Xmas In July Lotto

[mckenry]

View attachment 47186

Beer: McKenry American Brown Ale
Date: 15th July 11
Details: 750ml PET bottle w/ label packaged 2/2/11 4.7% 70IBU
Sampling Notes:
Pours a billowing pillowy slightly off-white head that eventually dies down. Copper sort of body, reasonable clarity.

Get some grassy, spicy, woody sort of hops on the nose with a dash of biscuity malt. A waft of green apple (acetaldehyde) comes through which is a slight bit off-putting at grabs my attention more than the other elements should.

Medium body, carbonation is spot on. Firm bitterness, finishes relatively dry, bit of phenolic twang mid-palate seems to go with the initial acetaldehyde character, somewhat confirming a mild infection of sorts.

Nice bit of slightly chocolatey biscuit malt upfront, maybe a bit short-lived. Hops follow up with those aforementioned spicy woody hops, dried leaves come to mind, like bay leaves, bit of ripe stonefruit in there too. Finish is a bit phenolic without being astringent.

The flavours are there but that mild infection seems to spoil it a bitspose Im a bit sensitive to these things though. Be nice to have a bit more oomph to the malt, but the basis of a good beer it certain there. Cheers McKenry, thanks for sharing!

Hey Muggus,
Sorry to hear about the infection
The keg was really good in Feb. I bottled off the leftovers and was hoping to age these for a while (hence why I said I hadnt tried it from the bottle yet). Will be interesting to see if NickB gets the same. Think I'll have to try some this weekend. Guess I should have tried some from the bottle before posting. Assumed it would be good as the keg was good. Assumptions, assumptions....
Apologies. I'll send something else when I next bottle a few.
mckenry

 

[NickB]

Have yet to post the judging sheet, but I don't recall noticing any infection... Will post the sheet tonight if I remember...

Cheers

 

[Aus_Rider_22]

Just cracked a darkie in a Grolsch bottle. Sorry, lost track of who sent that one.

Anyhow, it was delicious!! Schwartz bier?

Hi mate.

That would be mine I would assume. I sent a Schwartzbier in the grolsch swingtop. Glad you enjoyed it. How was the carbonation? I am still getting the hang of my CPBF...

 

[TmC]

View attachment 47250
Beer: TMC AGGA(all grain golden ale?)
Date: 23rd July 11
Details: 750mL PET bottle bottled 20/05/11 3.9%
Sampling Notes:
Pours a dark golden body with a reasonable amount of clarity. Head is a bit short-lived.

Grainy malt aroma, bit of twang about it, possibly DMS? Get some orange-like hops to it, not overt, just supporting.

Medium carbonation and body, has a drying texture to itwheat malt?

More of that bready/grainy/cereal malt on the body with subtle citrus hops. Finishes mildly bitter, lingering sort of tinned corn character.

I think you may have a bit of DMS in here. How long do you boil for? It might come from the use of pilsner malt, and can be boiled off with a longer boil (90min+). Other that it seems clean and just easy drinking. Cheers TMC!

Yeah i cant get rid of the taste, its a bit overpowering and i have made better beers from kits using spec grain rather than all grain. Next time i brew i will give the boil a little bit longer, 90-120 minutes.

 

[Muggus]

Yeah i cant get rid of the taste, its a bit overpowering and i have made better beers from kits using spec grain rather than all grain. Next time i brew i will give the boil a little bit longer, 90-120 minutes.

Did you use Pilsner malt?
As a result of the kilning process, certain pale malts, pilsner in particular, tend to produce pre-cusorary products to dimethyl sulfide (DMS), which are leeched out into the wort during mashing.
The good thing is however, boiling for around 90min will blow off all of those DMS characters, leaving you with a much cleaner malt profile.

 

[mfeighan]

View attachment 47191

Beer: Mikey Yorkshire Bitter
Date: 10th July 11
Details: 500mL bottle 5.2%
Sampling Notes:
Bronze body, decent clarity, leaves a small persistent off-white head leaving good lace.

Straight away the aroma had me charmed; toffee, molasses, biscuit, good bit of cocoa with dried leafy hops earthy and spice with a hint of dark fruit esters.

Smooth palate with good richness and low creamy carbonation.

Plenty of complex malt ; sweet biscuit, burnt caramel, and vanilla combining with leafy, earthy hops. Somewhat subdued bitterness leaves the beer towards the sweeter end of the spectrum, but in a good way. Some welcome fruit esters on the finish.

Really enjoyed this beer! Beautiful malt and complimentary hop character. Almost verging on a brown ale of sorts. Cheers Mikey loved it!

glad you enjoyed it, i was kind of worried of infection as I poured it straight from the keg faucet.

 

[TmC]

Did you use Pilsner malt?
As a result of the kilning process, certain pale malts, pilsner in particular, tend to produce pre-cusorary products to dimethyl sulfide (DMS), which are leeched out into the wort during mashing.
The good thing is however, boiling for around 90min will blow off all of those DMS characters, leaving you with a much cleaner malt profile.

Yeah i think the recipe was mostly pils because it was so cheap. Will have another crack today and boil for 120 minutes to see how that turns out. Cheers for the feedback.

 

[NickB]

OK, finally got around to scanning in another couple of reviews....

First up was McKenry's American Brown Ale:



Poured a beautiful colour, great head retention...




Nice beer mate!

Cheers

 

[NickB]

Next up was Bullsneck's Mild:




Colour was spot on, the photography was not




A nice mild Bullsneck, though a little light-on body wise.

