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It's actually not to do with extraction, it's a way of adding flavour. The extraction and conversion of sugars is done in the mash step, where we soak the grains at a given temperature fore a period of time. The grains are all removed for the boil. On this beer, the long boil was for two reasons: One was to reduce the double batch volume down to a single batch size (therefore doubling the alcohol potential). The second was to brown the sugars and create caramel flavours in the beer. Much the same as when you bochet a mead. The colours and flavours in the mead are coming from the caramelised honey. Hope this helps.... 🍺👍

@brewandbuild Amazing. A few more questions. What's a good beer style to try as a first project? Meadmaking is challenging to create something people want to drink, because it requires a lot of balancing of sweetness, acids, and tannins. Is grain brewing easier to create something drinkable? I've heard that beer is far more vulnerable to municipal water imperfections like chloramine and pH. How hard is it to test and correct this? Likewise, I've heard beer is more easily oxidized than mead; what extra steps do I need to take to make sure even less oxygen reaches beer than it does mead? Can I mash and boil on an electric kitchen stove, or does it have to be done outdoors with a burner as I see most brewers do?

I agree that mead making is an art in itself. However, I have to say, I find making mead a lot less work than beer. Although, the maturing time of mead is way beyond anything you'll get in the beer world. A good style to start is some sort of pale ale. They're forgiving, the yeast is generally quite neutral, and it's more about a good process with temperature control and keeping the oxygen exposure to a minimum. Generally you can fix most water issues with boiling the water first, and most municipal waters are fine to use. The best option is reverse osmosis to produce a blank canvas, and then build the water profile to what you require. However, this is WAY beyond where you need to start with beer brewing. I think the best place to start is with a kit, or even invent your own recipe, but use malt extract to start. This will give you a chance to get the fermentation control practiced, plus it will give you a chance to work out your oxygen exposure protections ie well sealed fermentor, controlled splashless transfers, good bottling/kegging technique etc. By the time you throw in all-grain mashing and so on, you're heading for disappointment, so make life easy at first.... It can all be done indoors on the stove, and to be honest, it can mostly be done with the equipment you already have in the kitchen. I've got a couple of videos on brewing with no gear at all, but there are loads of videos on ways to start out. Hope it goes well if you give it a shot. 👍

Funny enough, I've got a Mexican lager in the tank that's holding up my next brew as well. Can't complain though, when the only thing standing between you and beer, is more beer. A nice rock and hard place situation. 😁🍺🍺

I love this beer. Hope you like it as well.

Can definitely see the Special III working well in this also. I think it depends on whether you're trying for more of a milk chocolate smoothness, or a more defined dark chocolate note.

It has crossed my mind a few times to maybe do that. By the time I get a camera set up, and everything ready, that idea completely slips my mind. Maybe one day. 😁

Please nick it, let me know if it works for you. I think 835X is one of the best lager yeasts out there (for the right style anyway). I've even started using it in my Czech Pils on the last 4 brews, not a Bohemian yeast sure, but it's the best Czech Pils I've made.

Good question. I stopped bottle priming nearly all my beers many years ago. Instead, I fine and clear everything in a unitank, then force carbonate, then bottle with a beer gun. This has given me much greater control over the carbonation process, and a useful side effect, I can pour crystal clear beer, right to the final dregs of the bottle. 😁 That's not to say I don't occasionally bottle prime. When the style absolutely calls for it, then I do it. An example of that is a beer I'm about to bottle. A Polish Grodziskie. Without bottle priming, it would lose some of what makes it the beer that it is.

We get bottles of iodine spray for our animals. The one we're using at the moment is Gold Label. It's a 3% iodine solution, and it's only about £5 online. I think any iodine will work. Just do a few tests as the mash is progressing, and you'll get an idea how much starch it takes to see a reaction, then you'll know how much you need and how long you might need to stir it around to see a result.

@@brewandbuild Thank you.

