Western Sydney Brewers

A bunch of us brewers in Western Sydney have started the Western Sydney Brewers club. We had our first get together at Paddy’s Brewery on Saturday 28th June 2009  which was a huge success. Details can be found at http://groups.google.com.au/group/western-sydney-brewers?hl=en

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Brew No.25 – Golden Ale

1st June 2009 – The new batch of Amarillo hops have arrived in Australia from the US so what better time to jump in and brew a nice Golden Ale using 100% Amarillo hops. This is also a good opportunity to try out my slightly smaller Boiler that I bought a few weeks ago…so…

• 3.6 kg Joe White Pilsner Malt
• 0.7kg Joe White Wheat Mallt
• 0.2kg Weyermann Caramunich I
• 20g Amarillo Hops @ 45 min
• 20g Amarillo Hops @ 5 min
• 20g Amarillo Hops @ 0 min
• 1 Whirfloc tablet @ 10 min
• Safale US05 – American Ale Yeast

Mashed with 16L of water at 72deg which settled at 62deg in the Mash.I wanted 64-65 so dumped in 1.5L boiling water which got me to 64 deg.  Mashed for an hour and a half .

Drained and sparged with extra 13.5L of water at 76deg. OG was 1.041 before the boil

Boiled for around 10 min in kettle till hot break (bloody huge, almost boiled over!) then for another hour with hop addition as above.

Transferred to 20L cube after flameout for no-chill.  Not surprisingly, I was  bit off due to a new boiler. This coupled with lack of pick up tube gave me a little less in the actual cube.

2 June 2009 – It’s getting pretty cold here, so threw the cube in the fermenting fridge in the morning to get up to 19 deg, then pitched tonight with a rehydrated yeast

8 June 2009 - Dry hopped with 20g of Amarillo….mmmm tastes so good I could eat them!

15 June 2009 – Man I really dicked this one up tonight. Cut a long story short I ended up with 1/3 of the brew on the garage floor and most probably infected the brew….any way whats left is bottled and we’ll see how we go.

28 June 2009 – very surprised, no infection and masses of flavour and aroma from the Amarillo. Quite a lot of carbonation as I lost some of the brew while bulk priming therefore using too much sugar. A pretty good beer

Brew No.24 – Australian Pale Ale

11th May 2009 – Probably cheating to call this a new brew, but I pitched the second half of the Aussie Pale Ale Double Batch in the fermenter this evening. It has been resting in the cube while waiting for the ESB to ferment out (patience grasshopper).

I started the yeast about 6 days ago, again using the dregs from 2 coopers bottles. Because of the cold weather it seemed to still be fermenting which is ideal so pitched her straight in at about 16 deg and straight into the fermenting fridge set at 19Deg.

12 May 2009 – Bit of a lag this time, took almost 24 hours but seems to be off and running. Keep our fingers crossed….

25 May 2009 – Bulk primed to 3 volumes and bottled into champagne bottles. Smells good!

12 June 2009 – mmmm…bit drier and cleaner than the first half of the batch. Or maybe its just that its my first beer on a friday after work!

Brew No.23 – English Special Bitter

OG: 1.056
FG: 1.014
alc: 5.5% 

18th April 2009 – Thought I would brew something a little bit different today, inspired by the great traditional English brews on offer at the Red Oak (www.redoak.com.au). I also had some of the upcoming Australian brewing comps in mind when deciding on this beer. Anyhow here is what it looked like:

• 4.15 kg Marris Otter Pale Malt (UK)
• 0.25kg Caramalt
• 0.1kg Dark Crystal Malt
• 60g East Kent Goldings Hops @ 45 min (instead of 60 min – accounting for no chill)
• 30g East Kent Goldings Hops @ 0 min
• 1 Whirfloc tablet @ 10 min
• Safale s04 – English Ale Yeast

Mashed with 16L of water at 73deg which settled at 66deg in the Mash. Mashed for an hour and a half dropping to 64deg at 90 min.

Drained and sparged with extra 18.5L of water at 76deg. OG was a little low at 1.041 so added 300g of LDME to bring to target of 1.046 (shhh..don’t tell anyone)

Boiled for around 10 min in kettle till hot break then for another hour with hop addition as above. 

