Vine Homebrew Club

[Jimothy1275]

I'm a keen all grain brewer, just wondered if any other Vine members brew their own beer and what their favourite styles are.

For me I love Porters and dark beers.
Here's my recipe for a Christmas beer I made last year -

Winter Warmer
Estimated ABV: 6%
OG: 1.060 FG: 1.015

Mash for 60 minutes at 66 C (Water strike temp 72 C)
Mash volume: 15 Litres
Batch Sparge 2 steps of 8 litres at 75 C

Batch Size: 23 Litres
Boil Volume: 31 Litres

Ingredients:
4.3KG Pale Malt(2 row)
280g Black Malt
280g Chocolate Malt
240g Crystal Malt (10l)
90g Flaked Oats
90g Torrified Wheat

Hops
Fuggles 32g Boil 60 mins
Challenger 16g Boil 10 mins

Christmas spices - add to last 5 mins of boil
4 Cardamon pods
Zest of 4 oranges
Cinnamon stick
1 Nutmeg

Add 2tsp Irish moss last 10mins of boil

Cool to 25 - 30C
Ferment using any English ale yeast. I used Nottingham yeast

Any questions let me know, I'd be happy to help.

[Jimny14]

Nice sounding recipe, I used to do AG a few years ago but moved house and didn't have enough space (now don't have enough time with new baby). I'm interested to know if the cardamon, cinnamon etc came through with only being in 5 mins. I've never done a spiced Brew like this so wouldn't know.
I did a very nice hippy light one, was aiming for a 5% ish Brew and calculated it all out with attenuation of S04 my preferred ale yeast but when I came to Brew up decided to use a cleaner American yeast so the hops would sing more without the ale yeast taste. From memory it ended up tasting exactly how I wanted (loads of c hops) but about 6.2%. Not a bad mistake but a learning experience.

[4Shoes]

I'm a keen all grain brewer, just wondered if any other Vine members brew their own beer and what their favourite styles are.

For me I love Porters and dark beers.
Here's my recipe for a Christmas beer I made last year -

Winter Warmer
Estimated ABV: 6%
OG: 1.060 FG: 1.015

Mash for 60 minutes at 66 C (Water strike temp 72 C)
Mash volume: 15 Litres
Batch Sparge 2 steps of 8 litres at 75 C

Batch Size: 23 Litres
Boil Volume: 31 Litres

Ingredients:
4.3KG Pale Malt(2 row)
280g Black Malt
280g Chocolate Malt
240g Crystal Malt (10l)
90g Flaked Oats
90g Torrified Wheat

Hops
Fuggles 32g Boil 60 mins
Challenger 16g Boil 10 mins

Christmas spices - add to last 5 mins of boil
4 Cardamon pods
Zest of 4 oranges
Cinnamon stick
1 Nutmeg

Add 2tsp Irish moss last 10mins of boil

Cool to 25 - 30C
Ferment using any English ale yeast. I used Nottingham yeast

Any questions let me know, I'd be happy to help.

I've been thinking about this sort of thing for some time, but never done anything about it. Is a project for man cave.... Thanks for the reminder.

Historically more a toucan brewer. Experimenting with different beers, seeing what I like and finishing beers by dry hopping to get inspiration going forward. I'm building my Man Cave in the Attic along with brewing fridge and disco light (Growing Lights). I did acquire a boiler and started looking into making it into a mash boiler, but OH managed to break it canning jars. Will see if it is just the thermostat - if so, could connect to Inkbird 1000 to get the rolling boil. - Have a food grade probe for it.

So back to you recipe

Had to google terms to get translation.

Reading between the lines....

Mash with 15l water for 1hr @ 66C -

@ 50mins add Challenger & 2tsp Irish moss
@ 55mins add Spice Mix.
Wash mash with Water at 75C to bring liquid in fermenter up to 23l
Cool to 25C (would you put this into the beer fried to get temperature down or does it not matter?)
Pitch Yeast

So need to set aside an evening to mash up and tidy up?

Read that there are suppliers that will supply ingredients to your recipe. Have you used any of these?

[Jimny14]

Right 4shoes you're on the right lines kind of but there are a few more steps. When I was doing all grain brewing I'd set aside a day to do a Brew start to finish. There are bits in the day where I can do house work, cook dinner etc. I've also split the work so that I'd do the mash one evening and boil etc the next morning.

I'll try to run through a standard Brew day using the porter recipe as an example.

First get your boiler set up and warming up 15litres of water to 71°c.
Take mash tun (insulated pot, I used a cool box with tap in the bottom with a copper pipe filter in bottom) and place all grain, wheat and oats in to this. When water is hot enough pour in water. Give a good stir and check temp, should be about 66°c (the cooler grain and tun will cool the water), if too low add some boiling water to make up to right temp. Wrap up the tun nice n warm and leave for 1hr.
When getting close to end of the hour heat up 16 litres of fresh water to 75°c. When your hour is up open the tap and drain off your wort (water now full of sugary grainy goodness) and set to one side. Pour on new 8litres of water (sparge) and let steep for a while before draining off. Then repeat with the other 8 litres and drain.

This should leave you with a little under 31 litres of wort. This wort all then gets poured in to the boiler and is brought to the boil. Once up to boiling add fuggles (bittering hops) and keep it on the boil with lid off (some volitile chemicals need to boil away) for 1hr. 10 mins before the end of the boil add challenger (flavouring hops) another 5 minutes later add the spices. When the hour of boiling is up turn off the heat.

