Homebrewers - Whats Fermenting?

[mthhurley]

I've used 2 methods....Water in a big rubbermaid tub...worked ok.
But I also invested in a small fridge, like a dorm fridge. You can fit a 5 gallon fermentor in there. Then I got a Ranco Temp Controller and once you have that, the world is your oyster.

Many, many experienced people will tell you....The single best thing you can do to improve your brewing quality is to control the fermentation temperatures. That said, the single biggest thing homebrewers neglect is.....fermentation temperature. Because we just throw it in the basement and cross our fingers.

 

[smokinghole]

Do any of you guys have tips or tricks for controlling fermentation temps during the warmer months?

I've tried a water bath and fill ziplocks with water and freeze them. I trade them out every 8 hours or so. That worked but it's a pain. So I tend to stay away from beers that need temps in the 68 range. I love saisons and other belgians which I tend to ferment all of them warm to begin with. I have to artificially heat them and hold at high temps in the winter but in the summer it's nice. Brett beers are also fun to play with late spring into summer because any overdone esters will likely get consumed by the brett. Plus the heat makes them move a bit faster.

The other option is a swamp cooler technique where you stick your fermentor in a shallow tray. You put a tshirt or towel on the fermentor and allow it to wick up an cool the beer via evaporation. You can combine that with the ice blocks. Water bottles work well instead of just ziploc bags.

 

[agctribefan]

My girlfriend and her father just started brewing two 5 gallon batches. One of chocolate cherry Porter, the other is a raspberry wheat. And in about 6 weeks I'll get to see how it turns out. They used to brew all the time, but haven't done it in a while. Hopefully it turns out well.

 

[Lorax429]

I've tried a water bath and fill ziplocks with water and freeze them. I trade them out every 8 hours or so. That worked but it's a pain. So I tend to stay away from beers that need temps in the 68 range. I love saisons and other belgians which I tend to ferment all of them warm to begin with. I have to artificially heat them and hold at high temps in the winter but in the summer it's nice. Brett beers are also fun to play with late spring into summer because any overdone esters will likely get consumed by the brett. Plus the heat makes them move a bit faster.

The other option is a swamp cooler technique where you stick your fermentor in a shallow tray. You put a tshirt or towel on the fermentor and allow it to wick up an cool the beer via evaporation. You can combine that with the ice blocks. Water bottles work well instead of just ziploc bags.

If I were to find a Saison extract recipe that I like the looks of, what yeast would you reccomend and what temps should I target for fermentation? Is it ok to be in the mid to high 70's?

 

[twenty5]

Bottling the Copper Ale tonight, transferring Imperial IPA to secondary and preparing for another brew this weekend! (Thinking about ordering another better bottle )

 

[JRL]

If I were to find a Saison extract recipe that I like the looks of, what yeast would you reccomend and what temps should I target for fermentation? Is it ok to be in the mid to high 70's?

I did a citra saison recipe out of a Zymurgy magazine from August or so. It was really good. I used Wyeast 3711 and it fermented the hell out of it. The temp range is 65-77 and I did it on the low end @68 (I ferment all by beers at 68) I don't recall if they had a extract version or not but I think you can convert it using Beersmith.

 

[JRL]

Bottling the Copper Ale tonight, transferring Imperial IPA to secondary and preparing for another brew this weekend! (Thinking about ordering another better bottle )

So how are you liking this "hobby"? :smile:

Keep that pipeline going.

 

[smokinghole]

If I were to find a Saison extract recipe that I like the looks of, what yeast would you reccomend and what temps should I target for fermentation? Is it ok to be in the mid to high 70's?

Saison is quite possibly my favorite style of beer, and certainly my favorite to make.

For a yeast I would highly suggest the Dupont strain so either White Labs 565 or Wyeast 3724. It makes a much more flavorful saison. If you get impatient or it just stops short of full attenuation make sure you order a culture of 3711 as backup. So you have a choice of just going with 3711 it makes a good beer, but I think the Dupont strain makes better flavor. Or you can use the Dupont strain and then kick it up a notch after 3 or so days with some 3711 to get it to finish out much faster than the dupont strain on it's own.