Transferred to 20L cube after flameout for no-chill.  Seem to have a little more than usual into cube, prob due to less vigorous boil.

26th April 2009 – pitched into fermentor with well hydrated yeast. Took off within a few hours at held at 20deg.

9th May 2009 - Bulk primed and bottled into Champagne bottles

23rd May 2009 – drinking quite well, and quite a malty brew which is not surprising considering the grain bill. Maybe a touch too malty for me, but true to style none the less. I will definately hold on to a few of these for competitions this year

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Those that have been here before (c’mon some of you must come back!) will notice the new format to this site. I have gone with something nice and simple….a little like me I hope you like it, please let me know!

6th All Grain (22) – Aussie Pale Ale (Double Batch)

5th April 2009 – I have been promising a few of my mates they could help brew a batch, so today was the day. There were four of us, so what better time to brew a double batch….besides needing two pots for the HLT everything fitted in nicely and the day went off without a hitch.

Since all these guys managed to polish off my stash of Aussie Pale a few weeks ago, I knew this was a beer all of us would appreciate. I designed the recipe to be slightly concentrated and fit into two 15L cubes. At ferment 4L of water will be added.

Recipe as follows:

• 7.2 kg Pilsner Malt
• 1kg Wheat Malt
• 300g Caramalt (50EBC)
• 70g POR @ 60 min
• 1 Whirfloc tablet @ 10 min
• Coopers Pale yeast

Mashed with 27L of water at 68deg which came out at spot on 62deg. Mashed for an hour and a half with no drop in temp.

Drained and sparged with extra 27.5L of water at 78deg. 

Boiled for around 10 min in kettle till hot break then for another hour with hop addition as above. 

Transferred to two 15L cubes after flameout for no-chill

12th April 2009 – transferred to fermentor and pitched with starter from 2 stubbies of Coopers Pale Ale. Was going off in a matter hours!

26th April 2009 – Bulk primed and bottled in champagne bottles

9th May 2009 – Not a bad drop, perhaps a little green still due to the cold weather. Certainly some more banana esters coming through, perhaps from a slightly warmer ferment or even some stressed yeast….although this does seem to be a feature of the coopers yeast.

5th All Grain (22) – Jamil’s American Pale Ale (APA)

 

14 March 2009 - I bought the fantastic book, Brewing Classic Styles recently by Jamil Zainasheff  & John Palmer. This brew I am trying out Jamil’s award winning APA. It has some interesting ingredients and lots of different hops so should be a bit of fun. Got the grain from Pat at Absolute Homebrew (after an hour of beer chat and a lovely wheat beer ) Recipe as follows:

• 4 kg Ale Malt
• 250g Amber Malt
• 250g Munich Malt
• 250g Wheat Malt
• 25g Horizon @ 60 min
• 10g Centennial @ 10 min
• 10g Cascade @10 min
• 15g Centennial @ 0 min
• 15g Cascade @ 0 min
• 1/2 Whirfloc tablet @ 10 min
• US05 (cheaper one from Craftbrewer anyway)

Mashed with 18L of water at 74deg which came out at spot on 67deg. Mashed for an hour with no drop in temp.

Drained and sparged with extra 18L of water at 78deg. Ended up with a little under 28L in Kettle after drain stopped.

Boiled for around 10 min in kettle till hot break then for another hour with hop additions as above. 

Transferred to 20L cube after flameout for no-chill. Should stay here for about a week while I wait for the IPA to ferment out…

26 March 2009 - Bugger, realised I didn’t have any yeast a few days ago and took until today to get to Daves Home Brew to pick up a US05. Pitched after hydration and was off like a cracker by the morning.

OG: 1.052
FG: 1.012
alc: 5.2% 

11 April 2009 - Finally had a chance to bottle today after 16 days in the fermenter. Well and truly done & cleared. Interestingly I took a swig from the fermenter and couldn’t taste much at all, certainly no hops anyway. Not sure if this had anything to do with the IPA’s I had been drinking all afternoon

21 April 2009 – Very well balanced beer, not so full of hops as previous APA’s. In fact maybe some dry hop in the fermentor (slightly) would be nice to add a little more aroma.

