[foodhackingbase] dark beer recipe - ideas?

[salomonderossi]

Hi Frantisek,

I will try to answer some of your questions. Regarding the malts you have made a good choice. If you want a bit darker color you can also be a bit sloopy when you stir. When mashing you normally have to stir all the time. If you make a 2 minute pause the malt will scorch a bit and the beer becomes darker. 

Regarding the alcohol, just use less malt. Do you have something to measure the original gravity of liquids? Something about 10 degree plato or 9.6 Brix or 1.03840 SG should fit your needs. With these values you should have about 3.5% alcohol. 

I usually mash the malts and after the lautering I fill up with water until the desired value :-D

Regarding the hops I would choose something mild with low alpha acid. The "classic" hops should fit best here. I found Hallertau and Tettnang in the shops you send. I would choose one of those two. Or you could combine the two. And boil the hops only for 45 minutes. The longer you boil the more bitter the beer gets. 

Regarding the yeast you can (in my opinion) choose any top fermenting yeast. With top fermenting yeast you cannot make any big mistakes. And it does not matter if the temperature is not exactly the same during the fermentation. The result is usually very tasty. I usually use the Safbrew T-58. This yeast is also listed in the online shop you send :-)

Regarding the gypsum I can give you no real tipps. This depends on your water hardness and the ratio of gypsum to lime ("Kalk" in germany). The ratio of gypsum and lime should be 1:1. But I think you should first find a nice malt and hop mix and get your process reproducible before you should think about that. 

I hope that helped a bit. 

King regards,
Philipp

> Am 04.07.2014 um 14:07 schrieb Frantisek Algoldor Apfelbeck <algoldor at foodhackingbase.org>:
> 
> Hi to all,
> I've a practical questions about my first beer adventure which I want to do next week. I'm after dark beer, preferably short beer so 3% alcohol content or so, I want to order whatever I have to by Monday. Here is recipe which I got from a beer brewer here in Korea Jason some time ago and I would like to hear comments because I would like to do some changes:
> 
> Batch size = 20 l (6% alcohol)
> 
> Malts
> 5 kg of Pilsner malt
> 1 kg of Munich malt
> 300 g of caramunich 3
> 100 g cara aroma
> 300 g carafa2 (steep separate)
> 
> Hops
> any hops that provide 4-5% of aa (60 min boiling) - Kent Golding suitable? other?
> any spicy hop (10 min boiling) - crystal suitable? other?
> optional - 1 tablespoon of gypsum (to lower pH)
> 
> Yeast
> S05
> Safale S05 (London ale yeast)
> 
> Below are online shops which I can use here in Korea for the ingredients, I've to buy everything except the Pilsner malt which I got in bulk for a good price, it is really expensive here (insane).
> 
> beerschool.co.kr
> seoulhomebrew.com
> craftbrewer.co.kr
> 
> I would like to decrease the amount of alcohol to 3-4% and I may have to change the dark malts composition a bit because I will not be able to get all of them - but I should be able to get a representative malt from each group (caramel, roasted etc.). I'm really not sure which hops are suitable, I do not like bitter flavour really ... I'll have to make my own false bottom for mashing, no way where to order here I'm afraid, maybe as Richard suggested that "bag beer brewing" can be an option ...
> 
> So please suggestions, thank you!
> 
> Sincerely from Jeju,
> 
> FAA
> 
> -- 
> Frantisek Algoldor Apfelbeck
> 
> biotechnologist&kvasir and hacker
> 
> http://www.frantisekapfelbeck.org
> 
> "There is no way to peace, peace is the way." Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
> 
> 
> Disclaimer - there are other people who have access to this email account, please be aware of that it is part of the design. For "highly private communication" use algoldor at yahoo.com