My name is Cam Nelson and I am a senior in the craft brewing major, so I decided to focus my practicum on the brew process. I went with a German Golden Pilsner recipe for my first brew. My goal for this practicum is to get hands on and learn how to make a beer on the Anvil system.

Process

The recipe I went with yields for 5 gallons. Requiring 10 pounds of milled pilsner malt, and 4.5 oz of Hallertau hops. I brewed using a system called the Anvil Foundry system. This is a small batch system that produces around 10 gallons of wort. To begin the brew, I Heated 6 gallons of water to 147 degrees. Once the water was at that required temperature, I was able to begin the mash. This is where I added the 10 pounds of milled pilsner malt into the anvil for 90 minutes. I attempted to follow a decoction mash schedule where I pulled a portion of the mash out of the anvil and boiled it in a separate vessel for 5 mins. Once the five minutes ended, I added the separated boil back to the mash. Once added back I increased the temperature to 170 degrees to achieve the mash out. Mash out was achieved, I then started implementing the Hallertau hops. I introduced 3.0 oz for about 90 minutes, then 0.75 oz added for 15 minutes, and lastly adding 0.75 oz for one minute.

After the mash out was complete, I began the cooling process. To do so I recirculated the hot wort through a pipe that passes by a pipe that is having cold water circulating through it. Therefore, cooling the wort quickly through heat exchange. Once the wort was cooled to about 80 degrees, I was able to pitch the yeast and exchange the wort to the anvil fermenter. The fermenter was then hooked up the glycol chiller. This is to help regulate the temperature of the brew keeping it at 52 degrees where it will ferment for 27 days.

Results

Being this was my first brew I set some marks I needed to hit, and throughout the brew I kept track of the pH by checking every time I altered temperature or added anything. The reason for this is because the closer the pH is to the desired level, the better the finish on the beer will be. I was looking to keep a pH of 5.2 and throughout the mash I was able to maintain a pH of 5.57 which is sufficient. The recipe called for a specific gravity of 1.054 and I ended with a Specific gravity of 1.048.

Overall, I learned a lot throughout this practicum. I was able to get hands on experience with the anvil system and grow a comfortability to it. I will be following up with the outcome of my first brew on March 24th, 2023.