Happy New Beer

I can't believe I haven't posted in '11. Well here goes. My Black IPA didn't attentuate, it would've had like 2.5 percent ABV, which is just garbage. So I tossed it today. My belgian ale, By The Fire, is coming along really nicely. After a month and a half in the bottle it's still young but is delicious. The spice tincture I added has such a subtle undertone, it's just right. This one is, so far, the most to style beer I have brewed yet. It needs another month or so before it's ready and will only get better with age.

I brewed a Pale a week ago. Calling it Crazy Pale. It's a session beer for sure. Just 4.5% ABV. The sparge got stuck again. Even with a stuck sparge I got 68% efficiency. That bodes well for when Brewcraft actually crushes the grain right. My numbers will go up substantially. This one I transferred today and the hydrometer sample was really good. Not too dry and not too bitter. Seems like the balance is good on this one. I put a half ounce of Columbus hops into the secondary. We'll see, I may have just made it an IPA, but only time will tell.

I was having attentuation problems, meaning the final gravity was way too high which would have led to a beer way to sweet with not enough alcohol. I bought a brewbelt, which you wrap around the fermenter and plug in, and it puts out a warm 70 degree temperature so your beer ferments better. It worked great. I got 70% apparent attentuation ending up with a FG of 1.014.

Hooray Beer

Love thy beer

Right back into the swing of things. I have brewed only twice since my last post, but I have high hopes for both of the brews. The first one was the prize beer for my birthday beer tasting party. Both Mel and Andrew won by having the beer that received the most votes. I made, as per their joint request, a holiday spiced beer. It will be ready by Easter so it can still be considered a holiday beer, but the style I brewed it in is more appropriate for a winter warmer. It's a belgian spiced ale that had about 15 pounds of grain in a 5 gallon batch. If I got 100% efficiency we'd be talking about a beer with about 12% alcohol. I did not but I got about 70% which will produce about 8% ABV. Still a big beer which is why I need to keep it bottled up for about 3 months before it's anywhere near ready to drink. I'll let you know Andrew and Mel

The other one, brewed today, is modeled after one of my current favorite styles. Black IPA is a robust and malty IPA with chocolaty undertones. I tried a couple new techniques on this one. First wort hopping involves putting an ounce or so of your hops into the wort as the sparge is taking place. The idea is to have a more balanced beer in the end. We shall see. I may have overdone the hops on this one, but I liked the taste of sample I pulled for my hydrometer reading. Good backbone in this one. I got about 70% efficiency again. I would like to get higher numbers, but I still got 1.056 hydrometer reading which will get me about 6% ABV. Tasty all around

Long Pull v.3

So I have completed my brew day and am happy to say my efficiency went way up, 80% to be exact. I am happy, and will be happy, with that number if I hit for the rest of my life (brewing that is). The first runnings got me to 2 gallons. I then sparged with about 5 and got a 7 gallon pre boil volume. The middle stats are OG 1.050, 6 gallons in the fermenter. I am excited about this one and I think I have found my happy medium for the propane cooker. I ended up with more volume at the end of the boil than any previous batch. Can't wait to taste, but I have to

Shouldn't have left you...

Okay, I haven't brewed in some time and I have a day off work today so here goes nothing. It's been so long I feel like I'm going to forget to add the hops or something. Hopefully not, that would be a super sweet malty beer considering there is 10.25 # of malt in it. Here's the recipe

8 # Maris Otter
1 # English Brown
.5 # carapils
.5 # Aromatic
.25 # 60L Crystal

Mash at 152 for one hour

1 oz Kent Golding for 60 min
.5 oz Challenger for 30 min
.5 oz Challenger for 15 min

Safale S-04 yeast

Fermentation temp should be around 68 F for one week in primary
and then two or three in secondary

The goal is to hit about 75% efficiency in my mash which would put me at 1.058 OG
If the yeast does its job I will have a 6.5% ABV beer. I can't wait

IPA is bottled

It's been a week since I bottled my Downtown IPA and I have extremely high hopes for this one. I dry hopped an ounce of Cascade and upon first taste it seems to have worked. Very prominent hop aroma and the taste has a brilliant fruity and citrus hop character which then turns to malty sweetness on the back end. Another two weeks priming in the bottle and this IPA is gonna be a winner.

Transfer day

I transferred my IPA into secondary today. It's OG was 1.063 and the FG today was 1.012. It's going to be just under 7% ABV and I put an ounce of Cascade pellets into the secondary so the hop aroma should be pretty prominent. The hydrometer sample tells me that this has some kick to it. I put four ounces of hops in the boil so we should have a pretty standard IPA in about a month.

