Homebrew Review - Homegrown Hop 2013

I brewed this beer in mid-September with my new harvest of Bramling Cross hops.

Last year's incarnation was good, but unfortunately, the 2013 brew hasn't turned out quite so well, even allowing for the fact that I'm particularly hard on my beers.

Homegrown Hop 2013 

I was out of carahell malt when I came to brew, so substituted that with caragold this time around. It produced a paler beer, probably the colour I was looking for initially, but at the expense of some body. I definitely preferred the rounder flavour the German malt provided last year.

I also increased my estimate of the alpha. This was a good move as last year's beer was possibly a shade too bitter and this year's is nicely balanced. The disappointment comes with the flavour and aroma.

Hop aroma is earthy, spicy, but definitely muted. Not the assertive, fruitiness, I was expecting.

The flavour is not too bad and was better received by my local homebrew group than it was by me. To be fair, it is nicely balanced, has more fruit to it than you get on the nose, but overall the beer is a shade thin. I think reverting to last year's recipe with the carahell malt would help in this respect.

It's nicely clear and has a bright white head which dissipates about half way through. But although it looks the part, because of the lack of body and aroma, the beer is ultimately underwhelming.

Only I know what I was setting out to achieve, which is why I'm probably a harsher critic than most and I think the problem lies with my hop picking. Worried about them 'going over' I harvested a couple of weeks earlier this year and while the hops looked great, they probably lacked some of that 'paperiness' that you need to ensure the Lupulin is at its peak.

Having said all of that, the beer is perfectly palatable and I'll have no qualms about sharing this among friends. I've bottled the whole batch, rather than splitting half into a keg, as I get more requests for handouts of this brew, than any other.

I'll keep trying, though. I'll revert to the carahell malt and pick the hops a shade later and hopefully this time next year I'll be singing its praises.

Edit: If you're a hop geek, there's an article and some great pictures from this year's British hop harvest HERE

Brewday - HGH Pale Ale 12/09/2013

It's time for the annual ritual that is brewing a beer with my homegrown hops. Last year's beer turned out especially good, so I'm planning to do something very similar this time around.

The recipe is essentially the same, although as I'm all out of Carahell malt, I'm going to replace this with Caragold in the same quantity. The Caragold is a lighter malt, but that's probably no bad thing as when I reviewed last year's beer, I did remark that the Carahell had made the beer a shade darker than I had originally anticipated.

I've also altered the hopping slightly. Beersmith predicted IBU's of 42 on last year's schedule and the beer came across significantly more bitter than that estimate. Of course, I had to guess the acid content of the hops and used a conservative 4.5% for the alpha content.

This year I'm assuming 5% alpha and have reduced the hop additions very slightly at various stages, so the recipe now looks like this;

HGH Pale Ale 2013

English IPA

Type: All Grain	Date: 12/09/2013
Batch Size (fermenter): 50.00 l	Brewer: Mark
Boil Size: 61.39 l	Asst Brewer:
Boil Time: 75 min	Equipment: Elite Brewery
End of Boil Volume 55.12 l	Brewhouse Efficiency: 73.00 %
Final Bottling Volume: 50.00 l	Est Mash Efficiency 77.4 %
Fermentation: Ale, Two Stage	Taste Rating(out of 50):
Taste Notes:
Ingredients
Ingredients Amt Name Type # %/IBU 11000.00 g Pale Malt, Maris Otter (Thomas Fawcett) (5.9 EBC) Grain 1 90.2 % 1200.00 g Caragold (9.0 EBC) Grain 2 9.8 % 80.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [5.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 3 19.4 IBUs 80.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [5.00 %] - Boil 20.0 min Hop 4 11.7 IBUs 1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 5 - 80.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [5.00 %] - Boil 7.0 min Hop 6 5.2 IBUs 80.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [5.00 %] - Boil 1.0 min Hop 7 0.8 IBUs 4.0 pkg US West Coast Yeast (Mangrove Jack's #M44) Yeast 8 - 150.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [5.00 %] - Dry Hop 3.0 Days Hop 9 0.0 IBUs
Beer Profile
Est Original Gravity: 1.056 SG	Measured Original Gravity:
Est Final Gravity: 1.014 SG	Measured Final Gravity:
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 5.6 %	Actual Alcohol by Vol:
Bitterness: 37.2 IBUs
Est Color: 10.1 EBC

That's nearly 500g of hops in a ten gallon batch and as the yield from my hop plants was 900g (dried), there'll be plenty left for another brew.

Brewday for this one is penciled in for Thursday.

