Category Archives: Czech

November 15, 2016 hommel Leave a comment

Beer 6 of 12 for my Skirmish in the Triad run of beers. I’m now beginning to question my sanity 🙂 Half way there and I feel like every night I’m doing something beer related. Or at least that’s what my wife keeps telling me! For NHC this year I have 7 beers planned and i’ll send the best of those and i’m brewing all of those for the skirmish so i can get a dry run in and get feedback and make some adjustments. My first Best of Show was with a Czech Pale Lager so I thought I’d give it’s darker cousin a try. It’s a new style to the BJCP 2015 guidelines and a bit hard to dig up any example recipes. The best I found were in Gordon Strong’s Modern Homebrew Recipes. There are two and after going through the guidelines I picked the one that is similar to U Flek and then messed with it a bit.

Recipe Info

Recipe: czech dark ebiab 1
Style: Czech Dark Lager 3D BJCP 2015
Date: 08-14-2016

	Recipe	Guideline Min	Guideline Max
OG	1.050	1.044	1.060
FG	1.010	1.013	1.017
Color	29.1	14.0	35.0
ABV	5.2	4.4	5.8
IBU	29.0	18.0	34.0

Brewery Info

Efficiency: 70 %
Attenuation: 80 %

Mash Info

Weight: 13.125 Lbs
Thickness: 1.96 Qt per Lb
Deadspace: 2.5 G
Strikewater: 8.93 G
Volume: 9.98 G
Temp: 131.0 F

Boil Info

Kettle Gravity: 1.042
Predicted Mash Run-off: 7.75 G
Target Starting Boil Volume: 7.75 G
Boil Duration: 60 min
Evaporation Rate: 1.25 G per Hour
Final Boil Volume: 6.5 G

Fermentables

Weight	% by Weight	Name	Yield	SRM
6.500 Lb	50.0 %	Pilsen (BestMälz)	78.3	1.5
4.000 Lb	30.0 %	Munich (BestMälz)	76.1	7.6
2.000 Lb	15.0 %	Caramunich III (Weyermann)	73.0	56.8
0.625 Lb	5.0 %	Carafa Special III (Weyermann)	65.0	525.5

Hops

Weight	Name	AAU	Time	Use	IBUs
0.7 Oz	Magnum	12.0	60 mins	Boil	26.0
1.0 Oz	Saaz	3.8	5 mins	Boil	2.0

Yeast

Amount	Name
1.000 unit	Czech Budejovice Lager White Labs WLP802

Misc

Amount	Name	Time	Use
1.000 tablet	Whirlfloc Tablet	15 mins	Boil
0.500 tsp	Yeast Nutrient (Wyeast)	10 mins	Boil

Water

Predicted Mash Ph: 5.38

	Ca	Mg	Na	Cl	So	Bicarbonate
Water	7	3	21	11	24	46
Mash	71	3	21	124	24	46
Sparge	0	0	0	0	0	0
Final	98	4	29	172	33	64
Target	75	0	0	0	0	0

Mash Water

Total Water Treated: 9.000 G
Percent RO / Distlled: 0 %
Water Used: 9.000 G

Mash Water Adjustments

Calcium Chloride: 8.0 g

Sparge Water

Leftover Mash Water Used: Yes
Total Water Treated: 0.000 G
Percent RO / Distlled: 0 %
Water Used: 0.000 G

Sparge Water Adjustments

Notes

Mash

131f 15 mins
147f 30 mins
158f 30 mins
168f 10 mins

8/23/16 1.5L start of WLP800 (they didn’t have 802)
8/25/16 normal brewday but used new colorado brewing system’s hard sided basket. went well. og a hair high. wort does look a bit clearer in the fermenter.
8/26/16 @ 8am thin kreusen and slow bubbling started
8/27/16 thin kreusen and steady bubbling
8/28/16 1/4″ kreusen and steady bubbling
8/29/16 ditto
9/3/16 ~5 sec between bubbles
9/4/16 ditto
9/5/16 ditto
9/8/16 looks done
9/15/16 moved to keg to lager FG 1.016 pH 4.34
tasting really good. nice dark malt character. nice hop character. clean lager. clarity is bad but thats expected. very promising.
10/9/16 gelatin added
10/11/16 racked to serving keg

i really like this beer. i don’t have a good example to compare it to but it is a nice beer. judges seemed to like it at the skirmish in the triad where it placed 2nd.

Czech Pale Lager eBIAB 2

February 8, 2016 hommel Leave a comment

My third NHC beer. Very similar to my first attempt at this beer but I went with all Weyermann malts this time and upped the Saaz by 50% in the 10 min and whirlpool additions. I also switched to the pilsner urquell strain.

