Homebrew - All Grain APA
This was my first all grain. To make it extra special I drunkenly made my own recipe using Beer Smith to guide me.
Ingredients
All grain with 6 lbs of grain.
- 5 lbs - 2 row
- 1 lbs - Crystal 40L
- 1.0oz - Cascade Pellet Hops (Bittering)
- 0.75 oz - Fuggle Pellet Hops (Aroma)
- White Labs English Ale WLP002
Method
- Heat 7.5 quarts of water to 169.
- Add all the grains to the mash tun and add the water. Mash for 60 minutes, stir half way through.
- Heat 9.75 quarts of water to 168.
- Drain the wort slowly and sparge. Try to keep some water above the grain bed.
- Add water to achieve a boil volume of 4.3 gallons.
- Bring wort to the boil.
- 0 Add bittering hops. (Cascade)
- Boil for 30 minutes.
- 30 Add aroma hops. (Fuggle)
- Boil for 5 minutes.
- 35 Add a tea spoon of Irish moss and the wort chiller.
- Boil for 10 minutes.
- 45 Cool wort to 65 degrees and pour through a strainer into a fermenting bucket.
- Take a hydrometer reading, add the yeast and ferment for 3 weeks.
I realized that I could fit maybe 1 more pound of grain in my mash tun. It is worth a try next time. My mash water dropped to 159 after adding it to the grain, it was 152 at the half way mark and 144 at the end. I am not 100% sure those temperatures are correct, the last one seems low given the middle reading. I topped up the boil with 0.3 gallons to make it 4.3. This was terrifying in a 5 gallon pot, I would not do that again. After adding the wort chiller the boil never really got going again, next time I must make sure I have the stove up high when I add it. By the time the wort was in the bucket I had around 3.75 gallons. The OG ended up lower than the target of 1.052, I got 1.039. Shows my process needs some work (or my calculations).
Starter: 24 May 2013 Brew: 27 May 2013, OG 1.039 Bottle: 16 Jun 2013 (20), FG 1.000, ABV 5.1% Ready: 09 Sep 2013 (79) Summary: Primary 20 days, Condition 79 days
Due to a surplus of homebrew I left these a long time before drinking them. The head looked great and had plenty of retention. I was really happy with the color. It smelt quite malty and did not have any weird homebrew smells. The taste was similar, malty and a little bitter. It was very smooth to drink and all of the flavors were mellow. No green homebrew tastes or any strange stuff. All things considered I was very happy with how this turned out. Perhaps next time I will up the grain by a pound and maybe add another .25 oz of hops to counter it. To do the same volume I need a bigger boil pot though, 4.3 gallons in 5 gallons is way too sketchy.
Starter
![2013-05-24 2405201320344015.jpg 2013-05-24 2405201320344015.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-24/thumb_2405201320344015.jpg)
![2013-05-24 2405201320393329.jpg 2013-05-24 2405201320393329.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-24/thumb_2405201320393329.jpg)
![2013-05-24 2405201321124917.jpg 2013-05-24 2405201321124917.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-24/thumb_2405201321124917.jpg)
![2013-05-25 2505201315163512.jpg 2013-05-25 2505201315163512.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-25/thumb_2505201315163512.jpg)
![2013-05-26 2605201309290911.jpg 2013-05-26 2605201309290911.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-26/thumb_2605201309290911.jpg)
![2013-05-26 2605201316202524.jpg 2013-05-26 2605201316202524.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-26/thumb_2605201316202524.jpg)
![2013-05-26 2605201321495619.jpg 2013-05-26 2605201321495619.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-26/thumb_2605201321495619.jpg)
Brew
![2013-05-27 2705201313515822.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201313515822.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201313515822.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201314245120.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201314245120.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201314245120.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201314273314.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201314273314.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201314273314.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315054228.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315054228.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315054228.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315271325.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315271325.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315271325.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315272320.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315272320.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315272320.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315360527.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315360527.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315360527.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315361371.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315361371.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315361371.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315373322.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315373322.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315373322.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315453119.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315453119.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315453119.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315560913.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315560913.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315560913.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315565713.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315565713.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315565713.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315572447.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315572447.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315572447.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315581820.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315581820.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315581820.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201315583585.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201315583585.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201315583585.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201316380141.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201316380141.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201316380141.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201316461675.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201316461675.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201316461675.jpg)
![2013-05-27 2705201317232514.jpg 2013-05-27 2705201317232514.jpg](/moblog/2013-05-27/thumb_2705201317232514.jpg)
Bottle
![2013-06-15 1506201323475199.jpg 2013-06-15 1506201323475199.jpg](/moblog/2013-06-15/thumb_1506201323475199.jpg)
![2013-06-16 1606201314520937.jpg 2013-06-16 1606201314520937.jpg](/moblog/2013-06-16/thumb_1606201314520937.jpg)
![2013-06-16 1606201314521724.jpg 2013-06-16 1606201314521724.jpg](/moblog/2013-06-16/thumb_1606201314521724.jpg)
![2013-06-16 1606201315094660.jpg 2013-06-16 1606201315094660.jpg](/moblog/2013-06-16/thumb_1606201315094660.jpg)
![2013-06-16 1606201315095229.jpg 2013-06-16 1606201315095229.jpg](/moblog/2013-06-16/thumb_1606201315095229.jpg)
![2013-06-16 1606201316033931.jpg 2013-06-16 1606201316033931.jpg](/moblog/2013-06-16/thumb_1606201316033931.jpg)
Ready
![2013-09-09 0909201320085020.jpg 2013-09-09 0909201320085020.jpg](/moblog/2013-09-09/thumb_0909201320085020.jpg)