Batch # 59 - 15 Years After Ale

This is a first beer after 15 years long break from homebrewing.

Bought ingredients at www.chicagolandwinemakers.com and made 5 gallon batch on Feb 7th, 2011 like that:

Recipe:

  • 6.6 Northwestern Gold Malt extract
  • 1 oz. Perle hops for 60 min, 7.7% Alpha
  • 2/3 oz. Saaz for 30 min, 3.2% Alpha
  • 1/2 oz. Tetnnang for 15 min, 4.5% Alpha
  • 1/3 oz. Saaz for 1 min, Alpha as above
  • Nottingham dry ale yeast, 11 gram, no starter, prepared per package instruction.
  • Original specific gravity 1,050
  • 1/3 cup of corn sugar in 2 cups of water at kegging

Procedure:

Progress log:

  • Feb 7, 2011 - boiled wort, cooled, pitched rehidrated yeast per package instructions; no starter. Fermentation started within 24 hours. Kept in the mudroom (62F-70F)
  • Feb 12, 2011 - Gravity down to 1,020 and fermentation slowed down. Racked to 5 gallon glass carboy with 0.5 oz Tetnnang dry pellet hops.
  • Feb 27, 2011 - moved from 60F in basement to 70F in the kitchen, kept overnight because fermentation recovered a little bit.
  • Feb 28, 2011 - in the evenning fermentation was done, so kegged at specific gravity 1,014 (~ 5% alkohol by volume) in sanitized with Star San refurbished Cornelius soda keg bought at Winemakers. The keg was, after openning, very clean inside and kept preasure very well. The keg was pressureized at the store. Added corn sugar desolved in boiled water. This is my first time kegging.
  • Mar 29, 2011 - very good beer, could be better carbonated sometimes.

Evaluation:

  • Feb 28, 2011 taste at racking to the keg: extremly promising, needs just carbonation:-)
  • Mar 28, 2001 was gone before noticed. Was preety good, could be better carbonated. Need inject some CO2 preassure at kegging to seal the cover.