Pilsner Feedback

[BKBrews]

I have been looking at a thouuuusand pilsner recipes to try and decide what I will go with. I am brewing my first pilsner in the next fortnight and incidentally my first lager as well.

I'm thinking of keeping it pretty basic:

97% Gladfield Pilsner Malt
3% Weyermann Acidulated Malt
Going for 1.048 SG

Hallertau Blanc @ 60 for 10 IBU
Hallertau Blanc @ 5 for 10 IBU
Hallertau Blanc @ 0 w/ 30min hopstand for 15 IBU
Total of 35 IBU

Will be using fresh WLP802 Budejovice Pilsner yeast. Going to do a 1L starter, stepped up to a 2L starter. Brewers friend indicates this will give me 528 billion cells and I require 521 billion cells for the brew. I will ferment @ 10 degrees Celsius, with a 3 day diacetyl rest at 18 (when it reaches 1.020), before gradually dropping to 1 degree. I plan to leave in primary for a month, then transfer to a keg and lager for a minimum of 4 weeks prior to carbing and sampling.

I will be using RO water and obviously need to keep it very soft. Any recommendations for this?

Overall - would you add anything? I was contemplating adding a touch of wheat, but a lot of the recipes I've looked at online keep it basic.

 

[droid]

Good onya for having a crack!

When I ferment a Lager at 9degC I use Brewers Friend and click on the 1.5 Lager or whatever the highest / biggest number is for Lager. You're best off with a big starter.

Do you need to add some Calcium Chloride? with RO water? Ive only used 100%pils or light lager malt but do decoctions with an overall mash of 64....I should try some acidulated. Will you have the acidulated in at the beginning of the mash or after conversion?

 

[manticle]

Are you wanting a bit of a new worldy pils or more classic German type?

No to wheat.
A small amount of calcium (I'd be leaning towards calcium chloride) to hit 40-50 ppm Ca. Acid to get pH in the right spot although your acidulated amount may have you there. I use lactic but phosphoric is ok too.

Loads of yeast (more, more, more) oxygen if you can, cool ferment and patience.

 

[BKBrews]

Good onya for having a crack!

When I ferment a Lager at 9degC I use Brewers Friend and click on the 1.5 Lager or whatever the highest / biggest number is for Lager. You're best off with a big starter.

Do you need to add some Calcium Chloride? with RO water? Ive only used 100%pils or light lager malt but do decoctions with an overall mash of 64....I should try some acidulated. Will you have the acidulated in at the beginning of the mash or after conversion?

Thanks mate.

I used the 1.75x setting on brewers friend and am guessing that the WLP802 was manufactured and packaged on 1st Jan (hoppy days have just put in a fresh order, so should be around there). It's saying I only need 521 billion, but I'll update it depending on the actual manufacturing date and might go a little higher just to be sure.

With my starter, I plan on doing the first starter until high Krausen and then dumping the whole lot into the 2nd starter. Once that has fermented out I will fridge it and decant prior to using.

The acidulated Malt will be going in at mash in with the Pilsner malt.

 

[BKBrews]

Are you wanting a bit of a new worldy pils or more classic German type?

No to wheat.
A small amount of calcium (I'd be leaning towards calcium chloride) to hit 40-50 ppm Ca. Acid to get pH in the right spot although your acidulated amount may have you there. I use lactic but phosphoric is ok too.

Loads of yeast (more, more, more) oxygen if you can, cool ferment and patience.

I sort of want a new worldly type, I think. Haha. I know my above recipe is fairly new world due to the late hop additions. I won't be going as far as dry hopping, as I want to harvest the yeast from the cake.

Thanks for the tip on the salts - I will give that a go. I thought 50 Ca was even too high for a Pilsner but I'm new to this style. I've used RO water exclusively on my ales for a while now and found it to be great. Judging by the minimal salt additions, I probably will need to add some acid to drop the pH - I doubt the acidulated and minimal salt additions will get it there.

Unfortunately I don't have a pure oxygen setup yet and I normally just shake the bejesus out of my ale ferments, but I might have to get a paint strainer and blast it with the drill for this.

Absolutely no issues with patience for this brew - I have a full keezer at the moment and I am going on a 2.5 week holiday on March 3rd. After that, I come home for a week and then I'm off for another week. So beer won't be sampled until at least end of March and most likely brewed on either the 4th or 11th. So my plan is to have it kegged on the 2nd (Hope to god it's ready) and then cold conditioned in my keezer for the entire duration of March.

 

[manticle]

50 was previously considered minimum for all brews. Some recent research by Martin Brungard among others, suggests 40 is better and malt may supply sufficient.

My personal experience is that low level Ca additions are good but I'd use 50 as a maximum, not minimum (in this style of brew).

Only asked about the new world to make sure you're not expecting hallertauer mittelfruh character from the blanc.

 

[Coodgee]

I'm no lager expert but that seems like a very sensible recipe to me. Nice and simple.

 

[BKBrews]

50 was considerex minimum for all brews. Some recent research by Martin Bfungard suggests 40 is better and malt may supply sufficient.

My personal experience is that low level Ca additions are good but I'd use 50 as a maximum, not minimum (in this style of brew).

Only asked about the new world to make sure you're not expecting hallertauer mittelfruh character from the blanc.

