German Pilsner

Ruh roh.  As if I didn't have enough things to work on in my brewing skill set, I decided I needed to tackle lager brewing.  I recently gave up on hoppy beers (spoiler alert, that beer is drinkable but mediocre at best) and have enough sour beer in the house to kill someone, so I didn't know what to brew for a summer drinker.  I had a bit of a falling out with my kolsch last time I brewed it, so I didnt want to do that.  I nixed a wheat, thought about a blonde/golden but then started reading about quick lagers (Tasty McDole first brought this to my attention on the Brewing Network) and thought, why not?  

So I'm leaving ales behind for a batch and jumping into lagers.  I think this comes from the desire to have a super crushable beer for the summer.  Oh and it doesn't hurt that I had Firestone Walker Pivo Pils for the first time and fell in love.  Now I'm off to create something in a similar vein.

I want this beer to be crisp, lower ABV, and slightly hoppy.  Something you could put away a few of.  I'll be following the following quick lager profile:

-Pitch massive starter into 50F wort.
-Bump the temperature up 5F every 12 hours once 50% attenuation is hit until you reach ~68F.
-Diacetyl rest
-Cold crash, gelatin fine, bottle.

I'm expecting this to take a few weeks.  I'm not in a rush so I have no problem with this taking longer, but I would like to see how fast I can turn around a decent beer for future reference.  


German Pilsner

2.5 Gallons
74% efficiency
90 minute boil

4.5 lb Best Malz Pilsner
0.25 lb Carapils

0.5 oz Tettnang (60 min)
0.5 oz Spalter Select (15 min)
1 oz Tettnang (Flameout)
0.5 oz Spalter Select (Flameout)

Wyeast 2124 Bohemian Lager @50F.  Mashed at 148F.

OG 1.050 | FG 1.010 | ABV 5.2% | IBU 29

Ca 70 | Mg 2 | Na 0 | Cl 90 | SO4 26 | HCO3 38

5/17/15: Brewday.  Pitched 2L starter next morning after cold crash.  OG 1.049.  Mash pH 5.35.

5/21/15: Gravity down to 1.024.  Bumped ambient up to 58F.

5/22/15: Bumped ambient to 68F.

5/26/15: Gravity down to 1.007.  Began ramp down to <50F to gelatin fine/lager.

6/1/15: Gravity down to 1.004.  Lagering at 40F.

6/11/15: Bottled