Cheers

 

[NickB]

Oh, and thanks to Florian for offering up another bottle to me when the original mysteriously went walkies at the case swap....

Cheers!

 

[mckenry]

View attachment 47186

Beer: McKenry American Brown Ale
Date: 15th July 11
Details: 750ml PET bottle w/ label packaged 2/2/11 4.7% 70IBU
Sampling Notes:
Pours a billowing pillowy slightly off-white head that eventually dies down. Copper sort of body, reasonable clarity.

Get some grassy, spicy, woody sort of hops on the nose with a dash of biscuity malt. A waft of green apple (acetaldehyde) comes through which is a slight bit off-putting at grabs my attention more than the other elements should.

Medium body, carbonation is spot on. Firm bitterness, finishes relatively dry, bit of phenolic twang mid-palate seems to go with the initial acetaldehyde character, somewhat confirming a mild infection of sorts.

Nice bit of slightly chocolatey biscuit malt upfront, maybe a bit short-lived. Hops follow up with those aforementioned spicy woody hops, dried leaves come to mind, like bay leaves, bit of ripe stonefruit in there too. Finish is a bit phenolic without being astringent.

The flavours are there but that mild infection seems to spoil it a bitspose Im a bit sensitive to these things though. Be nice to have a bit more oomph to the malt, but the basis of a good beer it certain there. Cheers McKenry, thanks for sharing!

Hey Muggus,
Sorry to hear about the infection
The keg was really good in Feb. I bottled off the leftovers and was hoping to age these for a while (hence why I said I hadnt tried it from the bottle yet). Will be interesting to see if NickB gets the same. Think I'll have to try some this weekend. Guess I should have tried some from the bottle before posting. Assumed it would be good as the keg was good. Assumptions, assumptions....
Apologies. I'll send something else when I next bottle a few.
mckenry

OK, finally got around to scanning in another couple of reviews....

First up was McKenry's American Brown Ale:

View attachment 47436

Poured a beautiful colour, great head retention...


View attachment 47437

Nice beer mate!

Cheers

Isnt that funny? Same beer to both you guys.
Glad someone enjoyed it :unsure:
Muggus - sorry (again) for that infection. I tried the last two bottles over the weekend just gone. Whilst the hops up front had dulled somewhat from what I remembered from the keg, and the caramel malt was coming through more, I couldnt detect any infection, acetaldehyde or other off flavours. Think you got a rogue bottle. I will send you another bottle of something next time I bottle.

 

[Muggus]

Isnt that funny? Same beer to both you guys.
Glad someone enjoyed it :unsure:
Muggus - sorry (again) for that infection. I tried the last two bottles over the weekend just gone. Whilst the hops up front had dulled somewhat from what I remembered from the keg, and the caramel malt was coming through more, I couldnt detect any infection, acetaldehyde or other off flavours. Think you got a rogue bottle. I will send you another bottle of something next time I bottle.

I'd say it must've been a rogue bottle, which sucks because it's not easy to prevent something like that...it could have come down to something like transport or storage, which you have no control over as is.

No need to send another though...like i mentioned it wasn't terrible by any stretch of the imagination.

Just looking the pics and Nicks description of the brew, definately similiar, though it pour quite a big foam when I had it so maybe it was too shaken up or something?

Anyway, hopefully it's just a one off, and cheers for the beer!
Mike

 

[Josh]

Muggus, I got to Speers Point yesterday, but by the time we were done and I'd visited, I didn't have the detour to your place in me before coming home.

I left the bottles with my mate who should be up your way on Friday. He has your address and instructions.

Traditional Bock and Russian Imperial Stout coming your way.

 

[NickB]

Just a quick update - haven't reviewed any more beers due to work overtaking things lately. Will be back into it over the next week or two.

Cheers

 

[bullsneck]

Florian,

Just had your 'German Trash'. It was very nice, low carbonation, but a good drop indeed.

 

[Florian]

Cheers mate, glad you liked it. Hadn't had one myself for a while, should give one a go and see how those ISO hops are with a bit more age on them.

Let me know what you think of the Schwarzbier, that would probably be my pick out of the two, but I'm not trying to influence you... :lol:

 

[bullsneck]

Will do. There's been a few Schwartzbiers in the post. It's a style I've never had previously but am more and more interested in brewing. Perhaps after the Munich Dunkel has finished in primary. Grab a bit of slurry and away I go.

 

[NickB]

It's been hard work, but I've been back into the reviews on my 'Brewday from Hell' aka 'my drill made the magic smoke' aka my day off that I should have stayed in bed... -_-

Kieren's NZ IPA:



Lovely!



Nice mate! Wish I had more than 500ml!

Pop in if you're ever visiting

Cheers!

 

[Kieren]

It's been hard work, but I've been back into the reviews on my 'Brewday from Hell' aka 'my drill made the magic smoke' aka my day off that I should have stayed in bed... -_-

Kieren's NZ IPA:

View attachment 47791

Lovely!

View attachment 47790

Nice mate! Wish I had more than 500ml!

Pop in if you're ever visiting

Cheers!

Cheers Nick,

Glad you got around to tasting the NWPA. Hopefully hadn't lost too much hop punch. I have another batch conditioning now, half on oak, which I'm looking foward to tapping.

Kieren

 

[NickB]

Ooooh, oak.. Lovely! Gotta get me some barrels If you're ever up this way, call in for a beer or seventeen!

Cheers!