Has a great biscuity malt backbone, very similar to Murray’s Nirvana which I think is coming from the amber malt…very nice

4th All Grain (21) – American India Pale Ale (AIPA)

1 March 2009 - My thirst for hops is starting to get unhealthy. I really am enjoying these highly hopped American Style beers, so this leaves me no choice but to brew an American IPA. Recipe as follows:

• 5.5 kg Pilsner Malt
• 250g Crystal (40EBC)
• 250g Munich Malt
• 30g Horizon @ 60 min
• 25g Centennial @ 10 min
• 25g Simcoe @ 5 min
• 30g Amarillo @ 0 min
• 1 Whirfloc tablet @ 10 min
• US05 (well the cheaper one from Craftbrewer anyway)

Mashed with 18L of water at 72deg which came out at spot on 65deg. Mashed for an hour with no drop in temp.

Drained and sparged with extra 18L of water at 78deg. Ended up with a little under 28L in Kettle after drain stopped.

Boiled for around 10 min in kettle till hot break then for another hour with hop additions as above. 

Transferred to 20L cube after flameout for no-chill and was a perfect volume, this time leaving a little over in the kettle to try and leave as much break behind as possible.

I still have another week to go in the fermenter with the Aussie PA, so this one will sit in the cube for a week or so.

8 March 2009 – Added to carboy and pitched yeast 250ml rehydration at about 24deg and brought down to 19 deg over the next few hours in fermentation fridge. Yeast took off pretty quickly in about 12 – 18 hours with awesome high krausen and the “bloop bloop” going nuts!

13 March 2009 – Added 25g of late Amarillo – mmmm they smell great. Still has a good Krausen and bubbling away in the fermenter.

23 March 2009 - Finally got around to bottling after a little over 2 weeks. Sneaked a little taste….mmmmm..much smoother than I thought and at a little under 7.1% alc. thats gonna be dangerous. for interest sake the OG was 1.065 and FG 1.011.

1 April 2009 – Holy crap, chilled a long neck this afternoon as wanted to see how this was going after a little over a week in the bottle. This was stunning! beautiful citrus notes on the nose and already this is balanced and sexy as, at over 7%. This was my first dry hop with all grain and I don’t think I will ever not do this again with an American style beer…..just great…..this is so exciting my beer really is going from strength to strength at the moment….woo hoo!!!!!!!!!!

11 April 2009 - this is mothers milk. I reckon the hop aroma is fading a little now but just great all the same. Only two bottles left which I will neck tomorrow during Easter lunch

3rd All Grain (20) – Aussie Pale Ale

22 February 2009 - Time to brew the Aussie pale, using of course the coopers yeast made up from last week. Recipe as follows:

• 4 kg Pilsner Malt
• 150g Crystal (40EBC)
• 35g POR @ 60 min
• 1/2 Whirfloc tablet @ 10 min
• Coopers Pale yeast (see previous post)

Mashed with 14L of water at 68deg which came out at spot on 62deg. Mashed for an hour with no drop in temp.

Drained and sparged with extra 18L of water at 78deg. Same as last batch, ended up with a little under 26L in Kettle after drain stopped. (Next time I will use an extra 2 L in HLT to make sure I don’t bring as much break material over to the cube from the kettle.

Boiled for around 10 min in kettle till hot break then for another hour with hop additions as above. 

Transferred to 20L cube after flameout for no-chill and was a perfect volume.

Added to glass fermentor the next day and pitched yeast from 1L starter (whole flask) at about 23deg and brought down to 19 deg over the next few hours.

24th February 2009 – Bloody hell its only been 12 hours and this yeast is going banana’s!!! looks like a damn washing machine in there….check out the video below…

8th March 2009 - Bottled today with a target carbonation of 3 volumes…pretty high I know but this is how they carb the real Coopers. Had a taste out of the hydrometer tube (1.005 by the way) and this tastes great already

17th March 2009 - mmm…9 days in the bottle and I’m liking this alot. Maybe a slight banana taste coming through but it’s still early days.

22nd March 2009 - It’s my birthday today and had some friends over for dinner. Bastards almost drank the whole bloody lot! 3 bottles left, and only cause I hid them at the back of the garage! Needless to say this was drinking very nicely….