Rednecktech

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Anyone Like Sierra Nevada Pale Ale? Here's a nice extra hoppy version of a west coast pale ale, very easy to make from extract, this is not meant to be a clone of Sierra Nevada, just plain ol' great hoppy beer

Try this:

9 lbs plain light malt extract
1.0 lbs crystal malt
1.5 oz cascade bittering hops (assuming ~4% AA) (60 min boil)
1 oz cascade @ 20 mins remaining in boil
3 oz cascade at boil end

Boil malt extrat in 8L water for 1 hr, add 1.5oz cascade hops for 60 mins, with 20 mins remaining add another oz of cascade hops, finally add 3 more oz of cascade hops to the kettle at the end of the boil. Ferment at 68F with Wyeast American Ale II

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Arena Rodent

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sall Pig latin to me but I'd love to try some lol

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Haxer

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Sounds good. I think I'll give it a go.
I was planning to do the mashing myself and not use extract, but it'd be great to compare.

What's your recommended amounts and way of working, should I do and mash myself?

Would you recommend plain crystal sugar, corn sugar or gyle (I'd really like to try that) to prime with?

Rednecktech

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Mashing is the preferred method if you have the equipment to do it for sure. Malt extract beers can be good with fresh ingredients so that can be an issue if you only have access to canned extracts on a shelf that may have sat there a long time.

If you are going to do a full mash on a beer like this for 5 US Gallons (23L) I'd actually step on a bit and bump it to IPA status. Here's a quick run down of how the grist bill and procedures may look. If you have any more questions feel free to ask. Keep in mind it's a basic guideline, there can be a lot more to it and so many other things to take into account but to keep it fairly simple to start with I've listed some specs below. Also if you aren't familiar with this process as of yet there are some great books available but I am assuming you have some knowledge on this already.

The Mash: Infusion @ 150F
Liquor/Grist Ratio: 2.8/1
Strike Water Volume (L) ~ 14.84L
Strike Water Adjustments/Temp: Burtonized @ ~ 162F - you really should have a decent idea of mineral content of your water before making too many adjustments to this.
Sparge Water Volume (L) ~ 16L
Sparge Liquor Temp: 169F

Grist Bill:
4.8kg Pale Ale Malt (2 row will suffice if pale ale is unavailable)
0.5kg Caramel Malt @ ~ 60 Degrees Lovibond (crystal malt)
20g Black Malt (black Patent)

MASH
- Grind malts to perfection but be sure to leave the black malt until last and set it aside from the rest. Mash in at 150F with the pale ale and caramel malts for 1 hr rest. When it's time for the vorlauf (wort recirculation) add the 20g of black malt. Recycle the wort for 10 minutes or until the wort runs clear.

-Slowly start running the wort off into your boil kettle while sparging with the 16L of sparge liquor until you have ~ 26L hot wort in the kettle and bring it up to a full rolling boil. This should be done over a 1 hr period or longer so pace yourself.

Time for the boil and hops
For a big beer like this you're going to need a good hop content to offset all the malt. My suggestions follow but I'll stick on the light side so as to not over do it on the 1st batch then you can increase the ibu's on your next batch

Desired IBU's (International Bittering Units): 40
Bittering Hops: Northern brewer (pellets)
Aromatic hops: Cascade or Amarillo (pellets)

You are shooting for 23L of finished wort after the boil and evaporation so you should base the hop calculation on this volume.
Let's say your Northern Brewer hops are 8% A.A. (alpha acid) so for 23L wort you need to use ~ 38g for 40 IBU's. This is also assuming negligible ibu content from other aromatic hop additions.

At boil begin time add 38g Northern Brewer hops. Continue boiling for 45 mins more so with 15mins remaining of the 1hr boil add 40g of Cascade hops. With 1 minute remaining in the boil add another 90g of Cascade hops. Turn the heat off, now start stiring the wort round and round with a large spoon or paddle of some sort to create the "whirlpool effect". Of course your method of whirlpooling is dependent on your cooling method etc. A lot of home brewing setups won't require the whirlpool at all, it's simply to pool the spent hops and proteins into the center of the kettle so you can draw off clean/clear wort into your fermenter.

Whether you use a counterflow heat exchanger or a submersion chiller you need to cool it down as quickly as possible and get it into your sanitary fermentation vessel with a good healthy yeast culture.

Ferment it in a cool area @ ~ 65 - 68F.

This should give you a brew with ~ 17.5 degree plato and should finish near 3- 4 degrees plato with an Alc/Vol content of ~ 7.5% of course this is totally dependent on your methods, malts and equipment which will dictate your brewhouse yield

As for priming at packaging time, wort is fantastic but some use malt extract to simplify the process with favourable results. Corn sugar isn't highly recommended but works and doesn't ruin a beer by any stretch. I wouldn't worry about it too much until you have the recipe down to where you really like it then try changing primers for carbonation so you can taste the difference 1st hand. Otherwise you'll always be guessing or taking somebody else's word for it, you should experience as much and as many of the intricate flavours first hand to become familiar with your product and raw materials. You'll be a better brewer in the long run

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Haxer

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Thanks a lot! This should get me going, I think.
Some knowledge indeed, from books to Internet resources. But, very basic.

Err, 23L equals 6 US Gallons, right? But I see the recipe is for 23L, which is what I was aiming for.

I can get the malts I need here. The minimum quantity I can get, is 1kg. How long do you think I can keep the remainder of the black malt? I'll look around more to see if I can get smaller quantities.

The Northern Brewer hops (pellets)are 5,7 %AA here. So, if my calculations are correct, I need 57gr?
I think I'll get some boiling bags for the hops, unless you think it affects flavour.

I've ordered the equipment a few weeks ago, it should be here next week. And then brewing time!
Oh, this should be great fun. I'll keep you informed about the process and will get back with additional questions I might have.

