Whirlpooling

Pickup (lower) and whirlpool (upper) ports

I read Jamil Z's article about whirlpool chilling years ago and it sounded pretty intriguing. The basic idea is to use a pump to recirculate your wort thus forming a whirlpool in your boil kettle. The whirlpool motion increases the amount of wort in contact with the immersion chiller coils resulting in a more efficient chilling process. At one point I tried to update my immersion chiller similar to Jamil's design, but my attempt was a bit kludgey and I soon abandoned it. Even though my first attempt didn't really work out, I figured I'd revisit at some point in the future when I had a chance to work out a better design.

Jamil's article focuses on immersion chillers, but he also mentions that you can recirculate through a plate chiller and accomplish similar results (bulk chilling). One benefit is you're able to chill quickly and get the entire batch out of the range in which DMS precursors can be an issue. Another benefit, the whirlpool motion aids in building that nice hop/trub cone in the center of your boil kettle. In theory, I should also be able to leave more cold break behind in the BK. Another benefit for me is I have a thermometer on my BK so I'll be able to chill to pitching temps whereas in the past I'd sometimes over-chill in the winter when ground water temps were lower. This can also come in handy when performing hop stands where you want to chill a little bit, then hold at a desired temperature before chilling completely.

So those are all the benefits. There are a couple possible complications from using this method. First is you want to make sure you have the ability to filter out hop debris that would otherwise clog your precious plate chiller. A hop bag, hop spider, inline filter, or a combination of these can be used to accomplish this. Secondly, it's important that the positioning of the whirlpool return is correct. You want to create a whirlpool, but avoid stirring up debris. Lastly, the chances of clogging something (chiller, filter, etc.) will be higher with recipes that call for more hops (especially pellet hops), so I may have to throttle back the flow a bit until a whirlpool is established.

As for my implementation, I recently upgraded from an 8 gallon kettle to a 15.5 gallon keggle. In order to be able to whirlpool, I added another ball valve above the pickup tube's ball valve. The port was added at the four gallon mark so that it will function regardless of whether I'm brewing a five or ten gallon batch. On the inside of the keggle there's a 90 degree street fitting that is positioned horizontally to create the whirlpool motion. The chilling circuit flows from keggle to pump to hop/trub filter to plate chiller then back to keggle via the whirlpool port.

I haven't brewed a batch since finishing this upgrade, but I did a test a couple days ago with water. I was able to knock the temp from boiling to 78-ish degrees in about six minutes. I'm hoping to brew this coming weekend, so I'll report back on how it all goes.

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Lambic #2

Sour beer time again! I recently split Lambic #1 in two and racked half onto red raspberries and half onto dark tart cherries. I figured it was time to start the next batch of lambic-style beer. I say lambic-style beer because there are some purists that don't believe a lambic is a lambic unless it's brewed the old world way (e.g. turbid mash, spontaneous fermentation, etc.). Personally, I don't subscribe to this line of reasoning. Processes, techniques, and raw materials change and evolve over time and I don't think it's that big of a deal to call it a lambic if the goal and the end result are consistent with the style. But what do I know, I'm one of those guys that eats their Chinese food with a fork.

Ok, back on topic. I also recently acquired a used Sanke keg that I converted to a keggle. It's more or less the standard conversion including a jig used to cut a circular opening in the top. I went with a ball valve and a combination sight glass and thermometer setup. This will be the inaugural batch on this new keggle and will also be my first time doing a 10 gallon batch. I know a lot of homebrewers start out doing 5 gallon sized batches then move on to 10 gallon or even larger sized batches. For me, 5 gallons is just about perfect; I have quite a bit on hand, but the kegs usually run dry right about the time I'm ready for a new style.  So I still plan to mostly brew 5 gallon batches, but it's nice to have the option of doing 10 gallons, especially for sours since they take so long to mature.

Today's recipe is similar to batch #1 but I'm playing around with the grain ratios a bit and I'm replacing a portion of the flaked wheat with wheat malt. As for yeast, I'm re-pitching the Roeselare cake from batch #1 along with a pack of Belgian Lambic Blend (Wyeast 3278). According to what I've read, 3278 doesn't contain a sach strain. Roeselare does when fresh, but since this is a re-pitch of the cake from batch #1 there probably aren't any viable sach cells left.

