I feel an impromptu trip to the South West coming on to unwind. Good red wine, wood fire, fresh air. So I may not make it to the mid point of the month. A fortnight is still good though... And I'll follow it up with another sober fortnight haha. Not like I'm raising money just hitting the reset button and curious to see how it'd affect me
Toast Beer / Homebrew Thread
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I feel an impromptu trip to the South West coming on to unwind. Good red wine, wood fire, fresh air. So I may not make it to the mid point of the month. A fortnight is still good though... And I'll follow it up with another sober fortnight haha. Not like I'm raising money just hitting the reset button and curious to see how it'd affect me
Yeah same here. I feel bad asking for money for some reason.
Bender_
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Second time using Wyeast London Ale - supposed to attenuate at 70-75%, last batch was excess 80% and this one just crossed the 80 mark and is still going. Just goes to show nothing is a certainty when working with micro-organisms. I can only assume that the inline oxygen kit I use has been a great investment.
Loving the Tilt, wouldn't have checked the gravity for another week and that'd be 10 minutes of sanitising and drawing just to ditch 100ml, so it's great to see how it's going and not have to * around with all that other shite.
Loving the Tilt, wouldn't have checked the gravity for another week and that'd be 10 minutes of sanitising and drawing just to ditch 100ml, so it's great to see how it's going and not have to * around with all that other shite.
London ale 3?
I got picked up my fermzilla on Friday and ordered ingredients for a brew this weekend.
Unboxed it and there’s a huge dent in it. Pretty bloody annoying. Just used the old plastic bucket fermenter instead
Bender_
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Yup, currently attenuated at 88% for a 6%ABV. Pretty happy with that.
That sux. Isn't it just malleable enough for the dent to pop back out?
Maybe, but * that, I paid $130 for it
If I’m fermenting under pressure I want something that I know is gonna be structurally sound. The plastic looks like it’s strained a bit and gone slightly opaque where it’s dented
Bender_
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Fair enough. I take it you'll be returning it?
Yeah, pity their store’s like 40 km from my place though
It’s like the cockburn of Melbourne
Fermenter. Much harder to control via keg with hop exposure. Plus you'll be pulling hop matter through the dip tube unless you can suspend it somehow (fishing float tied to mesh bag?)
Hey that's not so bad. I live in the city of Cockburn! Actually drove past floppy Walters place on the weekend looking at houses nearby. I'm assuming he has a couple of Lambos in the garage because the house is meh.
Bender_
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Spent all his cash on bad tatts and neck braces.
Yeah I was thinking maybe string tied to the top of the keg? No idea yet. Might just dry hop in the fermenter. Still got a couple of weeks til I’m ready to keg to think about it. Just so burnt about oxygen after my last hoppy beer turned out absolutely rubbish.
I doubt you're letting oxygen in during DH. co2 forms a pretty decent layer above the fermenting beer and is heavier than o2.
Have you got a plan in place for transferring from fermenter to keg? This is where I reckon most o2 becomes introduced.
Yeah that’s the thing - it seems that hop compounds get oxidised way worse than regular beer, so by dry hopping first and then introducing oxygen through transferring into the keg, the oxidation is worse. At least dry hopping after transfer there is less dissolved oxygen - maybe. Need to do more reading
Ideally I’d be doing closed pressurised transfers from the Fermzilla but not on this occasion.
Actually KegLand just contacted me and said that the dents are normal and should just push out
campaignersMaybe I’ll try using it and see how it goes
Yeah that’s the thing - it seems that hop compounds get oxidised way worse than regular beer, so by dry hopping first and then introducing oxygen through transferring into the keg, the oxidation is worse. At least dry hopping after transfer there is less dissolved oxygen - maybe. Need to do more reading
Ideally I’d be doing closed pressurised transfers from the Fermzilla but not on this occasion.
