Brew day: English Brown Ale

[PaulBeer]

Lately I have found myself drinking a lot of English ales...brown ones to be specific. I enjoy Newcastle and Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale so I decided to brew a beer resembling one of those. I found a recipe for a nut brown ale in Randy Mosher's Radical Brewing.
I bought all of the partial mash ingredients instead of the all grain mainly because I'm not done constructing my all-grain equipment yet. (Soon tho!) I did a hop substitution: Instead of using the Northern Brewer for the 90 minute boil, I used the Northdown in its place. I then use Fuggles for the 20 minute boil in place of the Northdown. It all works out.

Here are some of the photos I took today. You can see more on my blog if interested.

Northdown Hops -- .75 oz


Grain for mini mash -- 2lbs. biscuit, 1lb medium crystal


Boiling wort -- 6lbs. of amber DME and the extract from the mash plus the initial hops.


20 minute hop -- .5 oz of Fuggle leaf hops


More boiling


OG -- 1.058(ish) I will measure again when transferring to secondary.

[Thirsty Mallard]

Looks good! Keep us posted!

[BadRock]

Great photos. Hope it turns out well

[PaulBeer]

Thanks, I hope so too. The airlock is bubbling away and that's always a good sign. I'll keep you guys posted.

[PaulBeer]

Finally this thing stopped fermenting. I was able to rack it today. I did a couple of gravity tests to make sure this wasn't stuck. Each time I did one, it went down a couple of points. I aerated it again and resealed the lid. That seemed to help matters greatly as the final gravity is about 1.010 (after calibrating the hydrometer and allowing to settle in temp. The OG was 1.060, so the ABV should be about 6.6%. Here's a quick shot:

OG: Shot taken March 2nd, 2008



Another test: Shot taken March 21st, 2008



Final Gravity: Shot taken today, March 29th, 2008



So now I will let this sit in the carboy for a while and then bottle in a month or so. At this rate, I won't be able to drink any until December!

[BrewTa2]

I did a couple of gravity tests to make sure this wasn't stuck. Each time I did one, it went down a couple of points. I aerated it again and resealed the lid.

Once fermentation begins, do not aerate! You will oxidize the hell out of the beer. Before fermentation begins oxygen is your friend. After the yeast start converting sugars to ethanol, oxygen is your enemy.

[bub]

I did a couple of gravity tests to make sure this wasn't stuck. Each time I did one, it went down a couple of points. I aerated it again and resealed the lid.

Once fermentation begins, do not aerate! You will oxidize the hell out of the beer. Before fermentation begins oxygen is your friend. After the yeast start converting sugars to ethanol, oxygen is your enemy.

ditto, drink it quick, and next time it is slow RELAX, dwhahb
BUB

[PaulBeer]

I need to correct myself. I stirred the beer again to move the yeast about. The temp was between 68 and 70 degrees, so it wasn't too cold. Maybe I used a weak strain, not sure.