Scott Ickes
Grandmaster Brewer
I decided to use up all of my grains and hops. I had 30.684 lbs. of NW Pale Malt and 1 lb. of Sonnet hops.
Mash Efficiency Issues:
I mashed in 27 lbs. of the NW Pale Malt at 156 F. My efficiency is horrible, because of the huge grain bill for a 5 gallon batch, but I was expecting that. I thought I'd get about 60% Mash Efficiency, but I only got about 51.5%. I knew this might happen, I just didn't expect it to be that low. I planned ahead and set my original batch size to 6 gallons. If the mash efficiency ended up low, I could always add about half an hour to the boil to bring my OG up in the range that I wanted. I was hoping for a pre-boil gravity of 1.075, but only hit 1.064.
Boil Time:
I already had planned to do a 2 hour boil. With this being a SMaSH, there are no specialty grains to add complexity. I mashed out via boiling the grains to raise my mash out temperature to 168 F. This should give me some caramelization and darken the color somewhat. The two hour boil should also help with the complexity, by adding even more caramelization. To get my OG up in the range I was after, I am boiling for 2.5 hours, instead of the planned 2 hours. This will give me 5.5 gallons into the fermenter. I'm using WLP007 yeast for this one.
Parti-Gyle:
I capped the spent grains with the remaining 3.684 lbs. of NW Pale Malt and mashed it back in at 156 F. I'm hoping for a batch of about 11 gallons of 1.050 wort. Once again, I'll use the sonnet hops to make an English IPA. The yeast, however, won't be an English Style yeast. I have two wild yeast varieties in my yeast bank. One is a yeast that was harvested from honey in Washougal, WA. The other is a wild yeast that I harvested from a Russian Sage bush in my back yard. Both have made consistently great Abbey style beers in the past. I'm going to split the 11 gallon batch into two fermenters and pitch one with the wild honey yeast and one with the wild Russian Sage yeast. That way I can get a side by side comparison of the two yeasts.
Attached is the English Barleywine recipe.
Mash Efficiency Issues:
I mashed in 27 lbs. of the NW Pale Malt at 156 F. My efficiency is horrible, because of the huge grain bill for a 5 gallon batch, but I was expecting that. I thought I'd get about 60% Mash Efficiency, but I only got about 51.5%. I knew this might happen, I just didn't expect it to be that low. I planned ahead and set my original batch size to 6 gallons. If the mash efficiency ended up low, I could always add about half an hour to the boil to bring my OG up in the range that I wanted. I was hoping for a pre-boil gravity of 1.075, but only hit 1.064.
Boil Time:
I already had planned to do a 2 hour boil. With this being a SMaSH, there are no specialty grains to add complexity. I mashed out via boiling the grains to raise my mash out temperature to 168 F. This should give me some caramelization and darken the color somewhat. The two hour boil should also help with the complexity, by adding even more caramelization. To get my OG up in the range I was after, I am boiling for 2.5 hours, instead of the planned 2 hours. This will give me 5.5 gallons into the fermenter. I'm using WLP007 yeast for this one.
Parti-Gyle:
I capped the spent grains with the remaining 3.684 lbs. of NW Pale Malt and mashed it back in at 156 F. I'm hoping for a batch of about 11 gallons of 1.050 wort. Once again, I'll use the sonnet hops to make an English IPA. The yeast, however, won't be an English Style yeast. I have two wild yeast varieties in my yeast bank. One is a yeast that was harvested from honey in Washougal, WA. The other is a wild yeast that I harvested from a Russian Sage bush in my back yard. Both have made consistently great Abbey style beers in the past. I'm going to split the 11 gallon batch into two fermenters and pitch one with the wild honey yeast and one with the wild Russian Sage yeast. That way I can get a side by side comparison of the two yeasts.
Attached is the English Barleywine recipe.