First ever, all grain, with a very, very mini 1L mash

[Mumathomebrew]

Brilliant idea and will do exactly that. I think I'm going to prefer lighter beers to stouts anyway. I'll pay attention to the water thing later. That's why I made a stout. It's all going to get bog standard tap water for now. I might filter it but impatience will make for forgetting to sooner or later.

 

[Miraculix]

Brilliant idea and will do exactly that. I think I'm going to prefer lighter beers to stouts anyway. I'll pay attention to the water thing later. That's why I made a stout. It's all going to get bog standard tap water for now. I might filter it but impatience will make for forgetting to sooner or later.

If you know that you got hard water, than you could just add 2% of the total grain bill as acid malt to compensate for the alkalinity. This is a rule of thumb thing and not very scientific, but it works of your got really hard water.

I had about 300ppm alkalinity and the 2% worked for me many times.

 

[Mumathomebrew]

I've ordered some Harris beer testing acid strips.

 

[Miraculix]

I've ordered some Harris beer testing acid strips.

I think that this does not really help. You'd need a proper pH meter. A water report is probably easier to obtain. With that and a software like brunwater it is possible to calculate the pH in a way that is close enough to dose acids.

 

[Mumathomebrew]

Thank you. I have the regional one here so will investigate further.

 

[Miraculix]

Thank you. I have the regional one here so will investigate further.

View attachment 651433 View attachment 651434

Ok, you got high alkalinity and low to moderate cl and so4.

Use 2% of the grainbill as acid malt to compensate for the alkalinity and ignore the rest for now.

 

[CascadesBrewer]

Curious, how are you bottling these? I have a pair of 1.5 gal fermenters with spigots. I bottle directly from the fermenter with sugar cubes in the bottles. I would be interested in doing even smaller experiments, but have not figured out a strategy for bottling.

 

[Mumathomebrew]

I use this and hose it straight from the demijohn. The mesh end stops the grobbleys getting in. The smaller 2L water bottles are easy to pour straight from the bottle through a mesh coffee filter to catch bits. (I have no affiliation with either product)

 

[Mumathomebrew]

Well, well, well. We tried a porter the other day to see how it was getting on and it was a different beast entirely a month later. Softer and more gentle on the tongue. Coffee and chocolate with a slight tobacco twang. Very smooth, full and drinkable with no jaggy aftertaste at all. Pretty strong in an alcoholic way but not unpleasantly so. I reckon my brother is going to love this Christmas present. I hope it will be even better another month later. What a nice surprise.

Even the 'small beer' I made with the dregs wasn't unpleasant either. I'd bunged the dregs in with a handful of garden raspberries and it made an unusual but light flavoured, dark style beer with a nice fruity twang.

After all my fiddlings with many baskets of gunk. I did not expect either of these to work. I love making beer as it's so fast to get a result compared to garden wines.

 

[@RoyalGallon]

Well, well, well. We tried a porter the other day to see how it was getting on and it was a different beast entirely a month later. Softer and more gentle on the tongue. Coffee and chocolate with a slight tobacco twang. Very smooth, full and drinkable with no jaggy aftertaste at all. Pretty strong in an alcoholic way but not unpleasantly so. I reckon my brother is going to love this Christmas present. I hope it will be even better another month later. What a nice surprise.

Even the 'small beer' I made with the dregs wasn't unpleasant either. I'd bunged the dregs in with a handful of garden raspberries and it made an unusual but light flavoured, dark style beer with a nice fruity twang.

After all my fiddlings with many baskets of gunk. I did not expect either of these to work. I love making beer as it's so fast to get a result compared to garden wines.

That’s great news - as we saw last month those beers ended up great after some long term storage - no matter what happens keep it in a cupboard and it’ll be fine eventually.

however it sounds like you nailed it right first time!

mare you going to try and brew the Golden ale for January?

edit - adding link to the recipe

http://www.wehomebrew.club/2019/12/03/january-golden-ale-recipe/

 

[Mumathomebrew]

Oooh yes. I'll have a go at that, but I'll need to buy those sorts of and more ingredients, hops unless I sub in mongrels again. I've now got fuggles and goldings too.

 

[Miraculix]

Oooh yes. I'll have a go at that, but I'll need to buy those sorts of and more ingredients hops unless I sub in mongrels again. I've now got fuggles and goldings too.

Good choice, Golding's is one of my all-time favourites

 

[@RoyalGallon]

Oooh yes. I'll have a go at that, but I'll need to buy those sorts of and more ingredients hops unless I sub in mongrels again. I've now got fuggles and goldings too.

Just a thought that if you do choose Goldings and Fuggles it’ll be a very different beer from the others using the Citrusy hops as per Paddy’s recipe. So most of the difference tasted between your beer and any others will be recipe driven and not process derived.

 

[Mumathomebrew]

I just re-looked at the recipe and at the end says he'll help with the hops. So I'm on for the right experiment.

I can do both for my own learning.

 

[Miraculix]

I just re-looked at the recipe and at the end says he'll help with the hops. So I'm on for the right experiment.

I can do both for my own learning.

Both in parallel would be best!

 

[Mumathomebrew]

I've got +/- 34 demijohns+++ languishing full of slowly maturing country wines.... now i want them empty.... for beers...

