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It's been a long time since I've posted here. Mostly I've been happily brewing away and have made a lot of beer I'm happy with. But I'm starting to get the itch to improve my system. It just feels inefficient and kludgy. My brother (with whom I brew) wondered what we could do if we each...

This is getting brewed for a pig roast happening in less than 4 weeks. Hopefully I can go grain to glass in that time. 11 gallon batch, going to do single infusion around 153 degrees, batch sparge. This is going to come in just a bit higher than the guidelines for a mild at ~1.046, getting to...

a friend is moving away and his wife wants to throw a pig roast before they go. i'd like to brew a beer, but this is happening first weekend in october and i can brew only this coming weekend (labor day weekend). I keg so can force carb, but need help with an idea for a beer that will be big...

I live in SoCal and haven't seen any kegs on craigslist in forever. And prices on kegconnection seem to have gone up. So anyone know of any deal on ball lock kegs?

Had an ounce or so of hops in a keg that I also primed with sugar. 3 weeks later (a bit long on the dry hop, but I'm busy) I go to take the hops out (haven't gotten around to putting this beer on tap yet) and it took forever to get the lid off. Venting took forever and never released all the...

I need help understanding why I have no delicious, bready MO flavor in my beer. Recently brewed up 10 gallons of bitter. 88.3% MO, 6.5% crystal 55 (british), 5.2% amber. Hopped with US Goldings, (1.5oz FWH, 1.75 @ 60 min, 1@15, .75@10, .7@5. Fermented with a 3L starter of WLP0002, split...

A few days into fermentation of 10 gallons of my special bitter using WLP-002 my chest freezer was full of an overpowering smell of nail polish remover. It hasn't gone away almost a week later. Anyone know what is up with this? Maybe just a byproduct of this particular yeast? Usually I make...

When a brewery says they use a "house" or "proprietary" strain of yeast, what exactly does that mean? Do they get custom "blends" from White Labs or Wyeast different from what is available to homebrewers? I assume it is not just how a yeast changes over generations of use, since I think most...

Saw this article in the NY Times and was wondering if anyone has experience with using that method for brewing, and if so, what was used and how big of a system you've seen. Seems like it might be an interesting way to brew. From what the article said it sounds like the health dept...

Hi, just planted 5 varieties of my first hop "farm" (Willamette, Goldings, Sterling, Cascade, Centennial) in my mom's back yard here in Southern California because I don't have a backyard where I live. Anyway, as I was planting she asked whether hops had deep roots and I said I didn't think...

I have some WL 565 for an upcoming saison, but I want to funk it up with some brett. I'm trying to get an idea of how and when I should use the brett. Should I dump both the 565 and brett into a single starter and pitch the combined starter? Do separate starters (I only have 1 stirplate) of...

I have an English IPA just about done fermenting that I'd like to dry hop for three to five days. The hops used in the brew include Willamette, EKG and Styrian Goldings. The Willamettes I got from hops direct, and the EKG and styrian came from my LHBS. The EKG hops from the LHBS never look...

I brewed up an old ale recently and after 4 weeks in primary stuck it in my 5.25 gallon whiskey barrel. I'm thinking of adding Brett C to get some of that stock ale taste and start inoculating the barrel for funkier things once all the whiskey character is out. Should I just drop a tube of...

Thoughts on this? I believe I saw an EIPA recipe in radical brewing with no crystal. I'm thinking about 85% MO, 8% biscuit (or toasted MO, depending on how lazy i am), 5% demerera sugar and 2% wheat. Burton yeast. Willamette bittering and 15 minute, EKG at 10 and 5, and Styrian Goldings at...

for some reason i thought it would be a good idea to dry hop the pilsner i was putting on for the superbowl. i got it into my head that the hop flavor would be gone so a little dry hop would do it good, especially since i had a ton of saaz still from hopsdirect. totally was not thinking about...

I brewed a smoked porter and have 2 issues with it--it did not carb naturally in the keg, and its gravity is still high. The story is I brewed it, let it ferment for 3 weeks (didn't record temp in my freezer, but should have been between 62-65 the whole time). OG at 1.074. FG came in around...

So, went to pull a pint and my tap handle was stuck. I pull and pull and... it breaks. yeah so I have beer pouring out and now I have no tap (at least I have my handpump). I wasn't expecting to upgrade, but it looks like I will have to go buy a new tower with dual perlicks. Hopefully it's...

I've had a lager (czech pils) going for a good couple weeks now, and it still has a layer of krausen and junk at the top. Is this normal for lagers? Ales all that falls to the bottom after a couple days. It's close to done (at about 1.014 right now, so I might be able to eek out a few more...

dang. In an effort to get the yeast to fall out of suspension faster I stuck my starter in the freezer hoping it would hasten the process, since I am brewing a nice light pilsner and didn't want to dump the whole 2L starter in, but got started late on making the starter. Then I got all involved...

I've done a search and seen a fairly wide variety of recipes. Some with mostly pilsner malt and a pound or two munich, plus crystal and even a bit of chocolate, others mostly (or entirely) munich with some specialty grains. Some split the bill between pilsner/2 row and Munich. For specialty...