Bottled the Christmas Brews
Category BeerSaturday night I bottled the Christmas brews.
The fermentation for both of these took much longer than normal. I think the reason is that we had a cold snap (I know, Phoenix and cold just don't go together). Being 1/2 Scottsman, I refused to turn the heat on until it dropped below 50. Which of course slowed down the fermentation. The fermentation finally finished sometime between Friday evening and Saturday morning.
I put the Irish Stout into (2 cases) 12 oz bottles, and the Christmas Ale went into a mix of 22 and 16 oz bottles. I'll work up the labels later this week (I'm going to base them on the ones I used last Christmas.)
I'm not sure if it was caused by the length of fermentation, or the low temperature, or a combination of both, but the ale came out much stronger than I expected. For the Stout, my starting gravity hydrometer test came in right at 1.058. The actual final gravity was 1.012, which works out to 6% by volume. I was expecting a 4-5% brew, so this was a little more than I expected.. The Ale was another story altogether.
For the Ale, I was estimating a starting gravity between 1.040 and 1.045, and a final gravity between 1.008 and 1.012, which should give about 4 - 5%. The actual numbers readings were:
- starting gravity: 1.055
- final gravity: 1.005
This works out to 6.7%. That's a mighty strong Christmas Ale. I'm thinking that these are both going to need to age in the bottle a little more than normal (minimum 21 days), which means that if I'm really lucky, they'll be ready to drink by Christmas. If not, then I'll have to save them until the new year.
-Devin.
The Pridelands
Chris Byrne
Show n' Tell Thursdays
Maddox
Comments
Posted by Stan Rogers At 01:30:45 PM On 12/08/2004 | - Website - |
Didn't we sample beers together at the brew pub behind the Swan at Lotusphere 2003?
The cold spell is over (still a bit chilly), but the brews are now resting comfortably at 61 degrees F.
Side note: both of these brews were single stage fermented. I plan on "graduating" to secondary fermentation sometime after the new year. I still need to buy some more equipment (carboy, chiller, etc) before that happens. I've considered building a lagering fridge, but that is still in the "someday" phase.
-Devin.
Posted by Devin Olson At 03:40:16 PM On 12/08/2004 | - Website - |
Posted by Stan Rogers At 04:00:57 PM On 12/08/2004 | - Website - |