The mash schedule and fermentation temps will be the same as batch #1. As with most of my sours, I'm using aged debittered hops. Here's the recipe as I'm planning to make it:

7.0# Rahr Pale Malt
5.0# Dingemans Pilsner Malt
5.0# Weyermann Pale Wheat Malt
5.0# Flaked Wheat
1.0#-ish Rice Hulls
6.0 oz Aged Hops (90 minutes)
1t Yeast Nutrient
Roeselare cake blended with fresh Wyeast 3278

Dough in at 113F for 15 min. Raise temp to 122F for 15 minutes. Raise temp to 149F for 45 minutes. Raise to 158F for 30 minutes. Mash out at 169F.

Ferment at 68F for 12+ months.

Brewing Notes
The brew session went well. I got started a little later than usual which means I finished up later than usual. I did a test boil last night to make sure there weren't any issues with the new keggle.  There weren't except for a little bit of soot...and carbon monoxide when the gas was turned up too high. CO levels never got very high, but it was above zero. I tend to get higher readings just from parking the car in the garage. I believe the issue is the combustion gasses weren't properly venting resulting in incomplete combustion. To remedy this, I drilled a few holes in the skirt. This seemed to help so I'll keep an eye on it and may end up drilling a few more holes.

One other thing, I usually gravity drain the mash into the BK then lift the BK onto the burner. That's not an issue with 5 gallon batches, but 10 gallon batches with a pre-boil volume greater than 12 gallons is a bit of a back breaker. Fortunately my daughter is pretty strong so the two of us were able to lift it up onto the burner. I'll need to figure out a different method in the future.

Update 2/10/2014
I checked the fermenters this morning and there was zero activity. I came home from work this evening and it was like dueling airlocks. Fermentation has taken off like crazy.

Update 2/14/2014
Both carboys are still fairly active (about one bubble every 4-5 seconds)  but the krausen has dropped. Krausen had started pushing up through the airlock about 20 minutes after the above video was taken. I ended up switching out the airlocks for blowoff hoses but it's low enough now that I'm able to re-install the airlocks. The aroma coming out of the airlocks is slightly sour with some sulfur notes.

Update 6/24/2014

Not really an update with the beer, but my tart cherry tree has a nice amount of fruit on it this year. This is only the second year bearing fruit. Last year I got about a dozen cherries. Here's a pic of this morning's harvest. These will likely go into a portion of the lambic #2.

Update 7/2/2014

I've harvested almost all the tart cherries and I'm up to 13.5 pounds. Not bad at all for a second year harvest.

Update 6/2/2015

I pulled a sample from half the batch last night (the half that didn't go into the fermenter. I have to say I was a little disappointed. The tartness level was much lower than I expected and the body seemed a little thin. I may have to do some tinkering with this one.

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Bacon Part 2

It's been a while since I've made my own bacon. I picked up a Cabela's meat slicer over the holidays which gave me the excuse to make up a batch. I made two styles; the first is a basic bacon with brown sugar and the second is an Asian-inspired bacon based on the one featured in Chop and Brew episode #2.

Both recipes use the Basic Cure which consists of 1# kosher salt, 8 ounces sugar, and 2 ounces pink salt (Prague powder #1).

Brown Sugar Bacon
The brown sugar bacon recipe is pretty straightforward. The pork bellies I used were about 1.5 pounds each; kind of on the small side, but that's how they come from my local Asian market.

1/8 cup basic cure
1/4 cup brown sugar

Mix basic cure and brown sugar then coat the pork belly. Wrap tightly in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge and allow it to cure for seven days. It is also a good idea to flip it once a day to ensure the resulting brine is evenly distributed. After 7 days, smoke the bacon (see below).

Asian Bacon
The Asian bacon was marinated/brined for two days then had the basic cure applied for the remaining five days. This one also used a 1.5# belly.

1 quart water
1 c soy sauce
1 c hoisin sauce
1/2 c brown sugar
1 star anise, crushed
4 cloves garlic
1/2 T ground ginger
1/2 T Sriracha sauce
1/8 c basic cure (after brining)

Combine everything but the 1/8 cup basic cure. Brine/marinate the pork belly for 2 days. After two days, remove the belly from the brine and rinse with cold water. Pat dry then apply the basic rub, wrap tightly in plastic wrap and place it in the fridge for the remaining five days. Same as the brown sugar bacon, remember to flip it daily.

