2018 Brew – 11 Gallon Brew

03/10/2018 / Today we brewed this recipe again, 11 gallons..

• we used 18 lb of Copeland 2-row (native to Washington state)
• 4 lb crystal 20 L

bittering – start of boil 1 ounce of pellet hops and 2 ounce of whole Cascade were used.

aroma/flavor – At end of 10 minutes we added 2 ounces of Saaz and 1/2 ounce of Fuggle.

White Labs California Ale Yeast was used this year.

At day 3 of fermentation, the puree from the canned apricots will be added to the fermentor.

OG 1.050 / because we brewed 1 extra gallon, 11 vs. 10 and used same amount of grain.

more update later..

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2016 Brew – 10 Gallon brew

On 6/4/2016 this year, we have brewed a 10 gallon version from last year, we scaled the grains and hops up by a factor of 2.  Total water used was 15.5 gallons, and to be honest I think we ended up with 11 gallons total beer.  However, this time we use canned Apricots, 5 cans total, they were already soft and super easy to create a puree (see video below) // also cost was much cheaper, 1 can costs $1, so $5 total.  At the brew store, canned Apricots extracts were much more expensive $20 – so that’s something to consider…

Yeast, since we maintain our own yeasts, we use that, saves a lot of money and we have great results, Wyeast 1056 was used.

OG 1.056 // on day 3 we added 5 cans of apricots, this for sure raised the sugar levels, but we haven’t figured out exactly how to measure that, fruit calculators do exist, but I am not sure how accurate that really is..  Fermentation was for 2 weeks, below is a 2 week fermentation plot derived from the logger and their respective fit lines.  You can see a nice spike when the fruit was added to the fermentor (blue lines are internal temps, orange external [outside the fermentor]).

FG 1.008

without factoring in the fruit added on day 3, final ABV 6.3% // which probably is closer to 8% 😉  when you do factor in the fruit.

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2015 Brew – 5 Gallon All Grain Recipe – Apricot Ale

This recipe is fairly easy and the finished beer is delicious!  The ABV % will range between 4 % ~ 6 % depending on how much fruit you use and what kind and the efficiency of your brew setup and the attenuation of your yeast.

http://www.whitelabs.com/beer/homebrew/beginners-attenuation-and-flocculation-definitions

OG – 1.043 // Brew Date: 6/14/2014

FG – 1.012 // Kegging and Botteling Date: 6/21/2014

We only used 2 LB of Apricots and later 4 ounces of a natural Apricot flavoring – which will most likely push the ABV up a little bit too once it is finished aging.  Normally recipe calls for 1 to 1.5 lbs of apricot fruit per each gallon of beer.

Grain:

9 lb American 2 row
2 lb Crystal 20L

Hops:

Set your timer and once a nice steady rolling boil has been achieved, then:

• add 1 oz Cascade (at start of-boil )
• add 1/2 Cascade or (1 OZ if you want more Hops) at last 15 minutes of Boil

– The resultant aroma is of medium strength and very distinct. It has a pleasant, flowery and spicy, citrus-like quality with a slight grapefruit characteristic. The hop is good for both flavor and aroma uses. It can also be used for bittering effectively, and can be used to make any ales.

Fruit:

2~3 lb of Canned Fruit Puree – add this to the Primary fermentation at day 3 of the fermentation.  You can also add some apricot flavorings (you can buy those at the brew store), but add this at the kegging or bottling time.

Apricot Extract/Flavoring or making your own Apricot puree (lower cost)…

Do a test before bottling or kegging if you go with the extract: Take a dropper or pipette with mL measurements and blend a measured amount of the extract into a measured sample of beer, this will help you to find the mix ratio you like, and then simply scale up to figure out how much to add for the volume of beer that you have – most people add 4 ounces per 5 Gallon…

Yeast:

Wyeast American 1056 – we always do a starter!