Arthur's Amber

[Two Wheeler]

Naming Arthur's Amber, due to Hurricane Arthur knocking out power to my ferm chamber 18 hours after pitching. The temp went on a wild ride after that...

Recipe: Arthur's Amber
Brewer: Jordan Harris
Asst Brewer:
Style: American Amber Ale
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (30.0)

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 7.1 gal
Post Boil Volume: 6.1 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.5 gal   
Bottling Volume: 5.4 gal
Estimated OG: 1.050 SG
Estimated Color: 14.9 SRM
Estimated IBU: 28.2 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 78.4 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt                     Name                                                  Type          #        %/IBU        
3.24 kg               Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM)           Grain         1        70.0 %       
0.93 kg               Crystal 73 (73.0 SRM)                          Grain         2        20.0 %       
0.46 kg               Carafoam (Weyermann) (2.0 SRM)       Grain         3        10.0 %       
0.75 oz               Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 45.0 min     Hop           4        24.7 IBUs     
1.00 Items           Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins)           Fining        5        -             
0.50 oz               Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 5.0 min      Hop           6        3.6 IBUs     
1.00 oz               Sorachi Ace [14.30 %] - Boil 0.0 min     Hop           7        0.0 IBUs     
1.0 pkg               Safale American  (US-05)                      Yeast         8        -             


Mash Schedule: BIAB, Light Body
Total Grain Weight: 4.63 kg
----------------------------
Name                   Description                                        Step Temperat     Step Time     
Saccharification   Add 7.81 gal of water at 158.9 F        152.0 F                  60 min       
Mash Out            Heat to 168.0 F over 7 min                 168.0 F                  10 min       

Sparge: If steeping, remove grains, and prepare to boil wort
Notes:
------


Quick brew session, 3:40 minutes flame on to pitch, even with delay due to over shooting mash temp.

Overall Efficiency of 73.5%

[Two Wheeler]

As mentioned - wild fermentation schedule here:

7/4 - Pitched at 68, set fermentation temp at 60
7/5 - power knocked out, measured beer temp at 61
7/6 - Ambient temp up to 68
7/7 - Ambient temp up to 72
7/8 - Ambient temp up to 75, but power came back on. Set temp to 65. Probe fell out of fridge, ambient temp fell to the 30's overnight
7/9- Fixed probe. Measured 1.018 (target 1.011)
7/10 - Measured 1.018 again, pitched a new pack of US-05

I figure I killed most of the yeast off when the temp got low.

[Two Wheeler]

This bastard got down to 1.017 (target 1.011) and stalled, even after re-pitching. I guess it's going to be a bit sweet.

[blisster]

This bastard got down to 1.017 (target 1.011) and stalled, even after re-pitching. I guess it's going to be a bit sweet.

Let us know how it tastes...  If it's too sweet you can always boil a hop tea and add to the secondary (or keg if already transferred) to hopefully balance it out.

I've never tried this but read that it works quite well... It would be easy to test with a pint or two first.

[Two Wheeler]

Interesting idea Blisster... do you get any IBU off the hop tea? I was thinking of dry hopping, but additional IBU's would likely be better here

[Roger]

You'll definitely get some IBU's if you boil the hops. After all that's what you're doing when you boil the wort.

[brew]

I've done that before, missed the 5 minute addition so boiled water for 5 minutes with the hops and tossed it into the primary. No problems, seemed to work great...

[Two Wheeler]

Way too much crystal malt taste in this beer... it's pretty bad. This may be a dumper.

[blisster]

Way too much crystal malt taste in this beer... it's pretty bad. This may be a dumper.

Hops will fix anything.... Nothing to loose by throwing in a hop tea 

[Two Wheeler]

Ok, let's do some math...

The original recipe called for 28 IBUs and a FG of 1.011. So, 28/11 = 2.5 IBU per point. In actuality was 28 IBU and a FG of 1.017. This is 1.6 IBU per point.

Now I want to get it to the 2.5 per point, which means I need to get to 42.5 IBU, adding 14.5 IBU.

Here's where I'm struggling. I have about 4.75 Gallons of this in the keg. Playing with an online calculator, I said .25 gallon boil for 15 mins, with a OG of 1.000 (water), using half ounce 10% AA hops. This gave an IBU number of 295, when diluted (divided by 20) is 14.75 IBU, which is pretty close to what I want.

Am I even close on this math and process?

[pliny]

I won't delve into the math here but if you don't mind, I would just give a few observations since something similar happened to me in the past.

What you're saying is that your beer is a bit sweet. Correct? It's probably a combination of things that may have contributed:
- It finished a bit high (but not incredibly high) 1.017 I think.
- There was a fair bit of sweetness if you add up the carafoam and C75 - 3lbs of it for a 5gallon batch is more than enough.
- It's possible that when you lost power, that it was a critical time during the fermentation cycle which may contribute to a more pronounced taste. A big swing there.
- The hop bill may be a bit low which didn't cut into that sweetness very much.

From the BJCP guidelines: Normally an amber ale has an OG: 1.045 – 1.060 ( I suspect you were ok here)
FG: 1.010 – 1.015 (looks like you were on the high side here)
IBUs: 25 – 40   (looks like you were on the low side here)

Brewing It's hard work and labor and it's very disappointing to have a batch of bad-to-mediocre beer. It'll happen. I tried to make a hazelnut brown ale once and it came out so sweet. When I looked at my recipe, I noticed that I had added way too much of everything sweet. Ended up not drinking much of it.
Recently made a stout OG: 1.060 can't remember the rest but it tastes like someone poured a 40oz of vodka in it. Not sure what happened but one thing that does happen to me is that every summer I get a crappy beer. I try to think about what I did and chalk it up as a lesson learned. Summer is not my favorite time to brew since I don't have a fermentation chamber and I try to adjust the beer style to the season.

Hopefully some of this may give you some ideas for the future.

[Roger]

I think your math looks fine. If you think its undrinkable than give it a try. But if you still want to dump it you can dump it in one of my kegs. 

[Two Wheeler]

Haha, I'll see how it goes Roger.

Pliny - thanks for the insight, and I agree, this one just got away from me on a few fronts. I've definitely learned that I have a lower threshold for Crystal than I thought.

[Two Wheeler]

Finally got around to making the hop tea, and added it to the keg. I boiled .5 ounce of centennial hops for 20 mins, in a half gallon volume of water.

It has certainly improved the beer! Not the best amber ale in the world, but it's more drinkable. There's more flavour and bitterness to mask the sweetness and crystal taste.

Here's what hop tea looks like

[Two Wheeler]

So just for the hell of it, I submitted this beer to the Member's of Barleyment competition in September. I sent in the Hop-Tea version.

To my surprise the beer scored a 38 and a 39 with overall good remarks