Monday, April 4, 2011

Beer Number Two (Cali Ale/Lager)

For me, the hardest part of brewing is choosing the recipe or style of beer. When I racked my Honey Amber (which I am now calling Buzz Bomb because it is 7.3% ABV)to the secondary, I harvested the yeast. I wanted to use the yeast for another American Amber or Brown but I also wanted to make a California Common. Wyeast 1056 is a nice multi-purpose yeast that can be used for many different styles except a Cali Common (Lager yeast). So, I decided to reuse my yeast, but then everything came to sudden halt while writing this entry. I typed in harvesting yeast in my search engine and found out something interesting: It is not recommended to reuse yeast with an ABV of 6.5% or higher.
Cali Common it is. Here is a recipe I found on Hopville.com:

California Common California Bastard

4.53 KG / 10 LB of 2 row pale
.45 KG / 1 LB of Caramel/Crystal Malt 60L
.22 KG / 8 OZ of Biscuit

28.5 Grams / 1 OZ Northern Brewer Hops at 60 Mins
14.5 G / .5 OZ Northern Brewer at 30 Mins
14.5 G / .5 OZ Northern Brewer at 1 Min

WYeast 2112 1056
Est OG 1.058
Est FG 1.018

I think this time I should skip the racking to secondary and just bottle after 3 weeks in primary.

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