One thing that I had on my mind regards the mash method. Is infusion your regular method and does it differ much from step (temperature controled) mashing when it comes to the end result? I've heard that the head will be better in the latter method.

Off to get a beer now! And thanks again.

Rednecktech

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Ahahahah, ya got me there. 5 US gallons is indeed 19L (18.9), too many breweries, too many countries, too many beers...

Don't worry about the black malt if you'd need to buy 1kg at a time, it's only to help adsorb tannins from the mash so it's not a big deal.

The northern Brewer hops at 5.7% would be about ~ 54g for 40 IBU's. Here's a quick formula I use:

(Desired IBU's)*(Litres Wort)
(Alpha Acid %)*(1000)*(% Utilization)

So in this case:

(40)*(23)
(.057)*(1000)*(.3)

=
920
17.1

=
53.8g

Of course the 1000 in this formula is a constant so it doesn't take into account different gravities. One will never truely know how many IBU's are in your beer without having a sample analyzed because of so many variables. The thing is it doesn't really matter how many IBU's it really is, it's all relative. The question is how does it taste to you, not bitter enough, right on the money or too bitter.


You don't really want or need to use hop bags with pelletized hops, it'll restrict isomerization and physical movement during the boil unless the bag is very large.

Infusion mashing is the norm for brewing beers like this but step mashing can certainly be used and is often. For your first few batches until you become familiar with your system I'd recommend keeping it simple, a beer like this will have a tremendous head retention without a protein rest due to the hop content but most brewers also add a small portion of raw flaked or malted wheat to the grist bill (say 3%) to also help aid head retention. The most important things for a good clean beer with great head retention is cleanliness and sanitation, a good clean healthy yeast culture at the appropriate pitching rate. I say master these then move on to step mashing, decoction mashing or other techniques. Again starting with the basics and moving up from there, you'll be able to see first hand how the differing techniques affect your brews and whether or not you feel they are beneficial, necessary or worth the extra time in your brewery setup.

If you are fluent with computers and really want to get into it I highly recommend purchasing "ProMash" brewing software, it's a great program for recipe formulation, brew day worksheets, calculations and so much more.

Check it out here:
http://www.promash.com/

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Haxer

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Ah, thanks for that!

My calculation was done with a gravity of 1.050, which was a wild guess.

Yeah, I'll keep it simple. No bags it'll be.

I came across promash yesterday, actually. Doesn't work on a Mac, unfortunately.

Rednecktech

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Ah that's too bad. There's other brewing software out there designed for Mac, check the links for a few:

http://brewery.org/Software.html#Macintosh
http://www.beertools.com/html/articles.php?view=231
http://www.brew-monkey.com/links/softwarelinks.php

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Haxer

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Thanks man.
I came across a few of them yesterday, I downloaded a few, but haven't had the time to evaluate yet. More investigations, tonight.

Btw; for this IPA recipe, do you recommend Wyeast American Ale II as well, or should I stick to Wyeast Brittish Ale?

My kettle comes with a stainless steel filter (false bottom). I figured I could use this combo to mash. Can I just place the filter on the bottom of the kettle, and go ahead?

Rednecktech

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No problem

Yeast again is a matter of preference after you become accustomed to each strains' characteristics, since I've cut back on the bittering hops for such a big beer I would go with the higher attenuating strain, or for myself I'd actually step on the IBU's but hey that's up to you, just don't want you to make a beer that you find more bitter than you prefer right off the line.

As for the kettle with filter, that should work fine as your mash/lauter tun if you have plastic pails or another vessel to run the wort into during the sparge, then clean your kettle and transfer the wort back to it for the boil. Try not to aerate the hot wort during these transfers. It'll cost you some time since it'll take a while to bring the wort up to a boil, it's nice having a separate mash vessel since you can put the heat to the wort as your kettle is filling and ideally by the time it's full you're up to a full boil.

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Rednecktech

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Oh btw do you have photos and specs on the new system you're getting?

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Haxer

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Ah, I'm evaluating http://www.kentplacesoftware.com/pro...erAlchemy.html right now. That looks pretty good.

As for IBU, based upon the recipes and mashing/boil, it expects a final 49 IBU. Well, what's in a number, my best friend will be my taste. I like the bitterness hand hoppyness of the IPA's I've had in the UK.

Based upon the descriptions I found, I think I'll go with the UK Pale yeast, because the brittish IPA is still in memory.

I guess I'll take this recipe as a basis and work from there the next batches.

Some specs:
- Simple malt grinder
- stainless steel kettle 36 l + tap 1/2" + perforated stainless filter
- copper worth chiller (immersion)
- simple measuring equipment.
- fermentation bottle with water stop

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bobbyok

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To keep it "West Coast American" style, I'd stick with the American Ale yeats. It's typically a bit cleaner than the British strains which lets the hops shine through. Wyeast American I (1056) is supposed to be the Sierra Nevada strain of yeast if you really want to go fo a Sierra Nevada clone.

Rednecktech

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See now I prefer American Ale II for such a fine brew, ahahha, it imparts a slight nuttiness to the brew but that's my personal preference. I'm in no way trying to create a Sierra Nevada clone with that base recipe though. That's the great thing about homebrewing, soon enough you know what you like and how to brew it to your preference.

Haxer if you want to emulate more of a British IPA style then I'd recommend changing the recipe. This is an American West Coast style IPA be it a little light on IBU's, it shares a lot of similar attributes with the British counterpart and forefather but way different at the same time

Bobby - FYI I used a British Ale yeast for my IPA at the brewery - ya can't interfere with that many finish hops can ya?

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bobbyok

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Really? I thought you told me you were using 1056. But yeah - throw in enough hops and the yeast isn't going to matter all that much, is it?