Ha 😁, the swimming was a bit out of place for a brewing video, but hey, I was heading down swimming anyway, before beer, so i figured I may as well get some footage... That water was bloody cold tho. I have to say that you popped into my thoughts a few times whilst I was editing that one together. I kept imagining your reaction to doing such a long boil. 🤣🤣 It does seem a bit indulgent to spend 14 hours making a beer, I'll admit. Cheers 🍺🍺

Some good questions. Before each use, I rinse the whole thing in Starsan. Then I put the stone end in the kettle and boil it. At the end of the 1 minute oxygen run, I turn off the gas and take the stone out of the wort. It tends to be still foaming a little at this point, which means that there can be no wort going into the pores. Then I rinse it under hot tap water, (give it a little wipe with some dishwashing liquid on my clean brewing sponge if needed) and then quickly boil the stone part in the kettle again. This way, there can be no yeast/bacteria left to multiply in the pores. I never touch the stone with my bare hands. Hope that's helpful. 👍

Yeah, I've done a couple of these now on sunny days using PV. It's been nice watching it boil away, and not costing me a thing. Good luck with trying it next year tho... 🍺🍺

Cheers for that. I'm not saying that it's the greatest way to brew beer, but I really set out on this video to show that there are so many ways to get into this hobby for almost free. It just needs a little imagination. Glad you enjoyed it though.

I take it you mean pellets? Yes I've got pellets of both these hops as well. I'm happy using either, and I'm probably starting to use pellets more than loose leaf.

@@brewandbuild Yupp, the pellets. I guess they are way better in terms of 'frozen' shelf time. But fresh loose leaves should be smashing, eh?

Thank you very much. 🍺🍺

I think anyone that enjoys kwak, would enjoy this. Although this is richer and with much more body. I've since done a Belgian Strong Dark as a long boil, and you'd definitely enjoy that as well. 🍺🍺

Thanks for that. 🍺 Lets face it, such a long boil is not practical for most brewers. But even still, waiting around for a year for a barleywine to come good is hard to do as well. I think it's definitely worth doing at least once in your brewing life though. 👍

The FG was 1.030, and the volume into the fermentor was about 18.5 litres. Nice job on the open fermentation. One of my future projects is to build myself an open square fermentation slab for some of my English ales. Time to get round to ti is the problem.... I really like TT Landlord myself. It will be interesting to see how your Seattle audience take to it. At least you're giving them the full experience with the beer engine. I've got so many beers in the pipeline, it's hard to keep track. I've got videos I need to find the time to edit for Pale Ales, Belgian Strong Dark, Kweik, Tripel and a Dunkel....... Then in fermentors at the moment I've got a Czech pils, Mexican Lager, Cider and a Grodziskie. As far as the next beers? I've got another Mex Lager to brew as a yeast comparison for someone first, then I'll be doing a Bavarian smoked dark lager. Plus I've got a list of about 10 more in my head that I'd like to do...... Once again, time is always the problem though.....

It's quite strong for sure, but the alcohol is really smooth after 10 months aging. It should be even better if I can hold it for another 12 months. That might be hard..... 😁

Man, you brew it, you keep in in a tank for a month and then you wait for a year, already bottled. Gonna taste my BW the next month... that was brewed in beg-Dec.'2023, lol. Patience, tho...

It's a brew that's worth the patience tho.....

Absolutely.

Christmas ales are great, but they're tricky to get right. You might need a trial run before serving to people you like. 😁😁 Slightly higher alcohol volume, some darker and richer malts, and restraint on the spices are the key to them being drinkable. I find any spices are generally best added in the last 5 minutes of the boil. Don't use powdered spice, unless you have a really good spice bag, and even then they can get through, and be impossible to strain out. Best of luck if you try it, and have a good Christmas. 🍺🍺

Thanks for the advice you have a good Christmas also

The OG was 1.050, but I seem to have missed putting the FG in the video. It was 1.012

@brewandbuild thank you, I'm brewing this beer now, can't wait to try it. I appreciate the work you put in.

Good luck with it. I hope it turns out well for you. 🍺🍺

I hope it helps with starting out on your beer journey. You've got a massive head start already, from all your bourbon knowledge. Good luck with the brewing. 🍺🍺

That sounds like a good result. I find the hard part is resisting drinking them long enough for them to get better. 😁

I'm afraid I'm not. It's a standard cold temp, non pressure ferment.

I like the combination of those two, and can definitely see it in a Mexican lager. As long as the melon didn't come through to strongly. The Hallertau Tradition is a great fit, and I might try that at some point. Something we don't talk about much is hop differences. We all say "oh, I used this, and it created this... blah, blah..." but depending on the hops year or region of origin, we can end up with a really different beer from brew to brew. An example I had recently, was when I re-brewed my Centennial pale. The difference in hops crop year, made a huge difference to the beer. Nowhere near (and I mean not even close) to as much grapefruit. The beer ended a little flabby, without as much sharp citrus bite, still very good, but not a patch on the original. The original was one of the most refreshing beers I've brewed in ages. The re-brew was nothing special. I'd hate to be a commercial brewer, having to try to match a flavour profile, brew after brew, year after year. It must be a nightmare.

