Today’s target is a mild ale. Found the starting recipe here, which I modified to have a bit more grains since we were extracting the malt without the aid of proper mashing gear. The ingredients were:
- 7.0 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter
- 2.0 lbs Crystal Malt – 60L
- 1.0 lbs Crystal Malt – 40L
- 0.33 lbs Chocolate Malt
- 2 oz. Fuggles hops (1st addition with 45 minutes remaining, 2nd addition with 15 minutes remaining)
Original Gravity was 1.030, which appears to be about right for the style. Due to the warmth outside, it was slow going getting the temperature down. Fortunately the fluid level was low, and I was able to add ice to both bring it up to 5 gallons as well as drop the temperature down to 78 degrees. To accomplish that I moved it to a plastic ale pail, which I added ice to to bring it up to 5 gallons, and gave it a stir with the aerator. Once those melted, the temperature was down to 78, and I added the Nottingham yeast, and transferred it to the glass carboy.
Before its addition, the yeast was made into a bit of a starter to prove it was active and give it a kick start. This was done by taking some residual honey in a container, adding some water and heating that up, shaking it around a bit, and putting the result in a canning jar with the yeast. In less than 30 minutes, it was highly pressurized and oozing yeast.
