My recipe was simple enough, I had some 2-row English Pale malt and some domestic 2-row pale malt left over from past brew days so I used those supplies along with my hops from time past.  The recipe is here:

• 11.5lbs English 2-row
• 7.7lbs Domestic 2-row
• 1lb 90L Crystal malt
• .25lb flaked barley
• 2oz Cascade hops 60 min
• 2oz Cascade hops 30 min
• 12.5oz fresh picked Cascade hops from my yard!
• Wyeast 1056 – American Ale

After doing some research, I found two consistent aspects of a harvest ale; one is that the base recipe is generally a pale ale, two is that the fresh hops are added at flame out.  Now initially I was going to just put all my cascade hops I had grown into it just because I figured with them being wet, I would need a lot to get something out of them.  However, after researching more, I found that most people used a 5-1 ratio for adjusting to the wet hops from normal dried hops, this means that if you would normally put 2oz of hops in at flame out, add 10 of wet hops.

One important aspect to keep in mind is that the fresh hops really suck up the wort, because of this, I squeezed out the hops when I was done.  I did this by using a hop sack for my hops.

This was a 9.5 gal target batch where I was looking for somewhere in the 1.04’s for my gravity, I wanted something light that would really accentuate the fresh hops flavor.  In the end, I wound up with about 10 gal and was 1.041 for my OG.  It reads at about 38 IBU’s but hopefully the only thing that you get is a big fresh hops bunch in the mouth.

I know, all my brew day pictures look the same.  Sometimes I wonder why I take so many of the same stuff.  Oh well.

Saturday I got up at a reasonable hour and started off on a relaxing brew day.  This was a 10.5 gallon batch with a target OG of 1.047.  A simple Pale Ale for some refreshing some summer beers. 

I struck 7.2 gallons at 170f for 55min.  I did a double batch sparge with 4.5 gallons each sparge, the first at 185f for a perfect 168f and the second at roughly 170f. 

The first runnings were 19brix (1.076), second running (first batch sparge) was 10.5 brix (1.042).  Finally the last sparge was 9 brix (1.036).  I collected roughly 13 gallons that boiled and cooled down to 11gallons.

In the end the OG was a perfect 1.047 but I wound up with and extra half gallon (need to keep playing with Beer Smith to get my settings right).  The hops I used on this pale ale was 1.5 oz UK Goldings for 60 min and 1.5 oz of Columbus for 10 min.

This was a simple enough brew that let to a very relaxing brew day.  I reused my 1056 yeast from the barley wine I brewed a few weeks back and it started firing within 8 hrs of being pitched.  Meatball even had some time to relax…

• 20lbs – US 2 row pale malt
• 1.5lbs Crystal 40L
• .5lbs Munich
• 1.5oz UK Goldings
• 1.5oz (umm I forgot)

I am using the 1056 from my barley wine (I tasted it, and it was awesome!!!).  I am going to be single infusion at 158f for 45min with two batch sparges.

Simple enough brew, what can I say?  This is a 10 gallon batch for sustenance, but I am excited about this brew.

cheers.