It is time.

[FlourPower]

So it's about that time. I got my kit together last year but then had to do 90 hour weeks at work so I went from the height of preparations to now not being sure what I'm doing again.

Anyway I hope to brew my first AG on Sunday, I have this recipe (from Spearmint Wino - viewtopic.php?f=24&t=7351&hilit=+op+clone) to work from.

Theakston's Old Peculier

Size: 23 L
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 290.06 per 1 pt

Original Gravity: 1.065
Terminal Gravity: 1.016
Color: 40.2
Alcohol: 6.43%
Bitterness: 30.16

Ingredients:
4700g Maris Otter Pale
650g Crystal 60
130g Black Malt
330g Torrified Wheat
570g White Table Sugar (Sucrose)
15.0 g Challenger (8.6%) - added during boil, boiled 90 min
25.0 g Fuggle (5%) - added during boil, boiled 90 min
10 g Goldings (5.8%) - added during boil, boiled 15 min
1 ea Whirlfloc Tablets (Irish moss) - added during boil, boiled 15 min
11 g Danstar Nottingham (going to use Safale04)

So..... where do I go from here? How do I work out how much I need to boil to sparge with? How much I should end up with? etc etc? Any help would be wonderful!

[Parva]

If you're going to be batch sparging then this may help - viewtopic.php?f=2&t=19662

Scroll down to Borodave's post (which is a repost of one I did earlier but am too lazy to find).

[Parva]

Having looked over the recipe, that's a lot of black malt. Ironically it's one ingredient that I have in stock but haven't dared to use yet. If you like very dark bitters then it may be ok I guess but I'm definitely light to medium. That much black malt will also bring a 'burnt' taste along with the dark colour. If you like your beers very dark then go for it, otherwise I would suggest dropping the black malt by 50%. If you want a brown ale around the Tetley bitter, John Smiths bitter, Newcastle Brown then I would drop the black malt altogether. I haven't used it yet so take my views with a pinch of salt but I have used crystal and know how much this changes stuff and I would be worried about using such a large quantity of black malt if I wasn't aiming for a very dark and 'smoky' beer.

[WishboneBrewery]

Having looked over the recipe, that's a lot of black malt. Ironically it's one ingredient that I have in stock but haven't dared to use yet.

Use it!!

I did this a bit back and its matured up to be very nice, not at all burnt but rounded and smooth. I'm going to do the same recipe with Choc Malt to see the difference. Using 100g in a 12L batch has given me the confidence to push it a bit further, so 130 in 23L should be pretty good.

AG#14 – Black Promise

Fermentables:
Golden Promise 1880g
Wheat Malt 260g
Black Malt 100g
Crystal Malt 100g

Hops:
Northdown 60 mins 5g (FWH)
Whitbread Golding 60 mins 5g (FWH)
Fuggle 60 mins 5g (FWH)
Whitbread Golding 20 mins 20g
Home Grown Fuggle 10 mins 21g

Final Volume: 12 Litres
Original Gravity: 1.044
Final Gravity: 1.012
Alcohol Content: 4.1% ABV
Total Liquor: 18.5 Litres
Mash Liquor: 5.9 Litres
Mash Efficiency: 75 %
Bitterness: 36 EBU
Colour: 86 EBC

[Mitchamitri]

Just, if its your first ag you are going to want to drink it asap - that much black malt will give a burnt flavour unless you give it a good few weeks conditioning.....

[FlourPower]

Hmm well I have a lot of stouts and kriek sitting around the house to drink while I wait for this to mature. So I think I'll follow the recipe (seeing as OP is very dark anyway) but if this goes well might experiment with changing the ingrdient ratios at a later date.

Thanks for the advice.

[lancsSteve]

Have you seen the other recipes/discussion here on Jims?

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=13523

[FlourPower]

Well I brewed today. Changed the recipe to one of the other ones on that thread and reduced to a 20l brew as I didn't have enough Pale malt

I think all went well. Chard popped in to see how we were messing up!

Some questions after my popping my AG cherry.

Should it bleed this....I mean...

How long should I take on the second batch sparge? I did the first batch for 75 minutes then wasn't sure how long the second batch should take? Erm well thats the main question for now I think.

[Parva]

I think you're getting confused. You mash the grains for anywhere between 60 and 90 minutes (usually). Batch sparging is simply a case of topping up the mash with batch 1 (as per my instructions in the post linked further up), stir and leave for 10 minutes. This is then run off to the boiler (first couple of jug fulls recirculated first) then you top up with your batch no.2 addition, stir, leave for 10 minutes then run this off to the boiler and then you're good to go.

[dave-o]

Yes i used to make that mistake at first - missing out the mashout.

For 4-5 kilo grain bills, and a 23l eventual batch size, i go 13-7-13. That's:
13 litres - Initial mash
7 litres - Added to initial mash after steeping for mashout
13 litres - Sparge

This always seems to work out about right.

[Parva]

Glad to help anyway FlourPower. Good luck with your brewing.

[FlourPower]

Thanks!

Yeah I went with

15l Initial
6l Mashout
then 13l

I just didn't know how long to leave that bit.

I got a fair amount out of it. Filled my FV and half a demi-john. However in the time it took me to find and steralise an airlock for the demijohn something other than yeast decided to colonise my demijohn. However the first bucket load smells fantastic.