Thanks for watching. We're all learning from each other on here, so the more we can share, hopefully, the better we can all get. 🍺👍

I know what you mean. It takes the spontaneity out of brewing.

Thanks Rick. 🍺

Ok, that's a good question. Firstly, you shouldn't need to use lemon juice, or any sort of acid with this. That's the opposite of the alkaline state we are trying to achieve here. For my method here, we need 10% glucose/fructose for the mix to not crystalise. This is being provided by the 10% honey. Having started doing it with this method, I have never crystalised a batch since, so there is something else at play here. Otherwise you need to hold at 125°c for about 30 minutes in order to invert enough of the sugar into glucose and fructose. I'm starting to wonder if a lot of the commercial honey out there is not pure. I use my own honey (we keep bees) which is pure, and therefore basically 50/50 glucose/fructose. I believe many large commercial honey sellers "cut" their honey with sugar syrup. This would mean that possibly you are below the 10% glucose/fructose that is required for it not to crystalise. This is still fine, just hold at 125°c for a while in order to invert some more sugar. Or perhaps try increasing to 15% - 20% honey. The only problem is that we don't want too much honey flavour in this. Other factors could be: -not melting all the sugar in the early low temperature stages. The unmelted sugar crystals can then be a catalyst for crystalisation -possibly particles in your pot/wok (non-stick coating coming off?) that would act as a catalyst Have a look at the comments under the video. Someone else was having trouble with this also, and he eventually found a mix that worked for him.

Great comment there. Thanks for posting that. I agree wholeheartedly with you on all of that process. Your system sounds well practiced. Yeast-wise, you are never going to go wrong with 34/70 either. I've never tasted maize in my beers either, so a very slight corn taste in one of these was unusual to find. It faded with a bit more time, although these had already been lagering for many weeks, so a bit odd. Good to hear from you. 🍺🍺

Thanks Ronny, I genuinely enjoyed doing this comparison, and I really wanted the Baja to be every bit as good as the WLP. I love the convenience of a dry yeast when I find the right ones. I hear you on the cost aspect. The only way I can justify the price is by splitting a pouch and freezing. This way it ends up being about the same price point as a packet yeast. Especially when pitching two packs for a lager. The AEG is an interesting one. I came across it when researching about the Baja. There seems to be a lot of suggestion on the net that Cellar Science is repackaged AEG, but you know what the online community is like... never let the truth get in the way of a good story and all.... It'd be interesting to hear how it works out for you.

@@brewandbuild Hey, I reached out on your website “contact me” form. I didn’t realise you were in Scotland. If you want some AEB Fermolager Yeast for your next batch let me know. Happy to send you some as I bought 500g.

Ron, I just had a look, and for some reason my website has been putting contact emails in my spam. Hopefully fixed it now, and I've got your email. I love the sound of trying some of this yeast, I'll drop you a line via your email. 👍

Yeah, I hear ya. There was no way I was forking out for fridges, but cooling during the summer was a real problem, even here in Scotland. These chambers work well. Glycol chiller for sure. Worth every penny. I have a chamber for a keg fermentor as well in the middle. The keg has a heat mat strapped to the bottom, and tubing wrapped round the top half. The tubing has disconnects for the glycol lines as well. It's a bit slower to cool than the unitanks, but it works very well nonetheless. That's the great thing about this hobby. we get to tinker away finding solutions to problems.... 🍺🍺

Thanks for watching. I'm not saying that the Baja is a bad yeast, just not as good as the liquid. I was saying to someone else, that I wonder if the Baja would re-pitch as a cleaner yeast. It's possible that it's the drying process that changes the flavour, and a re-pitch would improve that. Even if that is so, however, it negates the convenience of a dry yeast.... Stick with the 835, by far one of the best lager yeasts around.

Thank you for that, I appreciate it.

An SRM of 21.3, according to Beersmith. So, quite dark, but with a thin glass and some bright sun, the colour is definitely beautiful. I just bottled another batch of this. It really is a nice beer. Surprisinly raisin fruity, and very easy to drink.

