5 Kilos Milled Pale Malt
Southern Brewer Hops 30grams
Irish moss 5 grams
Ale Yeast
Using these ingredients as described above should give you a reasonable basic beer. Because you are using ale yeast
and fermenting at 18degC this will be an ale. My guess would be that strictly speaking it would be a pale ale.
Fill Mash Tun with hot water (approx 72deg C - Strike Temp) about 2 litres per kilo, Mix in grain well making sure
there are no lumps. Check the temp of the mash and adjust to 65degC.
Close mash tun and leave for 90 minutes (you may want to check temp once or twice and readjust if necessary by the
addition of some boiling water)
Collect a little of the first run off from the mash (about 50 ml) and put onto a white saucer. Add a drop of tincture of
iodine (normal get at any chemist) to check that all starch has been converted to sugar. If there is still starch the iodine
will immediately turn black/purple. If this happens (not happened to me yet) continue mashing until conversion
complete.
Run first few litres (or until runoff clear) into jug and pour gently back into mash tun (Called reciculating).
Run the wort slowly into the kettle, if possible start heating the kettle as soon as you have collected sufficient wort. If
possible try not to splash (maybe a tube to the bottom of the kettle - the idea being not to allow air to mix with wort,
apparently it can cause problems with beer oxidising later on, don’t ask me why or what oxidising actually is, I don’t
have a clue).
Sparge the grain with water at between 76deg and 78degC. This can be as simple as pouring very gently jugs of hot
water over the grain or using a watering can, the trick is very gently taking care not to break up the grain bed as this
acts as a filter.
Keep sparging until you have collected approx one and a half times the final volume. Some books say you should stop
sparging once the gravity drops to 1006 but in all the time we brewed with Lex Mitchell we sparged until we had the
volume we required, so for a first try its probably easier. The same rules apply to the run off from the sparge ie very
gently with no splashing.
Bring the kettle to the boil, ideally you want a good vigourous boil (called a rolling boil). As soon as it starts boiling add
the hops. After 75 minutes add irish moss. Switch off kettle after 90 minutes.
If you can ,whirl the wort (use a sterilized stick to get a good whirlpool action going in the kettle, once the whirl is going
allow to stand for about 10 minutes.The purpose of this is that all the debris then settled in a cone at the bottom of the
kettle. When transferring to the kettle take care not to disturb the cone (if you do it won’t really hurt anything but the
clarity later on).
Now comes the tricky bit cooling the wort to about 18 to 20 degC. This is up to you (stand the kettle in a bath of cold
water with ice in for example). The trick will be to cool as quickly as possible (minimise the chance of infection) within
disturbing the gunge (called trub which will have collected at the bottom of the kettle).
Once cool enough tranfer to the fermenter (taking care not to disturb the debris -called trub) at this stage the wort
needs to be aerated, splash it about or fill the fermenter from height or whatever works. Pitch then yeast about halfway
through.
Ferment until complete (no change in gravity to 24 hours) or when all signs of activity have ceased. Keep in a cool
place preferably where the temperature can be maintained at about 18 degC.
Bottle ( a science all of its own) but basically clean bottles available, you can use perasan to sterilise, the tip of a
teaspoon of sugar in each bottle (to musch sugar and the bottles can explode). Fill with beer using a tube to the bottom
of the bottle (trick here is to minimise contact with air). Leave about 3cm head space in bottle as this helps with
carbonisation (not sure why). Store bottles in a cool place and out of sunlight for at least 2 weeks and then drink.
General
Use perasan, I would suggest to spray bottles one filled with perasan and one water. Spray everything you use with
perasan before use and then use the water spay for a basic rinse. (eg spray the outside of the yeast bottle before
opening and pitching , the inside of plastic taps, themometers etc etc. It may be overkill but cant do any harm. Perasan
should be diluted about 2.5 mil in a litre of water. (a good measure is a syringe).
pub culture