Tahoe blog

Well, I've been up a while and all I can think about is my IPA at home. I'm just kidding. I'm hanging with V bug quietly, she's been up since about 5. I think it's time to retire the porta crib. She touches both ends with her head and feet. She's playing quietly so as not to wake up the others in the house right now. What a good girl. But back to beer, I had the Dogfish Head 60 minute IPA, and I must say, that is as close to perfect as I have ever had. It got me thinking about my IPA at home. Once we get home, I'm going to transfer it and throw in the dry hops. I'm excited about this one. I just have a good feeling about it.
Until next time

Trouble with numbers

The Downtown IPA is done. If I got anywhere near 100% efficiency it would have turned out to be an Imperial IPA with an OG around 1.090. But, I didn't and so it's a run of the mill IPA. Just kidding, this beer is gonna have some serious kick to it, and with 68% efficiency, I got a 1.063 OG which will still produce a pretty big beer. 4 ounces of hops in the boil and one waiting to be dry hopped. Mmm mmm. Can't wait

My last two batches have produced less than stellar efficiency. I got 65% for the pilsener and 68% today with the IPA. I'm not complaining about the numbers here, anything above 65% is considered good in homebrewing. What I am concerned about is the drop in efficiency. In my first three batches I got an average of 76% and then all of a sudden it drops to 65%. I think I may have narrowed it down to one of two factors. I didn't add gypsum to either of the last two batches, and they both also got stuck during sparging. I think if the grain were crushed a little less fine, and I added gypsum during the mash, my efficiency would go back up to the 70's. I'll have to wait until next time to find out. Darn, that means I get to brew again

Long time coming

Well, since the last time we talked, I have brewed a pilsener and it seems to be going just fine. I got about 64% efficiency which isn't bad in homebrewers terms but I would like higher efficiencies for my beers. Thats just me though. I let it ferment longer, and gave it a good two day diacetyl rest, which, by bringing the temp of the beer back up to room temp, it gets rid of the buttery flavor that cold fermentation leaves behind. It's going to be a session beer for sure coming in at a whopping 3.47% ABV.

I'm going to the brew store today to get ingredients for my first IPA since my first batch that I brewed over a year ago. It's gonna be a darker IPA, going for a big malt backbone on this one to try and balance out the big hops I plan on using. Gonna look something like this

9 lbs 2 row
1 lb munich
1 lb aromatic
1 lb 40 L

1 oz Galena for 60 min
.5 oz Cascade for 60 min
1 oz Willamette for 30 min
.5 oz Cascade for 15 min
1 oz Willamette for 5 min
1 oz Cascade dry hopped

Maybe an IPA?

Transferred Brandon's nameless pale ale to secondary today. I ended up using a dry yeast for this batch and the attentuation was crazy. OG was 1.061 and the FG was 1.009. Man this beer is gonna be big. I might have to try the dry yeast Safale US-05 on my next batch. I think I wanna make a balanced pale ale next, after my pilsner for Katie of course, with some low AA hops. I love doing this stuff man. Great results so far from my AG switch

Black Cap Beer

The first Common is now bottled. I have decided to treat it like a Seasonal Release, therefore it's only in 22's. With around 7 percent ABV, it's gonna be one of those beers that you should savor. Hopefully the flavor coincides with this. My next beer is going to be a pilsner, as per Katie's request, thinking about rehashing the German one I made with a partial mash recipe not too long ago. It will look something like this

8# German pils malt
1# Vienna malt
6 oz Carapils

2 0z saaz for 60 min
.5 oz tettnanger for 30 min
.5 oz tettnanger for 15 min

The guys at Brewcraft told me that a triple decoction was the best way to get a really clean and crisp pils, I don't know if my set up could handle all that. It involves taking part of the mash out and boiling it to raise the temp of the whole mash slowly. The other thing that would do is lengthen my brew day by about 3 hours, I will probably just do a single infusion and try to rig some filters and what not to clean out the beer nicely.

The beer of champagne

The Pale Ale is complete. Brandon got to do most of the heavy lifting, thank goodness, because I have a serious crick in my neck right now. As a result of our concerted efforts we now have 4.4 gallons of wort fermenting in the hall closet. I wanted to get more than that, but I think my kettle and brewing system just boils off more than I thought. I started with just about 6.5 gallons pre boil and I ended up getting about 4.5 after. I should be able to tweak some things to get it going right. My efficiency was at 74%, it would have been higher had I gotten 5 gallons, but I can live with 74. The OG was 1.061 and with an expected FG of 1.012, we should have a pretty punchy pale ale in about a month.

