12/04/2007: "Brewblogue: Temperance Mild"
Listening to: nothingCurrent mood: tired but cheerful
Water: 4.5 Gallons filtered Hillcrest tap water
Grain:
- 3.3lbs Maris Otter
- 0.45lbs Crystal 60
- 0.3lbs Crystal 120
- 0.3lbs British Dark Crystal¹
Yeast: 1 vial WLP002 English Ale
Hops: 0.42oz East Kent Goldings @ 60 minutes²
Mashed at ~152° for 60 minutes. Boiled 65 minutes.
OG: 1.038
¹ Annoyingly not labeled as to their alpha acid content.
² Recipe called for Pale Chocolate malt, which the store did not have. I panicked and bought this because it was the same color.
So last night we finally bit the bullet and tried our very first all-grain batch here in our tiny apartment. And believe it or not, I think it worked. In fact we actually ended up a few points above the gravity I was aiming for, though we undershot our mash temp by a few degrees (which as far as I understand it means we'll have less residual sugars and thinner mouthfeel from the finished beer... which considering it was our first time, I can more than live with). And in fact it was really pretty easy, quite a bit easier than I expected (batch sparging is the bomb-diggity, yo). Sure it took a little longer than extract brewing, but a fair amount of that time was spend watching Kids in the Hall episodes while we waited for stuff to finish what it was doing. And it was even kinda fun. Of course we had actually planned to brew on Sunday but ran into various problems (such as my starter not starting and a leaky cooler) so it was postponed to Monday night, which is not quite the most ideal time to brew. But we didn't too badly and as long as I get to bed early tonight I should be fine.
As for the beer itself it's supposed to be a dark mild (BJCP style 11A for those playing at home), but I'm not sure it's going to have the toastiness that it's supposed to since I couldn't find any pale chocolate malt. Might end up more like a Southern English Brown. And as of tonight it's happily bubbling away, which is fantastic. So anyway, I'm very pleased that it actually seems to have worked. Perhaps I'll remember to actually say if it turns out... after all, with beer this low in alcohol (it'll hit maybe 4% max - which is a little too strong for the style) it should be ready to bottle in a week. Woo hoo.
Replies: 3 Comments
Good to hear it is working out. You can help me figure out what I need and I'll attempt it over here too.
[Matt] on Wednesday, December 5th
our house smelled weird for 24 hours after brewing.
[Lynnea] on Thursday, December 13th
Whoa. Full grain in the apartment? w00t!
[Zac] on Saturday, December 15th
