You wanted sweet to balance citra??? Man, one of the reasons I don’t use Citra is that it makes the beer too sweet for me!
If you’re getting a braid, this is the one I recommend…Lasco brand (part number 10-0121 or 10-0321). I get them at a local hardware store, but they’re also available through Amazon.
Thanks Denny for the link.
This is my first time using Citra (well soon to be second time)…
Fingers crossed. I think I’ll mash low around 149* this time too.
:cheers:
Hi Andy, I’m glad Denny chimed in, I’m reading His and Drew’s new book Experimental Brewing. In chapt. 2 they talk about some very important things to do about recipe formulation[ like adding too many things into your recipe]. You might consider buying this book, it has very valuable info in it about brewing plus some great recipes, plus pics of Denny’s mash cooler set up with braid. I’ve been sold on this mash tun set up for many years and it has worked great for me.
I ordered the braid from Amazon today. Now there will be a false bottom for sale on craigslist.
Thanks Denny!
Hi old guy, I actually own the book and love it. There is some much great information in there. I brewed a few out of the book and improvised off a few recipes too.
I normally would never add this much crystal, but I fell for the old “google” trap on recipe design, specifically regarding the utilization of citra hops, and fell hook, line, and sinker for a recipe that went against all logic. I know Rouge uses like 20% crystal, but this went overboard. I’ll probably cross my fingers and hope for the best, but in the end learn a valuable lesson. Which happens to be, beersmith and brewersfriend are there to help design clones.
Maybe it’s a good thing that I had such a hard brew day because it got me to re-tool my set up and also to carefully evaluate my recipe design.
:cheers:
Thanks for the kind words, you guys!
Took a gravity reading yesterday.
It finished at 1.012 and started at 1.050, so I am happy there. I didn’t notice any off flavors other than it is obviously sweet but not cloyingly sweet. Citra is definitely an interesting hop variety for this brew, and I would probably not enter this as an American Brown Ale as it is way too sweet for that and the citra is way too overpowering.
I am going to re-brew this next week and this time I will scale back the crystal to 15% and increase the base by 15% and drop the citra by an ounce and use an American variety yeast like American Ale II.
1.012 with over 30% crystal? Interesting. I’ve done 20% with 158F mash temp and finished about the same and hardly sweet at all. This is another data point to me that suggests that crystal malts might not have an effect on FG as much as we think. I personally think pH plays a larger role.
It depends on the hopping. 30% crystal won’;t seem sweet if you hop to compensate.