Actually KegLand just contacted me and said that the dents are normal and should just push out
Maybe I’ll try using it and see how it goes
Home brewers have been dryhopping and kegging for decades with good results. Your problem may have been a one off. Mashs NEIPAs have suffered terribly from DO during the canning process, but I suspect also with the volume of hops used it doesn't take much for those types of beers to turn.
Some keg lids have a hook underneath that you could suspend a mesh bag of hops from if you were adamant about keg hopping. There's some arguments to and fro about whether you get a better result from DH at fermenting temp or fridge temp, and so you'd need to look into that as well. For the best of both worlds you may be able to DH in keg at ambient temp with a good squirt of co2 to purge the head space and seal the lid, then remove hops and carbonate as normal.
As for the KegLand comment I think they're testing you to see what they can get away with. You paid for a new product to present as new. Just because paper can be folded and unfolded doesn't mean an office would accept reams of crumpled paper. Take it back and inspect the replacement out of box before you leave, man. I figured there had to be a catch to their low prices. Shitty, dismissive service apparently.
Update on the fermenter sitch: after i posted in AHB, Kegland changed their tune somewhat and offered me the option of a replacement (once the new stock comes in). They still pushed their preferred option of putting 50 degree water in it to soften it up and then apply pressure while it cooled back in to shape. Basically getting it just hot enough to almost melt the PET. Wasn't too keen on that.
Judging by other posts on AHB and an unboxing video on youtube, a lot of them are being shipped out with dents. Seems like a fully expected part of the manufacturing process (they say it's because they need to make it pliable for pressurised cold crashing etc). But mine was especially dented so I'm going to get it replaced regardless.
Currently fermenting a red rye IPA in the old brew bucket, which will go into my very first keg, and just designing my next brew, which will be a hoppy kolsch/lager. 75/25 Pils and Vienna malt. Mandarina Bavaria, Lemondrop, Motueka and Perle. thirsty already
Judging by other posts on AHB and an unboxing video on youtube, a lot of them are being shipped out with dents. Seems like a fully expected part of the manufacturing process (they say it's because they need to make it pliable for pressurised cold crashing etc). But mine was especially dented so I'm going to get it replaced regardless.
Currently fermenting a red rye IPA in the old brew bucket, which will go into my very first keg, and just designing my next brew, which will be a hoppy kolsch/lager. 75/25 Pils and Vienna malt. Mandarina Bavaria, Lemondrop, Motueka and Perle. thirsty already
What don't you like about them?
The hype partly and the hop burn mostly
No real issues with hazy hoppy beers in principle, but 99% of the Australian NEIPA attempts I’ve had have been pretty unpleasant.
Also the effort people go to to make a beer hazy is pretty lame. It doesn’t equate to a better tasting beer most of the time, so it just seems like pure beer nerdery to use all these adjuncts and techniques just go make it opaque
I’ve listened to a podcast with Scott Janish and he seems much more reasonable about the whole style and less pretentious, hence I got the book.
Pretty interested in how to maximise hop impact in all beers without necessarily making hop bombs
Understanding hop efficiency is definitely a big thing I'd love to learn. I swear some of my hoppiest perceived beers were the first ones I brewed with smaller quantities. Given the cost of hops it's a great area to focus on.
Yeah the most recent pale I did earlier in the year had so much hoppage in it yet it didn’t taste or smell hoppy at all. Blew my mind.
Bender_
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Like the sound of this. Making me thirsty 2.
Currently cold crashing my NEIPA for a couple of days before bottling on Thursday. Ended up forgetting about the terradactyl rest but forgot about the past few brews too and haven't noticed anything too negative about them. Has gone well so far and I'm looking forward to having a taste in the coming weeks.
Also I too am preparing for the next batch in a few weeks time (mentioned it before) which will be an attempt at the Pirate Life NZ Pale Ale; Pale and Munich with some carapils and NZ Cascade, Motueka and Pacifica.
Personally I've always been more about the taste of things over the appearance, though I think there is a very small amount of merit in regards to the way a beer or food is presented I don't think it's the be all and end all.