The way I'd do it if I were to go the dupont/3711 route would be to brew your recipe, and before you cool take and reserve some of the wort in a sanitized bottle. Then you just cool and transfer as normal. The point of not cooling the reserved portion is get it in a sanitized container while hot so there's no chance of a contaminating organism getting in there and living. Then you just put your Dupont yeast in (I advise a small starter) and start fermentation around 70, and raise it to 80-85 if you can. After 3-4 days you will be 50-75% attenuated. So on day two I would add the 3711 to the reserved wort to get it going, and then just dump the whole kit and kaboodle into the already fermenting beer. This will give you the better flavor (in my opinion) of the Dupont strain, and the fast attenuation of the 3711. If you go with just the Dupont strain it can take 21-30 days to fully attenuate if it ever does. Plus with extract it might stop short of being dry enough, so 3711 would be very good insurance in that case.

 

[Lorax429]

I looked at a couple recipies online and decided this is what I want my Saison to look like...

5.5 gal Water
3.0 lbs Pilsen LME
3.0 lbs Wheat LME
1.0 lbs Belgian Beet Sugar
8.0 oz Belgian Caravienne (Steeping grains) (oops. corrected typo in the amount)
1.0 oz Bitter Orange Peel
0.5 oz Coriander seed
0.25 oz Grains of Paradise
2.0 oz Hallertau Pellets (Est. 4.0%aa)
1.0 oz Czech Saaz Pellets (est. 5.5%aa)
1.0 tab Whirlfloc
1.0 pkg Wyeast 3724
1.0 pkg Wyeast 3711

Will steep the Caravienne for 30 minutes at 155-F. Plan to add the Pilsen LME at start of the boil. Hops additions and amts will depend on the actual AA percentage of what I get with some portion of the Saaz going in at flame out. Everything else goes in for the last 10 or 15 minutes of the boil.

Gonna take smokinghole's advice. I'll give the #3724 4 to 5 days and then I will pitch the #3711 to help finish it off a bit quicker.

I'll punch this all into BeerSmith2 to see where the target OG and projected FG ends up and adjust as necessary. I will tweak it to try and land just under or right at 5.0% abv.

Since I have never made this style and am not really all that familiar with it in general, does this look like a sound recipie for a Saison?

 

[twenty5]

So how are you liking this "hobby"? :smile:

Keep that pipeline going.

Loving it! Its a lot more enjoyable than I ever thought it would be. Knowing when to stop would be nice though.

Transfer to secondary went well, looks like the IIPA is sitting at 8.4% as of last night. Copper is all bottled just waiting to carbonate up and I have a choice of 2 kits to make this weekend.. Noble Trappist Ale or a New Zealand Pale Ale... Havent decided yet.... If I had that second primary I wouldnt have to decide :wink:

 

[veeref]

Brewed a simple Bavarian Hefeweizen yesterday. German Wheat and Pils, and an ounce of Hallerteau. I used Wyeast 3068 at 68 degrees.

I found the recipe from HBT, we'll see how this turns out in a few weeks

 

[smokinghole]

I looked at a couple recipies online and decided this is what I want my Saison to look like...

5.5 gal Water
3.0 lbs Pilsen LME
3.0 lbs Wheat LME
1.0 lbs Belgian Beet Sugar
0.8 oz Belgian Caravienne (Steeping grains)
1.0 oz Bitter Orange Peel
0.5 oz Coriander seed
0.25 oz Grains of Paradise
2.0 oz Hallertau Pellets (Est. 4.0%aa)
1.0 oz Czech Saaz Pellets (est. 5.5%aa)
1.0 tab Whirlfloc
1.0 pkg Wyeast 3724
1.0 pkg Wyeast 3711

Will steep the Caravienne for 30 minutes at 155-F. Plan to add the Pilsen LME at start of the boil. Hops additions and amts will depend on the actual AA percentage of what I get with some portion of the Saaz going in at flame out. Everything else goes in for the last 10 or 15 minutes of the boil.

Gonna take smokinghole's advice. I'll give the #3724 4 to 5 days and then I will pitch the #3711 to help finish it off a bit quicker.

I'll punch this all into BeerSmith2 to see where the target OG and projected FG ends up and adjust as necessary. I will tweak it to try and land just under or right at 5.0% abv.

Since I have never made this style and am not really all that familiar with it in general, does this look like a sound recipie for a Saison?

I only have one suggestion. Drop the spices down to about 1gram each or .5grams each. The yeast makes plenty of flavor. In my 10gal batches I put 1gram of grains of paradise and that's it.