Smoking the Bacon
The first time I tried making bacon, I only cold-smoked it. There's nothing wrong with cold-smoking, but in my opinion it needs to be followed up with hot-smoking to end up with a product that tastes like bacon. I'm not sure exactly what happens, but something definitely happens during the hot-smoking process. If you only cold-smoke you, end up with a weird tasting pork product. For mine, I cold-smoke for about 8-10 hours. then follow it up with a hot smoke (225F) until it reaches an internal temp of 160F.

Before smoking the bacon, unwrap it and rinse well with cold water. This removes excess cure ensuring the final product isn't too salty. Pat dry and place it on a cooling rack and allow it to come to room temp. At this point I cold-smoked mine for about 10 hours.

Right before hot-smoking, I rubbed the brown sugar bacon with more brown sugar. The Asian bacon was rubbed with a combination of brown sugar and red pepper flakes. I cold-smoked with hickory and hot-smoked with a blend of hickory, oak, and cherry.

After hot-smoking, it is time to remove the skin; you can usually pull the skin off as soon as it's cool enough to handle. 

Once cooled, wrap with plastic wrap and place it in the fridge to condition for a few days. The conditioning stage isn't absolutely necessary, but I think it allows the smokey character to mellow and penetrate the meat better.

Slicing the Bacon
A meat slicer is the easiest way to slice bacon and will result in the most uniform slices. If you don't have access to one you can still get good results with a good sharp knife. You probably won't be able to get it super thin, but you can get it to about 1/8". In both cases it seems to help if you partially freeze the bacon first. You don't want it to be frozen solid, but it's easier to slice if it's somewhat firm from a good chilling. Slice it to your desired thickness then cook it up in a hot pan and enjoy!

Tasting Notes
Both of the recipes turned out really well. They were eaten up before I even had a chance to snap a picture of the cooked bacon.

As I would expect, the brown sugar version had a noticeable sweetness. It was along the lines of what most people would think of as traditional breakfast bacon, but definitely better than store- bought. We served it with some hashbrowns and eggs and it was scarfed down quickly.

The Asian version was less sweet and preferred by my wife and two older daughters. The marinade flavors were there, but they were subtle. I think I'd leave it in the marinade at least a day longer next time and also increase the star anise and ginger a bit. This one smelled similar to pho soup when it was cooking. We fried it up, chopped it and served it on Chinese chicken salad with manderine oranges.

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Barn Dance Pale Ale

Today I'm brewing a recipe I came up with that should result in a nice hop-focused session style pale ale. This recipe includes several of my favorite hop varieties, one of which is probably my absolute favorite, Amarillo. I'm hoping to get lots of hop flavor and aroma out of this beer with the bitterness being towards the lower end for the style.

I don't think I've ever used the San Diego Super Yeast strain before. My understanding is this is the one used by Stone Brewing in most of their beers. It's supposed to be similar to WLP001; basically a fast and clean fermenting yeast.

Here's the recipe as I'm making it for version 1.0:

5.25# Rahr Pale Malt - 68.3 % 

12.0 oz Briess Caramel Malt - 10L - 9.8 % 

12.0 oz Crisp Maris Otter - 9.8 % 

9.0 oz Briess Cara-Pils/Dextrine - 7.3 % 

6.0 oz Simpsons Golden Naked Oats - 4.9 % 

20.0 g Columbus - Boil 20 min

23.0 g Amarillo - Boil 5 min

11.5 g Chinook - Boil 5 min

1/2t Yeast Nutrient - 5 min

1/2 Whirlfloc - 5 min

1.0 pkg White Labs San Diego Super Yeast WLP090 in 1L starter

46.0 g Amarillo - Dry hop 

23.0 g Cascade - Dry hop

Target OG: 1.046

IBU's: 33.8

Mash at 151F for 60 min. 90 min boil. Ferment at 65F.

Brewing Notes
No real issues to speak of. My gravity came in a tad low at 1.045.

Update 1/10/2014
Gravity has dropped to 1.006...this yeast really is fast. Dry hops were added today. I'll probably pull a sample in a few days and see how it's coming along.

