The new brew I mentioned yesterday is another one based on Flowers IPA, from Graham Wheeler’s recipe in Brew Your Own British Real Ale. I’ve used the recipe a couple of times before (Summer Flowers and Slow Flowers), both of which turned out well, but it is almost three years since I last cooked up a batch.

For this one, I’ve adjusted the ingredients to scale around 10 litres of water in the pot to begin with: 900g pale malt, 80g crystal malt and 7g black malt. After mashing that for 75 minutes at about 66°C, I brought the wort to the boil and added 90g brewing sugar and 16g Target hops. The recipe calls for a small amount of Target but my pellets were fairly old and so I figured I’d be generous. As an aside, I tried brewing up the rest with hot water and even with several teaspoons of sugar, had to decide that the result was undrinkable so I don’t think they had lost all their bittering power!

After a 60 minute boil (with 2g fresher Fuggles hop pellets standing in for Styrian Goldings and a pinch of Irish Moss ten minutes before the end), I put it into my plastic jerry can and left to cool overnight. This afternoon, I’ve checked the gravity, which read 1.036 – 1 point over target, which is close enough for the accuracy of the measurement I’m able to make. Once I post this, the yeast (5.5g Safale S-04) will have finished rehydrating and I’ll combine that with the wort and set fermenting with a brew belt being used to keep the temperature at about 17°C. Right, time to press the button…