What I did for beer today

Brewed the SuperHighPressure lager experiment this morning. Vacuum-sealed ice blocks did okay, but decided it's not worth the hassle going forward; will just do what I've been doing, chill down as far as I can with the plate chiller, then let the ferment fridge chill it down the rest of the way. Wanted to post a small video but HBT won't let me, it's hissing loud and smells great.

Fri-Sat recap:

Friday, Assistent Braulein and I went to LHBS to get specialty grains for the next brew. Picked up some hops and yeast as well for an American Amber Ale for the fall -- I'mma start a separate thread on that 'cause I want some feedback.

Saturday, performed my Grill Test on the Amber Grains Pale Ale. It's a very complex procedure that requires at least half-a-liter of the ale, decanted and enjoyed through all phases of preparing the grill, grilling the proteins, then enjoying the proteins at the table. I'm happy to report that Amber Grains received high marks (in my very subjective opinion) in all phases of the test.

Today, I'm going to repeat the test to establish validity and reliability.

Second phase of the SuperHighPressureLager experiment underway. This morning increased the temperature to 81° (no I'm not kidding) and the pressure to 30psi (again not kidding). What little krausen there was dropped like a rock, and a quick test of gravity shows it down from 1.058 to 1.017 in less than 24 hours. Sample was still a tad sweet, but nothing off, no tang, just a little bitterness from the yeast; kinda like eating bread dough after second rising. If it gets down around 1.010 by this afternoon I'll start it crashing. With no esters/weirdness being produced, it shouldn't need any cleanup time. For those who may scoff, this IS just an experiment; not something I will do with every beer going forward. For one thing, with that much pressure on it, the yeast slurry will probably be essentially useless to use again. That hurts my pocketbook a bit. But if this works, it solves the problem of 'oh cr*p my pipeline is super low, need a beer done by this weekend'. On a Wednesday to be done by Saturday. If nothing else, it's fun.

Brew day complete. Brut IPA.

100% not feeling it, but bottled the latest Tellen-faux buckwheat porter this morning. Not sure about the buckwheat, but the sample I took looked and tasted like an English porter. A partial success.

seatazzz said:

Brewed the SuperHighPressure lager experiment this morning. Vacuum-sealed ice blocks did okay, but decided it's not worth the hassle going forward; will just do what I've been doing, chill down as far as I can with the plate chiller, then let the ferment fridge chill it down the rest of the way. Wanted to post a small video but HBT won't let me, it's hissing loud and smells great. View attachment 827429

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You never know until you try..pretty cool experiment.

Didnt do too much exciting today, I rinsed, sanitized and put away my brew pot, and all things associated with last Fridays brew, ordered my grain bill for next Fridays brew day, checked on the fermentation of my Francoinian lager ( drained the trub) also watched my Cherry porter fermentation take off... now I wait ( and drink a pint)

Prepping for the school year kept me occupied for the last two weeks, so no time to read or post. In that time, hit a Big Brew with the local home-brew clubs at Scholb Brewing-Torrance. Came home with 10G of wort that became a Lager (currently cold crashing) and a Pale Ale which is cold crashing on its 2nd dry hop. Would love to keg them, but can't clean anything until Hilary is done raining on the backyard, so waiting. Bottled the last of the Blackberry wine (still need to label those) and kegged the Cascade-hopped Muscat.

Harvested the grapes (Gold Muscat, Black Muscat, and Pinot Noir) in advance of the storm, but I am afraid my hops are probably a lost cause for this year; will need to wait and see on that, as the NeoMex was almost to harvest but the Saaz, Old Mission and Comet were still putting out burrs. The Cascade, Eroica, and Chinook have barely climbed this year for some reason.

Talking to vendors to source the Crabapples for the 12BOC2023 Crabapple Lambic, I want to move the beer onto the fruit so it's ready to bottle at Thanksgiving.

Bottled a couple different styles for a 6 pack sampler a friend wanted to try.

Labeled up some Warbler Sugar Cane Wheat

FINALLY kicked my maibock, so moved the grodziskie to that tap. This allowed me to free up space to move one of my marzen kegs in the back of the kegerator to continue lagering and free up space elsewhere.

I live near Seattle and have been doing pieces of the Mt. Rainier Wonderland Trail. It's a 94 mile (150km) trail around the solitary active volcano that includes 22,000 feet (6700m) vertical gain during the circumference. If you ain't going up, then you're going down on this alpine trail. There is a lottery to get a permit, which gives early access to get the few campsites along the entire route. Otherwise, one can only do it in chunks or camp off trail (which is a different permit). But I digress.

Anyhoo, it seems a group of Ukrainians opened up the Paradise Village Hotel less than 10 miles from the main entrance of Mt. Rainier National Park.

So, after back packing up the Wonderland about 10 miles for an overnighter in my tent, and back out the next day, I thought what better way to reward myself than by eating a Ukrainian meal and trying a Ukrainian beer???

Lvivske 1715 was a delightful lager. Didn't try any of the other beers since I was driving. Good thirst quencher after a hike for sure. Whaddya know, Lvivske brewery first operated in 1715 (now a Carlsberg company). Never looked before, but should be available in big liquor stores, and the menu featured about 10 different beers including Dark, Dunkel and Porter.

Fingers crossed that the Lviv Brewery keeps the beer flowing!

Checked for the yellow stuff.

First year?

