After brewing ales (and meads) exclusively for 6 years, it was well past time to finally brew a lager. I’ve always wanted to but never had the capability due to my apartment not having room temperature control. However, a few months ago, I got my hands on the BrewJacket Immersion. This is a more compact temp control system (with no Ice Packs!), so doing a lager was a logical next step.

Brewing a Baltic Porter

There might be some easier lagers to brew for your first, but baltic porters are one of my all-time favorite styles. Because of this, I took the plunge on this rich, dark and malty lager style.

Malt

39.2% – 6 pounds – Pale Malt

32.8% – 5 Pounds – Bohemian Pilsner Malt

19.6% – 3 Pounds – Bonlander Munich

5% – 0.75 Pounds – Crystal 120L

2% – 0.3 Pounds – Carapils

1.6% – 0.25 Pounds – Black malt

Mash at 152F for 1 hour.

Hops

0.2 oz / gal – Magnum @ 60 minutes (37 IBUs)

Yeast

Bohemian Lager – 2L Starter

• Ferment at 50F – 3 weeks

• Diacetyl Rest – 3 days @65F

• Lager @ 40F – 2.5 Weeks

SG / FG / ABV

1.063 / 1.011 / 6.8%

Lager Brew Day:

Brew day was fairly uneventful. I used some calcium carbonate and a very small amount of chalk to adjust calcium, sulfate and carbonate numbers, and buffer the mash pH some from the darker malts.

Water Profile:

calcium: 81 ppm

chloride: 50ppm

bicarbonate: 160ppm

The mash temp stayed between 152 and 150F. Unfortunately, there was a bit of a boil-over, so cleaning took a little bit longer than it needed to. After the boil, I cooled the beer for 25 minutes with an immersion chiller.

3 Weeks

The baltic porter finished fermentation and the gravity was at 1.011. At this time I turned off the fermentation chiller for a three day diacetyl rest. I didn’t detect any diacetyl, but seeing as it was my first lager, I wanted to be careful. After the D-rest, I dropped the temp to 40F and lagered the beer for 2.5 weeks.

Bottling

Bottling went smoothly. I primed the beer to 2.7 volumes of CO2. Part of this is because I tend to like the carbonation a bit higher than most styles call for. The flat beer has a solid, almost creamy body and very smooth flavor. Hopefully this holds true once the bottles are done conditioning. I also bottled a few larger 500ml bottles to age for a few months to see how it holds up after several months of bottle conditioning.

Up next is a Pale Ale!

Cheers.

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