Beer Blogging - An introduction

Hello there, I'm Nutty_gnome. Well, not really; in reality I have a normal name and life. But online I'm Nutty_gnome (or N_G for short).

I started a blog of my homebrewing experiences on the morebeer.com social site (the buzz). But I found that I was not using that site often enough. I was always browsing around Homebrewtalk.com. So, I ponied up the dough today and became a HBT member.

I'm going to take my blog posts from the buzz site and repost them here for continuity.

Why should you read my stuff? I don't know. Why are you reading this right now? Thats probably a good enough reason then.

On with the show.

Documented here for posterity.

My brewing roots were started (and dug-up) during grad school in Tempe, Arizona. Some kind soul opened a home brew shop within walking distance of my apartment so I bought a Brewer's Best equipment kit. This was back in 1997 when I always needed cash and figured that brewing would save a few bucks. The kit had 2 buckets, no carboy, no autosiphon, and lots of little sanitizer packets that resembled the packaging of a common wet-nap you can get at rib restaurants. I don't remember the name of the store, but I think is was due east of the ASU campus in a strip mall off University (south side).

Anyway. My first beers were an IPA and I think an Red or Scottish ale? These were brewer's best basic kits, similar to what you can buy today. To be fair, it seems that all aspects of home brewing have improved over the last decade, so modern kits are probably much better in quality than those from 10 years ago. The IPA I brewed had a SEVERE twangy flavor that never went away. The beer was so un-inspiring that I had doubts about the whole home brewing thing. The Irish ale was so unremarkable that I have no recollection of it. It’s quite possible that it was awful and I dumped it.

I had several barriers preventing me from achieving a successful home-brew hobby in 1997:

First, I lived in AZ where the water is terrible and the heat is worse. I stored my equipment and beer in a closet and it would often get hot in that closet. I was probably conducting primary in the upper 70s most of the time. There was no secondary fermentation and I probably didn't let it sit in primary for more than 8 days.

Second, they didn't have Star San at the time so I was using bleach and whatever came in the Brewer's Best kit. Based on my more recent experiences, these sanitizers were woefully inadequate for my novice brewing skills.

Third, I had no community to consult for advice. The guys at the store were great, but they weren't there to asnwer the burning questions when I needed them. And books? Well, C. Papazian had the only widely available book for beginners and at the time (first or second edition) it wasn't all that useful to me because I had different equipment than what he covered. That edition left me with many unanswered questions and the conflicting advice I got from the store confused me even more.

And finally, I lived in a one bedroom apartment with my new wife. We had no space. I'd been living in AZ for a year and already my junk was filling the few closets we had. Adding my wife and her things to the mix decimated storage space. I had been storing my equipment, beer, and bottles in the main closet but this was soon deemed unacceptable after a beer odor was detected on some clothes in the closet. After a short argument, the brewing equipment was summarily dismissed and sold to a very lucky buddy at a cut rate deal.

Ah. Those were the days. My wife and I look back on them with rose-colored glasses. But 10 years later on the other side of the country, my interest in home brewing was re-kindled and I've jumped back into the hobby.

When in Tempe, check out 4 Peaks brewing company (east of the campus on or around 8th street, south of University). They are a brew-pub that markets locally and the reason why I like Scottish ales today.

Next up: Equipment.