Easy Hoe

[frawg]

Hi Folks,

I just put one of these on yesterday and i have a few questions. I'l start out by first listing what i did and then post my questions after that...


1. Boil 5L of water.
2. Add 1 kg Wheat Malt Extract (Powder)
3. Boil for 10 minutes
4. Add 36G of Hallertauer pellets
5. Boil for 40 minutes
6. Add 14g of Hallertauer pellets
6a. Start corriander & orange peel here.
7. Boil for 10 minutes
8. Add 14g of Saaz pellets
9. Boil for 10 minutes
10. Add orange peel & corriander juice & 250g of 'brewing sugar' & 1 tin liquid malt extract
11. Poor into fermenter
12. add ice water up to 23L mark
13. once temperature had reached 22c i added the yeast.

6a.... slightly crush 13g of coriander seeds (just to crack them)
6b. peel 1 large orange
6c. add to 1l of boiling water
6d. boil for 10 minutes


The Gravity was then 1.040.

So my questions are:-

1. Does everything I did look correct?
2. At what gravity should i bottle?

Cheers,
Kris

 

[pint of lager]

Everything looks fine, your og is about where I would expect it.

When peeling your orange, you only want the zest, which is the part very close to the surface and is orange in colour. Not the white bit which is pith and tastes bitter. Another method I have seen to get orange flavour into the brew is to add a jar of orange marmalade.

It is very hard to make a stab at the IBU's. Saaz pellets sourced from different parts of the globe have huge differences in alpha acid rating. Also, doing a concentrated boil makes judging IBU's difficult.

Next time, you could try chilling your pot of wort down in a laundry tub. Put the pot in a tub, fill the tub with water, avoid splashing around the lid, change the water a few times and the pot will come down in temperature.

It is impossible to say what your final gravity will be. Yeast and different brands of malt vary the final gravity. Like any brew, wait till the sg reading is stable over a few days, and then bottle. Most brews benefit from a longer stay in primary, a week left sitting quietly after the final sg is reached allows the brew to mature before bottling.

This sort of recipe lends itself to becoming a partial mash, if you have the time and gear to attempt it. Replace 1kg of liquid malt with 2 kgs of pilsner or ale malted grain. Or if you want to up your og, use a little more LME.

Good luck with your Hoegaarden style brew.

 

[frawg]

Hrmm,

What does LME stand for? Also do these work in a HERMS style system?

 

[Ross]

Hrmm,

What does LME stand for?

LME stands for liquid malt extract. Under number 10 - I assume you meant corriander seed, not juice??

cheers Ross

 

[pint of lager]

Have a read of this thread: Frequently asked questions

LME is liquid malt extract
DME is dried malt extract

A HERMS is a rig for brewing using malted barley. Very nice if you have one. You can brew an extract recipe such as what you have posted, but you will only be using a small amount of its capabilities. A bit like buying a Porsche and using it to run down to the shops 300m away to buy a litre of milk.

 

[FNQ Bunyip]

POL love your analogy


:beer:
frawg
Post your location in your settings and see if there is a fellow AHB'er near by it realy can help...

 

[frawg]

I've updated my locating settings now..

Ahh rightio, then i won't bother with building a HERMS yet. After a solid day of brewing under the house it's at 1.036 so moving along slowish...

I realised after I posted what LME meant. Hey Ross, yeh I meant corriander seed.

You don't happen to own/run a HBS by any chance do you Ross?

I'm now going to update to put the actual brand names of the stuff i used.

LME was 'Morgans' unhopped extra pale malt extract (1.5kg)
DME was 'Brewcraft' Wheat unhopped spray malt (2x500g bags)
Yeast was 'Safale' US-56 (11.5g)
Saaz was 'Brewers Choice'
Hallertau was 'Brewers Choice'
Brewing sugar was 'Coopers home brew' brewing sugar.

All up cost me around $60 for the ingrediants. Does it get cheeper if you start from scratch with grain?

 

[frawg]

Am I right in my thinking to do a secondary?

Going to get a 25L bucket (think it used to have butter or oil in it). wash & sanitize it.

Once the beer has it's FG transfer (via syphon) to the bucket. Leave it for a week or so. Then bottle it?

