Regular IPA #15

Sometimes when the stars and moon are in proper alignment a batch is in progress prior to the complete consumption of the last batch. This is today's scenario. The last Rye PA was so good I was asked not to F#$% with the recipe. This is unpossible. As I am serving home brew on pool night I figured I would try an economy version:

10 lb 2-row
1/4 lb choc

1 oz Sterling
1 oz Cascade

Safale us-05

Total bill: $25.08. went out to the truck for 8 cents.

Trub rinse is a habit now. I get and extra gallon out of the primary and I don't have to 'water up'.

I tried a new brew method. Mash on the stove top in the boil pot. As the mash draws water I am able to more closely monitor the process, stirring as the pot thickens, adding water and adjusting heat to hold a steady 153 Deg F. Then after the mash is done, add heat and start sifting the husks out. This takes time and is not as efficient as the Sparge-O-Matic but, I believe I get maximal conversion.

Boil Pot, Rinse Pot, Strainer

Rye IPA # 14

Brew Date: 2/25/12

Enough with the sissy beer. Time to get back to business. Rye IPA is the best beer on Earth that I have tasted so far so here goes another batch. Oh, wait. I already posted this one. will have to bring it forward.

Bumped Post #1:

12 lb 2-row
2 lb rye
1/4 lb choc wheat
1 oz gelena hops
1 oz sterling hops
1 oz kent golding hops
safale dry yeast

5 gal in 6.5 gal carboy

Taste like Guinness, finishes like an IPA.

Rye IPA #14

Corona Facsimile Lucky No 13

Brew Date: 10/16/2011

Things go in cycles so it was time once again to try another shot at Corona. This time the low budget version.

10 lb 2-row
2 lb flaked maze
1/2 lb Briess caramel

1 oz Tettnang
1 oz SAAZ

Safale S-04

Mashed 1hr & 10 min, one hour boil, added hops in thirds at 15, 30, 45 minutes.

Comments: Everyone who tried it loved it, even did the lime thing. Next time, scale back the corn, I don't get the corn thing.

The Magic Sparging Hand

5 Gallons of Happiness

 Anyone notice the kitchen improvements under way?

Pool Table To Go With Drinking Night

Or is that beer to go with pool night?

Updated Update

Batch #12 pics Follow:

Rye IPA #12

Typical 12,2,1/4 with Kent and Cascade. Made 8 gallons and it was awesome.

And, I received a new mash tun. I helped a guy move and said "do you need these?". I said "are you for real?".

One Man's Juice Box Is Another's Mash Tun

When I See An Igloo Cooler I Think "Oh, You Brew Too?"

Dark IPA #11

Brew Date: 6/4/2011

This SH!te Just Got Real...That is a joke.

But really. Talk about a the bare knuckle hop and chocolate beat down of your tongue. I had to do it just once and will probably not do it again.

10 lb 2-row
1 lb reye
1 lb choc wheat

2 oz Gelena hops @ 13.2%

Safale us-05

Then to add insult to injury, I overcharged the priming sugar and the bottles opened like Champagne. Too bad.
 

Mashed in a Bucket

I Spilled A Lot And Drank A Lot Real Fast Before I Said "Get Me A Pitcher".

That is NOT Funny!

We have a comedian in the family.

Did you ever have one of those sudden WTF!!11!1 moments? I did,  after seeing that second pic on my computer I was ready for a fight.

sTevo's Wallpaper Pic

Billy of the Hill's Pic

10 gallons for #10

Brew Date: 4/23/11

A birthday present to myself: brewed a double batch. Rye IPA, the continuing saga.

14 lb 2-row
2 lb rye
1/4 lb Chocolate wheat

1 oz Gelena
1 oz Kent
1 oz Sterling


1 oz Kent dry hopped in one carboy.
1 oz Sterling dry hopped in a second carboy.

First we liked the Kent, then when that was gone we really like the Sterling.

Double Duty

Never Mind That Box Behind

 The Carboy

Number 9, Number 9, Number 9....

Brew Date: 3/31/11

Another outstanding recipe, according to my notes.

8 lb 2-row
1-1/2 lb flaked barley
1-1/2 lb roasted barley (alt to wheat)
1/4 lb flake rye

2 oz Kent Golding

Safale us-05

60 minute boil, disperse hops continuously.

The flaked rye and barley are supposed to give good head retention.  No pics, just outstanding although if this were my performance review it would be just "Very Good".

