Homegrown homebrew

Homegrown hops, and I got to use some this time! Wasn't ready to brew when they needed to be picked, so they were dried (in a dehydrator at 85-90ºF for about 2 days) , vacuum packed, and frozen. Mostly mild Cascade, but some potent Centennial as well. This was the entire harvest, so it's all mixed in together. This is also the last of my base malt, of which there was about 3 pounds less than I had on record...luckily had some rye malt lying around to shore up the grist bill to hit a reasonable gravity. Beautiful copper color, wort tastes great,... hops might have fared better as a 5min addition.

Batch #106

Harvest-ish Rye Pale Ale

5 gallons

8.5 lbs 2-row base malt (mostly Maris Otter with maybe a pound CA Select mixed in)
1 lb Rye Malt

8 oz American Crystal 40L
8 oz American Crystal 90L
8 oz Aromatic

0.8 oz Columbus (14.9%aa), 60 minutes

4 ounces whole Cascade/Centennial (about 3:1), flameout+whirlpool

GigaYeast NorCal #1

Mash in with 16qts to 154F, hold one hour. Collect 7.5 gallons. One hour boil. Just shy of 5.5gal in the fermenter, with trub loss in transfer. Kegged after 4 weeks (because lazy) with 2oz priming sugar. Tastes good, but the hops aren't coming through as much as I'd like.

OG: 1.050

FG: 1.018 (a bit high)

ABV: 4.2% (a bit low)

IBU: ~45-50

Summer is hot

Batch #105

Apricot Saison

8.5 gallons

5.5 lbs Maris Otter

6 lb White Wheat

8 oz American CaraPils

0.5 oz Columbus (14.9%aa), 60 minutes

1 oz Nelson Sauvin, 1 min

Wyeast 3711 French Saison  - 1.5L starter

Mash in with 20qts to 152F, hold one hour. Batch sparged to collect 10 gallons. One hour boil. Split into two batches.

Batch A - 3.5 gallons. Will go on tap fresh in August. Possibly with apricot puree to bring up to ~4.5% ABV or apricot extract if already close enough in range.
Batch B - 4.5 gallons. For souring. Will get apricot puree and White Labs Belgian Sour Blend. Might have to blend in a small batch of beer with residual sugars. We'll see how it goes.

OG: 1.036

FG: 

ABV: 

IBU: ~20-25

Hazy Pig

Batch #104

Hazy Variation on Blind Pig...ish

8.5 gallons

12.5 lbs Maris Otter

3 lb White Wheat

1 lb Rolled Oats

8 oz American 40L

8 oz American CaraPils

0.6 oz Columbus (14.9%aa), 60 minutes

1.2 oz Chinook (13.1%aa), 60 minutes

0.5 oz Amarillo (9.8%aa), 30 minutes

1.5 oz Amarillo, 0 min

1.5 oz Cascade, 0 min

1 oz Simcoe, 0 min

0.8 oz Chinook, 0 min

GigaYeast VT IPA - 1.5L starter

RO water with ~ 2:1 CaCl2 to CaSO4 added for about 80ppm chloride and 40ppm sulfate.

Mash in with 26qts to 152F, hold one hour. Batch sparged with 24qts. Collected 10.3 gallons. One hour boil. Split into two batches of about 4.25 gallons each, pitched yeast.

4/14 - Racked 2.5 gallons from one batch onto 1oz Citra LupuLN2 and the cascade pellets I had left (about 0.5oz) in a keg, pressurized to force carb. Racked the remaining volume onto the other batch and added 1oz Simcoe LupuLN2.

4/29 - Racked 2.5gal to keg, pressurized to force carb, remaining 2.5gal to small carboy with 1oz Chinook pellets.

OG: 1.054

FG: 1.012

ABV: 5.5%

IBU: ~50

Learning curves

It's been a while. Upgraded to a 60qt kettle and bought a proper heat source. Test driving the new setup with a recent favorite style to brew. 

Batch #103
TBD fruit tart, shooting for 7 gallons total
7 lbs Maris Otter
7 lbs White Wheat Malt
1 lb Acid Malt
0.375 lb Am Crystal 40L

- Day One -

About 1/2 cup grain reserved for lactic acid rest.

Soft water. Built from RO with a little chalk, epsom, and table salt. + gypsum (just shy 3/4 tsp each).

Save a fistful of crushed grain. Mash in targeted at 125F in about 3 gallons water, rest 15 min. Add boiling water to bring to 155F. Rest one hour. Result was 130F and 150F, in about 4.5 gallons total. Did not correct saccharification temp because I had already recombined my sparge water and the hot liquor tank temp was low. 

Lazy, so batch sparged to collect just over 10 gallons. Saved grain added back to wort.

1.2 L starter pulled from sweet wort pitched with Gigayeast Saison II (four months old?! always check the label, especially at an unfamiliar shop...yes I know it's winter) and some ancient Brett Brux that I found in the fridge.
I like the flexibility to have extra water in the kettle going into the mash. I like that my new burner works instead of just coating everything in soot. Running 7-10gal beers is going to take a couple of attempts before I have a smooth operation going.

- Day Two - 

Boil 45 min.
1.5oz Mosaic (11.2%aa) at 10min with whirlfloc.

I don't have a great solution for cooling the new kettle yet. Ambient chill overnight.

- Day Three -

Split into two 4 gallon volumes for fermentation. Pitched the yeast. Fermenting at 68ºF ambient. About 75% grain-to-fermenter volume efficiency (rough estimate)...not bad.

- Day Fifteen - 

Added 1oz Oak cubes and 2oz dried hibiscus to one of the fermenters.

- Day Thirty-one - 

Transferred the beer off of the hibiscus. A few pellicles and a fair amount of other evidence of substantial souring. A few possibilities - unwashed hibiscus and oak, insufficient sanitizing of the bucket, or the glass weight I used to hold the hibiscus bag down carried some sauerkraut bugs with it. Whatever the case... it smells amazing.

- Day What? -
Bottled the regular stuff on 3/3. Bottled the hibiscus on 3/17. Stuff on top was still showing there, reforming after racking in minutes... probably from brettanomyces. SG was still 1.008

OG: 1.052
FG: 1.008
ABV: about 5.8%
IBU: 5-10