Schwarz Doppelbock James Perkins 10/15/2000 Feedback? Write james@loowit.net This was my first lager, and it turned out stunningly delicious. The taste profile was a bit heavy on the chocolate and a bit sweeter than desired, but the sweetness mellowed over the next two years into a longlasting, complex, tasty beer. I have made it again, with some modifications. Great thanks to the guys at http://www.mainbrew.com for thier suggestions and handholding. 6 lb. Tartan (Dark) Malt Extract 7 lb. Amber Malt Extract 8 oz. 2-Row Malt for toasting 8 oz. Munich Malt 8 oz. Chocolate Malt 8 oz. Canadian Honey Malt 4 oz. Crystal 120L Malt 4 oz. CaraMunich Malt 4 oz. Special B Malt 3 gal. distilled water for boiling grains 3 gal. distilled water to sparge/top up. 2 oz. Northern Brewer hops for 60 min. 2 oz. Northern Brewer hops for 30 min. Wyeast 2206 Bavarian Lager pitchable yeast Toast the 2-row malt: lay on cookie sheet. place in preheated 350F oven for 10 minutes. crush with a rolling pin just enough to break each kernel into 3-4 pieces. Note the that husk of the kernels stays intact so don't be fooled by the intact husks. Ready boiling kettle with 3 gal. water at room temperature. Place the toasted malts and the rest of the crushed malts in a boiling bag and place in the water. Heat water to 180F (I use the side burner of an outdoor propane bbq). Periodically lift the bag free of the water to drain, like dunking a huge teabag. I leave the lid off during this heating. Remove the grain bag, squeeze the grain bag into the water (I use two large stainless steel mixing bowls and trap the grain bag between them like so -- )o) -- where ")" is a bowl and "o" is the grain bag. Bring to full rolling bowl. beware of it foaming over... if it looks like it is going to do so, remove from heat until it subsides, then put it back. Mine developed about 1/2" of creamy foam at the start of the boil. Add all the malt extract syrup, stirring to keep it from sticking and burning on the bottom. Return to full boil, watching carefully for it possibly foaming up. Add 2 oz. of the hops and set your timer for 60 min. I stir 'em in at this point until they are totally soggy. With 30 min. left add the rest of your hops. I stir these in too. Even still, most of the hops seem to float around the edges of the kettle and get periodically doused with boiling malty foam from the center, kind of eruptions of a molten malt volcano. I leave the lid off during this process. If I put it on partway things really get rolling. When the buzzer goes off, pour 1/2 gal. cold water in the bottom of the primary fermenter, then hold a (sanitized) kitchen strainer over the fermenter and scoop pintfuls of hops and wort into the strainer. When the strainer's nearly overfull I smush the hops to drain the extract, and pour a cup or two of cold water through it to sparge, then plop the hops into a container to later throw into my garden compost. Repeat until done (took about 4 strainers-ful of hops for me) (I really must get a brewer's strainer to hold ALL the hops). Top up the primary fermenter to 5 gal. liquid. Cover securely and let it sit overnight. Measure the temperature When it gets down around 75F, measure the specific gravity (I have 1.070, although I expected around 1.100 -- did I do something wrong?). Pitch the lager yeast in over the surface of the wort and keep covered. Place in a 75F room and wait for fermentation to get really going (8-10 hours). Update 10/17 - It took 24 hours to get going, but came home from work today and discovered major foam (now 3/4 inches high in my primary). Tommorrow morning I will trundle it through the house, out the garage door and into the tin shed next to the garden to start lagering. This space should average near 50-55F. I'll plan to measure specific gravity every couple of days. Try to get it under 1.035 -- 1.025 would be really excellent. When it is stable for at least half a week at a nice low number, I'll rack it off to the secondary fermenter (I'll use a glass carboy with bubbler) and return it to the 50-55F space. Let it lager for a long time. A few months -- before bottling. Update 10/22 Specific Gravity ~1.042. There is a thick yeast cap with bubbles. Temperature in my entryway have gone between 50 and 60 regularly. All seems to be well! Update 10/29 Specific Gravity 1.025. Update 10/31 Specific Gravity 1.025. Much of the yeast cap has sunk, but there's a surface scum. Brought the wort out of the house entryway (48-58F) into the garage (55-63F) to warm it up a little. Kevin says this will allow the yeast to metabolize the diacetyls (butterscotch flavors) and is what commercial brewers do. He says if S.G. stays stable I can move to the secondary on 11/2 (which I subsequently do, and leave in in the garage another 2.5 months). Update 2/17 Brought wort into house to warm it up. Update 2/18 After warming, Specific Gravity 1.022. Pitched a second batch of Lager Yeast. Will let it distribute for a day and bottle tommorrow.