What I did for beer today

gonna bottle my scottish ale (kilt lifter clone) and rack my english pale to a secondary. plan to brew again next weekend... big question is what will i brew?

Today I brewed a batch of Mocha Stout (chocolate coffee stout).

Labeled my last batch of beer.
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I made a socket for my pin lock kegs.

Cost me all 4$

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Also replaced a hose clamp on my co2 line. The small ones I had just kept stripping before it was tight enough.

I think that was the longest day in the brewery that was not a brew day.

-racked an imperial stout to keg for aging
-cleaned a SS Brew bucket. First time using. I like it. May have to get another for small batches.
-cleaned 6 kegs (next time I won't let them collect)
-checked a honey pale ale, roused dry hops
-checked a centennial blonde. Done with primary fermentation. Tastes like a centennial bland. Kinda watery.
-drank a 2xRye from Southern Tier. Man, that's good beer.

Brew a Rye American Pale Ale w/ all Galaxy hops yesterday. Noted departure from my normal gig but felt the need to change it up a bit.

Brewed a Flanders red to replace the one I bottled yesterday. Third generation of de bom with dregs.

I bought a Mr Beer over the weekend. it was $8 at an estate sale and had never been used. I kinda wanted the PET bottles, and realyl wanted the 2 gallon fermenter for making a small batch of apfelwein.

I felt kinda weird carrying it about. I wanted to tell people that I'm a real brewer and actually know what I'm doing . . .

NickTheGreat said:

I bought a Mr Beer over the weekend. it was $8 at an estate sale and had never been used. I kinda wanted the PET bottles, and realyl wanted the 2 gallon fermenter for making a small batch of apfelwein.

I felt kinda weird carrying it about. I wanted to tell people that I'm a real brewer and actually know what I'm doing . . .

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small batch apfelwein? mine keep growing. Started with 5 G batches, I now make it 15 at a time. It gets better as it ages IMO and I always have a spare keg of it on hand. I am just glad I dont bottle the stuff. 6.5 cases in one session would be too much for cleaning/sanatizing/bottling/capping manually.

DrunkleJon said:

small batch apfelwein? mine keep growing. Started with 5 G batches, I now make it 15 at a time. It gets better as it ages IMO and I always have a spare keg of it on hand. I am just glad I dont bottle the stuff. 6.5 cases in one session would be too much for cleaning/sanatizing/bottling/capping manually.

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Well yeah, I guess. I don't want to have 5 gallons of this stuff if I don't like it

But yeah, I'm curious about ginger ale too. Maybe this 2 gallon fermenter will be good for experimenting

Brewed up a batch of DIPA last night. Cleaned the stove today after recalling the boil-over I had last night. Oops!

Researching family history looking for any beer brewers. Does that count? Trying to find some link to a old family recipe or other...

just cooling a batch of Yellow Fizzy Beer/SMaSH style... nothing but 2 row and US Goldings hops...

Brewed a batch of pale ale.

Still cleaning bottles. Gonna start delabeling a batch for my son's chili IIPA this summer. Then get a starter going for the WL029 for kottbusser.

Just figured out my next brew recipe! A blonde ale with wlp004 Irish ale yeast, 10#'s 2row, 1# crystal 10 and .5#'s each of caramunich and Carspils. .5oz of Summit at 60 min and 1oz of Saphir at 15 min.

Had my spare propane tank filled for a club brew day Saturday. Checked the contents of my brew day box for the same.

Brewed a Pilsner today and used the beer smith timer for the first time.

Kicked a keg of not-so-fantastic English reddish-brown ale. Filled the spot with my first 1084 Irish Red. Here's to hoping. Also whipped up a "what I have on hand" session beer recipe featuring Munich and Simcoe, 1.032 OG at estimated 85%. Been spending a lot of time at home lately and something truly sessionable is something I've been meaning to make. Come to think of it should have made it about 4 weeks ago...

