Mystery Beer

Update 9/20 - Kegged. Kinda gross. Cinnamon phenol from the dry hop. Don't care what the FG is.
Update 9/9 - Dry hopped in primary. Didn't check SG
--

MoreBeer put out a mystery kit for their forum competition this year. Entries due at the end of September, so hopefully this will be ready by then. My guess is that the steeping grains are 1 lb of a medium crystal (40-60L) and 0.25 lb pale chocolate malt for color.

Batch #63
Mystery Beer (5.25 gal)
8 lbs Light Malt Extract (syrup)
1.25 lbs Steeping grains
Sugar, 5m
1 oz hops "A" (60m)
0.5 oz hops "B" (5m)
0.875 oz hops "C" (1m)
1 oz hops "D" (dry hop)
Whrilfloc, 5m
Safale US-04, 11g dry
OG: 1.058
FG:
ABV:
IBU: ???

Steep the grains for 30m (start cold, ramp towards 170°F). Mix in the extract at the start of the boil (burner off!). Add hops, etc, as indicated. I plan to ferment around 68°F.

Small feather, but it's in my cap

The latest incarnation of the blackberry stout took 2nd place in its category at the Beer, Beer, and More Beer forum competition. Okay, so it was 2nd out of 4 or 5, but still, I'm proud of it. I have yet to see the judges' comments,...even though I was at the competition as a steward and could have read them. =)

Why not?

Update 9/13/08 - Bottled 4.5 gallons. Tart right now, but should mellow over the next month or so. Primed with 4oz corn sugar.
--
Update 9/7/08 - Racked to secondary, added 1# frozen berries.
--
Update 9/1/08 - Ack! Well, more of a "BOOM" and a soft rattle of the house. I forgot that this one tends to ferment really fast and didn't hook up a blow-off tube. So I instead spent about half an hour cleaning up the closet and am doing laundry to get the blackberry out of everything. At least my fancier clothes that share the closet weren't hit. Smells good, though.
--

Competitions are coming, and just for the hell of it, I decided to submit one of my favorite brews. Changed it up a little this time to enhance the berry flavor. Should be ready in time for the California State Homebrew Competition, and the MoreBeer forum competition, which I will be stewarding to try and get in to the judging thing (at the very least, to refine my tasting skills). I'll probably also submit the GoP Trippel.

In other news, my mash efficiency jumped up today. Turns out the mill I was using didn't grind well enough for all grain. With the other mill in the shop, my efficiency (nothing else significantly different) jumped to around 75%.

Batch #21
Blackberry Stout 3 (All-grain), Irish Ale Yeast (White Labs 004)
--9 lbs Amer. 2-row Pale (RAHR)
--1 lb Crystal 40L
--8 oz Black Roasted
--4 oz Black Patent
--4 oz Chocolate Malt
--1 oz Glacier 6.0%AA (60min)
--1 oz Glacier 6.0%AA (1min)
--4 lbs Frozen blackberries (~10min)
--1 lb Frozen blackberries (secondary)
--1/4 tsp Supermoss (10min)
OG: 1.054+ (right on the money for 75% efficiency!)
FG: 1.011
ABV: ~6%
Calc. IBUs: ~23

Mashed for 1 hour at 154F in 3.5 gallons water. Fly sparge (by the pint) with 170F strike, collected ~ 6.5 gallons wort. Added 4 lbs berries with clarifier to sterilize. One pound of berries will be added to the secondary.