Scottish Ale Brewday

So today marked my 4th brew (3rd all-grain) in Northwest Arkansas.  As we get nearer to that cold weather I realized I had to brew a good warming, malty beer for those winter nights.  I haven't decided if this will be a holiday ale, but either way I wanted to brew another Scottish Ale.  Last November my twink and I brewed a Scottish on a whim and it turned out to be my most memorable brew of the holiday season.  This time around I wanted to brew a more classic 'Wee Heavy' style of Scottish ale that has a very basic grain bill and utilizes caramelization in the boil to obtain the rich caramel and malty flavors (as opposed to using caramel malts in the mash).  It presented itself to me as a decent challenge and an exciting opportunity to push myself as an amateur brewer.  So off to my LHBS I went for the grains and hops:

13# Marris Otter
0.25# Roasted Black Barley

1.3 oz. 5% AA East Kent Goldings at 60 minutes

Nothing too exciting about that grain.

Pretty dang simple, huh?  I thought so, too.  I mashed for about an hour, starting around 157F and winding down around 154F by the end of the hour. 

Mash it up.

This is where my typical brewing practices got a little more complicated.  I started to recirculated the wort until I obtained clarity and a good (1 qt/min) flow.  I then proceeded to collect the first gallon of the wort and put in on the stove to boil.  While the rest of the wort collected, this 1 gallon started its caramelization boil.  I took the boil all the way down to 1 qt of syrupy and sweet wort. 

Not a terribly valuable pic, but it the first gallon of runnings boiling away.

Concurrently, I collected the rest of the wort (~7 gallons) and got it out onto the turkey fryer stand.  I allowed this to hot break and begin the boil (about 30 minutes) before I added the caramelized wort.  Are you keeping up with all this action?  Okay.  So once I combined my worts I started a 90 minute boil. 

One full brew kettle.  Luckily, the hot break was over.  All I had to do was boil this down.

At the 60 minute mark I added my EKG's and the rest of the brewday basically went as normal.  I was able to cool this brew down to ~78F in 20 minutes.  Earlier in the week I had made a yeast starter from a White Labs Edinburgh (Scottish) Ale vial.  I pitched this starter and stuck my Scottish ale in my kegerator....

Scottish ales are supposed to be clean with minimal esters.  Being so, I decided to put a temperature controller on my kegerator and set it to 58F.  With the frenzy of fermenting, I figure the internal temp of the carboy will be closer to 62F, right where I want to be.

I am still in the process of refurbing the kegerator, but it should be alright for some fermenting.  You can see the temp controller on top of the brass tap fixture in the top left of the picture (It's a small Loves TSS2-2100 dual stage controller).

So that is about all.  I was able to hit (and even exceed) my OG target of 1.070 (I got closer to 1.072).  I expect the final gravity to be in the mid teens, making this a medium bodied brew with a super clean and malty flavor balanced with about 20 IBUs.  The prolonged boil and reduction should make for some toffee-ish flavors as well.  I can't wait to see what happens; should be a great beer.

A Dick's Scottish Style Ale from WA (compliments of the Tuckers).  I really like this beer, though it utilized smoked malts in the recipe, which I did not.  So mine probably will not resemble it much.

Sampling of my brew.  It is very sweet and thick.  I can taste the hops fighting for balance.  I am very interested to see where this brew goes with the cooler fermentation.

On a side note, Connor told me (the night before brewday) that he didn't want to hear any sob stories about missing my targets or screwing something up.  He wanted me to nail this ale.  So, I told him that this brew was for him.  Then I had an idea for the name of this batch, 'Willie's Scottish Ale'.  William is a good Scottish name and it is also Connor's first name.  Thoughts?

Thanks for stopping by!  Stay tuned for updates on this brew.  Tomorrow Ashley and I are making a standard Chardonnay and I am transferring my pumpkin ale to secondary.  My Common ale and my Pig Trail Ale are both in bottles and conditioning.

Pumpkin Ale Brewday

Well it seems like all of my brewing buddies are in on the pumpkin ale this year.  I decided to jump into the action this past weekend with a Pumpkin ale all my own.  Ashley made for a great brewing partner (though I still miss you Mark [and Amber]) and game updater (The Razorbacks were in a heated match against the Aggies, they won!).  She thought the beer was really smelling nice during mash and boil.  Here is my grain bill for the brew (3 gallon batch, don't want any bottles after the holidays):

9.5# Roasted Pie Pumpkin (cut into small chunks)
6# Organic American 2-row
1/3# Dingeman's Caramel 45L
1/3# Carapils

 

Roasted Pumpkins, they came out perfectly...

 

Adding that grain player.

 

Grain and Pumpkin...just add water.

I meant to mash at 154 but failed to include the weight of the pumpkin into my calculations so I ended up at 140F.  After two more boiling additions (and close to 40 minutes) I was finally just over 150F.  Decided not to mess with it and let it sit for 40 or 45 minutes.

 

Halfway through the sparge.

Before boiling I stirred in a 1/4# of dark brown sugar.  Here is my hop schedule:

1.25oz Hersbrucker (German Noble Hop, 3.8% AA) at 70 min
0.75oz Hersbrucker at 10 min

 

The nice thing about 3 gallon batches is you can have a nice ferocious boil.

 

I don't know how else to say it, the Hersbrucker hops smelled great....very Noble. That's Ash adding the hops....no, I don't paint my nails.

 

Ashley's dogs (left to right: Mercedes, Haley) were very helpful and entertaining on this fine brewday.  That's me in the background chillin like a villain.

The brew day went fine (pumpkin was a little messy) but I missed my desired OG (1.054) by over ten points.  I was closer to a 1.042 OG.  I started to think it was from either the crappy mash (but then decided the mash wasn't that bad, I basically had a two stage mash) or from using organic malts (thinking possible they had a lower sugar yield per pound of grain).  However, when I went to dump the grain I realized what it was.  I noticed a lot of the hulls were not even cracked.  So I am very disappointed in myself for not checking my crush.  I should have looked after it was crushed, turned the wheel in more and ran it through again.  Oh well, I'm going to make lemonade from this lemon.  Being low on gravity (and ultimately lower in alcohol), Ash recommended I call this brew 'Pumpkin D-light' to admit that yes, it is a lighter beer, but it will be a delight regardless.  This brew will probably end up around 4.5% ABV and 30 IBU.  The color is nice and I think there will be a nice pumpkin flavor to it.  It may turn out to be a good low cal brew.

I am going to add a very small amount of spices to the secondary.

I used a vial of White Labs California Ale yeast that was very viable (big hiss and suds when I cracked it open).  Fermentation has already slowed almost to a halt and the smell of the airlock is clean and hoppy and earthy (pumpkiny).  I can't wait to see how this brew turns out!
 
P.S.  No pics of it in a fermentor because I was out of carboys....had to use a plastic bucket!

I am brewing a Scottish Ale next weekend so be sure to  check back!

-Matt and Ash