each house layout is different, but FYI my garage used to get super cold, with freezing inside. since getting properly fitted and new garage doors with rubber seals around the trim, it is now honestly comfy in winter even when its -20 outside, maintaing about 7C, probably dipping a bit lower if its consistently extreme temps like -20 to -30. i am in SW ontario btw.
anyway consider sealing those cracks maybe
Actually it’s not my brewing location but where I choose to get my cooling water for my immersion chiller. I use an outside faucet with a hose. I want to stay above 0 C to reduce the risk of the hose freezing/ blowing the back flow valve. It happened last year and was a PITA to deal with
I’ve had really great results with the Viking Pilsner Zero, through at least three full sacks of the stuff during the past few years. Maybe I’m oblivious to it? The wort (and resulting beer) are as “normal” for the recipes I use them in, predominantly pale lagers. The purplish-colored wort issue is fascinating to me - was it a subtle color? Or no?
I do note some reddish residue on the side of my mash tun with some batches (not just pilsner zero), but I’ve always attributed that to BrewTanB usage.
It was subtle, but definitely an odd color, and murky, I never worry about conducting a starch conversion test, but I believe this may not have passed, even with a 90-minute mash at 148F. I think I used BrewTan B in that batch as well, never thought of that as a possible cause. But the finished beer came out normal, and very pale as expected.
Fascinating! I can’t say I look closely at the wort / mash, but I don’t recall anything odd.
Just finished brewing The Martian Amber Ale, and I hit my numbers pretty well. 1.049 s.g., chilled to 68 degrees, and I’ll move it into the fermenter and pitch the yeast momentarily. It’s a fascinating wort, in that it is indeed a deep reddish amber; the flavor is somewhat like turbo-charged Munich. I think this is going to be a really great SMaSH!
One minor edit from the recipe I posted was I reduced the dry hop to 1.5 oz. - 2 oz. seemed a bit much for a 2.75 gallon batch. Everything else is pretty much as advertised.
All did not go according to plan. I couldn’t find the oats I thought we had. And there was only about 200g grams of pale malt left in the bag after I measured the 1343g. So I just added the extra pale and doubled the wheat — 78% pale and 22% wheat. Should come in a bit over 7% ABV. Adapt and overcome. Semper Gumbi.
The brown ale was uneventful, though.
That’s why it’s good to be a homebrewer! You probably got a better sparge without all the beta glucans anyway.
I’ve made a lot of rye beers and never found beta glucans to hinder my sparge.
I do no-sparge BIAB. No sparge to get stuck.
I still fly sparge because I’ve gotten used to 95%+ efficiency, but with adjunct beers it occasionally bites me in the ■■■■.
Denny, I should probably know this, but what’s your mash tun filter design? False bottom? Cut pipe manifold? Steel braid hose? Just curious.
For many years it was a cooler with hose braid. These days it’s a Grainfather G40.
lol, guess I’m still doing it the hard way.
Just bottled a cinnamon blueberry mead this weekend.
Yield: 7.5 gal
Alcohol: ~17% by volume
5 qts wildflower honey (backyard bees)
21 qts Knudsen Just Blueberry juice
Lalvin D47 dry wine yeast
7.5 g Fermaid O
Fermented to dryness, then added:
8 cans fzn apple juice concentrate and 1 qt honey to back-sweeten
1 tsp potassium sorbate to stabilize
1 tsp sodium metabisulfite to stabilize
3 tsp chestnut wood tannin (or to taste)
1 tsp. Citric acid (or to taste)
1 cinnamon stick (Ceylon) for about a week in secondary - just enough for a hint
If it wasn’t for the G40 I probably would no longer be brewing
Couple big milestones for me today. I’ll be brewing my all Mars alt with Spalt and Tettnang. That means I’ll be brewing twice in a week, and will have all 3 of my fermenters going for the first time in I don’t remember how long.
Good luck with the Mars alt! I did my all-Mars American amber ale SMaSH last weekend, and the malt performed really well in the mash. It’s quite Munich-like in terms of flavor, which I guess is to be expected - curious to hear your impressions once you’ve finished the brew.
The gravity sample wasn’t as red as I expected, but the wort left in the kettle was. Guess we’ll see after fermentation. I overshot my OG, too, so that may be part of it.
I’m going shopping this weekend for my newest dumb project - another 4 Saisons.
Cool! I had similar vibes on the sample I looked at; once it is fermented and clarified, I’ll have a better handle on actual color for this batch.