Reviewing my red ale recipe

Observation I’ve done two batches of the red ale (which I wrote up one run-through of) and I’m pretty happy with the flavour, but one thing that has vexed me is the quantity. I ended up with about 17L of beer at the end of the last batch, where I was expecting something closer to 25L. Hypothesis I think that if I play with the Brewer’s Friend website, I can increase the final yield without altering the flavour too much. ...

11 October, 2018 · 4 min · 741 words · Niall O'Callaghan

Brewing an Irish Red Ale - Bottling Day

After two weeks in the fermenter, it was time to bottle the Irish Red Ale. My checklist is below. Bottling Workflow Wash the following with standard detergent: Bottling bucket Siphon tube Filling tube Bottlecaps Spigot Paddle Thermometer 500ml bottles (31) Wash the following using VWP: Filling tube Siphon tube Bottlecaps Spigot Paddle Trial jar (tall pint glass in this case) Hydrometer Thermometer Bottling bucket 500ml bottles (31) Assemble bottling bucket Attach tubing to fermenter spigot ...

16 November, 2016 · 2 min · 251 words · Niall O'Callaghan

Brewing an Irish Red Ale - Brew day

The ingredients from my ingredient shopping arrived really quickly - I placed the order on Thursday at 17:30 and they arrived on Saturday. Impressive work from The Homebrew Company! I put together the workflow below and printed it out so I’d have something to follow along with on brew day. It really helped pinpoint things to focus on and times when I’d be able to prepare the next step while waiting for target temperatures. ...

31 October, 2016 · 3 min · 576 words · Niall O'Callaghan