4/25/12

Update: While reviewing my notes I found that this is my Guinness clone. I had even used a 2 oz of grain spoiled in 24oz of Guinness for the classic taste. It really worked, according to memory. The only thing that separated this from a Guinness was that I have no way to nitrogen-ate.

Corona Clone via Castle Lager #8

March 16th, 2011

We have all done it, given the better half a present for yourself. Well I brewed a Corona clone for Wifey's birthday and who gets to drink it all? Moi. I can't tell you the ABV in Corona but if I had to guess, I would say it was around 4 percent. Using the rule of thumb that 2 lbs of grain makes 1 percent ABV, I was around  5% range. This brings up a good point. I don't use a hydrometer. Why? Because, that's why. I could drive without a speedometer. I could play a song without looking at the music although that might be improvisation based on my skill level. So I guess you can say I leave a lot to improvisation.

 The beer was a killer but the cost was extreme: $52.42 for two cases. It would have been cheaper to just go buy it. But, you can't buy taste. I would have been disappointed had my beer actually tasted like Corona. No, I needed more body, more malt and certainly more hops. And I got it.

The reason it is so pricey is because it has many different types of grain and in quantities under ten lbs it is over $2.50 /lb, some as high as $5.40.  This is stupid in my mind. Now I start all recipes with 10 lbs of 2-row @ $2.1 per lb, crushed, and flavor with chocolate barley or wheat. Oh, and forget the corn. No corn or rice in my beer. I don't have a purity standard but then again, I'm not making vodka.

I can only tell you what is on the receipt, can't tell you the lovibonds.

4 lb 2-row
4 lb Dingemans Pilse
1/4 lb Caramel
1/4 lb Vienna
1 lb Muntons


1 oz Hallertau hops @ 4.7 %
1 oz Tettnang Hops @ 4.8%

Whitelabs Pilsner Yeast @ $5.00
This yeast failed so I added Saflager S-23

Brew #7 Rye IPA

March 6th, 2011

Rye is a continuing theme. This batch is another keeper.

10 lb 2-row
1 lb crystal briess caramel
1 lb rye

1 oz Gelena
1 oz Sterling
1 oz Cascade

Notice that I mashed in a 5 gal bucket this time. Mashing in the boiling pot causes issues because the wort needs to go into the pot occupied by the mash. I have since come up with even different methods and will share them later. The Sparge-O-Matic isn't so 'matic, more like manual. I am working a better method here as well. The main difficulty here is the 5 gal limit boiling pot, it would be better to have a 7 gal, on the kitchen stove. Ideally, I would work on a 15 gal keg system and I keep dreaming.

Sparge-O-Manuel:

Rinse

Press

Rye Pale Ale #6

Feb 15th, 2011

While reading about the different types of grain I heard about rye. I like bourbon so what better brewing grain could I add to my IPA. I gave out some samples and it was called "Best Ever". I have to tell you though, I feel like I cheated. See if you can tell by the recipe.

6 lb 2-row
1 lb rye
1/4 lb choc wheat
3 lb spray malt

1 oz Northern Brewer @ 8 %
1 oz Sterling @ 6 %
1 oz Cascade @ 5%

Safale US-05

90 minute boil, continuous hop addition through-out boil, strongest to weakest.

Sparge Water, Boiling Pot, Sparge-O-Matic

Laying Out the Hops

IPA #5

Jan 19th, 2011

I finally have the mashing temperature figured out. An excel spreadsheet calculates the amount of water at which temperature to add based on the weight & temperature of grain. I found it on-line somewhere and I can dig it up if anyone is interested.

10 lb 2-row
1 lb dark crystal #120

1 oz Gelena @ 13.2%
1 oz German Traditional @ 5.8%
1 oz Kent Goldings @ 4.5%

Safale us-05

I usually add the strongest hops after the break in the boil after i skim off most of the scum. Some people don't skim, I skim. I usually boil for 90 minutes too. So I add half the gelena after boil, 20 minutes later I add the other half. Then I split the other hops into 3 or 4 little bowls and add the at equal interval, the last addition a minute or two before removing heat.

Observation: Boiling longer converts more sugar which allows for a quicker turn around. I shoot for 3 weeks. Week one in primary, week two in secondary, week three in bottle, week four half gone, week five all gone seems to be the pattern. If ferment-able sugars don't ferment in the abbreviated cycle them they will ferment in you gut. This can be a dangerous thing.

