- Brew Log
Dorothy Gale
The new code names! (Batch #4)
When polishing off my last entry being "Aftermath" it became apparent that the long arm of my Dyslexia had finally reached this part of my life as well. I had to re-edit the entry about five times, as I was constantly getting confused between batch 1 and batch 2. A few times when I thought I had finally gotten it straight, it just turned out that I had completely inverted the error. One fuckup was replaced by it’s mirror image, and back again.
It’s still obvious that I can’t even stay consistent with whether a batch is a "BATCH" or a "BREW". Obviously it’s both, but I’ve got an index to consider here, assuming that anyone reads this blog.
I learned as a child that the best way for me to overcome my learning disability is to convolute something to the point where I have to think about it carefully.
So from now on the batches shall be named rather than numbered.
Batch #1 shall now be known as Arsenio Hall.
Batch #2 shall now be known as Bertrand Russell.
Batch #3 shall now be known as Carol Burnett.
And finally, the star of this entry Batch #4 shall now be known as...
Dorothy Gale.
Of Wizard of Oz fame, as envisioned by Royal Painter of Oz, John R. Neill.
This new convention has two benefits, firstly the obvious pattern. It’s alphabetical by first name, so there is a system, however I suck at the alphabet. I have to count the alphabet on my fingers, so this will force me to concentrate harder on getting the details right the first time.
The other benefit is purely aesthetic. It seams that your average blog has to have plenty of pictures of celebrities to embellish the authors rambling smart ass banter. I know this for a fact as for research purposes I have read all of two blogs by other people for about five minuets, after Colin basically forced me to start a blog of my own. I mean, believe it or not, I wasn’t even sure what a blog was until a few weeks ago. All I knew is that people sent links to me that I would never click, and the name sounded like "LOG", and that makes me think of toilet humor.
Obviously I was being unfair. ...How about some CONTENT?:
The brew: DOROTHY GALE. The 4th stage, or D stage of my continuing quest to duplicate Witchwood’s Hobgoblin Ale.
I wont ask that you page back and read about Arsenio Hall in order to get the back ground. Here’s a recap of the ingredients:
- 6 Ounces Crystal malt
- 1 Ounce Chocolate malt
- 0.5 Ounces Black patent malt
- 12 Pounds Pale malt
- 1 Ounce goldings for the bitter
- 1 Ounce goldings for the mid
- 1 Ounce goldings for the finish.
For yeast I got my hands on Wyeast 1028 again, which is what the original recipe I found on byo.com specifies. Bertrand Russell was fermented by 1028, and I liked the taste, so I’m going for a repeat. It should be noted that the BYO recipe is far more complex. I’ve opted for a super simplified starting point, not only because I can’t get the exact ingredients, but because I’m still relatively new to all grain brewing. I would rather build an actual first hand understanding of this beer off a series of simple failures, success, and improvements, than cross my fingers at miraculously duplicating a complex perfection, that I don’t understand at all.
I’m just going to keep slowly adjusting this beer one factor at a time, until it tastes exactly like Hobgoblin. It should only take about 500 years, but I’m in no hurry.
THE MASH PROFILE
The difference this time is in the mash. With the three previous brews, the beer was to sweet. I decided to be a little more intelligent with my planing. I consulted the wisdom of the internet and settled on the fallowing plan:
For roughly 12.5 Pounds of grist I decided on 13 Litres of strike water at 63° Celsius to hit a target of 60° Celsius.
A 60 Minutes rest, then a 1/4th decoction to step up to 67° Celsius, then a 30 Minutes rest.
Now the only reason why I chose a 1/4th decoction is that I have one of those plastic bucket type mash tuns, and in order to simulate a step infusion mash without thinning the mash I’ve got to go with a boil and then add back.
Let me state for the record that I have twice made a traditional pilsner, three decoctions, using the boiling fraction equation. Perhaps it was just dumb luck that I hit all my targets, but I had a reasonable expectation of what a 1/4th would do to 12.5 Pounds of thick mash.
THE MASH
Totally different story... Sign.
I don’t know what it is with this new mash tun. I still haven't narrowed the strike water temperature down it seams. I went with 64° Celsius just for a little margin and it came out to 55° Celsius - 50° Celsius. It was also a little thinner than I wanted.
I didn’t have time to do all the math (and math is not one of my strong points either) so foaming at the mouth with irritation I decided to see if I could salvage the situation with a quick 1/8th decoction which I also have had good results with in the past.
At the time of the add back the grain bed was at 56° Celsius. Like magic it came to 61° Celsius, Thank the Holly Beer Cow! I started the clock and did my Beta rest. The temp had fallen to 59° Celsius at the end, and so this time I tried the math...
(67 - 59) / (100 - 59 - 10) = 0.258
There we have it, slightly more than 1/4th. So I conducted this PLANED decoction and the result was a temp of 66° Celsius - 67° Celsius. As an apology I decided to give it a 40 Minutes rest instead of a 30 Minutes.
During my lautering I was rewarded for my constant meddling with a stuck mash. Screwing around with a long spoon got things going again, and the sparge went off as normal.
THE BOIL
Flawless. After 15 Minutes of hotbreak, I skimmed the scum, added the hops, and started the clock. Mid hops at 30 Minutes, moss at 15 Minutes. Wort chiller in at 10 Minutes, heat off, aroma hops, CHILLER ON.
THE PITCH
1028 dumped in after a good thrashing of the wort with a spoon.
OG: 1.050... Hmmmmmmmmm.
Well, on a different mater, the bottling of Carol Burnett occurred on the 22 (feb 07). The FG: was at 1.011. Just tasting it flat, the bitterness was good, and it had a mature sort of beer taste. Still to sweet though. Oh well.