Mosiac Special Bitter

[mashani]

Because I can. I threw a little bit of a bunch of different types of aromatic and flavorful grains in here that I had laying around to make it more interesting since I didn't have any Maris Otter.

BIAB Mash @152 in Burtonized water of:

4# 2-row
4oz Torrified Wheat
4oz Fawcet Medium Crystal (55L)
4oz Cara 8 (this is like 6L crystal made from pilsner - think carafoam, but with a little bit more light sweet/caramel flavor contribution)
2oz Special Roast
1oz British Chocolate
1oz Aromatic

Hop schedule was done as short boil because of Mosiac AAs. But I did a full 60 minute boil just to be safe, since I was going to do a lid on hop stand. I've never managed to piss off the DMS gods, but there is always the first time.

1/2oz US Fuggles (3.9%) @20
1/2oz Mosiac (12.3%) @20
1/2oz US Fuggles @Flameout
1/2oz Mosiac @Flameout

Did a 20 minute lid on hopstand with all that still in there. So that adds some AAu contribution.

Cooled and pitched starter of WLP013 (London Ale)

OG was 1.053
IBUs are probably in the upper 40s
SRM around 14

EDIT: The plan is to dry hop some EKG and/or Mosiac. Will depend on how samples smell/taste.

[Beer-lord]

This looks oddly good! London Ale huh? Nice twist with the special roast malt.

[Dawg LB Steve]

I need to do a water adjusted style accurate brew one time.

[BigPapaG]

Nice, looks good!

You mentioned that you left all the hops in for the post-boil hopstand...

Just an FYI that I do that each time...

Actually hadn't even thought of taking the boil hops out and then tossing in the hopstand hops...

I just cool with the wort chiller to a target temp (today it was 180°F) and toss in the hopstand hops.

20-30 minutes gets the temp down to about 170°F and then I turn the chiller back on to cool to pitch temp.

Don't know how much difference pulling the boil hops at flameout would make... Maybe a cleaner effect from the hopstand addition?

Thoughts?

[mashani]

I usually do it too. I just want to make it obvious to folks who read the recipe, in case I say it's awesome and they want to make it themselves.

But full disclosure - this is how I do it.

I'll throw up to 2oz of hops in commando from T-20 down. Those obviously always stay in. That's the magical amount that causes no trouble with my spigots in 2.5 gallon LBC. Any more and I start to bag them. Especially if I'm going to dry hop later. But sometimes if I'm using a high floc yeast, I will throw more in commando.

Any hops that I bag for a short boil batch (anything I throw in T-40 or under - which is usually more like T-30 or under - which in a short boil batch means pretty much all of them) I leave in for the hopstand. I figure there is still goodness in them that can come out during the steep.

Anything that was a more traditional bittering addition, I will pull just to get some of the space in the pot freed up, so the late hops can expand more easily and get at the "open space" in the top of the pot. Otherwise sometimes they end up smushed into small areas if I use a lot of hops, and I wonder if they get utilized as well that way. I figure the long boil hops don't have any significant flavor to contribute, so I get them outa the way, hoping to get more out of the other hops. (does it really matter, I dunno, but that's why I do it)

Also, I've been doing these lid-on hop stands starting at flameout temps instead of cooling to 180 first. So I get a lot of AA from the stand, like 10 full minutes of extra full utilization. But the lid on the pot keeps all the aroma compounds from being blown off into my air, and as the wort cools they re-condense back into the wort (like perfume distillation except I'm just keeping them captured in the same vessel). I start my active cooling in an ice bath with the lid still on, and then (when it's not bretty out) switch to a chiller. I'm getting great aroma doing this - the only bad thing is that my house doesn't smell as awesome as if I left the lid off - but that's a good thing later. I started doing this out of desperation to try to keep my Brett out - and liked the results so much that I've not looked back. Never had DMS from doing it. Seems to be a non-issue, although who knows, it might be an issue if you short boiled the entire wort - I've pretty much stuck with a traditional 60 minute boil for the most part for BIAB batches. I have short boil PM's and Extract/Steep batches without any bad effects though.

@Beer-Lord: The special roast and chocolate play nice with WLP013's oaky/smoky esters. And fuggles does too. I'm hoping the mosaic does as well, I think it should blend with all of it and add some goodness.

@Dawg: Adding the sulfates to the water changes how the hops are perceived, you can try same batch both ways and see. It's likely this beer would turn out good either way, but it would be noticeably different. The beer with all the added sulfate will have more of a "bite" and if you use a yeast that has a mineral flavor profile (some English yeasts do), it will make that pop more too in my experience. So this beer won't be quite as much "less bitey" that you would normally get from a short boil without a standard bittering addition. It also won't be quite "as bitey" as a true long boil bittered burton ale. It's going to be somewhere in the middle, which is more appropriate for this anyways.

[mashani]

Bottled 1.013.

Sample tasted nice. Fuggles and Mosiac are friends. Gonna be really good beer.

[mashani]

This is yummy.

[Pudge]

Bottled 1.013.

Sample tasted nice. Fuggles and Mosiac are friends. Gonna be really good beer.

Maybe I should jot that down. Not all hop varieties play well together.