Recent content by ctdenney

I emailed Russian River asking for help recreating their Shadow of a Doubt Imperial Porter and Vinnie just emailed me back today! Unfortunately he didn't have a homebrew formulation for the beer but he gave me the ingredients list and some other details and I'm hoping you guys can help me turn...

How long do I need to let each step go? Is 24 hours enough?

After looking around, there seemed to be several threads close to this but none exactly on. Beersmith is telling me I need a 3L yeast starter for a 1.068 IPA I'm planning. Unfortunately I only have one 1000ml flask to make a starter in. So my question is this: Is it better to do the 600ml...

I tried tapping and it didn't budge. Guess I'll just remember to subtract. Thanks for the feedback everyone!

I have been using a refractometer for a while now, but decided to double check it against my floating hydrometer on my most recent brew. When I checked my OG, the refractometer said 1.051 (target was 1.044, but I boiled off a bit too much water) and the hydrometer said 1.061! I assumed the...

Assuming I am using the calculators correctly, it seems like the refractometer is 100% the problem, and the corrected values are all quite a bit lower. Problem solved! Thanks

I have been using a dual scale brix and gravity refractometer. I had no idea they would read wrong with alcohol. Do they read high or low? Is there a standard way to correct them? If that is the problem, I will simultaneously breath a huge sigh of relief and get massively annoyed that I have...

Usually Safale us-04 or 05 depending on the beer. I used Danstar Nottingham ale yeast for a recent oatmeal Stout I did.

This is a problem I have with almost every beer I brew: extract or all grain, big beer or little, stater or not, they almost ALL finish high. Usually above 1.035. I know that the usual causes of this are underpitching and poor aeration, and those were my first thoughts. But it has happened on...

My thermometer, after it reaches 100F starts over, so that 120F is just labeled 20 So on my first brew, since i did not have any cooling equipment, I was letting it cool on its own(first mistake) After a while i checked the temp and it was at 85, good enough! i thought, and pitched the yeast...