Pilsner Mar 01, 08

So I promised my sis, Kari, that I would drive down to her wedding and bring a few kegs with me. So what to brew? The wedding will be in the summer so a pilsner is always a good thing to have at hand for all them other types that don't like a lot of flavor in their beer. Actually, a well done pils has a ton of flavor. Any suggestions for a good, interesting, wedding beer?

Also at the brewstore I paid 75 bucks for a sack of grain. This compares to 55 bucks the last time i went in. With our crop land being trashed, global warming/cooling, a huge demand for bio fuels (i.e. EtOH), and other blights, there is a massive shortage on certain crops (wheat, barley, hops, and the list keeps going). So I'll get off my soap box, suffice it to say though, that good brews are going to be getting ridiculously expensive. Oh yeah, and my original point to bring this up. I have a bunch of older Spalt hops that i don't know what to do. So I decided to try something new and feature them (well, almost, I couldn't get rid of Saaz - that's sacrilege) in the brew. If I were smart I would have done a side y side test, but I was lazy today.

So i decided to brew under the car port because of the inclement weather. After I saw the sun, I wished I had stayed up on the deck. Oh well. Turned out uneventful, good brew day. Here's the details:

10 gallon batch. Target OG 1.045 (tad low for a pils; assume 80% efficiency). Target HBU - Don't know .... just followed a prv recipe that turned out.

Water. Filtered with no additions
Yeast. I think wyeast 2206. I took the dregs from the primary of a previous batch on 1/26 and made a ~0.5 gallon starter about 30 hrs before pitching.
grains 15# german pils, 1.25# Vienna, 0.75 #crystal 10 degree
Hops. 4 oz Saaz 3.1%. 4Oz Spalt 4.1%

2Mash in to 124 for 30 min. Raise to 153 for 50 minutes (fluctuated between 145-155 but orig set was 153) . Raise to 170 for 10 minutes. Sparge with ~10 gallons hot water (Mash stayed at 170 throughout). Take about 14 gallons. Boil 60 minutes with following sched.
60 - 1 oz saaz 1 oz Spalt
30 - same
15 - same
5 - same + tea of irish moss.
0- knockout. Chill to 70 degrees. split to two primaries, aerate (filtered air) and pitch.

Actual OG - 1.053. Only took 9.5 gallons so Calc efficiency ~82%.

Picture on the right is during the sparge of my setup in the carport. after pitching there was activity within 24 (+) hours? very disappointing but there was noticeable activity Sunday evening... pictured left.

transfered 3/14 after 48 hr Diactyl rest at cellar temp. Gravity 1.015, which seems a tad high. Tasted nice and dandy. Will need to compare with my previous batch. Will leave at cellar temp before crashing it to see if it will ferment down any farther.