Beer Blogging - Busted Boiler Black Lager - The $7000 beer.

In March my home's heating system died. I'm in an older 'quaint' house with steam heat. The truth is that the heat never really worked all that well. Lately, only 4 of the 10 radiators in the house could be counted on to warm up. Over the past 6 years the heating in the house had declined to the point that some areas simply had no heat. But that was ok because we had sweaters and slippers and the kids are young and full of heat-producing energy. In retrospect (in late April after spending the big bucks on a new boiler) it seems silly that we didn't take care of this issue years ago. But the multi thousand dollar price tag involved and the fact that we are young and stupid kept the job from happening.

So the steam boiler, the heart of the system, died. It had been leaking gently puffing steam into the basement for the past 2 months and I'd noticed that several corroded, rusted holes had appeared in the top of the boiler housing. I also had been noticing a lot of steam coming from the chimney. Finally my wife called PSE&G to take a look at this thing (we were enrolled in their crappy maintenance program that doesn't really cover much of anything, as it turns out). PSE&G came out on a Tuesday morning and promptly pulled the plug on the boiler and wrote-up a nice red card saying that this appliance was not fit for use with their gas and that it would be a violation of all laws and good sense to turn it back on. The PSE&G guy told us the boiler had cracked. And it had.

It was March and it was 40 degrees. Mid-March in NJ means that people are looking forward to spring. Usually the snows are gone for good and in fact it can be quite balmy for weeks at a stretch. The boiler died during pleasant weather. Early weather forecasts suggested that the following two to three weeks would be mild and in the low 60s with sun and no storms. Based on this, we decided to take our time, secure low interest financing or a home refinance loan to pay for the repair, investigate our options and solicit bids from contractors. We didn't immediately take the first outrageous offer from PSE&G to replace the boiler.(see footnote 1)

However, what actually happened was that the temps almost immediately plummeted into the upper 20s and we had snow and rain for a week. When the daytime temps in the house quickly dropped to 60 degrees, my wife and kids had to move out to the in-laws down the street. I remained behind to keep things going and because I can't sleep at my in-laws. After a few days, the temps in the house fell to 48-50 degrees. That is pretty cold. The toilet and tile floors seemed even colder.

Anyway, Because of the low temps (in the basement especially) I thought I would "make lemonade from lemons". So I went to the brew shop at the first opportunity and bought the BB kit for Black Lager. I don't know what a black lager is, or what it tastes like, it was just the simplest and cheapest way to try a lager. If they had had a lighter variety in stock I would have tried that.

I brewed it up and started fermenting. I had no trouble chilling the wort! I hit the basic lager fermentation temps of 50 to 55 degrees for a week. No problem. I even transferred it to secondary for some healthy lagering time in the basement at around 49 degrees.

It was at this time that we finally got our new boiler installed. As it turns out, our old boiler had been undersized and installed in such a way that it would never have done its job properly. The new one is sized correctly and can heat the house wonderfully in around 10 minutes. It is an amazing thing to have all your radiators actually working.

Well, this meant that the temp in the basement slowly increased to the upper 50s and eventually crested into the low 60s in April. I tried to keep the secondary cold by putting it in a cooler filled with water to increase the thermal mass and counteract quick changes in temperature. I even tried keeping the cooler iced down. But while the spirit was willing, the flesh was weak and after a few days I forgot about icing the lager.

So now its late April, temps in the basement are in the low to mid 60s. I have no idea how this beer is going to taste or even if it is viable. It fermented at the proper temps but hasn't really been 'lagered' at the right temp. I'm very curious to see how this one goes. I will say that I had a sip while transferring the beer to secondary and it tasted ok, if a bit thin. The stuff was as black as any beer I've seen but when held to a strong light, had some ruby-red color transmission.

So I'm calling it Busted Boiler Black Lager. I'm going to bottle it soon, maybe tonight and I'll let you know how it goes.

Footnote 1: Thank god for the recession! I had to beat the plumbers with a stick to get them to stop calling us about the job. Everyone was looking to bid on our job. They would even come out the same day I called. This was a refreshing change of pace the usual crap one has to put up with from contractors. I remember 5 years ago when I waited a month for the guy to come look at a job, then after signing a contract, the guy didn't show up to do the work for 6 months. And when he did come by it took him only 4 hours to do the work. Oh yeah, PSE&G wanted twice what the average contractor wanted to make the repair.

I'll post comments as things develop.

- Things have deloped (Part 1):

I bottled the Busted Boiler Black Lager last night. First: I am not well-educated on what a black lager is supposed to taste like. Second: I usually don't drink really dark beers (e.g. stouts and porters). But i"ll make an exception for this one.

I was pleasantly surprised by the way this Brewer's Best Kit turned out. You'll recall that I hit the proper temps for a lager during primary fermentation and then due to lack of equipment and lack of care, allowed the lager to sit for about a month in temps well above those for a lager (they eventually rose to the mid 60's).

The Black Lager was pretty black when in a glass and it wasn't the least bit cloudy or hazed. In the siphon tubes it was a light caramel color. It definely has alcohol but the taste doesn't manifest on the tongue. It has a very strong flavor that I associate with the black crispy parts of plain, bar-b-qued chicken breast (no sauce).... so I suppose its a charcoal-esqe flavor but there is only a very mild smokeyness to the beer. Body was good, it wasn't too thin for a flat beer and I expect that once carbonated it will be a pleasant beer for spring. I don't think it will win any awards... but it was pretty clean tasting. No butter or other noticable off flavors and only a very slight extract twang that I think will go away with bottle conditioning. All in all, it should be drinkable in a few weeks.

Will I be doing more lagers in the future? No. Not until I have the equipment and facilities to do it right.

- Things have developed (Part 2):

This beer cost me roughly $7,000 to brew. That is to say that the final repairs to the house including all of the inspections and ancillary work done to accommodate the new system cost me roughly $7,000. Without the boiler dying, I could not have brewed this beer. So how does it taste?

Well, in June, as I write this, it is wonderful. It is a very dark beer with no twang or off tastes. It was a nice, light burnt barley taste. To my palate it is 'dead-nuts' on for the Sam Adams version of Black Lager. It carbonated well and tastes great. I've been sharing it as it is one of the best ones I've brewed to date. I just wish it hadn't cost $7,000 to brew it. I hope to never make this one again!