 

[Miraculix]

I've got +/- 34 demijohns+++ languishing full of slowly maturing country wines.... now i want them empty.... for beers...

Get yourself some decent buckets

 

[Mumathomebrew]

The three buckets I have are full of Müller T grapes... soon to be evicted though. I've resorted to lots of 2L water bottles instead. Bit fiddly on the evaporation stakes for a long boil but still doing the job so far. I'm sort of glad late harvest time in the country is almost finished because it causes so much work... I just cannot resist the call of the berries.

 

[Mumathomebrew]

Joy actually. I've just found a supplier on ebay who sells hops by the micro quantity in a tea bag. I'll report back when they come. I have no affinity but they seems to be a legit brewer with time for the micro brewers to even bother doing that small a quantity. Suits me better than having huge stocks going off in a freezer, let alone the expense.

 

[Miraculix]

Joy actually. I've just found a supplier on ebay who sells hops by the micro quantity in a tea bag. I'll report back when they come. I have no affinity but they seems to be a legit brewer with time for the micro brewers to even bother doing that small a quantity. Suits me better than having huge stocks going off in a freezer, let alone the expense.

That's crossmyloof, they are decent guys. They also repack yeasts and sell them for cheap, their lil saison is for example lallemands belle saison. I had good experiences buying from them on Amazon and I know other people had as well.

 

[IslandLizard]

Joy actually. I've just found a supplier on ebay who sells hops by the micro quantity in a tea bag. I'll report back when they come. I have no affinity but they seems to be a legit brewer with time for the micro brewers to even bother doing that small a quantity. Suits me better than having huge stocks going off in a freezer, let alone the expense.

Maybe you can buy directly from their company, not through eBay. Especially with eBay/Amazon/etc. you got to keep an eye on the total cost though, you may end up paying much more for shipping than the merchandise if they don't combine orders. Maybe they do?

Hops, vacuum (re)sealed or with as much air squeezed out as possible, and stored in the freezer, will easily last for a couple years.
I don't think buying hops by the oz is all that much burden. Depending on variety and origin, hops here in the U.S. run between $1.50 (e.g., Cascade, U.S. Fuggles) and $4.50+ (e.g., Nelson Sauvin) if bought by the oz. I bought whole pounds of common hops for as low as $5, from harvests 1 or 2 years before. Vacuum packed and freezer stored they're just as fine as this year's. Moreover, if the seller doesn't declare the harvest year chances are they may well be from the year before, or even older.

Even a heaped tablespoon of hop pellets swells enormously when wet, make sure the "teabags" are large/roomy enough, so wort/beer can flow through unrestricted for maximum extraction.

 

[Miraculix]

Maybe you can buy directly from their company, not through eBay. Especially with eBay/Amazon/etc. you got to keep an eye on the total cost though, you may end up paying much more for shipping than the merchandise if they don't combine orders. Maybe they do?

Hops, vacuum (re)sealed or with as much air squeezed out as possible, and stored in the freezer, will easily last for a couple years.
I don't think buying hops by the oz is all that much burden. Depending on variety and origin, hops here in the U.S. run between $1.50 (e.g., Cascade, U.S. Fuggles) and $4.50+ (e.g., Nelson Sauvin) if bought by the oz. I bought whole pounds of common hops for as low as $5, from harvests 1 or 2 years before. Vacuum packed and freezer stored they're just as fine as this year's. Moreover, if the seller doesn't declare the harvest year chances are they may well be from the year before, or even older.

Even a heaped tablespoon of hop pellets swells enormously when wet, make sure the "teabags" are large/roomy enough, so wort/beer can flow through unrestricted for maximum extraction.

Yes you can!

https://www.crossmyloofbrew.co.uk/

 

[IslandLizard]

The three buckets I have are full of Müller T grapes... soon to be evicted though. I've resorted to lots of 2L water bottles instead. Bit fiddly on the evaporation stakes for a long boil but still doing the job so far. I'm sort of glad late harvest time in the country is almost finished because it causes so much work... I just cannot resist the call of the berries.

You don't want 2 liters of wort in a 5 gallon pail anyway. Super large headspaces can cause problems.
Your 2 liter water bottles are very suitable fermenters. I've fermented in gallon and half gallon size plastic milk jugs, all too common here.

You don't need to boil your wort for an hour, 20-30 minutes is probably just fine for very small batches, possibly even shorter, as SMM and DMS are driven off much faster in a smaller pot. Keeping the pot closed for the first half, then open for the second half of the boil concentrates the SMM then drives off more of the resulting DMS than boiled open for the entire time.

 

[@RoyalGallon]

Ah Crossmyloof - had my Amarillo hops for this recipe delivered just today. First time I’ve used them but I’ve been really impressed with their delivery and comms so far.

 

[Mumathomebrew]

I bought their weeny 15g bags of Amarillo, and Citra for that recipe, then Jarrylo and Saaz out of curiosity. That'll be more than plenty for these tiny 2L brews. Totally suits me to only buy what i need when I'm only using between 3g - 20g at a time. I only hope these guys make a small fortune for bothering to cater for the likes of mini brewers like us. Good on them.