And Phase Three of the SuperHighPressure lager experiment is about to go down. It hit a brix of 7, just about 1.010. Crashed it yesterday morning, and getting set to keg it tonight. It might not be the best tasting lager I've made, but it is really not bad. Just a bit of 'young' taste (big surprise) that should condition out fairly quickly. Will post a pic later when I pull a pint.

Bottled my Altbier ... brewed a fig stout ... and cooked a boston butt in a dutch oven . Now i'm going to bed ... I'm pooped.

Yesterday kegged my English IPA and brewed Best Bitter with the starter I made from the English IPA. While brewing the best bitter I seen my neglected hops plants and decided to do a double brew day. Picked enough fresh hops to do a Columbus, Cascade and Chinook wet hop pale ale.

Today check on the new brews and both were cranking away so no cheering required. With the extra time I brew my first Piwo Grodziskie using @MaxStout 's recipe as a guide. I was a little worried about a possible stuck mash with a grain bill close to 100% wheat but it ran very smoothly. I used all Saaz hops and the end of the boil looked and smelled like split pea soup.

day_trippr said:

First year?

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No more like fifth but neglected for the last three.

Bottled my Moose Drool 20 x 500ml bottles @ 5.6% ABV. Will save them for Christmas hopefully .

Pulled a sample of my second attempt at a hazy, looking good so far.

Then went to get, and put together, my next investment.. a kegerator. Got a great deal on a new one due to some “scratches and dents”. Looking forward to trying it out

Bottled my Chocolate Milk Stout from the keg.

I brewed 20 litres of Citra IPA
4400g Maris Otter
200g Naked Malted Oats
200g Wheat malt
30g Citra @60m
40g Citra @ whirlpool 80C for 20m
The yeast is called Clipper as it’s a repackaged NEIPA yeast.
OG 1056 BHE 74%

bellhp said:

Bottled my Altbier ... brewed a fig stout ... and cooked a boston butt in a dutch oven . Now i'm going to bed ... I'm pooped.

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From the west coast...WTF is a Boston Butt???

Seriously? It's a wedge of pork shoulder, perfect for the smoker leading to pulled pork sammiches!

Cheers!

Seatazz , it's one of the best cuts of pork in my opinion ... and economical too . try it. Also made homemade vinegar coleslaw to go on the sammy's the next day. 2 days worth of meals out of a 5 dollar roast

Bottled my Helicopter pale ale today 37x 500ml bottles.

Transferred my marzen into the lagering freezer.. made(R/O water)my strike and sparge water for tomorrow's brew, seasoned it as needed
. Filled my SS Brewtech fermenter with PBW to let it soak overnight.. set up the brewzilla to heat my strike water at 0 600.ready brew an Irish red in the morning

Bottled some really small batches of sour beers for competition. (Small because I don’t really like them much) A Berliner and a Gose.

seatazzz said:

From the west coast...WTF is a Boston Butt???

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I’m guessing they just call it a different name in the west. I’ll look for a butcher’s chart.

Brewed my "Figgy Pudding" Christmas Stout. First brew on my outdoor propane setup, and it's definitely not dialed in yet. Wound up doing an unplanned step mash because I was quite a ways off on my strike water temperature. I'll probably wind up with a more fermentable wort this way. Crush was probably off a little bit too, so this will end up being less of an imperial than I was shooting for. On the plus side, I only have to clean my gear instead of my whole kitchen.

Packing up to take my superfasthighpressure lager to FF Draft party today. Bit sad to see it go, it's a tasty one; and our crew will demolish it in short order, fairly certain. Free beer? Oh yes. The cream 'ale' I brewed yesterday is going great guns today, going to increase the pressure/temperature when I get home later tonight; and maybe brew up a quick Mosaic NEIPA in the morning.

Just milled my 12 pound grain bill for brewday tomorrow… beer is my gym today. LOL

Just pasteurized 5 pounds of figs to go into my fig stout ... today is day 5 of fermentation ... once they cool down a bit I'll put them in the carboy and then I'm off to the inlaws house for some BBQ ribs

bellhp said:

Just pasteurized 5 pounds of figs to go into my fig stout ... today is day 5 of fermentation ... once they cool down a bit I'll put them in the carboy

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Sounds like you're five days ahead of me. Did you puree your figs? Chop? Crush? Not sure it matters all that much.

I put the frozen figs in a stock pot , put just enough water to cover , brought temp up to 160... scooped them out into a bowl and mashed them lightly with the back of the spoon to open them up. Fun part was getting 5 pounds of figs through the neck of a glass carboy

bellhp said:

Fun part was getting 5 pounds of figs through the neck of a glass carboy

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Yeah. This has me considering just taking the lid off of the bucket and dumping them in.

Racked the Laison onto the pound of honey. And pitched the 34/70 and dropped the temp to 50 degrees. It’s happily chugging away.
The initial fermentation went from 1.055 all the way down to 1.001 for a 7.1

After the pound of honey the SG went back up to 1.017. I expect it to finish dry around 1.002-1.004

Tasted amazing after the first fermentation now to lagerfy it!

bellhp said:

I put the frozen figs in a stock pot , put just enough water to cover , brought temp up to 160... scooped them out into a bowl and mashed them lightly with the back of the spoon to open them up. Fun part was getting 5 pounds of figs through the neck of a glass carboy

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Do you have a recipe you want to share? Never had a fig stout.