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Hey Guys, So about a year ago, a local bee keepers association donated us 20 pounds of honey to make a mead with. I threw it together like usual, did my usual rehydration w/ go ferm and did staggered nutrient additions. After giving the mead a couple months, the gravity had only gone from 1.140...

Hi Everyone, Been a long time home brewer and just started trying out some meads. Did a couple that turned out very well, but this most recent batch will not ferment past 1.100. Original Gravity was 1.144 and I pitched yeast back on 10/1. I admit, it has been somewhat neglected and it probably...

Hi HBT, I work at a LHBS and I've been running into some issues with Wyeast yeast. Looking to see if anyone else has any similar experiences lately. We sold a few WY1099 Whitbread Ale yeasts a couple weeks back and had everyone that bought and pitched the yeasts come back within a few days...

Hey HBT, Going to be visiting family in Eugene, OR over New Years and I've never been. Wondering what I should check out. Only bottles I know I want to be able to track down to bring home at this point would be anything from De Garde. I hear great things about them. I know they're in...

So I work at a LHBS and I'm trying to decide which Aromatic malt we want to have as a default. We've been pretty happy with Castle for a while. Simpson's is very nice as well. I have some Dingeman's Aromatic on the way just to smell/taste the difference. I know a lot of people tend to gravitate...

So I'm brewing up a hoppy pale ale right now. I have oxygen and a diffusion stone, which I usually only use for imperial stouts/barley wines etc. I've always been hesitant to use it in hoppy beers for fear of reducing the hop character in the final beer. Oxygen is detrimental to hop...

I'm planning on brewing a moderate ABV oatmeal stout within the next couple weeks and I want it to be delicious, but I also want to experiment a little. I've always added my roasted grains at the beginning of the mash and have always been happy with the results. Never turns out too...

Every time I go to the store to get brewing water, the only thing I ever see is Distilled water sold by the gallon. It's usually $1 per gallon, which is more than I want to pay. I've checked places like Jewel, Target, Wal Mart, and Meijer (they actually have 2.5 gal of Distilled). I keep reading...

So I'm going to Stillwater / Oak Park Hts, MN to visit the grandparents this week for Thanksgiving. I'm from Chicago, so I'm looking to grab some good local stuff while I'm up there. I know Toppling Goliath distributes up there so that is definitely on the top of my list. Also trying to score...

So I went to check for an updated water quality report to keep my Brun Water up to date and noticed that the Iron level seems high. I then went to plug the numbers into Brun Water and it came up with this message: "Water Report is Unbalanced. Cation and Anion totals should be within .5 meq/L of...

So I'm looking to brew an APA this weekend. Got an idea on what I want to do, sort of inspired by Yooper's Pale Ale (the malt bill, at least). This is for a 3 gallon batch. Let me know what you think.. Malt Bill 46% 2 Row Pale 23% Vienna 11.5% Munich 10L 11.5% Wheat 2.9% Flaked...

I'm looking to brew a pale-ish beer tonight (around 5 SRM). I'm in Chicago and trying to avoid having to buy RO / distilled water every time I want to brew a pale beer. I've been using lactic acid to treat my mash/sparge water based on Bru'n Water's calculations, in order to get my pH in range...

So I've been looking into this for a while now and can't seem to find any recent posts on this subject. I have an imperial stout (1.094 OG) that's been in primary for almost 2 weeks now and I plan to rack it onto vanilla bean, cacao nibs and bourbon soaked oak cubes after it's been in primary...

So I did my first parti gyle over the weekend. First beer was an Imp Stout that came out at 1.094 OG. The second runnings came out to be 1.042 OG and is looking like a brown porter. From what I've been reading, these "second running" beers typically turn out with a lackluster malt profile. So...

So I'm brewing my first Imperial Stout this weekend. Doing a 3.5 gallon batch with a total of 15.85 lbs of grain. What concerns me is that when I enter my numbers into the mash/sparge water calculator (I use this one: http://www.brew365.com/mash_sparge_water_calculator.php ) it gives me a mash...

So I'm planning on brewing an imperial oatmeal stout in the next couple weeks. I want to base it (somewhat loosely) off of one of OldSock's recipes from his blog : "Toasted Oat - Coffee Stout" 60.6% 7.50 lbs. Maris Otter 18.2% 2.25 lbs. Toasted Oatmeal 8.1% 1.00 lbs. Briess Roasted Barley...

This may be a silly question, but I'm trying this for the first time and would like to get it right. I'm prepping my sparge water now, I have all the salts in, now I'm wondering if it matters when I add the lactic acid. Just throw it in before I start heating the sparge water?

Going to brew this weekend and want to try out a Saison with Brett. Here's what I got for the grain bill: Pilsner (48%) Munich 10 (14%) Munich 20 (20%) Wheat malt (14%) Table Sugar (4%) I want to get an amber-colored Saison so that's why I'm going with a mix of the Munich light and...

So I was reading up on recipes for a stout I'm looking to brew this weekend.. came across Yooper's Oatmeal Stout. I noticed something towards the end of the 1st post that caught my attention : From @Yooper : "Mashed at 156, with a thin mash (1.75 quarts per pound) to keep the pH in range."...

So the last 3 batches I've done have all been IPAs/pales. Wanna do something different this time. Planning on brewing up a nice stout and fermenting with hefe yeast. Spiteful Brewing in Chicago does a beer like this and it sounds interesting (I haven't actually tried it, but hear good things)...