How much Crystal

[barry44]

Gents,

im planning a clone of the brewdog 'Hoppy Christmas' and as such i am looking for opinions of how much crystal to add.

The brewsheet has an OG of 1.067 using pale, cara and dark crystal.

The ABV is 7.2. What percentage of crystal do you reckon is used at this strength? 5%? More?

I had one last night and i could taste the crystal without it being overpowering.

Also, it will be a 22 litre brew, would i get away with one sachet of US-05 or should i use 2 at this OG?

Cheers,

Barry

[LeeH]

Can be cheeky and steel your recipe?

[barry44]

http://beersmithrecipes.com/viewrecipe/ ... ear-forty4

there you go.

[LeeH]

Thanks Barry.

Isn't beer smith good!

[barry44]

I really like it. Any ides how much crystal I should uses??

[barry44]

That's 6.6kg of Maris otter, 400g of both carapils and Pale crystal in the bucket ready for tomorrow morning.

[jaroporter]

i had this beer last year so i dunno if it's the same recipe but it was decent. but as far as the yeast goes, i'd definitely use two packets. you might get away with one, but it'll be done quicker and cleaner with two, and ready to drink sooner! definitely like to hear how ya get on..

[barry44]

Thanks mate. I'll use the 2 packets.

What do you reckon the cut off, og wise, is for 1 sachet of yeast?

[jaroporter]

dunno really, i've just recently tried pitching at around 1g/L (as recommended by danstar i think, not neccessarily fermentis also) when using 05 (for anything that ain't super strong), and i'm getting a much quicker and cleaner ferment than when i just pitched one. still had some decent beers when i used to pitch one pack 05, but generally after a good conditioning time. my latest american porter at something like 1,055-60 OG is perfect after a week or so! had some horribly peachy 05 beers in the past too from underpitching.. i can't say anything more technical than i know fermentation is the key to a good beer and two packs seems to have made a big difference to the beers i've made recently.

[barry44]

I'm going to rehydrate a packet for the first time tomorrow and try that.

[barry44]

Brewed this today.

Was above pre boil and on the button post.

I hoped I might've seen the efficiency increase that I had in the last brew but I'm stuck at 63.5%

[barry44]

Brewed this today.

Was above pre boil and on the button post.

I hoped I might've seen the efficiency increase that I had in the last brew but I'm stuck at 63.5%

I had 7.4kg of grain in the mash and sparged twice with 7.2l of water.

Although I gave it a good stir both times, I assume that the fact that not all of the grain was submerged by the sparge water may have dropped the efficiency somewhat.

I will try the thin mash and three sparge method on a smaller grain bill to see what I get there.

[charliemartin]

Barry,
It's quite normal to see a reduced efficiency when brewing a higher gravity beer. You are not extracting all the sugars from the grains. That is why some people do two beers from the same grain bill. A "big" beer and a "small" beer. I wouldn't worry too much about your efficiency on this one.

Cheers,
Charliemartin

[barry44]

Thanks Charlie.