For Jessica's upcoming birthday party I decided to try to brew one of her favortie beers styles: Nut Brown Ale. I have an old receipe from 2005 which I slightly modified and brewed again. I took a few photos in the process:

This was the first time in several years that I did a mini-mash rather than an all-grain batch. Basically, I'm short on time these days so mashing and sparging just sounded a bit too much. However, I made a few improvements to the mini-mash this time. First, I monitored the temp of the liquor, and added the grains around 130 F, turned off the heat once the temp reached 150 F and let the pot sit for 20 minutes, and mashed out around 175 F. Rather than dumping the grains, I put them in a strainer and poured some heated water over them to collect about 1 liter. Kind of a micro-sparge. I then added the malt extract and started the boil. After removing the hop bag from the boil, I used two spoons to squeeze the bag until most of the wort drained out leaving a rather dry bag.

So, a fun little brew session. Here is the recipe for a 5 gallon batch:

• 8 lbs LME
• 1 lb Victory malt (mini-mash)
• 3/4 lb Special B matl (mini-mash)
• 1/2 lb Crystal 80 (mini-mash)
• 1/8 lb Chocolate malt (mini-mash)
• 1 oz East Kent Goldings (45 minute boil)
• 1 oz Cascade (5 minute boil)
• 1 oz East Kent Goldings (2 minute boil)
• 1 bottle WL London Ale Yeast
• O.G. 1.060

That is all folks!