 

[jimmypa]

My first attempt at brewing!! did this on Sunday, now its fermenting in the basement. Got a starter kit and an Irish Stout recipe. Can't wait to see how it turned out!

I think the hops were in the sack at this point while it was boiling vv

 

[Lorax429]

I only have one suggestion. Drop the spices down to about 1gram each or .5grams each. The yeast makes plenty of flavor. In my 10gal batches I put 1gram of grains of paradise and that's it.

Will do. Thanks.

 

[smokinghole]

Matt just remembered I had a book with some guidelines.

For a 5 gal batch:
Coriander 7-12g
cumin 0.5-1.2g
bitter orange peel 7-14g
ginger 0.5-1.2g
grains of paradise 0.5-1g
star anise 0.5-1g
sweet orange peel 5-10g

The low end is supposed to be barely detectable up to noticeable and all are weights of ground powder. Of course this is just a beginning guide. If you like the flavor but want more of it you can up it next time. You can't remove the spice flavor after you're done. Some of them can even be added in the secondary using a tincture or something if you think it could use more spice flavor.

 

[Lorax429]

Matt just remembered I had a book with some guidelines.

For a 5 gal batch:
Coriander 7-12g
cumin 0.5-1.2g
bitter orange peel 7-14g
ginger 0.5-1.2g
grains of paradise 0.5-1g
star anise 0.5-1g
sweet orange peel 5-10g

The low end is supposed to be barely detectable up to noticeable and all are weights of ground powder. Of course this is just a beginning guide. If you like the flavor but want more of it you can up it next time. You can't remove the spice flavor after you're done. Some of them can even be added in the secondary using a tincture or something if you think it could use more spice flavor.

Cool thanks. When I punched it all into Beersmith I put 2g of the orange, 1g of the coriander and .5g of the GoP. Looks like all I need to do is Up the Orange peel and Coriander a few grams. I am excited about this recipe. I have high hopes for a really good summer beer. My recipe actually fell pretty well into the BJCP guidelines for color, gravity, and bitterness. Just had to adjust the amt of steeping grains a bit and reduce the beet sugar a little to get the OG target where I wanted it. The target OG on it is 1.050 and should end up around 5.3% abv.

 

[smokinghole]

Do not use plain round coriander from the grocery store. If you use any make sure you get the oblong or football shaped stuff from India. Trust me! One tastes like shitty lettuce (mexican I think), and one tastes very citrusy (indian). Plus if you buy Indian stuff it's dirt cheap. I can get 7oz for less than $2 at an Indian market.

 

[Lorax429]

Do not use plain round coriander from the grocery store. If you use any make sure you get the oblong or football shaped stuff from India. Trust me! One tastes like shitty lettuce (mexican I think), and one tastes very citrusy (indian). Plus if you buy Indian stuff it's dirt cheap. I can get 7oz for less than $2 at an Indian market.

Yeah, I read that somewhere when I was looking at recipes. Luckily I have an India Food Mart not far from where I live.

 

[smokinghole]

Okay. So National Homebrew Competition entries are do in this month. I decided to register (late mind you) but still got to enter the 3 beers I wanted to enter. This will be my third competition and I figured I might as well give a big competition a shot. Sure I won two smaller ones but I figured they were a flook. I wanted to see how my skills stack up to a possible 750 total entrants and likely 40 or more in each category.

I'm entering the Belgian Dubbel I just bottled, the Spelt Saison, and the Belgian Specialty that is inspired by Orval. We'll see.

I hate the way they do these competitions because my specialty ale has to say what makes it a specialty ale. I am bottle conditioning it with brett. The brett wasn't there last week, and it likely won't be there between the judging dates of Mar 30 and Apr 22. So I don't have high expectations for that. The dubbel is good possibly a tad sweet but damn good. Sweet to me might be appropriate to them. I think the spelt saison is as good as I can do for a saison. It has all it needs going on as far as I'm concerned.

I don't know about the category entrant numbers, but I'm sure there will be a CRAP ton of entries for American Pale Ale and American IPA.

 

[JRL]

I entered 2. An amber ale and a Belgian pale ale. Mainly for the feedback but shit you never know. Sending mine to Denver.

I do not know why the tasting dates are over so many dates. Makes no sense to me. The local competition had over 1000 entries and they did tastings in one and a half days.