Homebrew thread

[justinh]

Sexy. 

I was talking with some dudes, and since it is colder here in the winter, I could probably homebrew during the 3 or 4 months of the year where the temperature is below 70 F, but all bets are off for the remaining 8 months.  Sadly, contrary to whatever Ned Stark says, winter is almost over. 

[elpollodiablo]

If you really wanted to get serious about it (ie, brew more than a few months out of the year), you should look into investing in an old fridge that you can install a temperature control on. Then you can do neat stuff like lager, as well. It's something I wish I had really desperately but almost certainly won't for quite a while.

In other news, an accurate gravity reading still eludes me. I even got a new hydrometer AND a fucking refractometer. There's a whole saga having to do with the different measurements I took this evening, and I'm gonna write it up for HomeBrewTalk and see what those dorks have to say. It's really frustrating.

[elpollodiablo]

Jimbo have you ever used Optic as a base malt before? I'm doing a SMaSH with it on Friday.

[YojimboMonkey]

Yes it was the base malt for the Turkish Delight beer I did for the Iron Brewer contest. I'd been told it's similar to Maris Otter and based on that one experience I agree, nice malty, slightly nutty flavor, aromatic, well-modified so easy to use, though in Maris Otter all those qualities are amped up to a degree.  I'd say that, like Maris Otter, it's a great base malt to use for English-style ales (or American interpretations of such).

[elpollodiablo]

Oh awesome! I didn't want to do a MO SMaSH simply because my last MO experiment wasn't super successful, but I think there were a lot of other factors involved in that beyond the malt. I'm interested to try this one, definitely. Gonna hop it with Chinook, I think. Wish I had an extra ounce of Simcoe sitting around, cuz I'd probably just do that instead.

[elpollodiablo]

I didn't post much here during September, but I brewed a ton of beer. Right now I'm enjoying a Bavarian hefe that was brewed to make up for one I ruined in July. Bottled, I have a really traditional, simple, musty & wonderful ESB, a terrific Optic/Simcoe SMaSH that's maybe the most drinkable beer I've ever made, and another biscuity, spicy rye amber. I'm gonna bottle a Rochefort 8 clone next week, and on Thursday I'm brewing my spiced holiday ale. It has been a good year for beer at our house.

[Greg Nog]

So this hopped apple-beer was kind of bad at first, but after a couple months, it's become rather wonderful!

[elpollodiablo]

Whoa, what? Did you just hop some apfelwein? Or did you use some malt?

[YojimboMonkey]

Sounds like the braggocyser I've been meaning to do for years, guess it might be time to get on the ball with that

Also in the past few weeks, though not as prolific as pollo, I have brewed my beer called Breakfast, which is an ale using a small amount of smoked malt (bacon), sage (sausage), oats, wheat, coffee, black pepper, maple syrup and citrusy hops to suggest a big old breakfast.  Should be transferring to secondary soon

And I brewed a spruce ale I'm calling Spruce Smash, where I did use a Single Malt and Single Hop recipe (Munich / Chinook) along with filtering the sparge through a bed of spruce tips.

[elpollodiablo]

Oh man that reminds me, I brought a bottle of this back from Portland



Ignore what those idiots on BeerAdvocate say; this stuff was pretty delicious, especially if you like rauchbier. Nice and smokey, and the maple came through beautifully. Mouthfeel was a little thin, which made it seem kind of inert on the tongue in a way that was not pleasant vis-a-vis the aftertaste, but overall I think it was a successful experiment.

[Greg Nog]

Whoa, what? Did you just hop some apfelwein? Or did you use some malt?

Just hopped apfelwein!  I've done it before with the full amount of sugar or honey in the basic apfelwein recipe, but this time, I only used the juice, no extra sugars.  I thought it would keep it fairly low in ABV this way, but it's still got a nice kick to it!

[elpollodiablo]

I'm going to try something I've been wanting to try for a while this evening: making a spiced hot punch with sweet wort. Gonna mash a couple of pounds of 2-row and some crystal, boil it with some cinnamon, throw in some cloves and a fifth or two of spiced rum. Don't really see how it *couldn't* be good.

[elpollodiablo]

I ordered some custom caps today! Only 12c apiece from these guys: http://www.bottlemark.com/

[Greg Nog]

Oh, damn.  That's kind of tempting.  What did you put on yours?

[cold before sunrise]

good god! if it wasn't illegal i'd love to give away free homebrew printed with my own logo at the next fashion week, if only to be cheeky and flout elegance for the sake of fun. i should do it and play metal.

[elpollodiablo]

Oh, damn.  That's kind of tempting.  What did you put on yours?

[elpollodiablo]

Stunningly, my own take on the Rochefort 8 doesn't have the complexity or subtle character of its inspiration. But it's still awesomely drinkable, even at 8%.

[YojimboMonkey]

I was just contemplating brew stuff. I think I'm going to start a new one tonight, sort of an experimental thing, attempting to approximate an Oud Bruin style ale with a Berliner Weisse style lactic fermentation of 2-3 days after the mash before the boil, and then finishing fermentation with an Abbey style yeast. Also I have 2 batches that I am feeling extremely lazy about bottling and I may just clean and sanitize a couple of kegs and transfer them there. I can always bottle later if I decide to.

[elpollodiablo]

Is that how those Flemish sours are done? Pre-boil fermentations with the bacteria? Shit is nuts.

[YojimboMonkey]

No I don't think they are, but I'm attempting to shortcut the process. "Oud" in "Oud Bruin" means "old" after all.

[elpollodiablo]

Gar. I think I overspiced my Xmas ale slightly. Just a bit too much cinnamon on the finish. Oh well. Learned a valuable lesson about spicing with vodka tincture. I predict it'll be well-received by many of the non-beer geeks it's being gifted to.

[justinh]

Great logo, Miles!

[YojimboMonkey]

Next up for this homebrewer, a couple of "barrel" aged products. One is an actual barrel aging, wherein several members of my homebrew club have gone in together on buying a used whiskey barrel from local distillery Koval, and we're each brewing 5 gallons of an identical robust porter recipe that we'll collectively age in the barrel. The barrel-filling party is in February.

Second, I received some kind of promotional homebrew product for oak aging, it's a piece of wood with a honeycomb of holes drilled into it that is supposed to be ideal for aging 5 gallons of beer. I've decided to do an English Old Ale and use this piece of wood in secondary.

Ingredients are ordered but I just realized the barrel-filling party is on my son's birthday. Oh well, I guess I don't need to be there for the barrel-filling party as long as I'm there to help empty it.

[elpollodiablo]

Wow, that's awesome! How much does an old whisky barrel go for?

[lucky strike]

If you really wanted to get serious about it (ie, brew more than a few months out of the year), you should look into investing in an old fridge that you can install a temperature control on. Then you can do neat stuff like lager, as well. It's something I wish I had really desperately but almost certainly won't for quite a while.

i have one sitting here in my house right now. it's a true piece of shit and would be perfect for this. i have been intending to look into overriding the temperature. i don't brew, though. i am interested in it, but haven't started yet.