Bitter Bottled

Bottled a bitter last night. It was intended to be a "Special Bitter" or "Best Bitter"; that is, stronger than an Ordinary Bitter but not as strong as an ESB or Extra Special Bitter. My mash efficiency was a bit better than I expected, yielding a 1.050 original gravity, which is more in the ESB range, but I'm going to call it "St. Crispin's Best Bitter" regardless, as ESB in my opinion ought to have a little more oomph in bitterness and body.

So far this has been one of my most promising brews. I'll approximate the recipe from memory:

7 1/2 lbs British Optic 2-row
1/2 lb Belgian biscuit malt
1/2 lb British medium crystal malt, 60 deg Lovibond
3 ounces Belgian debittered black malt

The small quantity of debittered black malt darkened the beer up more than I had anticipated or intended, and instead of the orange amber I wanted, it was a deeper reddish amber, verging on brown. However, the roasted flavours associated with the darker malts is not there. Here is my hopping schedule:

60 min: 1/2 oz East Kent Goldings, 1/2 oz Willamette (both around 5% alpha acids)
30 min: 1/2 oz Willamette
10 min: 1/2 oz East Kent Goldings

The light hopping really allows the malt and hops to be in balance, something I've never quite allowed in my British bitters before (to their detriment). Willamette makes a great substitute for UK Fuggles, I think, and the aroma of it fresh is intoxicating. Very nice hop, one of my favourites.

I used the Fermentis S-04 strain (with a Whitbread origin) to ferment this batch. This is a very flocculant strain, which leaves a "bright" beer atop a concrete-like yeast cake.

In bottling it last night, the sample I had had a warm maltiness to it, with an unmistakeable biscuit-like flavour from the biscuit malt. Also a slight honey note. Very drinkable; has a sort of mild, rounded flavour that is never harsh or astringent. This is what brewing is about!

Weizen

Earlier this week I brewed a hefeweizen, my first wheat beer since last June. A delightfully simple and easy brewing session, using 4 pounds of British Optic 2-row malt and 5 pounds of domestic wheat malt. For yeast, I used a rehydrated packet of Danstar's Munich yeast. I hit the target OG dead on, at 1.049.

For hops, I was very generously given an interesting new product to try; Northern Brewer's HopShot. The details of the product are not all clear at this point, but it appears to be a non-isomerized hop extract. It comes in 5ml resealable syringes, with 1ml of extract having approximately the same bittering power as 1 ounce of 2.4% alpha acid hops; that is, 1ml will impart 10 IBUs to a 1.050 wort when boiled for 60 minutes. Very interesting, aromatic, and convenient. Hopefully this will help homebrewers get through the hop shortage a little bit better. I bittered with 1.5ml at 60min, and 0.5ml at 30min, which imparts an estimated 18 IBUs. A touch bitter for a true hefeweizen, but should still be nice.

Tonight I will be brewing a base beer for the kirschweizen (cherry wheat). This beer will need a touch more sweetness, so I will dial back the hop extract to a single 1ml addition at 60min, giving 10 IBUs. The grain bill will be similar, with 5lbs of American wheat, but an additional 1/2 pound of Optic and 1/2 pound of Crystal 60 for sweetness, for a total of 10lbs. Once this has finished fermenting in primary, I will rack this onto a quart of tart cherry juice concentrate.

As a status update on earlier beers, the bitter will be bottled in a week or two, having clarified nicely. The ginger beer is hot, spicy, dry, and strong, as expected. I sampled both the gruit and the espresso stout. The gruit was interesting and herbal, but the espresso stout is shaping up to be a royal failure, with a harsh astringency that I may not be able to force on anyone. Live and learn...coffee should be enjoyed freshly brewed, not bottle conditioned and aged.