Oh right. I've never used either prior to this, but I found the Blanc on special at hoppy days and it sounded very interesting. I think it will be quite nice - certainly smells good.

It looks like I might nearly leave the RO water as is, with some extremely mild tweaks (under 2g salts I'd say).

 

[kaiserben]

It looks like you've done your homework here.

Out of interest, what are your mash steps?

 

[Ferg]

http://brulosophy.com/methods/lager-method/

I don't think it will effect you too much as you have time on your hands but I read this recently. I must admit I've been putting off a pilsner because it will stop me from brewing anything else and while I'm sceptical I might give this method a crack soon.

 

[TheWiggman]

Do you have more details on your yeast stepping method? Are you stepping 1 litre into 2 litres for a total of 3l? How you do it will will affect yeast health. I'd personally recommend pitching a single FRESH pack (<1 month) of yeast into a 3l starter of 1.040, ferment out and decant the spent wort. Don't step up unless you have a need, and if doing so follow the 6 - 10x volume method per step.
Good move using RO water - I'd personally never use tap water again for lagers. Any residual flavour in the tap water will come out in the final beer, and there's no room to hide in a good lager.

 

[BKBrews]

It looks like you've done your homework here.

Out of interest, what are your mash steps?

Was planning a single step of 66 degrees for 90min and a 15min mashout at 75. I'm all ears in this area though!

 

[BKBrews]

Do you have more details on your yeast stepping method? Are you stepping 1 litre into 2 litres for a total of 3l? How you do it will will affect yeast health. I'd personally recommend pitching a single FRESH pack (<1 month) of yeast into a 3l starter of 1.040, ferment out and decant the spent wort. Don't step up unless you have a need, and if doing so follow the 6 - 10x volume method per step.
Good move using RO water - I'd personally never use tap water again for lagers. Any residual flavour in the tap water will come out in the final beer, and there's no room to hide in a good lager.

That's what I was thinking mate! The only reason I didn't work it out as a single step starter is because I read that you shouldn't go too big straight up. What's the max size you would go for a single starter? 5L?

I'm just about ready to ditch normal tap water for good - I've had excellent results with RO water and considering water is such an important part of every beer and t only adds $10 to my 25L batches, it's a no brainer for me.

 

[BKBrews]

http://brulosophy.com/methods/lager-method/

I don't think it will effect you too much as you have time on your hands but I read this recently. I must admit I've been putting off a pilsner because it will stop me from brewing anything else and while I'm sceptical I might give this method a crack soon.

Yeah I've read that too mate, but I just think these practices have been designed over such a long period that there has to be a reason for them! You might be able to make good beer with these quicker methods, but I want to make great beer!

 

[BKBrews]

Good onya for having a crack!

When I ferment a Lager at 9degC I use Brewers Friend and click on the 1.5 Lager or whatever the highest / biggest number is for Lager. You're best off with a big starter.

Do you need to add some Calcium Chloride? with RO water? Ive only used 100%pils or light lager malt but do decoctions with an overall mash of 64....I should try some acidulated. Will you have the acidulated in at the beginning of the mash or after conversion?

mate, when you use brewers friend, which profile do you use? Braukeiser or Chris White for the stirplate method? I note they give vastly different numbers. Braukeiser reckons I can get away with a 3L starter with fresh yeast and it will be more than enough.

 

[droid]

Hi, I use braukeiser stir plate

 

[rude]

Just had a go on Mr Malty 31/1/17 Lager yeast, stir plate , 23Litres @ 1048

409 B cells 1 pkt needed for starter

Litres required with starter 3.87

Yeast calc is very similar using J Zaineshef method

You are pitching cold no o2 so maybe go bigger but someone else with more knowledge can confirm this approach

 

[klangers]

If you're using pilsner malt, be aware that traditionally it is under-modified. Some modern Pilsner malts are still like that, others are just a different name for a pale malt and whereas others are pale malts kilned slightly less.

This means it is often prudent to carry out a protein rest if you can. This will reduce the chance of chill haze. I have no experience with gladfield, but it would be worth checking if others have needed protein rests.

 

[manticle]

I wouldn't worry too much about any extended protein rest or rest below 52: not with gladfields, not with weyermann (except maybe floor malted), not with dingeman.

I'm sure someone like mhb or wessmith may have better info but my understanding is all these malts are well modified (and I have used all 3 - I only ever rest for around 5 mins above 52, usually 55 and that's for head retention).

 

[BKBrews]

I've had a look at a few mash schedules online. how does this look:

55 degrees for 5min
63 degrees for 45min
68 degrees for 30min

Really only ever done single infusion mashes prior to this.

Also, what sort of rise and fall times do you think I should do? Seeming as though I have a bit of time up my sleeve, I was considering doing it gradually:

10 degrees until 1.020
bump 2 degrees per 12 hours until 18 (is this necessary? can I just bump straight to 18? Do I run the risk of the wort fermenting out while I gradually increase the temp and not having enough yeast left in suspension to clean up?)
leave at 18 for 48 hours
drop 2 degrees per 12 hours until 1 degree

That will leave me with about a week or more in primary at 1 degree before I keg. Then I'll keg right before I go away, purge it and then leave in my keezer which is set to 1 degree.