Beer Flights

Wednesday evening, two weeks ago, a friend Kris and I had a tasting flight, with  our wings.

Beer Flight

When you make your own 6 pack, the beer is on the self, unchilled. So in order to attain the proper operating temperature is a short time, I converted a waste basket into a cooler. Not to worry, It was lined with a bag and I scrubbed it for several minutes in the tub. I grabbed a handful of salt packages and emptied them in the mix too. All was chilled in half an hour.

Instant Cooler

No pics of wings or cigars. When you are in Miramar FL, you have to go here for wings : http://www.jerseyswings.com.

And when you want a smoke, you have to go here:
http://www.aficionadoscigars.com/index.php/photos

I had an Hoyo de Monterrey Excalibur and Kris had an Armondo's blend. Kris normally makes it about 1/3 of the way but this one made it to the end. Next time I am at Aficionados, I will focus my attention on the house blended cigars because they are excellent.

Hoppy Clouds

I go down to check on my project and all I can thing of is Bob Ross painting Happy Clouds.

I have Happy Yeast and a nice cap.

Had I watered back up to five gallons, all my hops would be on the floor because I don't use a blow off tube. In a week, I will siphon to the secondary and then add a gallon of water to the trub to separate the beer from the soupy mixture of yeast, hops and wort, that will by then have settled on the bottom.

Brew #20 Porter #17, Take 3

Brew Date: Dec 19th, 2012

Here we go again. You know by now that something here is not like the other. After making a poor choice of substituting chocolate rye for chocolate wheat on brew #19, I am putting the wheat back, and then adding 3 lb of spraymalt extract to the boil. My mash ton can only hold so much grain and until I get this under control, higher ABV's will have to come by way of extract.

sTevo's Porter, take 3:

10 lbs 2-row
3 lb Plain Extra Light Spraymalt
3/4 lb crystal 80L
1/2 lb roasted barley 300L
1/4 lb chocolate wheat 1000L

1 oz saaz @ 4.9%
1 oz tettnang @ 4.8%
1 oz kent golding @ 4.5%

Safale US#05 dry yeast


Hop Addition Schedule:
Upon Boil after Skimming
1/2 oz saaz  1/2 oz tett t=20
1/2 oz saaz  1/2 oz tett t=40
1/3 oz Kent t=55
dry hop 2/3 kent after active fermentation settles down.

Rinsing Adds ~1 Gallon

Pours like Syrup

My concoction  boiled over on wifey's glass cook top which was a major pain and caused a lengthy delay. I had to cool down the wort, siphon it in a carboy, clean the glass using razor blades and ceramic cleaner. Then I started the boil all over after the mess was cleaned up, an hour and a half later. On the plus side, wifey was to tired to get involved.

Wort hit that cook top and instantly caramelized and then turned to charcoal. Had I continued, the smoke alarms would have started blaring. I used two pots to boil in on the second round so I would not repeat this operation, even though the dross from the break hit the cook top and flowed to the floor. I still have to remove the oven door face to clean out the inside. The blob flowed in through the vents as it proceeded downward.

I was up till midnight getting it done. On the plus side, I got to use my wort chiller twice in one evening.

Deconstruction

Jupiter SAS 767 '89

In order to fully understand something, you must fully deconstruct it. Then put it back together piece by piece.

In some ways the same goes for an excellent brew. You must know all of the components and how to assembly them properly. Each part has its proper place in the assembly. The trick is to figure this out, with minimal rework.

So, now that all of the parts cleaned are cleaned up and ready to be assembled. Will it play? Not without fine tuning and regulation.

Happy Thanksgiving

Have taken way too much time off from brewing. In the meantime, here is a pic of my daughter getting all artsy fartsy with the fruits. Plus, it is 5:00 PM somewhere.

#18 Turned Out Just Fine

 A few pictures, hic!

Bottling Day #18

 Notice the little coke bottle.

Quaker IPA @ 3 Weeks Old

 Perfect recipe. We were tasting it at 2-1/2 weeks and it was good then, even had some bubbles too.

Back By Popular Demand sTevo's Porter

We'll have to see if the judges like.

Update: They didn't like it, as a Porter. The mistake (cause of low ratings) I made was using chocolate rye instead of wheat or barley. Essentially this batch turned out more like an English Ale. Recipe #17 was definitely a Porter.

Porter # 19

 Brew Date: Sept 1st, 2012

Joined the Brewers Guild and had a great time at the August meeting at Smith Mountain Lake. Later this month there will be a Porter competition so I can recycle recipe #17 because it was so good. While I was at the shop I noticed that Chris restocked the shelves with a few more roasted varieties of grain.

Because I am never content to leave a good thing alone, I am substituting the chocolate wheat with chocolate rye. Will it still be a Porter? I don't know, will have to consult the experts.

I need get busy and hope this can be ready in time.
 
sTevo's Porter Take 2:

10 lbs 2-row
3/4 lb crystal 80L
1/2 lb roasted barley 300L
1/4 lb chocolate rye 500L

1 oz saaz @ 4.9%
1 oz tettnang @ 4.8%
1 oz kent golding @ 4.5%

Safale US#05 dry yeast

Update:

From the Beer Advocate http://beeradvocate.com/beer/style/80

Baltic Porter

Description:
Porters of the late 1700's were quite strong compared to today’s standards, easily surpassing 7% alcohol by volume. Some brewers made a stronger, more robust version, to be shipped across the North Sea, dubbed a Baltic Porter. In general, the style’s dark brown color covered up cloudiness and the smoky/roasted brown malts and bitter tastes masked brewing imperfections. The addition of stale ale also lent a pleasant acidic flavor to the style, which made it quite popular. These issues were quite important given that most breweries were getting away from pub brewing and opening up breweries that could ship beer across the world.

Average alcohol by volume (abv) range: 7.0-10.0%

 ---

OK, looks like I am on the light side of the ABV.

Feel The Grain, See How It Converted

Sometimes it can feel doughy. Today, only empty husks and little spouts.

I Need A Bigger Juice Box

 I want to go for a higher ABV but the box is too small. I need a 7.5 gallon one to help the mash.

My Latest Arrangement

It's all about ergonomics.

Strained Bits

At the learn to brew day I noticed one of the guy straining the flow  coming out of his sparging unit. So I figure I could do a similar thing.