Some general advice for brewing English bitter...please.

Hello everyone,
                          First of all let me say how delighted I am to have discovered ‘Brewsmith’ I think it’s a really great website and demonstrates all that is truly good about the internet.
    My name is Chuck, I live in Kent England, and I'd like some advice please:
  I am about to make my fisrt batch of proper beer made from malted barley and thought I’d describe my intended process and recipe to see if anyone has any criticism or advice.

1)  I am using a stainless steel dixie to boil 5 gallons of well water ( taken from a friend's farm in Kent) which I will then let cool to 66 degrees centigrade. I will then add 6.5 Kilos of (Maris Otter Pale) malted barley. I will stir this and add some more boiling water to bring the temperature back to 66 degrees centigrade, then I will put the lid on the dixie, cover it in a winter quilt and leave it over night.

2)  In the morning I will strain out the wort, put the grains in a muslin bag on a large jelly stand and sparge them with kettles of boiling water untill I have a total of 5 gallons of wort.

3)  I will then boil the wort in the dixie with 4ozs of (goldings) hops for 1 hour. I will then remove the hops, transfer the wort to a plastic fermentation bin and add 1 litre blocks of frozen water until the temperature is 16 degrees centigrade.(At this stage I will take a reading with a hydrometer) I will then add a packet of preprepared ‘Gervin English ale yeast’, stir, cover and leave in a warm place.

4)  After 3 days I will skim off any thing floating on top, syphon the beer into another fermentation bin, put the plastic lid on and leave it 7 days to ‘fall bright’

5)  After 7 days I will syphon off the beer into some nice old 26oz glass beer bottles ( with stone caps, rubber seals and large sediment traps) and leave these another 7 days in a cool cellar.

6)  I will then start drinking the stuff and take another hydrometer reading to establish alcoholic volume.

I am keeping everything clean using a ‘Boots’ brand (an English pharmacy) sterilising solution for babies. The sort of beer I like is fairly weak (3.8%) English bitter which isn’t too hoppy. (eg ‘Black Sheep’ , ‘Everards Beacon’ , ‘Hook Norton’ etc.) If anyone has any comments or criticisms on my process or recipe I would be gratefull to hear them.

                                                      Many thanks, Chuck.

Your porportions are all off for what you intend to brew, 5 gallons UK of an Ordinary Bitter.

Some conversions First
5 gal UK = 6 gal US
8 qts UK = 9.61 Qts US
74C = 165.2F
67.5C = 153.5F
66C = 150.8F
60C = 140F
16C = 60.8F
6.5K = 14.33 lbs US
3.5K = 7.75 lbs US

1:

• 6.5k of grain is too much,  use 3.5k to target an OG of about 1.038 which will yield something around a 3.8% beer
• 5 galUK is too much volume for a mash,  you need about 8qts UK (to go with the 3.5k of crushed malted grain)
• You want the mash temp to be around 67.5C so you get a bit of body in a small beer so you want the the 8 qts of water you add to the grain to be about 74C/165.2F
• an overnight mash is not the norm (about 1 hr) but is ok.  if the temp drops too much you have a stronger possibility of souring the mash.  If possible put in a 'cooler' to mash and cover with a quilt.  The quilt will be sufficient for an hour or so but I don't think it will retain sufficient heat overnight.

2:
This method is pretty inefficient, I would batch sparge,

• drain all the wort
• add half the remaining volume needed for your boil of 80-85C water,
• stir and let sit for 15 minutes
• drain off all water
• add the other half the remaining volume needed for your boil of 80-85C water,
• stir and let sit for 15 minutes
• drain off all water

3:
4 oz of Golding will make this beer too bitter, either use 2 oz for 60 minutes
or better
1.5 oz Goldings for 60 minutes (bittering)
.5 oz for 15 minutes (flavor)
.5 oz Goldings for 5 minutes (aroma)

While using ice blocks will work, it will also dilute your beer.  If possible use a copper coil to immerse in your wort and run water through it to chill.
4:
There is no need to transfer at 3 days, there still should be yeast activity going on, even if you don't see it.  In fact for this beer there is no reason to transfer it until you are ready to bottle

5:
You don't mention adding any bottling sugar,  you will need to do so in order to carbonate the beer.

6:
Take the second hydrometer reading when you bottle,  The beer has finished fermenting at that time.

Realize that what you have proposed will make beer, probally good beer, but the techniques and amounts are not close to standard.  I tend to brew a lot of things that are out there pushing the limits.

I hope this helps some.


Fred

Thanks very much Fred, I will follow your advice and let you know how I get on. The recipe I presented is a bastardised version of one I found in a book called 'The complete book of self sufficiency'. The author's original version calls for 'half a hundred weight' (25.5 kgs) of grain for a ten gallon batch of beer... I'm glad I found beersmith!  Chuck.