Bassett Street Amber - Our First Attempt at Brewing Beer

2-22-14

Bassett Street Amber

First we washed everything. It’s really, really important.  Really.  And we had to test our stovetop to make sure it could handle the boil.  For this batch (since we’re using a kit and not buying our individual ingredients from the local home brew store) we’re following the directions…behaving ourselves…although I’m already thinking about possible infusing ideas.

And just as I typed that, Tyler (our mentor) asked if we’d like to stray from the recipe a bit and divide the hop addition to pull back on the bittering and add to the flavor and aroma.  Um…okay.

So it looks like our pot’s gonna boil!  It’s a good thing because the alternative is a big ol’ propane burner – think like you’d use to fry a turkey – that Tyler brought over.  I’m sure our landlord would be happy that the pot will boil, too. 

While we were waiting for the pot to boil, we had a little vertical tasting: Victory Old Horizontal.  Tyler brought a 2009 and a 2013.  Nice way to spend time while boiling the water. 

We finally got to a good boil and (because we were just testing and used tap water) we dumped the boiling water over the can of malt (hopped amber) extract to soften the syrup.

Three gallons of Eldorado bottled water (the third best water in the world, according to the guys at Stranahan’s Distillary  – it’s the water they use) go into the pot and we begin the real boil.  Bring to a 165°. 

We bought hop bags and grain bags.  The big bags are for the grains, the small ones are hop bags…they’re gauze bags that keep the demerits out of the boil.  Once the water reaches 165, we drop the pound and a quarter of malt into the pot and let it steep for 30 to 45 minutes (there is no too long).

The malt we used for this batch:

.75 lbs English Medium

.25 lbs English Brown

.25 lbs Belgian aromatic

Tyler chose these malts from an earlier batch he liked.  He and Joe bought the grain and course ground them at the store.

We steeped the grain bag at between 150° and 165°.  Too cold is okay, too hot is bad.

After 35 minutes we took out the grain bag.  Raise the bag above the liquid and let it drain out…do not squeeze…squeezing invites the flavors off your hands.

Return the liquid to a boil.  By this time our kitchen smells like a strong tea brewing.  A little like tea and a little like the smell of a brewery tour.  We’re on the right track.  Once it got back to a boil, we added the liquid extract, stirring so it didn't wind up on the bottom of the pot and scorch.  After the pot began to boil again, we added the dry extract.

When the pot once again began to boil, we added our first bag of hops.  For our first add, we used Cascade hops. 

So here’s the thing: hops additions fall into three categories: bittering, flavor, and aroma.  If the hops has a high alpha acid percentage, the more bitter flavor it will impart.  The lower the percentage, the less bitter it is.  So if you shooting for a bitter hoppy beer, you’d look for the higher percentage and you’d boil the shit out of it.  If you’d like a more flavorful, aromatic beer, plan on  many later additions.  Whatever you add in the later additions will add flavor no matter what, but a short boil of a high percentage hop will still add bitterness, but it’ll be negligible. 

After I dropped in the hop bag, we set the timer for 50 minutes.  It’s really starting to smell like bakery…the wort aroma is taking over our kitchen.

We stirred the wort a couple of times during this boil just to check the bottom (to make sure nothing was sticking).

It was about now that we rehydrated the yeast.  We sanitized my Pyrex 2-cup measuring cup and added a cup of Eldorado water.  You dump in the yeast – don’t stir – and cover it with aluminum foil so nothing will fall into the cup.  Let it set until you’re ready to use.

We filled one of the 5 gallon barrels with sanitizer and dropped in the thermometer, the funnel and the rest of our “tools” so we wouldn't infect the beer.  We bought StarSan  - it’s a no rinse sanitizer…and, apparently a little bit of sanitizer in your beer doesn't hurt it at all.

At the 50 minutes mark, we added a second hopping (or late addition).  This addition consisted of a pinch of Irish Moss (helps keep the sediment at the bottom of the barrel instead of floating around in your brew), some Cascade hops and some Citra hops.  This late addition…we’re only going to boil for 10 minutes. 

The total boil time should be 60 minutes or longer…additional hops should be boiled for only 10 or 15 minutes…you really want to boil the bittering hops for 30 minutes (and plus), but the additional hops should be shorter so that you keep the flavor in the beer…so 10 to 15 minutes max for each.

At the appointed hour, we took the two hop bags out of the pot and moved the beer from the stove into the sink and into an ice bath…we need to cool the beer to 75°.

Once the beer cooled, it was time to dump into the fermenting bucket (primary).  Be sure to aerate the beer - you can aggressively pour the beer into the bucket or just give the bucket a good shake - it gets that yeast hungry and working.

Next, we added three gallons of Eldorado water to the fermenter bucket.  The goal is to end up with 5 gallons (you lose some in the grain bag, in the evaporation, in the transfer, etc.).

We pulled the pot out of the ice bath and dried off the sides so no water dripped into the bucket, and poured the luscious liquid into the fermenter bucket using a huge funnel that had a tight mesh screen at the bottom. Almost instantly it clogged up.  We quickly sanitized a plastic spatula (30 seconds) and began to drag it gently across the screen pulling the clog to one side so the liquid could pass through.

Once it was all in, we added the yeast and gave the bucket a bit of a shake.  We dropped the floating hydrometer into the batch (after sanitizing).  The hydrometer measures the gravity (how much sugar content the beer has).  You measure before fermentation and after…the difference between the numbers shows you how much sugar was converted to alcohol…it helps you calculate the ABV.  We were right on target at 1.044.  

We popped the bucket top on and put the airlock in the available hole.  And we’re done.  By tomorrow, we should see the bubbles in the airlock (which tells us the fermentation process is working).

I’m sure I've left out some steps in this narrative…we were drinking and learning.  But, in about 18 days, we’ll bottle this shit up.  Stay tuned!