Yep. I was craving a Pilsener. But, rather than spending money buying beer, I decided to spend money to make beer. And with an extra fridge to lager in, I decided it’s time to break it in.
Did Papazian’s recipe for Top Drop Pilsener, settling for a White Labs WPL800, given that I went to a different home brew shop than normal.
Knowing that a clear beer is the goal, I decided to use my hops bag with my hop pellets. What a difference that made! Filtering the crap out at the end was a piece of cake!
Also experienced my first stuck runoff with grains on this one. I actually sparged the grains twice, and on the second round experienced the stuck runoff. I figured I was trying to drain the liquid too fast, created a vacuum that compacted the grains and stopped the runoff. My solution? I stuck my spoon in and stirred up the grains. Not the ideal solution, but it worked.
Cooled off the finished beer in the fridge, enabling me to pitch the yeast sooner than normal. Once I saw signs of fermentation, put the beer back in the fridge to ferment. Right now it’s sitting between 46 and 48 degrees.
Initial gravity on this bad boy was 1.048. In less than two weeks I’m transferring this to a secondary fermenter with some hop pellets in the bottom (not sure what I’ll use- most likely Saaz or Tettnanger’s). Then another 4 weeks lagering.
Can’t wait to try this bad boy out!
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