mature, starting this Christmas I think.

In homebrewing, I have brewed 20 batches of beer this year (so far), of which I was highly commended in the CBA national competition in Skipton in Strong Ales and took a first in bitters over 1045 at Sutton in the London and Home Counties competition in November with my “Yew Tree Ale” (Pale, wheat, caramalt, Munich, WGV & fuggles, WLP005). Both beers made their debut at Badger’s stag in Wales – went down just as well (if not better) with the boys as well as with the judges

No complete disasters yet either this year – and maybe even time to get one or two on at Christmas too if I’m lucky.

The first sample of a 7.2% Belgian Dark Strong Ale I brewed way back in mid-April. It has been conditioning for the last few months and it is now getting very smooth indeed. Excellent carbonation; slightly peppery; some faint banana with some dark fruits (though could do with more to be more like a Rochefort); hints of roses in the aroma; warming alcohol and slight, but pleasant sourness in the finish.

Not too bad at all. And looks great in a good glass.

I have been incredibly slack on the blog. I’m just popping on to say: “Dammit Yahoo!” – http://www.ygroupsblog.com/blog/2010/03/24/updates-in-your-groups/ – Enabling this for everyone is a real pain in the arse!

Grrr!

Last weekend was the CBA National Homebrewing Festival in Sutton – I went last year and entered four beers this year. I took along a best bitter, an ordinary bitter, my BBX Porter and my year old Mad Boris.

As a (rather unexpected) result, I picked up a second in “Mild, Porter and Stout” with the Russian Stout with lots of good feedback from guys at the festival who tried it; and to top that, a first in “Bitters up to 1040″ with my “Windrush Bitter”.

Was very chuffed with it all and had a great afternoon and chatted a lot with some other great homebrewers. I got to try my stout again at the festival for the first time in 4 months(!), and was pleasantly surprised that the bitter got first place given the standard of the competition.

Congrats to Andy Hill who picked up the overall best beer with his mild which was very good indeed.

My Windrush Bitter recipe that got first place was as follows:

3.2kg Pale male
102g Light Crystal malt
102g Crystal Malt
85g Amber Malt

Mashed at 67-68C for 60min, then boiled for 90 min as follows:

WGV 8.7% 14g, 90min
EKG 4.6% 14g, 90min
EKG 4.6% 14g 15min
EKG 14g 0min
Dry hop 4 days prior to bottling with 10g EKG.

Yeast: Wyeast 1335
“Fruity, hoppy nose. Light refreshing bitter. Long bitter finish.”

The Wy1335 is great yeast – I fermented at “about 20C” (upstairs front room) for 2 weeks and got from 1034 to 1008. It forms a thick yeasty head while fermenting, not unlike Hopback yeast, but then drops very clear quite quickly – much quicker than Nottingham (though not as quick as the Fullers strain so it will ferment out without needing rousing – though stirring back in seems useful!). I must make this beer again soon – it was only 4 weeks from brewing to the festival so it’s a quick one to get ready.

In fact I have another beer on the go (a week now) with the same yeast and it’s almost done at the moment (Pale malt, light crystal (4.5%) and (2.3% each of) light chocolate and roast barley; touch of sugar; Fuggles, Goldings, Boadicea and Challenger, with Goldings for flavour and aroma.). It’s down to 1013 from 1037 – another couple of points in the next few days and it’s done and ready to be racked – though the ferment was explosive at the start and had piles of yeast being thrown out of the fermenter via the airlock after just 36 hours… I need a bigger fermenter I think (those 60 litre ones at Hop and Grape look like just the trick…)