the_bird

Recipes 

OK, it's 2:00 PM, not midnight, but still...

I've spent the morning getting caught up on a LOT of homebrew stuff that's been neglected.... and I kinda feel like I need to confess.

Remember BrewPastor's wonderful 777 Rye IPA recipe? I liked referring to it as "Resurrection," since the whole 777 creation process died horribly, until he singlehandedly brought it back to life.

Well, I just kegged it. I brewed it in May.

I was never really happy with it, I missed by target gravity, and missed my volume significantly. So, after I racked it to secondary and tossed in some dry hops, I left it kinda buried on the shelf. Didn't really want to bottle it, never bothered kegging it (my kegging stuff, until recently, was really disjointed).

So, it's been sitting with a couple ounces of pellet hops in secondary for about six months. And you know what?

It's wonderful.

I'll have to see what it's like when it's carbed up, but I can't get any off flavors from it now. It still has some good aroma, it's got a nice kick and a real nice flavor. It's DAMN GOOD. It truly has come back from the dead.

Also, I kegged my oatmeal stout. Now, this beer's only about six weeks old, but I never racked from primary. But, the bigger issue......

This was made almost entirely with OLD ingredients. Like, crystal malts and stuff that I've had around, crushed, for close to a year. Base malt that's not much fresher. I think the only thing that was fresh was the pound of flaked oats, otherwise, this was my "I'm way too cheap to throw out $8 worth of grain!" batch.

It, too - and this is confirmed by my wife - is really, really good. Nice and smooth. Doesn't taste old or stale at all.

So, the lessons here:

1. Do as I say, not as I do.
2. Really, you shouldn't do as I say OR as I do.
3. Beer's a helluva lot more resiliant than you would think.

OK, who's next? Who's got something they need to get off their chest?

__________________
Come join Yankee Ingenuity!

"I'm kind of toasted. But I looked at my watch and it's only 6:30 so I can't stop drinking yet." - Yooper's Bob

Orfy

Recipes 

Lesson in the above.

Beer gets better with age.

My confession.......

I have a bag of pre crushed grain and I can't get more than 65% efficiency out of it.

__________________
GET THE GOBLIN
Have a beer on me.

eriktlupus

Recipes 

i've got a batch of extract pilsner bulk aging for 3 mo now( smelled real funky buttery when racked in, pitched a new yeast strain on it)

__________________
primary1 :UTOPIA BABY(still searching for it)
secondary:middling bastard ipa
kegged:simcoe blonde, crystal pale ale, yellow jacket golden ale, lemon shandy blonde
DRINKIN DAWG BREWERY
LET'S GO RED WINGS


join michigan mashers here

extraction calculator
grains in pounds(G) X 36(average points per gallon of grains) / batch size in gallons(g) = maximum efficiency(ME)
OG / ME = brewhouse efficiency

ScubaSteve

Recipes 

That is so true. It just blows my mind when I think about how close I was to dumping a relatively expensive Honey Dubbel ($35 kit, plus $15 for honey) that tasted like paint thinner. Maybe it's because I'm cheap, but I stuck the keg of it in a closet and forgot about it. 6-7 months later, it came out incredibly complex; far beyond anything I could have created in my usual 6 weeks. I'm really thinking about signing up and doing the 08/08/08 RIS just because I know it'll be amazing.

My Confession: I've sent many a good soldier down the drain thinking it was a bad batch.

__________________
UNIBREW 5500 SINGLE VESSEL BREWERY
COUNTERTOP COFFEEMAKER SINGLE VESSEL BREWERY
WOODEN SINGLE TIER

david_42

Recipes 

Just because you store your crushed grain in the freezer to keep it fresh, doesn't mean it won't get moldy when you take it out to thaw.

__________________
Remember one unassailable statistic, as explained by the late, great George Carlin: "Just think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize half of them are even stupider!"

ScoutMan

Recipes 

Despite the fact that an autosiphon is less than ten bucks, I never get around to buying one. If I can't start a siphon using the racking cane method on the first two tries, I still start it by mouth. I actually keep a jug of cheap vodka on hand to act as an oral sanitizer prior to commiting such an awful act of laziness.

__________________
Primary- Export Stout
Kegged - Mt

ScubaSteve

Recipes 

Old school, baby!

__________________
UNIBREW 5500 SINGLE VESSEL BREWERY
COUNTERTOP COFFEEMAKER SINGLE VESSEL BREWERY
WOODEN SINGLE TIER

mrk305

Recipes 

I confess. I chill by emptying my ice bin into my primary, nasties and all. Pisses of SWMBO too.

Cheesefood

Recipes 

i brewed a hefe yesterday and put 3068 on it.

Now, I've used this combo enough to know that you need a blow-off tube on it. So WTF was I thinking when I just put the old carboy cap on it?

This morning I'm watching TV and I hear a pop and feel the floor have a slight repercussion. So I go downstairs and sure enough, fresh BOOM-BOOM. Blow-tube now installed.

Also, I consistantly have a problem with soot from my burner. My pots are all greasy-nasty with soot and most of my jeans have soot marks. Last night, I sooted up my nice new jeans (too stupid to change before brewing). The most likely culprit? Neglect. I had a bad unattended boilover once and I never really cleaned the burner. So today I took it down to the workshop and ran the dremmel over it to remove all the gunk. Need to clean the stand next and figure out how to de-gunk the pots.

__________________
Past Winners: Caramel Cream Ale #1, Hoegaarden Clone, Boom-Boom Vanilla Ale, Lazy Monk Abbey Style, Amarillo Cream Ale. (AG),

Buy a shirt now!!! Please! Did I help you? Buya shirt!
Cool Shirts.

Ryanh1801

Recipes 

Confession, I usually have to pitch my yeast at 80-85 degree's. Never tasted any off flavors though.