Brew Day and Whirlpools

Yes, it is brew day again at the Leaky Spicket brewery. And, no, I'm not talking about a relaxing whirlpool bath, although with the humidity such as it is today here in Texas I might as well be in a sauna! Two batches today so quite a long day. I am excited about these two brews not only because they're newly created recipes of mine but also since they are both going to try a new technique. The first of the two beers is kind of my take on something similar to a west coast red ale (I know, not a real style according BJCP guidelines but many will understand what I mean) but with a distinctly British slant. The other is a straight ahead Standard or Ordinary Bitter but a recipe a bit different from ones I've done in the past. It is a good thing my new 55lb. sack of Thomas Fawcett Maris Otter came in time or I would have had to postpone.

First, let me give you an idea of what the conditions are like in the 'brew house' (the garage). Today, my inside thermometer says 88F, 75% relative humidity according to the hygrometer, and the barometer is off the scale on the low side. Lovely, like I said, sauna. To the left is a quick peak at the grain storage cabinet. Obviously, this is the starting place for any beer. I make a point to purchase ingredients that are appropriate to the type of beer I'm brewing. Right now that means exclusively British malts; many from Thomas Fawcett, some from Simpsons and one from Bairds.

So, what about this whirlpool thing? Well, it is something I picked up from Jamil Zainascheff, you know, that guy that has won tons of homebrewer awards, does two shows on The Brewing Network (including the one I help interview for, 'Can You Brew It?'), and now soon to become a professional owner/brewer at Heretic Brewing. Jamil is a firm believer in immersion chillers with a whirlpool and he created a modification to his chiller that allows just that using a high-temp pump such as a March pump. I whimped out and bought my whirlpool kit at More Beer as it was designed specifically for the massive immersion chiller of theirs that I already have; however, I saw one at my local shop, Austin Homebrew, the other day and I'm sure others have them as well. If you're handy, one could easily be made by bending a bit of copper. After attaching the "Jamil tube", I'll call it, this is what the chiller looks like.

I was not so much interested in the increased efficiency of the immersion chiller using this method as I already have a Blichmann Therminator so chilling wort quickly is not an issue. No, what interested me was a couple of things. Most importantly, some claim that by late hopping and whirlpooling more of the hop flavor and aroma gets taken up by the beer. In particular, aroma similar to a commercial beer is something that homebrewers struggle to achieve due to the differences in scale. If this technique helps, I was game to try it. Secondly, Jamil at least swears that this also helps to run off clearer chilled wort into the fermenter. I have to say my first experience did not yield this but it was likely due to my disturbing the whirlpool when I should have just left well enough alone. We'll see in the next batch with pellet hops (more on this in a minute). Finally, and this is not of much use to me except during Oktoberfest because I rarely do lager style beers but Jamil also uses this technique to chill the wort low enough for lager yeast pitching.

Now, one issue that bothered me about Jamil's technique is that he only uses pellet hops. No, there is absolutely nothing wrong with this; however, there are a couple of things that present a problem for me at the present time. Most importantly, I have quite a stock of whole hops and I'm not willing to just chuck them out but more than that I have a preference for using whole hops even though there is much greater loss of wort and I've had to adjust my batch size to compensate for this. However, it is true that whole hops just don't keep as well not to mention the fact that they take up a lot more storage space. Anyway, around the same time that I contacted Jamil for some details about this, I was also reading Gordon Strong's new book, "Brewing Better Beer". Gordon is a big proponent of whole hops too, as I found out. So, I got in touch with Gordon to ask him about how he achieves a whirlpool using whole hops. Long story short, Gordon has a somewhat unique brew kettle that has a very heavy false bottom in it; therefore, he can run off into a counterflow chiller or use an immersion chiller as in Jamil's technique and whole hops are not a problem because they are blocked from getting to the pump. Well, that got me to thinking, I always use the screen in my Blichmann BoilerMaker pot when using whole hops, so unless there are just SO many hops that the screen gets plugged (something that can just as easily happen even when not using a whirlpool) why not give it a try too?

So, I did. My first batch used solely pellet hops and my second batch used solely whole hops. I used the same MoreBeer immersion chiller with the Jamil whirlpool tube for both batches. For the first, I left the screen out of the BoilerMaker but left the dip tube and the second was just as normal other than the fact that I did not use my Therminator as I normally would. As mentioned, I had some trouble with hop trub getting to the fermenter with the pellets - more than I wanted at least - but I doubt it will have a detrimental effect on the beer. And, I think the next batch that I use pellets I will be more careful. All in all I was pleased. What surprised me a little was the whole hop technique. I had no issues whatsoever with the whole hops, BoilerMaker screen in place, and pump through the immersion chiller tube to whirlpool. But, more importantly, the clarity of the wort was really clean for which I was very pleased. There are also some positive effects in chilling the entire wort as quickly as possible as opposed to quick chilling using a counterflow chiller such as the Therminator; however, I've leave that for another post.

The proof will be in the drinking; unfortunately, that won't happen until about three weeks from now. Stay tuned...

Yours Aye!

Neil