Recent content by Saint_Doyle

I pitched 2 packets of dry champagne yeast into the carboy on the recommendation of my LHBS. I'll let you know how this turns out. I'm going to watch it and cold-crash it when the gravity reaches ~1.040.

It's an imperial Oktoberfest/Double Bock sort of experiment. I tasted it and it is way too sweet as is. So, yes, I definitely want to drop the gravity down. To reiterate my main concern: I'm afraid that any residual lager yeast may not appreciate being stored at room temperature if I were to...

I brewed up a high-gravity wort and racked it on top of a healthy White Labs Oktoberfest yeast cake (left in the bottom of a carboy from mid-gravity lager that previously inhabited the carboy). This is a trick I use in place of making a yeast starter. OG: 1.130 stuck fermentation gravity...

I was thinking of using Dr. Pepper to add some gluten-free flavor to a gluten-free beer I am planning. I as also worried about the HFCS doing weird stuff, so I got some Dr. Pepper made from cane sugar. Don't know if I'm going to boil it, or just add to the primary...

Has anyone else noticed the bizarre reaction that occurs when your iodophor sanitizing solution comes in contact with anything that has had honey on it? It leaves a purple residue behind. I've been experimenting with honey beers lately and for the longest time couldn't figure out why the hose...

I had to go check my brew journal. The SG was sitting at 1.064 when I dumped an ungodly amount of dry champagne yeast packets in there. I think 2 packets were called on for a 5 gallon batch. I doubled, maybe tripled that to make sure I could get the SG down to a reasonable amount. They were...

I'm glad someone could get something out of this. 4 years!?!?! Did you forget about it or were you just not thirsty?

Oh boy, that was a stupid idea. If anyone is interested, this is how that little experiment worked out: Exploding Barleywine Bottles: My Latest Failure

Yeah, I had some of the WLP099 in there, along with tons of champagne yeast. I should have been more patient. Now I have to go to the liquor store until this next batch of American Wheat is done.

Uncapping/re-capping proved to be a giant pain. I flipped the top off one bottle and it gushed foam out the neck for over a minute. After it finally settled the bottle was only half full. So I lined up the bottles and one by one tipped the cap just a bit so as to let some of the pressure out...

Here's a few more pictures of the disaster. I cleaned broken glass shards for 3 hours today. See that little brown spot on the ceiling? That is a piece of shrapnel stuck in the ceiling. This picture was taken about an hour after I'd begun vacuuming up glass. There were tiny shards...

I have been struggling with a Barleywine I made almost a year ago. There has been no activity in the air lock for several months though it still had a suspiciously high gravity reading of 1.029. It was suggested that I bottle it up and forget about it for another couple months. 2 weeks...

Sounds like I'm gonna cap this batch and forget about it for a while. Guess I'm gonna HAVE to drink a case or two of commercial beer this weekend so I can acquire enough bottles. Next time I'll soak this batch with more hops. No, next time I'll stick to the Oktoberfests.

I'm starting to agree with you. I wanted to make a high gravity beer, and around that time I tried a Sam Adams seasonal Barleywine. It wasn't bad so I gave it a shot. I'm not a big hop head, so I may have skimped on the hops. I don't plan to actually enjoy this beer at this point, but I...

Long story short, I've moved this beer around from carboy to keg to carboy to carboy a couple of times, thinking it was ready. The last taste test I did was WAY to sweet to be drinkable. I would be ecstatic if I could lower the gravity reading down to say 1.010.