If you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, you might have seen the brew-day post.
This is my first time brewing since I got the Skadoosh Blond Ale (Batch 386) batch done.
As I mentioned in SheppyBrew 2025 Year End Brewing Stats, I only brewed 95 gallons last year. I was actually planning on brewing this batch before the end of the year, but the timing just never really worked out.
So, I finally brewed it last Sunday.
If I'm counting correct, this is my 387th batch of beer in my brewing career and my 101st batch of beer in my Anvil Foundry ...
I picked the name Hop-cember when I thought I was going to brew this in December. I thought maybe I'd change the name when that December brew day didn't happen, but I decided to keep the name.
It is technically a hoppy lager, although stylistically it might be closer to a "Cold IPA". The BJCP doesn't have "Cold IPA" in its guidelines yet, so I'm just calling it a Pale Ale brewed with lager yeast.
I came up with the recipe as sort of a tribute to Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale ... maybe how I wish that beer was brewed.
Regardless, I got started brewing on Sunday morning. I had made a starter on Saturday, but didn't do any other preparation, so I didn't really get the mash started until just after 6:30 am.
This works great for my SOP of using my time going to church to heat up the wort from mash temperature to just below boiling so that I can get started pretty quickly after returning.
I also smoked up some Chuck Roast for a few hours while brewing.
I actually intended to get started on the Chuck a little earlier, but sort of forgot my intensions. Luckily, it turned out fine even with the late start.
My pre-boil gravity was a bit low, but my volume was a bit high, so I ended up boiling a little longer to adjust the gravity.
As it turns out, my OG was right on plan.
The boil went as planned. I got the Chuck Roast off the kettle and into a crock-pot after about 3 hours of smoking.
"Bittering" hops didn't go in until 20 minutes left in the boil. The rest of the hops went in as a "hop stand".
For my hop "hop stands" I don't usually bother cooling the wort at all, but this time, I did use the wort chiller to bring the wort down.
My intention was to bring the temperature down to 180-ish, but after only a couple of minutes, the temperature was down to 150ish.
I just went with it.
The aroma hops stayed in the hop spider for 15 minutes before I chilled the wort down the rest of the way.
I got the wort chilled down into the 50's. The yeast starter was pitched and into the basement by noon.
I set up my cooling system to keep the temperature in the high-50's, and fermentation took off before the end of the day.
I had issues with the cooling pump coming off the tubing, so the wort wasn't really cooled over that first night. But, it didn't rise too far. Fermentation seems to have been going very well.
I'll be drinking this in a couple of weeks. Chances are good you'll be able to read how I like it at some point either on this blog and/or on the website and/or social media.
The chuck roast was wonderful.
As always keep watching the regular SheppyBrew Channels to see what is happening with my BBQ, Beer, Biking: SheppyBrew's Facebook Page; Sheppy's Twitter Feed; SheppyBrew's Instagram Page; and SheppyBrew's Website.Of course, don't forget to visit this blog often as well!
No comments:
Post a Comment