Bohemian Pilsner 40L Brewing Journal

Started 22nd April 2018

Almost all of my previous brewing has been based on traditional English Ale's but I thought that I would try a Lager for this summer. in the past I have been put off by the amount of time and the low temperatures required to make lagers. However, the Brulosophy website has reported excellent results from a minimal Lagering period, so it is time to give it a go.

I am aiming for around 40 IBU's for bitterness and have decided to use 100% Saaz Hops. This is not the most efficient way of bittering as the alpha acid is only just over 3%, so a lot of hops are required but hopefully I will be rewarded with depth of flavour.

The method to be used is as follows:

Ferment at 12c for around 5 days or until 50% attenuated.
Raise the temperature slowly by 1c per day until 18c is reached.
Hold 18c for 3 days for diacetyl rest.
Chill to as close to 0C as possible for 5 days

Recipe:

Ingredients:

Recipe	Measure
Brew Length	40L
Floor Malted Bohemium Pilsner Malt	9500g
Saaz Hops (Start of Boil)	170g
Saaz Hops (last 30 Min)	30g
Saaz Hops (last 10 Min)	30g
Saaz Hops (flame out)	30g
IBU	39
Yeast (Using Starter)	WLP800
Mash Liquor	23.75 Litres
Strike Heat	72C
Mash Temperature	66C
Mash Time	1 Hour 30 Minutes
Sparge Temperature	77C
Mash Efficiency (estimated)	75%
Boil Time	1 Hour 30 Minutes
Fermentation Temperature	12C
Expected OG @ 80%	1052
Actual OG	1052
Expected FG	1011
Actual FG

Water Treatment:

Recipe	Measure
CaCo3 Adjustments
Calcium Carbonate CAC03	194 ppm
Calcium Carbonate Required	30 ppm
Adjustment Necessary	164 ppm
CRS per Litre Required (Brupacks)	0.9 ml/L
Total CRS to add to Mash (24L)	21 ml
Total CRS to add to Sparge water (10+24.5L)	9 + 22ml
*Chlorine Treatment*
Campden Tablets (half in mash, half in sparge)	1 tablet
Calcium Adjustment (using brupaks calculation)
Calcium in Water	78 ppm
Calcium Required	120 ppm
Adjustment	42 ppm
Gypsum	1 Tsp

Water Schedule:

This brew will be batch sparged, so the water will be scheduled as follows:

Mash = 24L using 21ml of CRS +1/2 Campden Tab
Top Up = 10L using 9ml of CRS
Final Batch Sparge = 24.5L using 22ml of CRS and 1/2 campden tab

Mashing:

Pre Heated Mash tun with warm water.
Mash water heated to 78c and treatments added.
Added 24L of water to mash tun which settled quickly to 72C, so doughed in with 1 tsp of Gypsum
After 5 minutes the temperature was 67C, so the lid was sealed for 1 Hour 30 Min.
The final Mash temperature was 65c. Although it was warm outside, it was also very windy, which I think has lowered the temperature more than usual. This is still well within acceptable levels.
Note - My mash tun lid is not sealing as well as it should at kept becoming unclipped. This will need to be addressed for future brews as this may have been the cause of the greater than normal Temperature loss.

Sparging

25L of sparge water was heated to 85C and treated with 21ml of CRS and 1/2 campden tab.
10L of water was added to the Mash tun at 85C and left for 15 minutes.
HLT filled back to 24.5L, treated with an additional 9mm of CRS and heated to 79C
First drain of mash tun into boiler
Mash Tun topped back up to 25L with water at 79C for final sparge, stirred and left for 10 Min to settle.
Final batch to boiler.

Boiling

Boiler switched on as soon as first few litres of wort were drained from the mash Tun.
First batch of hops added once the boil started.
After 1 Hour second batch of hops added.
Last 15 minutes - inserted immersion Cooler
Last 10 minutes - 10 Minute hops and Protofloc.
Flame out hops added.
Cooling started - This took around 1 hour to get down to about 25c and at this point the cold break was evident and their were clear clumps of break material.
The wort was crystal clear and was drained slowly in batches of 15L + 15L +14L
44L of wort in total was collected, which is a bit higher than expected.
Original Gravity after boil was 1052 which is spot on but considering i have ended up with 4L extra this means efficiency was quite high.

