First Brew of the New Year! 01/30/10

Brewed Beers: Nut Brown and Bohemian Pilsener

After a Long hiatus of not brewing since at least November, I decided to break out the brewing equipment on what was probably one of the coldest days of the year to date... I thought I'd be able to brew outside, but after about 3 minutes out there in full ski gear, face mask, and every other conceivable piece of cold weather gear, I conceded to move into the garage.

The brew day started at 8am with set up and run off through my new filtration set up... I can tell already with the first sample tastes that the filtered water has already improved the beer's overall bitterness levels. This is of course great news, so now those judges can't complain about the musty, taste they got in my last IIPA.

I wanted to stay pretty simple with the recipes and the additions so I stayed away from really measuring out my water additions... I actually was able to hit almost every target gravity that I set at 70% BHE for the final.

Here are the recipes (6gal):

Bohemian Pilsener
1.063OG
45 IBUs

13# Pils Malt

1.65oz Czech Saaz 60 Mins
2oz Czech Saaz 30 Mins
1oz Czech Saaz 10 Mins
1oz Czech Saaz 0 Mins

Wyeast Bohemian Pilsner

Nut Brown:
1.050OG
46.6 IBUs

10# 2-Row Pale Malt
.5# Crystal 60L
.5# Caravienne Malt
.25# Victory Malt
.25# Chocolate Malt

1oz Northern Brewer 60 Mins
1oz Willamette 5 Mins
1 Oz Willamette 1 Mins

Safale US-05

I did not use any whirfloc for any of these beers however i will absolutely be filtering the Pilsener. Its very cloudy in its primary stage as of right now.

I have done my Diacetyl rest for the beer and am getting ready to crash it at 37* for a while and then transfer off into a secondary for about 1-2 months of lagering at 34*. I am thinking about doing a Russian Imperial Stout pitched ontop of the pilsener yeast cake, however I'm unsure about that just yet... Maybe I'll do 2 CAP's instead...

I guess I need some recommendations.


I'll post pictures later