The Homebrew Thread

[TiggaPlease]

Bru'n water pale ale profile - 300ppm sulphate. The last pale ale I made used the same water profile and tastes excellent.

 

[Steve_Urkel]

Can you homebrew cider?

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Can you homebrew cider?

Go buy some apple juice, throw it in a bucket with some yeast, put glad wrap over the top. Bottle it after a few weeks with a little sugar to carb it up.

 

[Steve_Urkel]

Go buy some apple juice, throw it in a bucket with some yeast, put glad wrap over the top. Bottle it after a few weeks with a little sugar to carb it up.

Sweet. thanking you kindly for your recipe.

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Bru'n water pale ale profile - 300ppm sulphate. The last pale ale I made used the same water profile and tastes excellent.

A few pages I have read has 300ppm at the high end of a hoppy/bitter ale. 400ppm produces a harsh bitterness and is undesired levels.

So I guess you are in the IPA sorta range.

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Sweet. thanking you kindly for your recipe.

That's the simple way, of course you can make it a lot nicer with the right yeast, a bit of brown sugar, cinnamon sticks etc. Even better to crush your own apples.

You are always going to end up with a dry cider, so if you want it sweet you need to add unfermentables to sweeten it up.

 

[Steve_Urkel]

That's the simple way, of course you can make it a lot nicer with the right yeast, a bit of brown sugar, cinnamon sticks etc. Even better to crush your own apples.

You are always going to end up with a dry cider, so if you want it sweet you need to add unfermentables to sweeten it up.

Cool. I'll give it a bash and let you know the results. Just curious, what sort of time frame should I plan for the cider?

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Cool. I'll give it a bash and let you know the results. Just curious, what sort of time frame should I plan for the cider?

1-2 weeks fermenting. 2 weeks bottle conditioning.

You can also get good cider kits from your local home brew shops. Mangrove jacks do a whole range of different ciders.

 

[Steve_Urkel]

1-2 weeks fermenting. 2 weeks bottle conditioning.

You can also get good cider kits from your local home brew shops. Mangrove jacks do a whole range of different ciders.

Thankyou for your advice. I'll name my first batch after you

 

[Frank_Grimes]

Your water looks really hard to balance lol.

Looking into it further, your magnesium is obviously too low, adding epsom salts is a must, but that also adds sulphates lol.

My head hurts.

You're right, it is a nightmare, but we may be over complicating it. I'm going to try just one or two simple additions in the next brew and follow my normal routine to the letter. If I see an increase in efficiency it could be the way forward. If the taste is significantly improved, then It will be all but confirmed. I'll do a Smurto's this weekend as I'm very familiar with the grain, the hops and the taste.

 

[Frank_Grimes]

Thankyou for your advice. I'll name my first batch after you

You can also try Oztops. Essentially they are bottle tops with membrane breathers built in that suit a few different size bottles. You buy a 2L bottle of apple juice, use the yeast provided, pop on the top and let it ferment for a few weeks. If you add a bit more sugar you will have a bit more alcohol. We've had them for years and they make more than passable cider for very little work and expense.

http://www.oztops.com.au/

Plus you can try a few different ciders based on whatever juice you can get - Apple/Cranberry etc. You can even do sparkling wine. Just stay away from any citrus juice as it will be insanely bitter.

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

You're right, it is a nightmare, but we may be over complicating it. I'm going to try just one or two simple additions in the next brew and follow my normal routine to the letter. If I see an increase in efficiency it could be the way forward. If the taste is significantly improved, then It will be all but confirmed. I'll do a Smurto's this weekend as I'm very familiar with the grain, the hops and the taste.

Yeah. What I plan on doing is working out what I need to add to my water(I posted it here a few days ago) and then halve it. By doing that I am ensuring I am not overshooting but should still be improving it. If my efficiency picks up I'll make some more additions in the next brew.

 

[Frank_Grimes]

I racked the Blonde onto a kg of frozen raspberries on Tuesday night and checked on it last night - smells incredible. It's sitting in my blue Bunnings fermenter so I can't tell exactly the colour but it looks nice and dark. Not sure how long I'll leave it on the raspberries. Probably a few more days and then cold crash and fine.

Picking up the grain and hops for Smurto's Golden Ale this arvo along with some Gypsum, Epsom and Chloride salts, so I'll play around with the water tonight and get straight into it tomorrow morning.

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Are you going to look at adding a few ml of lactic acid to any of your mashs?


I tried some of my oatmeal stout out of the fermentor yesterday when I checked it's gravity. It was pretty amazing. Can't wait to bottle it and condition it. Nice roast flavour but not harsh at all, seems to have a silky body to it which is what I was looking for. I hope it's a sign that it will be good when it's finished.

I am now also planning another lager.

Basically it is going to be 50% Vienna 40% Pilsner 5% wheat 5% carapils/caramalt

Hop profile

Hallertauer at 60 min to about 15ibu
15g Saaz and hallertau at 20min
10g Saaz and hallertau at 5min

Total ibu about 25-30

I'll be adding 2-3g of gypsum 2-3G of CaCl and 1-2ml of lactic acid

Probably do a 60min mash at around 63degrees and 15 min mash out at 75

Then after this brew I am going to look at a big DIPA to get rid of some cascade and Columbus hops.

 

[Frank_Grimes]

No lactic acid. I added all of the salts and the brew went pretty well. Not sure if it was just me but it looked better, and clearer in the mash. Mash efficiency was 72% and I hit the pre-boil gravity dead on, but alas OG was just missed again and I ended up with a brewery efficiency of 59%. I'm still hopeful that the gypsum, epsom and sulfate additions will accentuate hop flavour, but will need to keep working on that efficiency number.

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Fair enough. I just find it impossible to get the mash efficiency down to 5.4 without adding acid using bru n water for any beers at 15ebc or less

 

[Frank_Grimes]

Are you testing mash ph?

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Nope just using the spread sheet

 

[Frank_Grimes]

Cool. I'll have to download it. I tried at work but the file was corrupt.

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

I bought some Ph strips online, the range on them is like 4.5 - 6 so should give me a decent ball park figure. Also bought some lactic acid and gypsum from the same store. Will be a good indicator of how accurate the spreadsheet is.