@@brewandbuild sounds good. czech dark lager is such a good beer. ill be making one soon. im making a oktober fest bier in about a week first then right after ill be doing a czech dark. i wish i had the recipe for sampsons czech dark i had 2 years ago it was so damn good! first czech dark ever and i fell in love with the style

I haven't made an Oktober fest for this year, got behind the calendar schedule for that. Certainly hasn't stopped us drinking a number of shop bought versions though. And it's not even October yet..... 🙄

@@brewandbuild im looking online and im still unsure. im trying to figure out if i can use weyermann floor malted dark malt along the side with munich malt. i guess they are alot alike but if you heard of it can you give me your opinion? ive never brewed with floor malted dark with munich at the same time

I've heard of it, and I've been looking at using some floor malted grains in the future, as they supposedly have a bit more character. However, at this point I have not used it. So take my following comments with a pinch of salt.... From my understanding of the Floor Malted Dark, it's meant to be a touch more caramel, and a touch less honey than Munich. Because of this, with a large addition (40% plus) I feel that you'd notice one to the other. As far as using either of them, or a mix of both, as almost 100% of the malt bill, I'd have no problem with that in a recipe (ie Doppelbock), as the diastatic power is there in both malts. As a smaller percentage to a recipe though, I'm not sure you'll pick the difference, as the flavour profile looks far too similar. So if you have one or the other, I wouldn't stress over the substitution. What I do know from experience with Weyermann malts, is that their specialty malts are always richer and fruitier than other maltsters. So if you're using Munich malt from somewhere else, then I'd bet that their floor malted dark is richer than the other brand of Munich that you use. Just my thoughts.....

Ahh, sorry about that, I'll try and take it on-board for the future. Thanks for letting me know, and thanks for watching.

It's always a nice surprise, that's for sure. I'm glad the Mex lager came good too...... I'm looking forward to hearing the Vista results.

@@brewandbuild so the Vista. It definitely does give a white melon flavour to me. I was a little timid hopping a lager with a 11.7%AA hop. I think I would give it a little more at the 10 minute mark next time. It's definitely worth you giving it a trial in place of Huell Melon IMO although I'm still playing with it myself 👍

@@MRW3455 That sounds like it might hit the spot for me. I'm wondering if a big whirlpool addition might be the way to go with such a high alpha hop.... Thanks for letting me know the results. It'll probably be a while until I put a brewing order in, but this is going in my basket now.

@@MRW3455 ....ahh sod it, I've ordered some......

Yes, definitely. 👍 Strangely, I don't have anything like that, other than my purpose bought brewing equipment, otherwise I might have done something like that. But that is kind of the reason that I made this video. It's to show that with just a couple of good ideas like yours, anyone can start brewing very cheaply. Good to hear from you. 🍺

I hadn't though of that aspect. Good point. It's hard to see how flavours and aromas that have survived through a boil and a whirlpool at 74c can be driven off by a warm fermentation. However, it does make sense that an extended period (1 week/ 2 weeks) at those temperatures could drive off the more delicate and subtle flavours that are in something like Huell Melon. Thanks for that suggestion, I like it.

Funnily enough, (there was no real brief on this, which is very unusual for me) I kind of set out to make more of an English ale, but with that large dose of EKG at the end, it has a very similar taste to a number of tripels I've had. Then I wanted to get as much character from the yeast, hence the top end fermentation temps, which brought out the light Belgian character. I totally agree with you, it reads as an English ale, and I could easily have called it that, however, it ended up more Belgian. It was just an unusual experiment with surprising results. It's higher carbonation yes, not quite Belgian perhaps, but certainly too high for an English style. Getting on toward 2.7-2.8 vols CO2.

Honestly, thank you for watching and taking an interest. 🍺

An experiment gone well, not always the case with brewing, so I'll take it as a win..... Cheers 🍺🍺

Yeah, WLP 002 is a strange yeast. I love the flavour and the final beer it produces, and so I continue using it, but the journey to get finished is always unpredictable. .....Brewing, huh???

Your description of your experiences with WLP002 sounds very similar to mine. I’ve worked with a lot of liquid yeasts and usually know what to expect but this one seems to mutate when subjected to my brewing environment.

It's certainly an outlier. At first I thought it was something that I was doing. However, I've read some stories from professional brewers that have similar experiences with it. So I think it's just the yeast. Interestingly, it is extremely reliable in that it will always ferment the same way, and to the same final gravity each time, as long as the recipe is the same. But as soon as I change something, then I just have to wait and see again. 🤷🤷