Fermentation:

A 1.5L yeast starter of Yeast WLP800 was started 3 days before and refrigerated overnight to ensure that the yeast flocculated. The started was removed from the fridge 30 minutes prior to pitching and the liquid poured off. About 1L of wort was added to the starter in order to mix the yeast and this was left for 30 minutes to acclimatize before pitching.
22nd April 22:30 - Temperature = 13.7c. It has taken quite some time for the wort to drop in temperature but it is now close enough to pitch. The ambient temperature is 13c and will drop a little further, so my chiller should continue to reduce the temperature to a set temperature of 12c.
23rd April 08:30 - Temperature is now at 12c and there are signs that Fermentation is starting with a few bubbles beginning to rise.
23rd April 17:00 - Temperature is 11.9 and there is still only minimal activity, although it has definitely started.
23rd April 22:30 - Temperature is stable at 11.9c and a thin krausen is starting to form.
24th April 16:00 - Krausen is now thick and rocky so wort is fermenting well. This yeast seems to have taken over 24 hours to really get going, which is something that I am not used to with Ale yeasts at higher temperatures. Current Temperature is 12.4c.
25th April - Krausen still thick and rocky. Poured a sample from fermenter to check SG and bitterness. The bitterness was just about what I was aiming for but it is difficult to be sure as the wort is still very sweet. The Brix reading was 11.5, which equates to roughly 1042, so the wort has dropped 10 points since starting. Temperature is 12.4c
26th April - Krausen is now thick and yeasty looking so fermentation is still going strong. Temperature is 12.4c
27th April - Temperature is 11.9c. Brix reading is 10.3 which equates to an SG of 1034
28th April - Temperature is 11.9c. Brix reading is 10.0 which equates to SG of 1032
30th April - Temperature is 12.9c. Brix reading is about 9.8 so only SG of 1031. The wort is also looking quite clear so I think it needs rousing. Temp Raised to 15c and wort given a good stir. it looked like a lot of yeast was sitting on top of the Krausen, which is odd.
1st May - Morning - Temperature is now 14.8c and Fermentation has kicked back off. I now have yeast escaping from the fermenter lid. Brix reading is already around 9.3 which is roughly SG of 1028.
1st May - Evening - Brix now at 8.8 SG 1025. Wort is still fermenting furiously but hopefully will slow again tomorrow in order for me to be able to clean up the overflowing yeast.
2nd May - Brix now around 8.4 SG 1021. Tried to clean up some of the mess on the outside of the fermenter as far as possible. Raised temperature to 16c.
3rd May - raised temperature to 17C
4th May - Raised temp to 18C. Brix = 8.0 SG1020
5th May - SG still at 1020. Lid of fermenter had lots of yeast stuck to it and the krausen also had thick yeast on the surface. The yeast was stirred back into the wort and the fermenter lid was cleaned and re sterilsied.
6th May - Brix reading = 7..0, SG of 1013 and there is still a thick krausen. This means that we are now almost at final Gravity. The diacetyl rest was 2-3 days at 18c, so I will leave for 1 further day before crash cooling. From the sample I can taste do Diacetyl, so the brew is progressing OK now.
7th May - Krausen has yeast on top again but is now very thin. Brix reading looks to be just under 7 so say 6.8 which equates to 1012. I am now going to start chilling to Lager.
8th May - Temperature 4.6c. Ambient temperature is around 25c so the chiller is struggling to keep the beer cold.
For the next 5 days the beer remained around 5C and was then kegged.

Tasting Notes:

The beer has been very slow to clear and quite a bit of yeast has settled inside the keg. It would have probably been better to rack to a secondary for a couple of weeks before kegging.

The beer has a lovely hop flavour and has remained slightly sweet, which makes it very easy drinking. There is probably a little too much body in this beer for a lager but as I am normally an ale drinker this works fine for me. The taste is very clean and the lacing from the head seems to last all the way to the bottom of the glass. Perhaps a little longer is required for conditioning but very drinkable already.