Recent content by brewingbryan

I'm planning to brew a stout and was thinking of adding pumpkin pie spices into the wort. I've been looking at various threads but having a hard time coming up with consensus. My plan is to brew a base stout batch (extract) and throw the spices in around flameout. Can you recommend amounts of...

I've used honey in a few recipes and found that adding it at 5 minutes left in the boil or at flameout have worked best. I made a honey basil ale with 1 pound at 5 minutes and I get lots of sweetness without an overpowering honey taste.

Well there you go. Thanks for the tip.

I can't easily find a previous thread to answer this question, so if you'd be so kind to indulge me... I use Cooper drops when I bottle and have a handful of packages with leftover drops I've kept in my freezer. My assumption is these will be OK to "reuse" - that is, pull the bag out of the...

I've been interested in brewing a stout and using oats to give a fuller body. I brew extract only, so is there an ideal way to get the benefits of oats without doing all grain or is maltodextrin simply my best bet?

I've been curious about this. I wondered if it'd be easy to throw a bunch of ice in the wort after flameout to try and lower the temp quickly. The heat of the wort would kill off nasties and the ice would hopefully lower degrees a bit fast.

I like to transfer, mostly to clarify but I also often add something to the process. I always throw on a normal airlock just like primary.

Thanks, all. Was just a fit of curiosity on my behalf - no particular rationale.

On their description of Noble Pils, Sam Adams says the brew is a "traditional Bohemian pilsner," however they use all five kinds of Noble family hops in the batch. Some basic research I've done on Bohemian pilsner recipes shows that Saaz is typically the only hop used in a traditional...

Spaceman - thanks, that's helpful. I should've noted that I'm brewing a wheat beer base and then the blueberries in secondary. When you smashed your berries, did you do anything additional to sanitize/pasteurize or did you play it as the alcohol in the beer would take care of any issues? I've...

I'm going to piggyback off this - I'm planning a fruit beer myself (blueberry) and wondering what the best method everyone prefers to add fruit to tue secondary. Many threads say to pitch the fruit frozen before racking to secondary, but I've been told by other homebrewers that heating the...

I soaked mine in vodka prior to using nibs with a stout. Not sure if the boiling changes anything. Nonetheless, I let the beer sit on them for two weeks and got what I thought was an OK flavor, but an extra week or two may give more. I'm not sure if there's a threshold nibs have for that kind...

To add to this, I will say my favorite (Ithaca Apricot Wheat) uses flavoring in their brew. Based on my personal experience with extract in my homebrews, I prefer the real thing for my purposes.

For what it's worth, I used apricot purée in a recent apricot wheat and like the way it turned out. I just bought a can of Vinter's from Austin Homebrew to use with a wheat kit. That said, I'd definitely be curious to try a new way of brewing the beer with real fruit, too.

I made a chocolate stout with nibs - racked on top of them for about two weeks in secondary. Worked really well and gave it a good amount of cocoa flavor without it being too much. I think it was just a few ounces, whatever came in a single pack from Austin Homebrew. As I'm sure you e found...