I'm thinking next I'm gonna try doing my own mash from scratch. Means I'll have to start getting everything organised this coming weekend to do it the weekend after.

 

[Jase]

You don't happen to own/run a HBS by any chance do you Ross?

Ross own/run a HBS, no..... does he? I haven't read a post mentioning this. Really??? :lol:

Sorry for the slight hijack.

Cheers,
Jase

 

[dreamboat]

SNIP

All up cost me around $60 for the ingrediants. Does it get cheeper if you start from scratch with grain?

Yes.

Depending on where you source your ingredients -
Grain - $2/kg, say 5kg for a brew
Hops - $5/100g, say 50g for a brew (could be up to 100g...... depends on what you like)
Yeast - $3-$15... you can make good beer with $3 yeast.

Total around $15 for a 20odd litre batch.



Rob

 

[Stuster]

Am I right in my thinking to do a secondary?

Going to get a 25L bucket (think it used to have butter or oil in it). wash & sanitize it.

Once the beer has it's FG transfer (via syphon) to the bucket. Leave it for a week or so. Then bottle it?

I'm thinking next I'm gonna try doing my own mash from scratch. Means I'll have to start getting everything organised this coming weekend to do it the weekend after.

I don't really think you need to do a secondary for a wit. You're not aiming for clear beer after all.

Just leave it in the primary for two weeks and you'll be fine. Just check the gravity, two days with the same gravity and it's done.

Tough timetable to get all the gear for mashing in one weekend, but certainly possible. Esky, braid, burner, big pot or two, some hose, taps (?). Searching on the site will turn up heaps of info on the whole thing. Good luck. It's definitely cheaper once you are set up for it. BTW, Ross runs/owns Craftbrewer which sells hops etc. Must be off to get something there myself today.

 

[DrewCarey82]

$60 for a batch! I went all out for my first baby partial and spent $48 but that included hop bag which was $10 and I was filthy at myself.

For most partials I wouldnt want to spend more than.

$8 for DME.
$15 for 4kg of grain.(Just realised my last batch was 3kg and had trouble fitting that in my 15 litre esky dulp!!!!)
and $4.50 for a saf-ale yeast.
$6 for 100g of hop pellets.

So around $33 but am buying things in bulk so will round in at under $20 for a for a 23 litre batch which is fine for me.

 

[frawg]

Well in that $60 was a new hydrometer and a 5l measuring bucket aswell.

I've just realised one of our clients deals with lots of grain (400tons at a time). So I've just contacted them asking what they get through.

The Gravity was 1.033 this morning so it's slowly getting there. Moved it under the house instead of the kitchen to try and keep the temp more stable.

When i bottle (using 375ml PET) just put a half teaspoon of Brewing Sugar in each bottle before I fill it up?

 

[dreamboat]

You will go mad trying to measure out your sugar that way.
MUCH better to get another fermenter or bottling bucket, put all of your sugar in that, then rack (no air entrainment) into it, and bottle from there.



Rob

 

[Stuster]

I'm with dreamboat on not doing each bottle individulally. Get another bucket and 'bulk prime'. You can vary your carbonation as well that way. No need for Brewing Sugar though, normal white sugar is just fine, as well as cheaper.

 

[DrewCarey82]

I use a sugar measure available at Big W, takes me about 5-10 mins to do around 60 bottles, much quicker than stuffing around with bulk priming.

Plus to be honest I dont trust it too mix through properly. But thats just me.

 

[Stuster]

If you run a hose to the bottom of the bulk priming bucket/fermenter you will get a nice whirlpool going which will mix in the sugar solution easily. No problem with putting sugar in each bottle, but one benefit of bulk priming is that you can vary the carbonation level for different beer styles. Just add less sugar for an English biter or a stout, more for a wheat beer. :chug:

Plus, you can never miss bottles, or add two scoops by mistake.

 

[frawg]

how much sugar should i put in?

 

[dreamboat]

Off the top of my head, it is around 150g to a 23 litre batch....
do a google or serch this site for "bulk priming" and you are bound to find something.


dreamboat

 

[Stuster]

Try the bulk priming calculator done by BeerIsGood. You can download it from this thread. Very easy to use IMO. :super: