McEwans No 1 Champion (With Pics)

[DC]

Hi all, I have decided to have a go at brewing a McEwans No 1 Champion clone after recently becoming quite found of this beer. I Got the Golden Promise pale malt for the base malt from a local brewery and ordered the speciality grains & hops from the Malt Miller (Cheers Rob). I was hoping to hit the OG gravity of 1079 which should work out as 7.3% but I only ended up with an OG of 1070 so it won’t be as strong as I was hoping it to turn out.
Recipe:
6.6 Kg Golden Promise (Pale Malt)
283 g Torrified Wheat
226 g Crystal Malt
57 g Roasted Barley
28 g Peated Malt
226 g Lyles’ Golden Syrup

35 g East Kent Goldings 5.85% AA (90 mins boil)
7 g Styrian Goldings (Bobek) 5.1% AA (Last 15 mins)
7 g German Hallertau Hersbrucker 4.13% AA (Last 15 mins)
1 Protafloc Tablet

White Labs Edinburgh Ale Yeast WLP028

Grain shot


1st Time using a White Labs Yeast


Doughed in


1st Runnings


Getting to the boil


Late Hop addition standing by


Cooling water ready to use


Ended up with OG 1070 should have been 1079


Tucked up for fermenting at 23°


Cheers DC

[fordpopular]

Looks great, I plan to do this myself once all my equipment is sorted
will be interested to find out how it turns out

[jimp2003]

Looks good. I really like this beer so it will be interesting to see how it turns out.

It appears from the pics that you did not make a starter of the yeast - if you didn't you might have to keep an eye on the fermentation...

Jim

[StrangeBrew]

Very nice colour in the sample jar and loving the levitating orange sieve!

[DC]

@Jimp2003 Your right I didnt make a starter as I didnt get around too it, and the instructions said you can pitch straight into the wort without making a starter so it just went into the wort after a good stir. Came home from work today and was greeted by this below

Who needs a starter


Best get cleaning, the wort has escaped the FV (yet again)


Cheers DC

[jimp2003]

Now that's the kind of mess I don't mind clearing up.

[borischarlton]

Your lower than expected efficiency could have come from the crush of the pale malt. Most brewery's use a much courser crush than home brewers need, just put extra in next brew.

Rob

[alfie09]

were is the water coming from under ground or is that a sewer?

[DC]

@ Alfie09, The water is coming from a pit in my garage (used for fixing cars) but there is a brook/stream which runs underground down the back of our street and the water seeps into the pit from there I used to pump it out every so often to get rid of the water but then thought I can use that large supply of very cold water to cool my wort on brew days

Cheers DC

[DC]

BUMP

Hey all, I was searching in my garage last weekend for something and came across this it will be 4 years old on the 8th December ! Totally forgot it was there I am going to Crack it open at the weekend and see if its Drinkable got a few small bottles so might share it out with a few of my Beer Tasters (providing its drinkable). Will post on how it tastes once ive opened it ! Fingers crossed



Cheers DC

[Hanglow]

Well good luck with drinking it Might still be fine

sadly Champion has gone down hill since Charlie Wells started brewing it.

[Phoenix]

Resurrecting an old thread.
Next up is a McEwans Champion my first attempt at this.
Anyone brewed this recently?
My recipe is pretty much same as DC's but with 100g smoked malt, is this too much?
I'll mash at 68C for this full bodied beer.
Any ideas on water profile given that originally it was brewed in Edinburgh.
Although sadly I think it is all brewed in Bedford now under Marstons.