Big Brew Weekend

I took off work Friday May 8th for a long weekend and brewed every day. Friday I brewed two beers a Belgian Blonde and an Apricot Blonde. The Apricot Blonde was just a standard recipe that I will either add some apricot puree in secondary or add some extract when I keg. I made one change to the Belgian recipe, instead of pale 2-row I used maris otter. These two beers are the first time I've made all grain blonde beers. I also mashed in at a lower temperature and my efficiency suffered. I normally get about 75% but the apricot was at 65% and the belgian was at 70%. I normally do a 30 min mash and for the belgian I went to 45 min and it helped.
Saturday I slacked off and only brewed one beer a Saison. This beer I extended my mash to 1 hour and I was back to my 75% efficiency.
Sunday I made an Imperial Honey Porter. The OG on this was 1.094 and I hope to get it down close to 1.015-1.020. I also made a lower gravity porter off the second runnings of the grains and that beer ended up with an OG of 1.024.

Here is a picture of my closet after I got all the beer fermenting.

National Homebrew Day

Saturday May 2nd was National Homebrew Day. I was not able to brew yesterday but I was able to get in a brew today. I brewed Dude's Lake Walk Pale Ale. I did not have the hops or yeast that he calls for so here is what the recipe turned out to be.

Lake Walk Pale Ale
8.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row)
2.00 lb Toasted Malt
0.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L
0.50 lb Wheat, Flaked
1.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (60 min)
1.00 oz Pearle [8.00 %] (20 min)
1.00 oz Pearle [8.00 %] (5 min)
1.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (5 min)
1.00 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 5.0 min)
1 Pkgs Nottingham
1.00 oz Pearle [8.00 %] (Dry Hop 14 days)
1.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (Dry Hop 14 days)

Efficiency 77%
OG 1.060

Birthday Brew

My brew day started at 7:00am today. I brewed an Abbey Pale Ale, kegged my Regal Amber and transferred a Barley Wine to secondary. The Barley Wine was a group brew from Homebrewtalk, it started with an OG 1.112 and is now down to FG 1.011. It still has a strong alcohol taste but it should mellow over the next six months. The Regal Amber was brewed on 2-2-09 I still have six kegged beers ahead of this one.
The Abbey Pale Ale I brewed for my one year brew anniversary (6-7-08). If this one turns out well I plan on brewing it again on 6-7-09. Recently I have been experimenting with my mash times. Most everything I've read says to mash for one hour. But more recently I have seen that 30min or 15min is all the grain needs to convert the sugars. My last five beers I went with 45min mash times and have been getting 72% efficiency. This beer I went with 30min and still hit about the same efficiency (76%). Well here is the recipe if anyone is interested.

Abbey Pale Ale
6.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US
1.00 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L
1.00 lb Munich Malt
1.00 lb Vienna Malt
1.00 oz Hallertauer
1.00 oz Hallertauer
1 Pkgs Abbey Ale (White Labs #WLP530) Yeast-Ale
Mash 11.25qt of water for 30min.