Here’s some video of the Helles fermentation. The huge starter made a big difference – it was starting to bubble this morning, and fully churning by tonight. It’s unfortunately still at 62 degrees but the basement was around 55. I’ve opened the basement window to bring it down to 48-50ish, hopefully the beer will drop gradually over the next day or two with the towel around it.
Archive for March, 2009
Go To Helles!
While the Oktoberfest sits lagering in the chest freezer and the basement is still at a balmy 48-50 degrees I am taking the opportunity to brew another lager. I’ve settled on a Munich Helles – a lighter, summer beer though still malty, and something that has a short lagering period. That way I can keg both it and the Oktoberfest at the same time and bring the whole freezer up to serving temp.
Once again I’ve borrowed from Jamil Zainasheff, but this time made a few small changes. I accidentally bought too much Pilsener for a five gallon batch, so I’m doing more like 5.5 gallons to bring the gravity back down to the recipe level.
Without further ado, Munich Helles:
9.75 lb German Pilsener malt
1/2 lb Munich malt (the lighter stuff, 8-10 srm)
2 oz Melanoidin malt
1.5 oz Hallertauer @ 60 minutes (3.00% AA)
Wyeast 2206 Bavarian Lager
Infusion mash at 150 degrees, 90 minute boil, chill and aerate 30 mins. Fermentation to start around 64 degrees and then once it gets started I’ll bring it down to the basement where it’s 48-50 consistently.
I’m building up a two-stage starter since Maine Brewing Supply had sold out of 2 liter flasks and I only have a 1 liter. First stage I did last night, pitched the smack pack into 800 mL of well aerated starter wort. This is the first time I’ve aerated a starter and the first starter I’ve done in a while.
Tonight I’ll chill it down a bit in the fridge, decant off the spent wort and boil/chill another 800mL to build it up again. That should get me somewhere in the range of 250-350 billion cells, which isn’t quite enough but it’s sure better than a single smack pack.