We’re done with brewing with this yeast culture, so no new batch today, but I did rack the Landlord clone brewed last week to a couple of corny kegs.  They dropped down to 1.01o in each primary, so that is good attenuation from the OG of 1.040, resulting in 3.9% ABV right now, and 4.2% ABV if it drops a further two points in the corny before it is vented and tapped.  I dry-hopped each keg with a couple ounces of Bobek.  The samples from the primaries were very good, with a nutty quality mixed with a great hop aroma and flavour.  Copious amounts of late hops in the boil seem to be great for the beer when it’s young.  The key is to drink it all before the hop character fades!

We have pitched this batch of English ale yeast five times so far, so today’s batch will be the last use of it.  Unusually, we’re not brewing a high gravity beer as the last batch of the cycle, but rather another session ale.  With today being the hottest day of the year so far and the whole summer being exceptionally hot, we have little interest in beer that’s over about 5% ABV.

The recipe is a clone of Timothy Taylor’s Landlord.  Golden Promise pale malt is used, along with a couple of ounces of debittered black malt for colour darkening.  Hops are Target pellets for bittering, East Kent Goldings for flavour, and aroma additions of Bobek at 15 minutes, 5 minutes, and steep.  We used almost a pound of hops total, mostly at the end of the boil, so the IBU is only 40 for a low-gravity ale.  Original gravity was 1.040, so it should be a great summer thirst-quencher.

The Simcoe pale ale was racked to corny kegs, with one keg getting the last of the Simcoe whole hops (1.25 oz.) and the other getting 2.75 oz. of homegrown Cascade.  The batch with the Simcoe dry hop is being cask-conditioned, while the other was force-carbonated and stored cold until a space is free in the co2 freezer.  Gravities were 1.011 for the Simcoe half and 1.012 for the Cascade keg.  The leftover beer from the primaries tasted very nice, there’s certainly no sign of any deterioration in the yeast.

Later tonight after brewing I replaced all of the beer lines for the four handpumps, and also dismantled one beer engine for cleaning.

The batch of Simcoe Pale Ale we brewed earlier this year was a very nice beer, and since we don’t have enough Simcoe hops to make the IPA, we brewed another batch of the pale ale.  We could have used another couple of ounces of Simcoe, but we made do with what we have.

We used our last 9 pounds of Maris Otter pale malt and supplemented another 6 pounds of Golden Promise.  Specialty malts are a pound of Vienna and half a pound each of carapils and caramunich.  We mashed for an hour and collected for the boil, then boiled it for 5 minutes and turned off the heat while we went over to a childrens’ birthday party (one-year old twins!) for an hour.  When we returned we started up the boil again, hopping with Newport and Magnum for bittering and Simcoe for flavour and aroma.  The original gravity is 1.042.

The Hophead from last week was racked straight to a couple of cornies and dry hopped liberally with Centennial – almost two ounces in one keg and almost three in the other.  The gravities were different again in each primary, like last week with the Palmer’s BB.  Again, the drier one was preferred, with better hop character.  They were between 1 and 2 points different this time.

Today we brewed a batch of Hophead, one of our favourite golden ales, brewed by the Dark Star Brewery in Sussex, England.  The original recipe is all Maris Otter pale malt and Cascade hops, but this time we’re varying the recipe by using Centennial instead of Cascade.  Bell’s Two Hearted Ale uses all Centennial and it’s a great beer.

We mashed at about 153F for an hour and boiled for the usual 90 minutes, with the first hop addition after 30 minutes of the boil.  We used Newport for bittering since the flavour of the bittering hops won’t be noticed, and Centennial for flavour and aroma additions.  The original gravity is 1.042.

We racked the Palmer’s Best Bitter brewed last weekend to a couple of corny kegs and dry hopped them with more Bobek.  Interestingly, the gravities on the primaries were difference by a couple of points, one was 1.012 and the other 1.014, and the beer tasted different too.  The drier batch was nicer, since the hops come through better.

Today we brewed another batch using the Bobek hops.  Palmer’s Best Bitter uses East Kent Goldings and Styrian Goldings and some crystal malt.  We used half light crystal and half dark crystal along with Maris Otter, and added almost a pound of golden syrup at the end of the boil.  Target gravity was 1.042 but we hit 1.046 instead, so the idea of matching our extract efficiency from last week was wrong.  Last week’s low efficiency must have been  an aberration, perhaps due to the higher mash temperature of 156F.   This week we mashed at 153F.

Target pellets and East Kent Goldings were used for bittering, then EKG for flavour and Bobek for aroma.  We racked the Golden Arrow to a couple of corny kegs dry-hopped with Bobek.  Gravity was down to 1.011 on the Golden Arrow, so a few days to a week of 65F temperature is needed to develop condition.

On Friday the pin of Bishop’s Farewell was vented and tapped, and it was served at a party over at Steve’s on Saturday.  By the end of the night of brew day, it was gone, so 36 imperial pints were consumed within 48 hours.  Light, sessionable bitter like that goes very quickly!

Another day to brew more cask beer.  After laying my hands on some Styrian Golding hops sent to me from England (actually Bobek is the variety I got, supposedly very similar to Styrians), we are brewing some of our favourite ales using this hop.  Today it’s Golden Arrow from Cottage Brewing, which is 97% Maris Otter and 3% pale crystal at an original gravity of 1.040. Next up will likely be another Styrian beer, Palmer’s Best Bitter.  Landlord is the most famous of the cask ales brewed with Styrian Goldings.

The hops are Target for bittering, Bobek and Willamette for flavour, and more Bobek for aroma.  We gave the flameout minute addition about 20 minutes to steep before beginning the chill.

