• 6 lb Pale Canadian 2 Row
• 500 gr Munton and Fison Wheat malt
• 500 gr Munich Malt
• 250 gr Crystal Malt
• 1.5 tsp Gypsum (in strike water)
• 1/2 tsp acid blend (in sparge water)
• 1.5 oz Randy Lawrence's Homegrown Hallertauer @ 60 min
• 0.5 oz Randy Lawrence's Homegrown Hallertauer @ 15 min
• 0.5 oz Randy Lawrence's Homegrown Hallertauer through hop-back
• Wyeast 2565 Kölsch (750 ml starter)

Procedure

Put strike water into 5 gallon Gott cooler, add 1.5 tsp gypsum. Mash in at 155F -- too high! Adjust to 123F with 3 - 600ml PET bottles, frozen full of water. Check pH at 5.4. Protein rest 20 minutes. Decoct 4.0 litres, bring to 153F, hold at 153F-155F for 20 minutes, slowly bring to a boil over 30 minutes, constantly stirring, then boil 15 minutes.

Return to main mash to bring it up to 145F. Needed to do emergency decoct to get temp up, so took 3.5 litres (very loose). Brought to 190F over 5 to 10 minutes, then returned and stirred. Mash now at ideal 155F.

Rest 60 minute. Test for conversion. OK.

Sparge 80 minutes with 171-176F water, collection 25 litres of wort. Boil 15 minutes, then begin hop schedule with 1.5 oz Hallertauer. Boil 60 minutes more, adding hops according to schedule.

Whirlpool wort, let sit 15 minutes. Begin siphon out of brewpot, through mason-jar hop-back, into chiller. Hop-back not air tight enough, so removed it after 1/5 of wort had been siphoned.

Pitching

Started yeast on Jun 28, adding a total of 1500ml over the next few days. Allowed it to sediment out, then poured off 750ml, pitching the rest.

Other Information

Why the name? Well, let's just say it was a very adventurous day, making this mash. I learned an awful lot! Oh, and for those of you who don't know, "abenteuer" means "adventure".

As it turns out, I brewed an Alt. I had wanted to brew a Koelsch, but couldn't get the Vienna malt on time, but as it turns out the two are almost identical except that Koelsch uses Vienna and Alt uses Munich. I tried decoction mashing, too. All-in-all, everything turned out really well, although there were a couple of small (well, actually big) disasters along the way.

First of all, I somehow totally screwed up my strike temp and ended up at 155F for my protein rest! My immediate reaction was : holy shit, that's going to require a *lot* of cold water to bring it down. BUt then I remembered that for some reason I had some 600ml pop bottles frozen in the freezer, so I grabbed 3 of them and stuck them in the mash. After about 5 minutes of stirring I had it right down to 122F where it should be.

After a 20 minute rest I took about 4 litres out and brought it up to 155, held it for 20 minutes, then slowly brought it to a boil. I boiled for 20 minutes, then returned it back to the main mash, but that only took it to 145F -- I didn't take enough out for my decoction! So I did an emergency decoction where I took about about 3.5 litres of really loose, watery mash, and started to heat it. I was trying to think of how high to heat it to get 155F when I returned it, and somehow came up with 190F as my desired temperature. So after 5 minutes or so I was at 190F, and returned it to the main mash. That was practically the only thing I did right all day because when I put it back in and stirred, I was right on exactly 155F!

So I rested there for 60 minutes, then began my sparge. But somehow some grain got into the EC-masher and plugged up the spigot. So I had to transfer the entire mash to my white bucket, pull out the ECmasher, unplug it (and upon looking at it I couldn't figure out how the grain got in there -- and I still can't figure it out), then put it back in and return the mash. So my mash is now at 145F -- I lost 10F in that disaster, which probably hurt my extraction, and I begin the sparge. From here on in everything went fine, thank goodness.

And for my boil, I didn't have a single boilover. But I was preparing for it and covered the stove top ahead of time with aluminum foil, just in case I had a boilover. That's when I discovered that covering the stove with foil greatly increases the effeciency of your stove! Last week it took about 65 minutes to bring the mash to a boil after the sparge, and this week only took about 35 or 40 minutes! I'm going to do that every time now!

For the final insult, I set it to ferment Monday evening, and by Tuesday morning it had just begun, but was at 25C -- way too warm for even an Ale! So after reading on the Net about a guy who throws wet towels on his carboy to bring down the temp, I stuck my carboy (which I use as a primary) into my white bucket and filled the bucket with cold water, icecubes, and blue cooler fake ice. This brought the thing down to a very respectable 18C, where it now remains. I just have to change the ice 2 or 3 times a day.