What I did for beer today

Cleaned some kegs, filled a keg with an ipa, and dry hopped my white ipa with some help from my 5 yr old daughter.

Rotor_Head said:

It no kidding tastes like bacon with a less pronounced maple flavor. Its gonna be a good beer I'm fairly certain but definitely unconventional. Its the most unique beer I've ever had. She's in a keg now and chilling. Couple more hours before go time. What's up with the chocolate peanut butter? How is it? How'd you do it?

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The Chocolate Peanut Butter came out great. I did do it two different ways: the first was with PB2 deoiled peanut butter powder (2lbs) in secondary and cacao beans, slightly crushed for 4 weeks. This gave a fairly mild peanut butter flavor and reasonable chocolate flavor, a little over what you would get for a normal chocolate stout. The second method was the addition of extract to half of the existing batch. I used 2 oz of each peanut butter flavor and chocolate flavor extract at bottling. Few people like both versions, most chose one. The experienced beer drinkers preferred the non extract versions.

If I did it again, I would use less extract, probably half.

That Bacon Maple sounds like breakfast beer!

Helped a friend brew his 2nd batch of beer and he already ordered 3 more kits!

BowAholic said:

Helped a friend brew his 2nd batch of beer and he already ordered 3 more kits!

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Now that's a Great Example!!

Kegged my AIH Pliny clone and cleaned fermenter, ext......tomorrow I brew AIH 2 hearted clone.:rockin:

I weeded around my 4 hops plants and found my Magnum and Willamette have already sprouted.

tossed my Bastard brown(english honey brown) in keg last night with a carb stone, soon as get home from work cracking that baby open.

BuffaloJohn said:

The Chocolate Peanut Butter came out great. I did do it two different ways: the first was with PB2 deoiled peanut butter powder (2lbs) in secondary and cacao beans, slightly crushed for 4 weeks. This gave a fairly mild peanut butter flavor and reasonable chocolate flavor, a little over what you would get for a normal chocolate stout. The second method was the addition of extract to half of the existing batch. I used 2 oz of each peanut butter flavor and chocolate flavor extract at bottling. Few people like both versions, most chose one. The experienced beer drinkers preferred the non extract versions.

If I did it again, I would use less extract, probably half.

That Bacon Maple sounds like breakfast beer!

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Nice! I have a peanut butter cup porter that I've done both ways, and the pb extract is preferred in my samplings. It all boils down to personal preference though.

Big long day for me
-brewed session black ipa, had to run to brew shop and buy extract because my gravity was way low
-racked half of Belgian blonde into keg with sugar to naturally carbonate
-racked other half into 1 gallon jugs to secondary with different Brett varieties
-started 3 gallons of cider with leftover yeast from Belgian
-made small starters to grow left over Brett for future use
-racked my split batch of supplication like beers into secondary fermentors

Still have 3 carboys left to clean and then put everything away, but it's break time.

Just got finished brewing an imperial amber and am currently listening to the ambient sounds of water running through my IC.

Went to my first Homebrew club meeting and really enjoyed it.

Kegged Sky Raider Maple Bacon Ale. Brewed Scooter American Honey Ale. Drank Merlin Blackberry Ale. So glad to finally have a cycle going. How does ginger Belgian triple sound?

Kegged and bottled 8 gallons of my house pale.

Using my Irish Red Ale in a Shepard's Pie for Pi Day.

Cleaned up a mess, that my stout left me. I should have used blow-off tube.

Inventory day! Damn, I either need to brew more or slow down my purchases. I have 51lbs of various grains, mostly Maris Otter. I have 14 varieties of hops totaling 48.5ozs. And I have 13 types of yeast, liquid and dry combined.

Who knew?

Cleanin some bottles I killed last night in the PBW bucket left over from delabeling my son's new stash. Gonna check the kottbusser in the morning & may be bottling it.

Checked the Scooter Pale Ale to see if it was still alive. Bought a sixer and gonna piss the day away with some Jimmy Buffet and Marshal Tucker....so we'll see how that all goes. You guys may have to start censoring me in a couple hours.....

I learned, the hard way, how not to fill a growler from a keg.

Bottled 5 gal of American Pale Ale.

Brewed the most recent iteration of Caramel Amber Ale, trying out a shorter mash and smaller sparge. Lost a couple efficiency points, but not enough to worry. Gonna try another 45 minute mash on my next brewday, but go back to the bigger sparge volume, since I suspect that was where the efficiency dropped.

replaced o-rings, relief valve, gas post and poppets on 1 of my kegs so can keg my stout, and start next brew.

My SSR just failed in an "always give power" mode. Looks like what I am doing for beer today is "Experimental batch featuring a volcanic boil."

In between painting gameroom coats for swmbo, messed around with a diy keg/carboy washer. Pretty happy so far.

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http://youtu.be/9U7yYbU_pFo

Building a starter of Westmalle yeast from an older, out of date vial of wlp530 (May 14, 2014). Just added the second step this am and will add the 3rd and final step before The Walking Dead at 9pm. In the am I'll put it in the fridge so they can nap for 3-4 weeks before they get a smorgasbord of sugar to gorge themselves on...

