Homebrewers - Whats Fermenting?

[smokinghole]

I'd like to pick up a couple 5 gal kegs to keep in the fridge with a picnic tap.

 

[Lorax429]

Kegging already? Nicely done. I still need a few more parts for my kegerator. Next month for sure. Just ordered a few items to make tap handles and also a screen for my keggle.

I will be brewing a oatmeal stout tomorrow, and smoking of course.

It is so much easier than bottling I didn't see the point in waiting.


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[smokinghole]

I might keg IPAs and some stouts, but my big beers and belgians will all go into bottles. I don't care if the belgian is 4% or 11% I think they need bottle conditioning to be great instead of just good. I prefer bottle conditioned everything to force carbonated to be honest. It's a softer flavor that doesn't have the carbonic acid tinge I associate with keg carbonation. So of course you might have guessed, I love cask ales.

 

[Lorax429]

I realize kegging isn't for everything. When I brew my Imperial porter I plan to bottle it. But it is a lot of extra work so for session style beers like this pale ale I like the convenience of the keg.


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[JRL]

I agree with both of you. Saison on tap seems weird to me.

 

[smokinghole]

Well I took 3 gal of my belgian dark strong and added some sour cherry juice with a dab of rum and a oak spiral. We'll see how that works for this beer. Hopefully the juice addition is a small enough sugar addition that it doesn't cause a new krausen.

 

[Lorax429]

Brew Day! A robust porter this time.

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[smokinghole]

I'm jealous. I haven't brewed in two weeks. Some of these Belgians can take forever with their low flocculation yeasts. Plus I've been playing with under aerating them and zero aeration to force more yeast flavor. The downside is sometimes it makes the fermentation proceed much slower than normal.

 

[JRL]

I just started my mash for the Oatmeal Stout. I think my LBS gave me an extra .5 lbs of Roasted barley. Hope it wont effect things too much.

 

[smokinghole]

What percentage of the beer is 8oz? It likely won't be an issue.

 

[JRL]

About 7.5 % of roasted barley. 13.5 lbs total grain bill.

 

[smokinghole]

So you have like almost 8% roasted barley now no big deal I'd say. Well 7.8%, it won't matter.

 

[Lorax429]

All done and cleaned up. The porter went in the primary with an OG of 1.067 which is spot on target. Pitched the Safale s-04 and now I wait...


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[smokinghole]

I've decided I'm doing a saison next weekend if the weather is agreeable. This will be another experiment where I add 20% acidulated malt to the mash in an effort to get a quick sour saison. My plan is to do my mash till conversion with 2% of the acidulated malt. Then after conversion I will add the remaining 18% of the acidulated malt. Hopefully it converts as well. Then I will boil and hop as normal. I will split the batch between my new favorite saison yeast ECY03 (brett spiked) and then I will grow up some Dupont yeast out of the bottle. If the Dupont yeast poops out due to a low pH environment I will add wyeast 3711. The reason for the 3711 back up is because that yeast is an animal. I think it will eat family pets if they get too close to the fermentor. Then as a plan C I have tons of different kinds of brettanomyces cultures in my house. If the non bretted portion of beer will not ferment due to the pH I will add some intense brett to finish the fermentation over time. The brett can tolerate a much lower pH than normal brewing yeasts. I can't wait.

 

[smokinghole]

There's a pic of the bigger bottles from the day I bottled up my Orval inspired beer. The big one is 3L, then there's a 1.5L and a 750mL. I also bottled a bunch of 375mLs and 330mLs(actual orval bottles).

Also here's a pic of my spelt saison from a few months ago. I opened my first one up last week.

 

[twenty5]

I have an imperial IPA fermenting right now along with a copper ale. The first batch I made, irish red ale, came out pretty good. Not my favorite but I got a lot of compliments from people who prefer a lighter tasting beer..

 

[Lorax429]

Awesome. I need to get another primary fermenter. I have kept the one constantly busy since I got it but lately I have found myself not wanting to wait to brew up another batch. I think if I had a second I could be happy with a staggered brew schedule that keeps them full.




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[BeerAdvocate]

2 Fermenters is the way to go. Keep that pipeline going!

 

[smokinghole]

There's a reason I have 4 - 10 gal fermentors, 3 - 6gal, 2 - 5gal and my newest baby fermentor a single 3gal. Makes brewing a lot more frequent easier when the time presents itself. Now I'm running into a problem of bottle space for my higher carbonated beers like belgians.

 

[wilfredsimpson]

Quick question for you home brewers. I'm thinking of getting into this hobby, but I'm not as interested in doing large batches. I'm more interested in doing lots of smaller ones, so I can do lots of experimenting.

What consideration do I have to have for going to a smaller gal fermenter? Is it just less water, or do I have to adjust the whole recipe?

Thanks for any help you can give.