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Tart of Darkness Experiment

As I indicated in a previous post, my brew club recently did a Tart of Darkness clone barrel project. That brew will spend the next 6-12 months in the barrel where bacteria and brett are working away on turning it into a nice sour stout.

Today I'm kicking off an experiment to see if I can do a speedy version of the same beer using the technique that I used for my Berliner Weisse back in April. The BW ended up being one of my favorite brews I've ever made and it finished much faster than most sours so I'm hoping this turns out as well.

The basic process is pitch a lacto starter and give it a seven day head start on the yeast. After seven days I'll pitch Roeselare. I'm hoping to have a decent sour in a couple months. That said, since Roeselare contains pedio, there is a chance this beer could get sick/ropey. If that happens, it'll take a bit longer for this beer to be ready...could be six months or more. Brewing is all about experimenting, so this will be fun even if it doesn't go exactly like I'm hoping it will.

I'm using the same recipe from our brew club except I'll be using aged hops so my IBUs will be close to zero. Another difference, I'm not going to toast the flaked oats like I did for the group brew. Also, I'm not mashing with the flaked oats; instead they'll go in the mash tun at the beginning of the sparge (after mashout). The reason for this is I'm trying to ensure I get some complex starches into the beer for the brett to work on. Lastly, I'm mashing at 155F instead of 158F.

8# 6.9oz Rarh Pale Malt
14 oz Briess Crystal 60L
14 oz Flaked Oats (steep in BK)
6.7 oz Briess Roasted Barley
5.1 oz Briess Chocolate Malt
28.3g Aged debittered hops (60 min)

1 package Wyeast 5335 Lactobacillus in 1L starter

1 package Wyeast 3763 Roeselare after 7 days

1/2t Wyeast Yeast Nutrient
Oak cubes in secondary

Mash at 155F for 60 min. 90 min boil. Ferment at 68F

Update 12/27/2013
The brew session went well back on 12/22; no issues, hit the target gravity, pitched at 66F and warmed to 68F overnight. That said, I might have an issue with this beer. The picture of my Berliner Weisse from April shows a nice krausen within 24 hours of pitching. After five days, I still haven't seen any sign of a krausen in the ToD Experiment. This has me a little worried. It's too early to panic, but I think I'll pull a sample before pitching the Roeselare to check the gravity and see how it's progressing. I tasted the starter wort before pitching and it had the same light lemony tartness as the BW starter. The aroma was a little bit different on this one...kind of musty but not smelling like dirty feet or anything like that.

Update 12/30/2013
So some sad news today, I checked on this brew and there were tiny spots of mold starting to grow on top. It never showed any signs of krausen from pitching the lacto. It was definitely mold and not a pellicle. I suspect I got a bad/mishandled lacto culture with limited viability. So essentially the lacto cell count was lower than expected which allowed the mold to take hold and start growing. There was a slight gravity change but there is no detectable sour aroma and only a very, very subtle tartness in the flavor. It was so subtle that I probably wouldn't have noticed it if I wasn't looking for it. I've never had mold before. I decided to go ahead and rack from under the the mold rafts and pitch the Roeselare to see what happens. Best case scenario, I'm probably looking at 6-12 months for it to finish; worst case, this will be a dumper.

Update 12/31/2013
Better news today, as usual the Roeselare has taken off like crazy. I added a blowoff this morning to hopefully avoid making a mess. I've heard people comment that Roeselare is a slow starter. I've only experienced that once and I think that was because it was an older sample (6+ months). Every other time I've used it, it has been very active within 24 hours of pitching. It usually calms down after a few days then gets fairly active again after a couple weeks then slows down again for the long haul.

Update 1/12/2014

This one is still slowly chugging along. There are no signs of mold now. The aroma out of the airlock is hints of sourness and malt. I'm looking forward to doing a side by side comparison to the group brew some day.

Update 1/7/2015
I pulled a sample today. This one turned out well with some nice chocolate notes to accompany the mild tartness. It's definitely not as complex as the club version that went into the barrel, but it's pretty good. I think I may add some bourbon soaked oak cubes to try to give it a bit more complexity.

Update 6/2/2015
I added bourbon soaked oak cubes a while back but this beer is still lacking a lot of complexity compared to the group version. Sourness level is fairly low as well. Not a bad beer but knowing how good the group version turned out, this one pales in comparison.

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