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Smoked a 9 lb brisket last night, 13 hours to 195 degrees. Wrapped in butcher paper the last 2-3 hours, the brisket came off at 9pm, was wrapped in foil and put into a towel/newspaper lined cooler. I meant to rest it for 1-2 hours but got distracted and forgot about it until 8 am. The...

Well, I think it's time to let someone else enjoy this brewing equipment as much as I used to. I haven't brewed much since my wife was diagnosed with celiac disease a couple of years ago (not too fun to say "Hey, this is great! You should try it! Oh, but you can't ..."). So I'm offering...

Doing a Belgian pale ale with 8 lbs of grain and 1.5 lbs of sugar. I checked the ph of my mash and it seems to be 5.0. I used test strips that I'm sure aren't the most accurate in the world but every time I've ever used them they have matched up with a 5.4 ph. I'm a little embarrassed to admit...

I'm going to try pitching onto a yeast cake for the first time this week. Any advice about this? The yeast is Wyeast 1214 (Belgian Abbey) that will be going onto it's third generation. The first generation was a Belgian Pale (5.2% Alc, 10.9 SRM) that was brewed last summer and washed...

Well, here's a new one for me. I put together a pilsner recipie and brewed on Feb 5. 5 gallon recipie, OG was 1.047. Pitched a 1.5 liter starter and put it in my wine cellar which is a consistent 51 degrees this time of year. It took a couple of days to kick off and then went .... Slowly...

I have a couple of GF brews under my belt, and last week I started one. In the past I've added maltodextrin but am not totally sure what it has meant for the final product. I forgot about it during this brew, but is that something that I need and could add now? Just dissolve some into some...

Going to be road tripping between Wisconsin and Jackson Hole, Wyoming in a couple of weeks. Any good nano breweries or the like close to I-90 that I should check out? Other Continental Divide region brews I might not have tried? I have a friend who swears up and down that ODells makes the...

I want to put together a partial mash by mashing oats and minute rice and then sorghum LME. However, since I'm not sure of the fermentability of the oats and rice, I'm going to have to fly by the seat of my pants here. I do stovetop PM's via the BYO magazine 2-gallon cooler method, but I use...

I brewed a Belgian Tripel in June, bottled in late September. At the time, I was a little surprised to find it nicely carbed and delicious three weeks after bottling. Since then, however, that beer has tended to foam after each bottle is opened. Not. A gusher, exactly, more like the beer...

Planning ahead for the depths of winter, when I like to do a pilsner. it just occurred to me: what about lagering by burying the secondary in a snow bank? I would split the batch and only bury a 2.5 gallon better bottle, and I imagine I would seal the top and place the carboy in a bag. Get it...

Okay, I made a starter using washed WLP 810 (san Fran lager). I started with a 500 ml starter and stepped it up to 2000 ml. Then cold crashed, poured off the top layer the day before brewing, then got sick and didn't brew. 3 days later I put it back in the fridge and left it for a week. Now I'm...

I've been brewing for about a year, now doing stovetop pm's. To date, I've used bottled water exclusively because my water is pretty hard. I'd like to start using my tap water to save on the costs and to have more control over the process, but I don't really like the taste of my water. I built a...

Built an IC this weekend and am not sure how to be sure it is clean enough. I wiped it down with dish soap and boiled it, but still had some tarnish and dark spots on the copper. I attacked it with Barkeerpers Friend and a toothbrush and got it looking very clean and shiny. Probably spent...

I'm going to do a PM tonight that will be only 2.5 gallons, meaning that it will be pretty close to full boil all-grain (only 3/4 pound of DME). Using a 2-gallon rubbermaid cooler to mash with a capacity of 4 lbs. I've always wanted to experiment with a steam beer, so this is my plan. Does...

Not 100% sure this is the right forum, but here goes: Went to the Bayshore Beerfest (Milwaukee) today, and had a great time. 100+ producers, 3+ options each. Lots of beer to try. But the whole thing confused me a little -- I was expecting an experience a little more like Napa wine tasting...

Poking around the LHBS today, I found a few expired Wyeast packs on sale for about a buck. I've never used liquid yeast or made a starter, so to try it out I bought a pack of 3944 Belgian Wit yeast (it was the least inflated of the 3-4 packs available). It's been out of date for about a year...