What I did for beer today

I cleaned out all the disconnects and cleaned/lubed/replaced all the gaskets on some kegs, then I cleaned out and sanitized all the lines on my kegerator, then I kegged 4 beers, and finally I cleaned out my fermentation temperature control, moved it out to the garage, and got it ready for some lagering in a few days.

Moved batch of blue moon clone to secondary so I could rinse and harvest the yeast. Brew day with that yeast is tomorrow hopefully.

Was hoping to get my Kölsch in bottles tonight, but it'll have to wait until morning.

Dry hopped an IPA with 2oz of Simcoe, 2oz of Summit, and 1oz of Citra pellets.

Did a lot of 'research' tonight and came home with 6 cases of 750s a friend snagged for me. Brewed another version of my Citra Nelson saison and finally put a blow off tube on right away instead of waiting until there was a mess already.

Brewed a Belgian quad in my new mash cooler. Missed my efficiency badly but did a second mash for a small beer that ended up near 1.050 OG. Should be nice to have two Belgians to try out.

Also used some of the second mash wort to make a starter for my Marylambic wild yeast project. Oh and burned my self pretty badly with home made candi syrup.

Guden said:

Also used some of the second mash wort to make a starter for my Marylambic wild yeast project. Oh and burned my self pretty badly with home made candi syrup.

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I was going to like your post, but then I saw that you burned yourself. Hot sugar syrup burn sounds awful. That sounds terrible!

I've made a few batches of syrup myself and never been 100% happy with results. Found D-180 online for $5.50 a pouch. More expensive than homemade, but still less than a bottle of a commercail quad and that's enough syrup to make a 5 gallon batch.

TNGabe said:

I was going to like your post, but then I saw that you burned yourself. Hot sugar syrup burn sounds awful. That sounds terrible!

I've made a few batches of syrup myself and never been 100% happy with results. Found D-180 online for $5.50 a pouch. More expensive than homemade, but still less than a bottle of a commercail quad and that's enough syrup to make a 5 gallon batch.

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Yeah, I will probably just use that next time, depending on how well the beer comes out with the homemade version. The burn was only a few spots on my arm and a tiny drop on my face, could have been much worse. Note: non-boiling sugar can still be hot enough to boil water explosively when mixed.

Took an SG reading of my Honey Cream Ale. Damn...was really surprised it got down to a 1.002. Target was 1.008. OG was 1.045. This one needed a blow-off tube by day 2 so I guess it was a pretty intense fermentation. I pitched a 36 hr starter on this one.

Also formulated my first AG recipe from scratch. It will be a pretty high ABV American Pale Ale. We're shooting for around 7.7%. IBU's just under 50. My buddy and I are going to try this one next weekend up at his place.

Bottling my Irish Red Ale right now.....drinking some homebrews made previously and watching Lord of the Rings....all in garage....what a glorious Sunday!

Spent $70 to take a 10 minute quiz online. Hope it helps me get a beer job!

Kegged 10 gals of blonde ale and working on my water supply.

Brewing a rye ipa right now

Just finished brewing Old Jubilation Ale. Efficiency numbers through the roof on this one, I love milling my own grain.

Drinking my BIG LHMS Clone and breaking hydrometers!! Thats what I'm doing :?
Racked my Irish Red to secondary from some additional clearing, racked 5 gal. of huckleberry wine.
Cleaned my gear and debating whether to brew up a Blue Moon hefe.
Oh yea, broke a hydrometer - that starsan is some kind of slickery

Made a new beer log. I use to use not book paper but I found printable sheets on line. Today I made a three ring binder of a few sheets of the brew log sheets and added my old ones. Also added a chart for my refractometer. I have an all grain section and an extract section.

Happy brewing!

I made a yeast starter for my brew tomorrow. I also put the DIY stir plate together. That stir plate is just a computer fan with some magnets but it works really well.

zacster said:

I made a yeast starter for my brew tomorrow. I also put the DIY stir plate together. That stir plate is just a computer fan with some magnets but it works really well.

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I would think you would have started the yeast at least 3days before you need it.

Drilled holes for my taps (should be here tomorrow) and ran co2 line into the fridge good riddens kegerator happy to be switching to a full size fridge

Making a starter for a brew later this week...

Racked a Maibock to a keg for long term lagering; Racked a Citra/Galaxy Pale Ale to secondary to cold crash; Tested the carb cap I bought yesterday on a 12oz plastic coke bottle of the Maibock. What a cool little gadget!

Jbird said:

I would think you would have started the yeast at least 3days before you need it.

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I made the starter Saturday afternoon actually for the brew on Monday evening. It should be plenty of time, especially with the stir plate.

Kegged 40 gallons of beer today (8 five gallon cornies) and washed all of the yeast. Looking forward to having good brews here in 2-3 weeks.

Brewed 6 gallons of ale and pitched my first starter, WLP007.

Bottled my first batch of Graf.

Managed to kill a keg of Blonde and a 5 pound cylinder of CO2 at the same exact time. I got one last perfect glass and when I went back for another - nothing. No sputtering dregs or anything. I knew both were close, but did not expect that kind of timing.

Bottled my Kolsch.

In the middle of brewing my Ruination IPA clone. 15 pounds of grain, using my new WilserBrewer grain bag for a BIAB batch. I'm bringing the wort up to a boil right now. My pre-boil gravity is 1.066, slightly lower than the 1.074 Beersmith calculates. This I think is due to the size of the grain load, and the fact that I have no second pot that it would fit in after I pulled it out of my 10 gallon pot. I struggled to squeeze it, and I got a lot of it, but obviously not all of the sugars.

Next time I'm going to try doing a sparge step by keeping a gallon or so of water out of the mash, and using it to sparge the bag once I pull it. I'll need another big pot, although not as big as my 10g, and maybe a false bottom. Of course, once I go this route I should just consider more traditional mash methods.

Bought 5 lbs of corn sugar
Bought PBW
Bought 5 hop bags
Soaked 9 bottles in Starsan for label removal
Bought 2nd primary fermenter

Dmlsys23 said:

Bought 5 lbs of corn sugar
Bought PBW
Bought 5 hop bags
Soaked 9 bottles in Starsan for label removal
Bought 2nd primary fermenter

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That's a good day.

Brewed my first SMaSH beer.

I got both fermenters full with 2 brew days last week. Hopped & Confusedv2 & a black lager I named Pork Soda since it had some rauchmalt in the mash.
Cleaned a case of bottles today,reused & newly emptied as well. Got my kettle,strainer bag,thermometer,hydrometer,etc all cleaned & stored.
I have to say,this WL029 German yeast is the steadiest fermenter I've used yet. Once it starts,it chuggs along very steadilly till initial fermentation is done. Def one trooper of a yeast.

I got a new 4 shelve chrome rack for all my brew stuff. It's about 6ft tall and can hold 350lbs per shelve. . It's amazing!

Boiled up and added the 12 oz of table sugar that I forgot to add to the Head Hunter clone I brewed yesterday.

Transferred my second version of a Saison I'm working on to the secondary

Bottled 10 750ml bottles of my Brett BGS & primed with Orange Blossom honey.
Brewed the wort for a 100% Brett APA.
Replaced the drain braid in my small mashtun; will have to do same for the big boy soon.
Made a starter for my Pacman yeast slurry, to be used in 10gal of Centennial Blond

Put my first two lagers in competion sat. Earned 2nd and 3rd place for my Dort export and my Munich Dunkel. and got into cincy beerfest fo FREE. (and drank the jolly pumpkin kegs dry!)

Also judged for the first time (other styles than what I entered of course). That is some exhausing work right there! 5 barleywines before 10am!