The Bishop’s Farewell brewed last week fermented well, dropping to 1.012 and showing no signs of problems despite fermenting the starter 5 to 10 degrees warmer than recommended.   After only a week it’s tasting great and with a bit of condition and chilling it to cellar temperature it will be just the thing for the hot summer days.  We put half of the batch in the pin with an ounce and a half of Cascade and the other half into a corny with two ounces of dry hop.

We are back to brewing again after a break of a couple of months.  I made a starter of White Labs WLP002 English Ale on Thursday night, but due to using a different stir plate than I usually do, the starter fermented at 80 to 85 degrees, which is 10 degrees more than it should have been.  The two home-built stir plates were not working to keep the starter agitated, so I switched to a commercial stir plate which generates more heat.  I cooled down the starter on Friday but then left it while brewing on Saturday and it ramped back up to 80 degrees.  Inquiries with White Labs indicated that I need not worry, so we are fermenting with it anyway.

The recipe is the Bishop’s Farewell best bitter from Oakham Ales.  I really like this one, it’s a golden bitter with a great Cascade hop flavour and aroma.  The mash is Maris Otter and wheat, and we hit our 1.042 target gravity with no adjustments.  Colin helped me today, it’s great that he enjoys the brewing. We hopped with Target pellets for bitterness and Cascade whole hops at 15 and 0 minutes.

We knew chilling would be tough today, so three big bags of ice were used with the immersion coil.  It melted quickly causing me to wonder if he had enough ice, but by the time the kettle drained we had a little bit of ice left in the very cold water, and we kept full flow out of the kettle.  The wort temperature was 70 degrees at the end, which we chilled down to 64 in the fridge by the time the fermentation started.

I had a carboy of the milk stout stored in the cold fridge from the last brewing cycle, so I kegged it up during the boil.  The final gravity was 1.025 and we force-carbonated it as a replacement for the nearly-empty keg on tap currently.

I received an order of a kilo of Bobek hops on Friday, so now we’ll be able to brew the ales I enjoy so much that call for Styrian Goldings, such as Timothy Taylor’s Landlord, Cottage Brewing’s Golden Arrow, and Palmer’s Best Bitter.  Expect one or two of those next.

We’re not brewing this weekend, nor did we brew last weekend, but tonight I kegged the Boathouse IPA we brewed two weeks ago.  The gravity for both fermenters was 1.016, from an original gravity of 1.065, so it is 6.4% ABV.  We used Cascade for flavour during the boil, so I dry hopped each keg with more Cascade, one got 1.75 ounces and the other got 2.25 ounces.  Each keg was force carbonated and chilled.

The next brew will likely be some time in June.  Before then there are one or two beer festivals to attend on the weekends.

It’s a wet wet day here so instead of dragging a lot of equipment down to a local microbrewery for the American Homebrewer’s Association Big Brew and potentially getting soaked all day, I brewed up a batch at home.  The recipe is an IPA we haven’t made before, with Golden Promise pale malt, Munich, and some kiln amber, which is similar to light crystal.  Target gravity is 1.065 and we hit it on the nose.

Hops are a combination of Newport for bittering, Target and Cascade for aroma and flavour at 15 minutes, and more Target along with some Mt. Hood at knockout.  We gave the hops ten minutes to steep after the boil and then chilled it down to 68F onto the yeast from the previous four batches.

I racked the American pale ale brewed last week on Friday night, so I had the empty primaries ready in case I did go to the Big Brew event.  I dumped out some of the excess yeast so as not to over-pitch the IPA, which can contribute off flavours.  The APA had dropped to 1.011 from the 1.045 OG, and the two corny kegs were dry hopped with 1.5 ounces of Cascade each, one with the commercial hops grown in Washington and the other with our 2009 homegrown hops.

During the course of the past week I built another galvanized steel stand and mounted a propane burner and regulator to it.  It was needed if I went to the Big Brew, to avoid having to transport the much larger two-tier three-keg stand.  I didn’t use it since we brewed at home, but is now ready for use in the next double batch.  This way we can boil two ten-gallons batches at once, with only a slight staggering in order to chill them one after the other.  Having a second brewpot would help, but we can make do by using the hot liquor tank as the second boil vessel.

We tapped both the Brewer’s Gold and the Old Ale while we brewed, and both turned out well.  The Brewer’s Gold needs venting to come down a bit in its condition, while the Old was fine.  There is plenty of cask ale on draught now.  Today’s batch is the last brew with this yeast, so it will likely be June before we brew again.

We still have last year’s harvest of the Cascade hops from our yard and I’ve wanted to brew with them, so assistant brewer Colin and I brewed an American pale ale today.  The malt bill is simply 95% Maris Otter and 5% wheat, with a target gravity of 1.046.

I used the remaining Galena hops for bittering and then homegrown Cascade for flavour and aroma, with less than an ounce of Amarillo included at the end of the boil.  Actual gravity was 1.045 after a shorter recirculation and wort collection than usual.  The chill went well, the wort was running at about 68F the entire time with full flow from the kettle.

The Harvey’s Old Ale clone brewed a week ago was racked to two corny kegs, no dry hop of course.  Gravity was down to 1.012; if it drops two points in secondary then it will be 5.1% ABV, which is almost 1% higher than Harvey’s version.  For some unknown reason our original gravity was much higher than expected last week – perhaps the extract potential of the darker malts is higher than what is contained in our spreadsheet.  The colour is much closer to the original beer (darker than our first attempt) and right now has a nice dark sugar/toffee flavour.   We shall see how it develops in secondary.