Outback Ale No.3
Brew day
Today was brewday for the next in my Outback Ale series of Galaxy & Nelson Sauvin hopped beers. The strange looking quantity of Maris Otter in the recipe is because I had that much left over and wanted to use it up so I put it all in and reduced the amount of Munich I was going to add to keep the sweetness in check. IBUs at 40 puts this in the low end IPA range but I'm still calling it an ale.
I've still got 100g of Galaxy and 50g of Nelson in the freezer after this brew so there'll be more brew days to come that feature these two hops. It's a good job I like them!
Recipe: Outback Ale No.3
Date: 23 Aug 2020
Batch Size (fermenter): 24.00 L
Estimated OG: 1.044 SG
Estimated Color: 8.6 EBC
Estimated IBU: 40.9 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 75.6 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes
Water profile: Ca:63, Mg:11, Na:10, SO4:98, Cl:65
Ingredients:
------------
Amt Name Type %/IBU
29.65 L Tesco Ashbeck Water -
2.50 g Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash) Water Agent -
2.00 g Calcium Chloride (Mash) Water Agent -
2.00 g Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Mash) Water Agent -
1.50 ml Lactic Acid (Mash) Water Agent -
0.50 g Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Sparge) Water Agent -
0.40 g Calcium Chloride (Sparge) Water Agent -
0.40 g Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Sparge) Water Agent -
0.20 ml Lactic Acid (Sparge) Water Agent -
2.86 kg Weyermann Bohemian Pilsner (4.0 EBC) Grain 61.6 %
1.32 kg Maris Otter (Crisp) (7.9 EBC) Grain 28.4 %
0.23 kg IREKS Crystal Maple (3.5 EBC) Grain 5.0 %
0.23 kg IREKS Munich Malt (20.0 EBC) Grain 5.0 %
12.00 g Galaxy [15.60 %] - Boil 15.0 min Hop 10.7 IBUs
12.00 g Nelson Sauvin [10.40 %] - Boil 15.0 min Hop 7.2 IBUs
16.00 g Galaxy [15.60 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 10.5 IBUs
16.00 g Nelson Sauvin [10.40 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 7.0 IBUs
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 7.0 mins) Fining -
22.00 g Galaxy [15.60 %] - Boil 2.0 min Hop 3.4 IBUs
22.00 g Nelson Sauvin [10.40 %] - Boil 2.0 min Hop 2.2 IBUs
1.0 pkg Vermont Ale (Yeast Bay #-) Yeast -
Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Medium Body, Batch Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 4.64 kg
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temperature Step Time
Mash In Add 24.65 L of water at 70.4 C 67.0 C 60 min
Sparge: Dunk sparge with 5 L of water at 75 C
There's nothing exciting to report about the brew day because it all went as planned and I collected 24 litres of 1.044 wort into the fermenter. Hitting the target gravity this time seems to have validated my decision to reduce the extract potential of the Weyermann Bohemian Pils from 1.038 to 1.036.
With our groundwater still up at around 21C I gave up with the immersion chiller at 26C and put the fermenter in the brew fridge to come down to the intended pitching temperature of 20C. It should be somewhere near that tonight. If this ferments down to the planned 1.007 which I totally expect it to then the final ABV will 4.9%.
Fermentation
The Vermont yeast starter went in at 9:00pm last night with the wort down to 20C. This morning at 7:00am it's already bubbling rapidly through the blow-off jar at the end of my keg-purging-with-CO2 hookup.
Kegging
I transferred 19 litres to a corny keg that been purged with the CO2 generated during fermentation and got an additional 3 bottles from the left overs.
FG was, as predicted 1.007 giving an ABV of 4.9%. I fined the keg with Kwik Clear, went to purge it and DISASTER I've run out of CO2! I managed to get a single purge cycle in and the small headspace will have been mostly CO2 anyway because the keg was pre-purged so I'm hoping the lid seal will be good enough to keep O2 out until I can get a replacement cylinder from Adams Gas.
This 6kg cylinder has done 13 kegs including purging, force carbonating, serving and pushing PBW and water through the lines to clean so I think I've got my 20 quids worth.
The aroma of Nelson and Galaxy from the fermenter was incredible and the sample jar tasted fantastic. I just hope my keg will keep until I can get another cylinder.
It's 6:00am and I'm laying in bed in a mild state of panic about having run out of CO2 and I got to thinking about how the high pressure gauge dropped from 750psi down to zero so fast last night - in about a second. Surely CO2 at 750psi in a 6kg cylinder would account for more than just a 20psi burst into the headspace of a full keg. That means it could only go to zero so fast if...
...I jumped out of bed, dressing gown on, muttered something unintelligible to the wife and legged it down to the garage. Yes, sure enough, numpty here hadn't turned the cylinder on last night and so all I'd done was empty the high pressure from inside the regulator body into the keg. Doh! :doh:
I quickly gave the keg a 5x15psi purge and set it to carbonate at about 12psi. Panic averted and all back to normal. That experience was enough to convince me to buy a second cylinder because I must be pushing it now on keg #14 and when it does actually run dry I'd like to do a smooth changeover leaving me with an empty cylinder that I can exchange for full when it's convenient to make the 45 minute drive to the supplier.
Tasting notes
Galaxy & Nelson Sauvin complement each other and as long as Nelson Sauvin is to your taste then I think you'd love this beer as much as I do.
