Beer & Brewer Awards

For the final story of Homebrew Week, we thought we’d give another recipe – to go with last week’s. You can find even more recipes here.

This recipe comes from our Summer issue, when Technical Editor Jake Brandish tackled that beloved style that’s tricker to master than you might think – lager.

He brewed a schwarzbier – a German style that brings dark beer and easy-drinking lager together. We have provided an all-grain recipe and an extract recipe.

Oztritzer Schwarzbier: Extract with specialty grains

Expected brew figures
OG: 1.049
FG: 1.010
ABV: 5.1%
IBU: 29
Volume: 20 litres

Ingredients
2.75kg light dry malt extract
1kg Munich malt extract
350g Carafa II malt
40g Tettnang hop pellets
35g Hallertauer hop pellets
WLP830 or Wyeast 2247 liquid yeast or two packs SafLager S-23 dry yeast

Method
1. Mini-mash: steep cracked grains in 2 litres of 67°C water for 60 mins, then drain.
2. Slowly dissolve half of the extract in 8 litres of water along with the 2 litres of wort from mini mash and bring to the boil.
3. Once boiling add 35g Hallertauer hops for a 90 minute boil.
4. With 20 minutes left on the boil, add 20g Tettnang hops.
5. At flame out add the remaining 20g Tettnang hops.
6. Stir in rest of extract at flame out. Make sure all lumps are dissolved.
7. Transfer to the fermenter and top up with fresh, very cold water to 20 litres.
8. When wort is stable at 10°C, pitch yeast.
9. Ferment at 10°C until fermentation starts to slow down, then increase temperature by 1°C per day over 4 or 5 days. Once fermentation stops increase to 18°C for 24 hours.
10. Once FG stabilises, keg or bottle then lager for 4 weeks minimum.
Prost!

Oztritzer Schwarzbier All-grain:
Expected Brew Figures
OG: 1.049
FG: 1.010
ABV: 5.1%
IBU: 29
Volume: 20 litres

Ingredients
3.1kg Pilsener malt
1.25kg Munich malt
350g Carafa II malt
40g Tettnang hop pellets
35g Hallertauer hop pellets
WLP830 or Wyeast 2247 liquid yeast or two packs SafLager S-23 dry yeast.

Method
1. Adjust brewing liquor to a ‘lager’ profile if possible.
2. Mash all grains at 66°C for 60 minutes.
3. Sparge, then transfer to kettle and bring to boil. Adjust sparge liquor to pH 5.4 if possible.
4. Once boiling add 35g Hallertauer hops for a 90 minute boil.
5. With 20 minutes left on the boil, add 20g Tettnang hops.
6. At flame out add the remaining 20g Tettnang hops.
7. Transfer to the fermenter and cool to 10°C, then pitch yeast.
8. Ferment at 10°C until fermentation starts to slow down then increase temperature by 1°C per day over 4 or 5 days. Once fermentation stops increase to 18°C for 24 hours.
9. Once FG stabilises, keg or bottle then lager for 4 weeks minimum.
Prost!

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