S-04 for Pale Ale?

J A

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Here's a recipe I'm brewing soon:
http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/r ... rillo-pale

It's an all-grain iteration of a partial mash I did that turned out pretty good. I used Amber Extract for the PM and it turned out with too much caramel in the malt. I want to clean that up with this grain bill, which I think will work and I'm tweaking the hops additions for this go-round.

I'm just about to pull a Blonde Ale off of a yeast cake of S-04. I'm thinking I might go right on top of it with this batch instead of pitching US-05. I know it'll change the ester flavor profile and I may not attenuate quite where US-05 would, but do you think it'll make a good beer?

Like I said, the first version was pretty good, but definitely needed improvement. I'm not worried about style and if I end up going in a little different direction with the recipe, I won't mind it being more English Pale than classic APA

Given that it might attenuate lower and leave more residual than might be perfect, should I mash a little lower or just push up the hop profile a little and let it do what it will?

Any thoughts appreciated.
 
its fine, I use 04 all the time, it keeps more flavor in the beer, just swirl the carboy around day 4 and raise the temp to the higher range and it should do better, also on top of a yeast cake will start vary fast and can be violent lol.

as for the hops you just want to sit there and throw hops in Im betting lol, Ive done that no biggie, I personally would add everything but the magnum at the end, it will add more hop flavor

I think that malt bill will be a good beer especially with the 04, good luck
 
Ozarks Mountain Brew said:
its fine, I use 04 all the time, it keeps more flavor in the beer, just swirl the carboy around day 4 and raise the temp to the higher range and it should do better, also on top of a yeast cake will start vary fast and can be violent lol.

as for the hops you just want to sit there and throw hops in Im betting lol, Ive done that no biggie, I personally would add everything but the magnum at the end, it will add more hop flavor

I think that malt bill will be a good beer especially with the 04, good luck

Thanks!
Yeah, the S-04 is a real animal, even on the first pitch - looks literally like there's a flame under the fermenter boiling it up. The Blonde that I'm doing was pitched late Sunday evening with one re-hydrated packet and was essentially at FG this morning. I swirled the crap out of it when it started slowing down. I realized several batches back that S-04 floc's so well that it drops out before it's done with it's work.

And, yes, almost all the hops are late addition. I like the Simcoe deep, dank bitter so I'm putting some of that in at 20 to pull some alpha out of it.

The first batch (just had one earlier this evening...definitely holds up to scrutiny for a late-addition PM) only had Simcoe and Amarillo, but I had a Falconers Flight on hand and wanted to see how a little extra pine/citrus/fruit from that blend would do.

I'm looking to make this a "house brew", so I'll try to keep refining it. I hope the 04 gives me a good result. :)
 
I personally think I like 04 the best as far as flavor, I just wish it would attenuate better.
I found a trick mix US04 with Nottingham, both are similar but Nottingham attenuates very well
 
I personally think I like 04 the best as far as flavor, I just wish it would attenuate better.
I found a trick mix US04 with Nottingham, both are similar but Nottingham attenuates very well

I had forgotten about this thread...just to follow up:
I ended up doing just what I mentioned in the original post - mashed a little lower and boosted the hops slightly. I pitched on top of the S-04 cake and it fermented beautifully. And just kept fermenting.o_O...It ended up going a lot further than I anticipated based on the average attenuation of the 04 and my past experience with it. The Blonde that was in the fermenter first went to a little over 76%, about average, but this Pale (IPA) went to almost 83%. The resulting beer is really good, but it definitely could use some residual sweetness and a little stronger malt presence to counteract the alcohol and hops. I love the hop flavor that I got in this batch, but it's definitely more toward the IPA range for hop balance.
 
I recently made a Trillium-inspired pale ale and pitched US-04 that I had harvested. It came out great! I was looking for some haze and real juiciness and 04 did the trick.
 
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Just curious ...

"I'm just about to pull a Blonde Ale off of a yeast cake of S-04. I'm thinking I might go right on top of it with this batch"

Is there any concern about over pitching using the entire yeast cake?
 
I've pitched on top of the cake for several batches. I think it works really well for lagers, and in general as long as it's a fairly big second beer, the overpitch doesn't seem to hurt. With this particular progression, I got more attenuation than I anticipated, so I'd have to take that into consideration next time. I'd do it again, though.
S-04 is such a hard-fermenting yeast that it's hard to see a big difference in pitch size. I find that there's a bigger difference in the first pitch and the second batch on the cake with other yeasts, especially lager strains.
The full cake is just a real easy way to push a second batch through with a minimum of extra work. Just rack the first batch off and refill with new wort. The alternative I use most often is to save the trub in a couple of quart containers and pitch one of those on a new batch. That's a more appropriately-sized pitch for most beers.
 
Thanks JA - I also tend to do the 2 Q jars thing .. but with a big beer might use it all.
 
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I've pitched on top of the cake for several batches. I think it works really well for lagers, and in general as long as it's a fairly big second beer, the overpitch doesn't seem to hurt. With this particular progression, I got more attenuation than I anticipated, so I'd have to take that into consideration next time. I'd do it again, though.
S-04 is such a hard-fermenting yeast that it's hard to see a big difference in pitch size. I find that there's a bigger difference in the first pitch and the second batch on the cake with other yeasts, especially lager strains.
The full cake is just a real easy way to push a second batch through with a minimum of extra work. Just rack the first batch off and refill with new wort. The alternative I use most often is to save the trub in a couple of quart containers and pitch one of those on a new batch. That's a more appropriately-sized pitch for most beers.

Quick question on saving trub are you adding pre boiled sanitatized water to ferment bucket giving it a good swill then just filling up your jars? Sounds like a simplified yeast washing program to me I'll have to give this a go.
Most yeast dry yeast satchets are 8 bucks a pop here so saving yeast allows you to spend the coins on hops or something else per brew day.
 
Quick question on saving trub are you adding pre boiled sanitatized water to ferment bucket giving it a good swill then just filling up your jars? Sounds like a simplified yeast washing program to me I'll have to give this a go.
Most yeast dry yeast satchets are 8 bucks a pop here so saving yeast allows you to spend the coins on hops or something else per brew day.
If I'm saving the trub, I'll often just put it into jars. There's usually enough beer left in the bottom of the bucket or carboy to slosh around and make it pretty loose. If there's not enough to let it settle, I'll add water, but clean, filtered tap water seems to do the trick. As long as all the containers are sanitized, I think it works out fine.
 

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