Competing

I'm entering two beers into a competition tomorrow. The tasting actually happens on the 30th with winners announced on the 6th of June. It's up in Sonoma in the town square. I will be entering my Laddertruck IPA and Bitter Beer Face Pilsner. Wish me luck

Brandon's Brew Day

Saturday is again Brewturday. Finally getting Brandon going on this. He's been waiting patiently since Christmas. We are brewing an APA with a fair amount of hoppiness. I was going to do a single hop series but decided to go with Cascade and Fuggles on this one.

8# Pale 2 row
1# Munich malt
1/2# Victory Malt
1/2# Carapils

2 0z Cascade pellets for 60 min
1/2 oz Fuggles pellets for 30 min
1/2 oz Fuggles pellets for 10 min

Going to mash at about 152 for 60 min hopefully getting about 2.5-3 gallons of first runnings

If my system stays the same I should get about a 1.054 reading on the hydrometer after boil. Mmm beer. Brandon has two cases plus of empty Sierra Nevada bottles ready to go, and who know, maybe this will be close to a clone of that beer. We'll see

It is decided

Let it be written. I am brewing this Saturday, finally giving Brandon his long awaited and well deserved batch of beer. We will be doing an American Pale Ale in the style of Sierra Nevada. I am aiming for the same efficiency as my last two beers, or thereabouts. If we do hit that number, 77% or so, the gravity should be around 1.055-58. We are going to do a single hop series. His will be Cascade and then I'm going to use the yeast cake from that beer and make the same exact beer but with Willamette hops. Should be tasty goodness.

Need a backup

I have completed my first real all grain brew day. I'm counting the actual first day as a practice run. I used my larger beverage cooler and was able to collect more than enough wort. I started out with just under 7 gallons and after the boil, just about 5.5 gallons went into the primary right on top of the yeast cake. My mash tun seems to work fine, although I broke my thermometer today, but it holds the mash temp really well. I think this helps with my extraction rate because I got a 1.054 reading on the hydrometer which puts my efficiency at 77%. I will be ecstatic if I can continue that for the rest of my brewing days.

Everything was going well, my first hop addition was in, and so I went upstairs to clean up a little bit. I came back down and my flippin propane had run out. AAAAAHHHHH. I had to carry 7 gallons of liquid, boiling hot liquid mind you, upstairs and try to get a rolling boil on the stove top. I got it done, and everything else went as planned, but that would have really sucked had I fallen or spilled boiling water all over myself. The two commons are getting along nicely, bubbles are already happening in today's batch. Can't wait to drink em

Commonly misconstrued

I am brewing today. The (hopefully) five gallon version of the Cal Common. I am going to change one thing in this version. Instead of Fuggles as my last two hop additions I am going to use Cascade. It will be cool to have a horizontal flight when both of these beers are done. We'll see how they both turn out. I know that the smaller batch is going to be a two and done type beer with almost 8% ABV. But this one today should be right around a 5%-er

FUNemployment

Day two of FUNemployment went well. I went with Veronica to Kindergym and got to see what she does with her Papi and Grandma on Tuesday's. What a blast that was. I continued the cleaning project that is our garage. Got rid of some cardboard, cleaned some more bottles. I also got the ingredients for another Cal Common which I am going to brew on Thursday. I am looking to hit 70% percent efficiency which will put me right around an OG of 1.055 which is more like a common than my little batch that's fermenting right now. I got one more pound of 2 row to put the total at 9# 2 row, 1/2# each of munich, cara-pils, and 40L. I converted my other beverage cooler to a mash tun and will now be able to sparge with the desired amount.

The next one's on you

Common misconceptions

I've decided to give the Common another go. I am going to make another batch of it in my larger cooler and then just use the yeast cake from my current batch. It will save me eight bucks which will put my cost right around 20 bucks for a whole batch. After I do this it's onto the Pale Ale that I promised my buddy we would make a while back. He's got all the bottles ready, now we just need to get it done. I haven't forgot Brandon.

Brew day complete

The first all grain brew day at Brewery 20th Ave is done. My "Not as Common as You Think" Cal Common is in the primary. Every site and video I've seen had me thinking that I was going to have to commit to an eight hour process. I started at 2 and am done before 6. Did I miss a step? Did I do something wrong? The proof will be in the pudding when I try the beer a month from now.

I found out that my 5 gallon water cooler is too small to batch sparge 10# of grain. I started out with 3.5 gallons of water at 170 which got me to my mash temp of 155. Surprisingly it held that temp the whole hour of mashing. I only got 2.5 gallons of wort out of this first running. So I tried to sparge with 4 gallons but I could only fit 3. It seems as though my next batch will put to use my ten gallon water cooler.

Everything went smoothly though. I ended up with 5 gallons of wort pre boil and 4 gallons post boil. My gravity was a wopping 1.070 which puts me at 80% efficiency so we're talking about 7% alcohol when all is said and done. Yikes. Til next time