Made another batch of candi syrup. Like the final color better on this batch, but it will all go in the quad :rockin:
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Snagged an old bench capper for $10.

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brewed 10 gal.


After,,,,
I used the wet spent grains, added 1 1/2 cups of them, to 1 cup of water, blended them up, into a milkshake so to speak, then stuck it into the mixer, added the oil, pinch of salt, two cups of flour, then a touch more to dry it up. , yeast, and half hour later, rolled it out, sauced it, added some mushrooms and slammed it onto the pizza stone.

Funny, most recipes call for drying it, then crushing into powder. it wasn't bad. anyone else do it this way?

Shopping for LME kit number 4. I'd like to add a chipoltle pepper syrup. What is a good vehicle for that? I'd do a stout but I'm moving in a few months so it wouldn't have time to age. Brown ale? Pale Ale? American Ale? What sayeth you?

I bottled a blonde for my self and brewed a Porter for my bosses birthday present! Birthday is mid May so it should be about ready.

I made a copper manifold for my cooler mash tun.

Tapped my pale ale and printed my shopping list for my next brew

Rotor_Head said:

Shopping for LME kit number 4. I'd like to add a chipoltle pepper syrup. What is a good vehicle for that? I'd do a stout but I'm moving in a few months so it wouldn't have time to age. Brown ale? Pale Ale? American Ale? What sayeth you?

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5 Rabbit Cerveceria makes a good chili pepper brown ale called 5 Vultures. They use ancho and guajillo I think? They take a light touch with the peppers, which strikes me as the right move for a brown. If you used the same amount in a brown ale as in a chili pepper stout, you'd never taste the beer.

There's is such that you get mild, smoky pepper flavor from the first step, but the heat is slow to build. By the end of the glass, you can feel it lightly warming up your mouth and throat.

Trippel-A said:

5 Rabbit Cerveceria makes a good chili pepper brown ale called 5 Vultures. They use ancho and guajillo I think? They take a light touch with the peppers, which strikes me as the right move for a brown. If you used the same amount in a brown ale as in a chili pepper stout, you'd never taste the beer.

There's is such that you get mild, smoky pepper flavor from the first step, but the heat is slow to build. By the end of the glass, you can feel it lightly warming up your mouth and throat.

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That sounds perfect. I'll do this for the next batch after what I just ordered. I got myself a Belgian Triple kit with some ginger syrup. I'm gonna add lime zest in vodka. I ordered the kit, syrup, a new auto siphon since I broke that little plastic plug out of the last one because of blackberries plugged it up. We're gonna call it "Phantom Ginger Lime Tripel"

Rotor_Head said:

That sounds perfect. I'll do this for the next batch after what I just ordered. I got myself a Belgian Triple kit with some ginger syrup. I'm gonna add lime zest in vodka. I ordered the kit, syrup, a new auto siphon since I broke that little plastic plug out of the last one because of blackberries plugged it up. We're gonna call it "Phantom Ginger Lime Tripel"

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Sounds good! A few summers ago I added rose hips and petals to the boil of a petite saison kit (from NB), then added hibiscus like you would add dry hops, a few days before bottling. We'd done a few batches, and had some gushers. So for the last batch, I put the hibiscus in vodka for a day then out it all in together. I used 12oz vodka, which was way too much. The beer tasted a little hot and boozy, which was not the goal. Next time, I'll try just 4oz.

Sent my neighbor a bunch of links to homebrewing equipment.

Gave the guy a couple of mine on Saturday, and Sunday afternoon I hear a knock on my door, it's the neighbor, asking how much it is to get into homebrewing, how to do it, if I'd show him the ropes, etc.

It was a good confidence boost, and now I'll have another homebrewer on my street. That makes 3 of us.

I notched the lid of my 16 gallon stainless steel brew kettle to accommodate my Hot Rod Heatstick from Brew Hardware. I use the 2kw Hot Rod on a timer as a preheater, then switch to propane for the boil (water is near boiling temp before I get to the garage).

It was a good day in Beer Nation. Moved some beer through the pipeline...

-Kegged a BCS American Brown Ale (taster delicious, balanced malty)
-Decanted extra beer off a cold crashed starter
-Moved a BCS American Rye Ale that I brewed Sunday to fermentation chamber with its starter. Will let those get to temp and then pitch in the morning
-Tested gravity on a BCS APA - down to 1.007. Probably terminal but I'll test again in a day or two. Taster was nice and bright but very smooth.
-Test glass (okay, two) of a BCS American Amber that I burst carbed over the weekend. Mmm, delicious and will only improve with another week or two in the keg.
-Cleaned a carboy and a conical
-Used a new pressurized conical transfer rig I built over the weekend to move some cleaning liquid around. Works great!

I kegged and force carbed a peat smoked scottish ale and an English strong ale.

Then, 12 hours later I drank waaaay too much.

Nivekt said:

I kegged and force carbed a peat smoked scottish ale and an English strong ale.

Then, 12 hours later I drank waaaay too much.

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Yeah that will happen. Especially when you make good product.