BrewDesign

Recipe Info

Beer Name: czech pale lager ebiab 2
Style: Czech Pale Lager

Style

Original Gravity: 1.043
Final Gravity: 1.014
Color: 4.2
Alcohol: 3.8 %
Bitterness: 37.3 IBUs

Brewery

Efficiency: 70
Attenuation: 68

Mash

Mash Fermentable Weight: 10 Pounds
Mash Thickness: 2.4 Quarts per Pound
Grain Temp: 72 F
Strike Water Qty: 8 Gallons
Mash Volume: 8.8 Gallons
Strike Water Temp: 164 F
Mash Temp: 156 F

Boil

Kettle Gravity (start of boil): 1.036
Predicted Mash Run-off Volume: 7.1
Target Starting Boil Volume: 7.25
Boil Duration: 60 Minutes
Evaporation Rate: 1.25 Gallons per Hour
Final Boil Volume: 6

Fermentables

Weight (Lbs)	% by Weight	Name	Yield	SRM
9	90.0	Weyermann Pilsner; German	80.0	1.8
.5	5.0	Weyermann Carared	74.0	19.5
.5	5.0	Weyermann Wheat Malt; Pale	82.0	2.0

Hops

Weight (ozs)	Name	AAU	Time (mins)	Use	IBUs / Addition
.4	Magnum Pellets	13.2	60	First Wort	19.1
1	Saaz Pellets	3.0	30	Boil	8.3
1.5	Saaz Pellets	3.0	10	Boil	5.9
1.5	Saaz Pellets	3.0	15	Whirlpool	4.0

Yeast and Friends

Amount (Milliters)	Name
1 vial	wlp 800 pilsner lager yeast or wyeast 2001 urquell

Misc

Amount	Name	Time
1 tablet	Whirlfloc Tablet	15
1 tsp	Yeast Nutrient (Wyeast)	10

Notes

Liquid Yeast Pitch – Stirplate StarterFirst Starter
Quantity of Yeast: 1 vials / pouches (100B cells per)
Quantity of DME: 125 grams
Starter Size: 1.25 litersSalt and Acid adjustments:
Mash Salts:
Calcium Chloride: 7.0 gram
Mash Acid:
Lactic Acid: 3.0 ml @ 88 %
Sparge/Boil Salts:
Predicted Mash pH of: 5.45
Mash Ions (ppm):
Ca: 70.0 Mg: 3.0 Na: 21.0 Cl: 122.5 So: 24.0
Boil Ions (ppm):
Ca: 70.0 Mg: 3.0 Na: 21.0 Cl: 122.5 So: 24.0
mash @ 156F 60 min
168F 10 min
cool to 45, oxygenate for 1.5 mins and pitch and raise to 50 over 24 hours, hold for total of 2 weeks. over 2 days raise to 60F and hold through total of 3 weeks. rack to clean keg and lager for 2 weeks at 35. add gelatin and lager for 1 more week. rack to clean keg, force carb and serve.
gelatin is 1/2 tsp in 1/4 of water heated in microwave to 180 by heating 10 secs at a time.
Forced Carbonation
Keg Temperature: 41 F
Volumes of CO2: 2.5
Set Keg Pressure to: 12.8 psi
1-8-16 make 1.5L starter of wlp800
1-11-16 regular brewday. pitched @ noon
1-12-16 kreusen starting but no bubbling. must be a leak but had a hard time finding. adjusted some clamps and and bubbling finally started.
1-13-16 nice 1″ kreusen and slow steady bubbling
1-14-16 ”
1-15-16 ”
1-16-16 starting to slow a bit
1-18-16 ~2 sec
1-19-16 ~4 sec
1-20-16 ~6 sec starting to drop clear
1-21-16 no bubbling
1-31-16 racked to lagering keg. FG 1.016 pH 4.34 tastes and smells great. very promising!
2-18-16 gelatin (1/2 tsp + 1/4 cup filtered water microwaved to 180F)
2-20-16 racked to clean serving keg. set to 30 psi for 24 hours @ 38F then set to 12 psi
3-5-16 bottled off 6
not sure how i feel about this beer. it is really good and hits all the style markers but there is a whisper of diacetyl which i’m not a fan of. i think it can do well in competition but not sure it is my thing.
NHC 2016 results:
It scored a 32 and its marked as 2nd in it’s flight but did not go to mini-BOS. the judge complaints are harshness from oversparging and overly bitter. i didn’t get either of these from this beer and they didn’t mention what i was noticing (diacetyl) so not sure what to make of it. kinda hard to oversparge BIAB 🙂 I guess I could tune down the bitterness but i really think it is spot on if not a hair low. I think these comments are going to be ignored. Scoresheets:

Colonial Cup results:
We have a winner! Not only a winner in category but BOS! Kinda surprised since I wasn’t sure what to make of this beer but when I drink it next to a pilsner urquell it hits all the czech pils notes – a little sweetness, a hint of diacetyl and a nice solid but pleasant saaz character. This recipe came from a BOS recipe that gordon strong gave out so I’m thinking it’s a pretty good recipe 🙂 Scoresheets:

Czech Pale Lager eBIAB 1

November 9, 2015 hommel Leave a comment

My first lager on the new eBIAB system. We’ll see how it goes. Another beer that I think will be one of my NHC 2016 entries. Great “Style Profile” write-up by Gordon Strong May-June 2015 BYO on this style was my inspiration and where I got this recipe: