Spiced Ale

[Ingieuk]

Well I'm just waiting for the wort to cool before pitching.

Took a couple of photos on my phone:



Ingredients ready to go in the boiler

I wouldn't say it was an uneventful brew. It's only my 2nd Extract brew, so I did make mistakes!

I left the tap on my fermenter OPEN as i was running the hot wort into it, one or two litres of wort on the floor, nice and sticky!

Also I didn't put the spices in a muslin bag as I thought they would just drop to the bottom when the boil was over, not so. They just blocked the tap on the boiler.

The tap also wouldn't open after the boil (metal screw thread) having been closed for a couple of days and then heated, took a beating with the other end of a wisk to jarr the threads apart.


However I do have some wort cooling and it smells damn good. Speaking of cooling, i have used current weather conditions to my advantage:



Snow powered wort cooler!

Seemed a shame to waste all the snow so I grabbed a lasagne dish and scooped some up.

[dave-o]

That's lateral thinking with the snow!

If it makes you feel any better, everyone who's been brewing for any length of time has left the receptacle tap open and lost some liquid at some time or another. A common "doh!" moment i reckon.

I haven't had a problem with spices sticking in the tap. What do you use to stop the hops?

Oh and did you take a sneaky taste of the wort? Have the spices come through?

[Ingieuk]

I haven't had a problem with spices sticking in the tap. What do you use to stop the hops?

...err...well...nothing actually The last brew I did (and this one) I put the hops in muslin bags. I hoped for this one the gratings of ginger would be small enough to pass through the tap and get caught by the sieve before the FV; it worked up to a point. However I didn't realise how fibrous the center of ginger is, it all matted together like hair in a plug hole. I got all I could out mind using my trusty bulb baster.

I'm thinking of making a hop filter, I havn't up to now as the tap on my Burco doesn't have an obvious way to attach any pipe to it, also the filter would be about an inch above the big element, would this be okay?

Yeah I had a sneaky taste - was good! You can't taste the individual spices, its sort of a cinnamon/clove hybrid with a hint of ginger. Maybe I should have put a little more ginger in.

Spice wise I used:

4 Cinnamon Sticks (short)
8 Cloves (they were tiny didn't look that powerful)
96g Root ginger (just the size of piece I bought, seemed a shame to throw the rest away)
for an 11.5l brew.

Though I suspect I have under adjusted for the water lost during the poil as my OG has come out at 1.052 so it's going to be a little stronger i suspect.

I also used some infamous S-04 yeast (!) I've heard lots about it but never used it, I'm expecting good things!

[trucker5774]

You shold be able to taste the cloves ....I used 8 crushed in 23L

[Ingieuk]

The Yeast is cracking on! Good 3 inch head of foam with brown patches on it. I must have overfilled the airlock as most of the water has been blown out! Its gurgling well, once every 10 seconds or so.

Suffice to say, S-04 has impressed me so far!

[dave-o]

I'm thinking of making a hop filter, I havn't up to now as the tap on 1) my Burco doesn't have an obvious way to attach any pipe to it, also 2) the filter would be about an inch above the big element, would this be okay?

Well comparing tio mine;

1) The pipe which goes into the internal tap output is just a piece of plastic tubing that narrows so it can be pushed in tightly. I would think this would be possible with any type of tap.

2) Well, mine goes below the element. Is your element very low down, touching the bottom?

[trucker5774]

I'm thinking of making a hop filter, I havn't up to now as the tap on 1) my Burco doesn't have an obvious way to attach any pipe to it, also 2) the filter would be about an inch above the big element, would this be okay?

Well comparing tio mine;

1) The pipe which goes into the internal tap output is just a piece of plastic tubing that narrows so it can be pushed in tightly. I would think this would be possible with any type of tap.

2) Well, mine goes below the element. Is your element very low down, touching the bottom?

The Burco is likely to have a "dip" where the walls of the boiler meet the base. It is common to run a filter around this area which gets it nice and low all around the central element. There are plenty of posts on here. My filter tube is just jammed into the tap with 2 sizes of plastic tube inside each other for a tight fit.

[Ingieuk]

1) The pipe which goes into the internal tap output is just a piece of plastic tubing that narrows so it can be pushed in tightly. I would think this would be possible with any type of tap.

2) Well, mine goes below the element. Is your element very low down, touching the bottom

1) Good idea, that will work perfectly fine with my burco

2) Yeah my element is maybe 2-3 mm off the bottom of the burco, in which case...

The Burco is likely to have a "dip" where the walls of the boiler meet the base. It is common to run a filter around this area which gets it nice and low all around the central element. There are plenty of posts on here. My filter tube is just jammed into the tap with 2 sizes of plastic tube inside each other for a tight fit.

I'm not sure the dip is present on mine, I think the base is all flat with a slight curve up to the cylindrical walls, I shall have a check though. A circular strainer sounds like a good idea, 1mm holes on the underside? What happens when the fluid level drops below the tap, up till now I have been able to tip the remaining wort out (avoiding trub if at all possible)?

Thanks,
Happy Christmas!

[trucker5774]

The tap level is not a problem. Just fix a length of tube to the tap (even better if you can then step it down a size) make sure the end of the tube is well below the boiler floor and the syphonic effect will drain it for you!