The remaining liquid will now need to be cooled to reduce the amount of time it is sitting round before fermenting to avoid it spoiling. I used a copper coil which I chucked in to the boiler at the start to ensure it was clean and when ready to cool just flowed tap water through the coil until just above required 23°c.
Then this liquid is dropped in to the fermenting vessel, yeast added, lid placed loosely on and left at room temperature for a while (I usually left mine a week).

Now all you have to do is find out what to do with several Kg of warm malt (chickens like it, also pigs), clean all your mash tun, boiler etc and then chill. Hope that makes sense.

[4Shoes]

ideal Jimny14. Understand better now. Quite a bit of upfront prep still required. Have to stick with Toucan's until man attic complete and/or other equipment secured / sourced.


What size copper did you use for your coil?

Microbore would be easier to make, but not the diameter to cool quickly. Have some lying about removed from old heating system. will polish nicely and coupling still available.

[Jimny14]

I made one with microbore for ease, just got a paint tin and coiled round that and slid coil up and continued coiling round tin until I'd got enough coil. Just remember to leave more than enough to run the lower end of the coil back up to the top to let the water in/out.

[Jimothy1275]

Jimny has the process summed up nicely there, but yes you'll need to set aside a morning or evening. There is a bit of waiting around time during the mash and boil, but I found that during the boil is the ideal time to clean up after the mash. I usually save the water that was used to cool the beer as it comes out fairly hot so ideal for washing up the boiler. I use a mesh bag to put the hops in otherwise they tend to block the tap when you transfer to the fermenter.

What size copper did you use for your coil?

Microbore would be easier to make, but not the diameter to cool quickly. Have some lying about removed from old heating system. will polish nicely and coupling still available.

My chiller coil is 10mm bore, so microbore should be ok, I've found that the slower the flow of water through the better the heat transfer. Also you should put the copper chiller coil in around 10 mins before the end of the boil as that will sterilise the pipe and kill any nasties. Also the copper actually helps the beer clear down. The cooling process is referred to as the cold break, where all the bits of trub fall out of suspension and collect at the bottom of the boiler.

I'm interested to know if the cardamon, cinnamon etc came through with only being in 5 mins. I've never done a spiced Brew like this so wouldn't know.

I found it worked well as it is in the boiler not only for the last 5 mins, but is steeping for the length of time the wort is cooling for too. The finished beer had the subtle flavours of the spices in the background without it overpowering the taste of the beer.

[Jimothy1275]

Read that there are suppliers that will supply ingredients to your recipe. Have you used any of these?

There's one supplier I use regularly, they are very good and delivery is quick. I'll PM you the web address as I don't know whether we're allowed to post links to traders on the forum, hopefully one of the mods will enlighten me

[the big lebowski]

i dont do ag brewing but i do make the kits in tins ,tin of homebrew,sugar ,water and yeast ,thanks for posting tho its always nice to learn more about homebrewing

[the big lebowski]

last night i started a muntons gold continental pilsner kit ,ive had it before and its lovely ,im going to save it to have over xmas ,next brew i fancy making is this one
https://www.wilko.com/en-uk/wilko-ch...E&gclsrc=aw.ds

looks good and not a bad price

[Nicos]

There's one supplier I use regularly, they are very good and delivery is quick. I'll PM you the web address as I don't know whether we're allowed to post links to traders on the forum, hopefully one of the mods will enlighten me

Links and recommendations are fine so long as you don't gain financially from them

[4Shoes]

last night i started a muntons gold continental pilsner kit ,ive had it before and its lovely ,im going to save it to have over xmas ,next brew i fancy making is this one
https://www.wilko.com/en-uk/wilko-ch...E&gclsrc=aw.ds

looks good and not a bad price

Saw it the other day. didn't bring it to attention of OH. May smuggle it in

[the big lebowski]

good thinking ,i just ordered mine online ,i`ll go and pick it up in the week

[4Shoes]

Was searching for winter beer tweaks and found these.

1. Add a tin of Golden Syrup into Lager Kits and add 50g of Fuggles Hop Leaf whilst it is fermenting. Gives a great low ABV summer drink with that much loved bit of "hoppiness".

2. "Top and bottom" 8 birdseye chillies and add them to a Pilsner Kit during fermentation. Amazing brew. No taste becomes a slight tingle at the back of the mouth and finally becomes a healthy "chilli" heat just behind the lips! Beautiful.

I was thinking of trying it on a Geordie Mild for a winter warmer perhaps make the brew and decant half into 2nd bucket 1st. Perhaps with treacle for part of the sugar content.

3. Chop pumpkins up, boil with a tablespoonful of All Spice and then squeeze out the resulting liquid and add it to a Wilco Cerveza Kit. Makes a great Christmas Beer.

See this link for more ideas.

https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/t...ic-kits.69466/

I've not tried any, but good ideas for 1 can brews.

[4Shoes]

Trying out the Mild beer fermenting tonight with Bulgarian Carrot. will just put in 6 or so. Sanitise bt pouring boiling water over them 1st. Not to point of cooking.

Change of plan

2 x Bulgarian Carrot
2 x Golden Cayenne
3 x Ring of Fire MX

Will spice it up with Thumb of Ginger and Dry Hop it Next Week with Cascade

in Keg - Sundew-
Today
Racked Wine
Bottled - Winter Warmer - condition 4 weeks
Fermenter 1 - Yorkshire Bitter. (Session Ale)
Fermenter 2 - 1/2 Mild - Brewed Short - 16 Pints -
Baby Fermenter - 1/2 Mild -(Chilli - Winter Experiment) - Brewed Short - 16 Pints
conditioning - Apple Wine