So leave out the crystal, use chocolate wheat for body and flavor. Three weeks, great taste, no gas.

KB IPA #4

Wed Jan 5th, 2011

I said "what do you want to drink?" He said "a nice dry IPA with a kick". That was all the encouragement I needed. I left at noon, stopped by the shop, and was brewing by 3:00PM.

12 lb 2-row
1 lb crystal #60

1 oz Gelena @ 13.2%
1 oz Sterling @ 6.0%
1 oz Kent @ 4.5%
1 oz Cascade @ 5%

Safale dry yeast us-05

Mashed in the the boiling pot and maintained temperature by placing the pot in a foam insulated box. I had some 2 inch rigid foam insulation that was begging to be made into something productive.

Boiled for 90 min and added hops every 20 min or so. Mashing temps still a little rocky. Need to tighten up on the temperature control.

The beer was freakin' awesome despite all the mistakes made with the temperature.

Mash Box

Had Last One On Brew #6 Day

Trub Rinse Brew #15

Last batch had a deficit of beer going from primary to secondary so I wondered what I could do to get more liquid out of the trub. It dawned on me to add water to the trub. I assume the extra frothy white sediment was the undigested rye because the more rye I add, the more white froth there was. This batch doesn't have any rye so the extra froth is not present.

The series of pics illustrate the process:

Trub with ~1 gal water added

 

After ~ 2 hrs

After ~4 hrs

After ~24 hrs

Round Two Rinse

Batch #3 Triple Chocolate Death

Tuesday Dec 28th, 2011

I was shooting for a Dark IPA. Kind of stout-like. Well who knew that a stout might only use one lb of chocolate wheat. I used three. My daughter was having a sleep over that evening and the house was smelling like a brewery. One of the kids couldn't get over the fact that you could actually make beer and she would comment to her quite often.The hops were also over the top; 1 oz @ 13.2% and 2oz @ 7.2%. The girls had to stay up stairs to keep from feeling ill. I was sedated by to aroma therapy. They say hops are a sedative.

Recipe
12 lb 2-row
3 lb chocolate wheat

1 oz Gelena hops
2 oz Amarillo hops

Safale us-05 yeast

I happened to screw up the temperatures on this round because I was alone in terms of help and it was my first real deal. I put to work the sparg-o-matic after the mash and all was well. The tannins weren't to bad because the three lbs of chocolate can hide an aweful lot. Esters were also present but the over all rating was high based on all who partook.

This is a solid recipe and I will make it again for summer vacation.

Full Grain Batch #2 Using Horse Grain

Before we even tasted our first beer, we were ready to brew our next batch. The problem was that we had no proper ingredients. So we said "what can we find". We had lots of stuff around the house: I went down a raided the horse grain bin. Southern States Reliance. We added a quart of rolled Oats. We added a bottle of molasses.

So we had enough ingredients for a full grain method. Never mind that the grains weren't malted. That was a minor detail. We then proceeded to bring our 3 gallons of water up to 170 deg F and mashed  for one hour.

Now we had to rinse or sparge so I had to come up with some thing. Behold, Wifey's Broccoli steamer. The perfect makeshift sparging unit.

Wifey's Broccoli Steamer, Rinse & Press

We boiled, fermented, dry hopped, secondary fermented bottled and a week later, taste tested.

Have you ever eaten green grass? Well the beer tasted like beer and it was real silky from the oats but, the after taste on the sides of my tongue was like green grass. I don't know, maybe its the rat poison in the horse grain. Who knows. I can tell you one thing. I am a full grain only brewer now.

Home Brew Batch #1

India Pale Ale Extract Kit

This is the first recipe that I tried and it is a good starter if you enjoy hops. Of course the directions have you doing one thing and I did the other. I went straight for the 90 minute boil because, I wanted a 90 minute pale ale.

Equipment on brew day:

5 gallon boiling pot
5 gallon plastic carboy with stopper and vent


Lessons learned on day 2: Leave ample room in the carboy for the cap to rise. During a violent fermentation the stopper will get blown off and foamy hops will be everywhere.

Equipment on secondary ferment day:
2nd carboy
5 ft food grade rubber hose

Lessons learned on day 7: Two carboys are better than one. This way you can siphon from primary to secondary fermentor.


Equipment on bottling day:

Bottle capper and caps
48 12oz bottles
bottling wand and rubber hose

Lesson Learned on bottling day: Use 24 oz bottles