Installed an under-the-sink RO water system. Testing it for leaks now.

Edit: No leaks! Plus, it was a breeze to install, lots of pics, and easy to follow. It's an APEC 90 GPD RO system, which I bought on Amazon. I'd recommend this unit...

jperry said:

Installed an under-the-sink RO water system. Testing it for leaks now.

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Sweet!

I got my brewstand dry plumbed with standard under sink filter and pre filter port for chilling / flushing / cleaning water. Favorite part is the HLT kettle filler. Swmbo is jealous!


Fun part will be soldering it all up. Gonna try to get that done before brew day Saturday

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I bought grain and hops for Saturday's brew, and I ordered a Mark II Keg Washer and a Speidel 30L fermenter from Morebeer. Too bad they wont arrive in time for this weekends brew.

Checked the gravity on my black IPA, down to 1006 so kegging at weekend

Should come in at 5% or so, tasted very good too

Racked my AG Smoked Rye IPA to secondary & dry hopped w/ 2 oz of Amarillo

Cold crashed my centennial blonde the other day. Adding gelatin solution today.

Had to do a lot of runnin' around, being retiree pay day. Found Harpoon 12;r of 4 different IPA's to try. No shoes too. Gotta get mt starter going. My son sowed me something at Walmart y'all might need. Powdered peanut butter that's 85% fat-free for those that like peanut butter stouts.

Gotta pick up 30 bottles to clean for bottling on Sunday. Then I've gotta plan my next brew day on 2/8 when The Walking Dead returns! Woop woop...!

Chilled a sixer of Centennial Blonde for tonight, priced out my IPA, just gotta go pick up the ingredients. Not sure if I'll brew this weekend or not.

Things to increase efficiency. False bottom and built fly sparge apparatus. Also took couple of brews for critique to local HB supplier. Both got great reviews...moral boost.

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Well today I kegged and force carbed my Irish red. I haven't tried it yet as it's only about 12 days old. Smelled good. Will likely sample tomorrow.

Yesterday I kegged my bourbon vanilla porter.

In about an hour I'm going to look at my English brown.

Today I scored 6 cases of empties on Craigslist.

cleand 5 kegs, re-jiggered my kettle dip tube, cut down the length of my liquid force carb line to 10' from 20' (20' is apparently to darn long). checked gravity and dry hopped 2 beers.

Canned some starter wort in little 150 ml servings and, while I was at it, made up some more slants.

Then I got ingredients for my first-time-in-4-years extract batch. I got a Therminator and second pump. I want to take it for a test run but do so with a super easy, no fuss recipe, so I got one of NB's 20-minute-boil extract kits. Hey, I figure if I do a full boil, handle the yeast properly, and temp control the fermentation, extract might be pretty good.

Later I'll take the Therminator/pump setup for a spin with just water and PBW to clean it and to check for leaks.

Racked a batch of blonde onto mixed fruit and bottled a gallon of cider with some help last night.

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Brewing a batch of bb Porter. First batch in ages.

Prepping to bottle my Cream of 3 Crops tomorrow. Also planning my brew day this weekend. Was planning an Irish blonde but I may switch that to a Belgian instead... Decisions, decisions!

Drinking my favorite IIPA preparing for the super bowl

Added 2 cups of wild turkey soaked oak chips, 4oz of cocoa nibs and 3oz hazel nut extract to my stout... Go Pats!
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Cleaning flip-tops!
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Yesterday I finally got around to putting the nice vinyl sight glass tube labels on my bk, had been using the chicken scratch sharpie markings I initially did about 2 years ago.

Also tried my damnest to clean the inside of the tube, it was caked on from past brews. I soaked in hot oxyclean, shot paper towel (rolled up spit ball style) through it with pressurized hot water, got the majority of the crud but it's not clean like I'd like. Any tips?

Oh and also did some organizing and inventory of grains (250 lbs total) and hops (85 oz total)! Gotta get to brewing!