Hop Harvest - 2013

I spent the last couple of evenings harvesting my Bramling Cross hops

The yield wasn't as good as last year, but I think I've got a better grade of hop, as I've picked them about a week earlier this time. Last year I left loads on the vine as they had opened too far and had a bit too much brown about them for my liking. This year's lot are about right - the cones are just about opening, with a hint of 'paperiness' about them, but still nicely green.

We got these two bags on Wednesday and I went up again on Thursday to get what was left, which was about half as much again.

The hops are now spread upon net curtains which adorn various parts my loft, 'hammock' style. It's so hot and stuffy up there, the cones dried in about two days last year.

Once done, I'll vacuum pack them and stick them in the freezer - then on to brew.

Homebrew Review - Homegrown IPA

Due to adverse weather, that Deuchers I was planning to brew this week will have to wait. Half a foot of snow and a frozen water supply have closed off that little avenue of pleasure.

As I've got behind with some of the tastings, perhaps it's a good time to review some of last year's brews. I'll kick off with the IPA I threw together with my homegrown Bramling Cross hops.

I have to confess, that despite not knowing the alpha content of the hops, this beer has turned out remarkably well.

As usual, I bottled half the batch and kegged the other. The picture is from the keg.

The 10% of Carahell I added to the Pale Malt made the beer a tad darker than I originally envisaged, but on the plus side, it does help to provide a decent malt backbone against the hops.

That's not to say this is a malty beer, far from it. But the balance is good, with the hops dominating as they rightly should. And the Bramling Cross are superb. My concerns that amateur drying techniques and storage would ruin them, failed to materialise. Perhaps it's because I used them relatively quickly after drying. But, surprisingly, I don't get the 'blackcurrant' that is often attributed to this variety. I'm getting fruity, spicy hop notes with a decent edge of bitterness, plus a hint of lemon.

Head retention is good and it laced the glass to the end. To be quite honest, I'm not sure I could have crafted a better beer, had I known the acid contents of the hop. If I'm being fussy (which I usually am) I'd prefer the colour to be slightly paler, but changing the malt would change the beer and I wouldn't want that. It's not completely clear, either, but that may be down to a hop haze.

Frankly, this is a lovely beer and I'd brew it again, just as it is. Granted a decent hop harvest in 2013, that's exactly what I'll be doing come September. It's a belter.

Brewday - Homegrown IPA 18/09/2012

Following on from the recent hop harvest, it's time to crack on and use the beauties.

To showcase the hop, I'm brewing an IPA. As the Alpha content is unknown, I've taken the view it will be at the bottom end of the commercial scale.

Because I only want to use my own hops in this brew, the IPA will also be at the lower end of the gravity range for the style. To hopefully maintain a reasonable level of bitterness, with limited hops of an unknown alpha, it seemed a sensible choice.

As it was a beautiful day, I pulled out the brewery from the confines of the garage and brewed outdoors.

The picture of the wort going into the copper makes the beer a lot darker than it is. It's really pale and gravity was bang on at 1.056

Homegrown IPA

English IPA

Type: All Grain	Date: 18/09/2012
Batch Size (fermenter): 50.00 l	Brewer: Mark
Boil Size: 62.65 l	Asst Brewer:
Boil Time: 90 min	Equipment: Elite Brewery
End of Boil Volume 55.12 l	Brewhouse Efficiency: 73.00 %
Final Bottling Volume: 50.00 l	Est Mash Efficiency 77.4 %
Fermentation: Ale, Two Stage	Taste Rating(out of 50):
Taste Notes:
Ingredients
Ingredients Amt Name Type # %/IBU 11000.00 g Pale Malt, Maris Otter (5.9 EBC) Grain 1 90.2 % 1200.00 g Carahell Malt (25.0 EBC) Grain 2 9.8 % 100.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [4.50 %] Boil 75.0 min Hop 3 23.0 IBUs 100.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [4.50 %] Boil 20.0 min Hop 4 13.3 IBUs 1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 5 - 80.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [4.50 %] Boil 7.0 min Hop 6 4.7 IBUs 100.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [4.50 %] Boil 1.0 min Hop 7 0.9 IBUs 2.0 pkg Safale American (DCL/Fermentis #US-05)  Yeast 8 - 100.00 g Homegrown Bramling X [4.50 %] Dry Hop 3.0 Days Hop 9 0.0 IBUs
Beer Profile
Est Original Gravity: 1.056 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.012 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 5.8 %
Bitterness: 42.0 IBUs
Est Color: 11.8 EBC