My First 'Red Ale'

[beanstalk]

Thanks!

Bottled that first batch anyway. It sure is dark! nice and choclately, will see how it turns out in a couple of weeks.

Meanwhile I put on another batch this morning, I'm a bit under the weather and was all over the place but got through it. Forgot to add the whirlfloc but its not the end of the world i spose.



Unfortunately the same thing happened again! slowd down the mash runnings to a trickle, kept it topped up, had to stop when the runnings were hitting 1.002! Still only 17.5 litres. Can't figure out what I'm doing wrong! 

hopefully the beer will be nice though. 

the projected EBC for this one is 46 so i'm hoping it will be a real dark ruby red colour but i might have gone too far...

[Bubbles]

Sometimes it's the beers you make "accidentally" that are the best, where the recipe didn't turn out as expected. I've done this several times and ended up keeping & re-brewing these recipes without any changes.

If you make the effort to understand why the recipe didn't give you the results you expected you're learning great skills and you'll end up a better brewer for it.

[biertourist]

hmm...the fermentation has stopped at 1.026. is this because of the high mash volume?

should i try adding more yeast to re--start it?

Might be due to the temperature you're fermenting at? Take a temp reading with a sanitised thermometer and check the optimum fermentation temperature of the S-04 yeast. If it looks low, then move your fermenter to a warmer spot, and rouse the yeast as suggested above.

Apart from temperature, the yeast floccing out too early usually suggests lack of oxygenation, or not pitching enough yeast. But that's unlikely to be the problem here.

As a matter of interest, how did you add your Whirlfloc? From your recipe, it looks like you added it along with the yeast..?

I'm afraid your high finishing gravity probably isn't a yeast issue that's fixable, your mash temp at 71C is by far the most likely culprit.  You've made very unfermentable wort with your very high mash temp. -Especially when dealing with MO as base malt which, depending upon which maltster it's from and the particular batch of malt can have pretty low diastatic power and will be rather unforgiving when it comes to mashing too high.

I agree with everyone else that an iodine test would've helped on this one and you might have still had a "black" iodine test at the end of your 60 minute mash (not just large chain unfermentable sugars left but even some unconverted starch).

Next time decrease that mash temp! Target 65C or even 63C next time AND do an iodine test to make sure you're getting conversion. (If you do an iodine test after 20 minutes and you're still mashing at 71C and not getting anywhere it's too late to fix it -once you denature an enzyme it's uncoiled and its never going to do its job.)  -Don't dump the iodine sample back into the mash either, remember it's poison at any significant dose.


Adam

[johnrm]

@beanstalk, What software is that? Love the font!

[beanstalk]

Hah thanks! Twas before the days of ms-dos or even BASIC. (they're actually just scanned pages from a personalised leather recipe journal my girlfriend got me for Christmas!)

@ biertourist: thanks for the sound advice, I'll def keep a closer eye on temp in the future.

@ bubbles: that's great advice, I'll let yous know how both turn out!

[johnrm]

@beanie, Adams pointers are to be digested. There's wisdom in that lad! Context: the beer you just chucked.  :-(

[beanstalk]

Ok well I just tried a bottle of the first batch!

Very dark, lots of chocolate and a smooth bitterness. Really pleased! 

[Qs]

Bet it's way better than a typical red.

[beanstalk]

i'm just really pleased at how smooth it is. I imagine after the two week mark it will be much better.

[auralabuse]

Looks great

[johnrm]

That's a fantastic homely pic. A dog to lick your toes and all!