Doll House Brewery UPDATE!

Hello all,

I am posting this update to tell all about my All Grain experiences so far. I have brewed 3 batches, all ag oatmeal stouts. My first, about 3 weeks ago, is gone. It was sub-par (for my tastes) until it was aged a little (I cant age long, ive only got 1 keg). It was very sweet, too sweet, probably under fermented. The tastes were to simple and boring, and it was heavy in the stomach. It sure got you drunk though!

Batch 2 went into the keg today. Wow, it tasted like actual quality micro brewed beer. I am SOOOOOO excited to open the keg, on my birthday in 3 days. It is sitting in the garage force carbing at 30psi right now. I was amazed. It was by long and far the BEST beer I have ever made. It was complex, malty and balanced. Wow, wow wow I am so happy...

Enought ranting, thought I would let all know how AG is going for me!

Batch 3 is still in primary, will rack possibly tomorrow. Thought it was infected, but its not! Go starsan! I need that batch to be ready to be drank by Oct 27... I am sick of only getting to drink young beer, I need more kegs!

Glad to hear that it's going well for you so far. It certainly sounds like to need to invest in some more kegs!

You can bottle some of it. Use larger bottles so you don't have to clean so many. Beer should be aged to be good. You have no idea how good it get's unless you put some bottles away to drink in 28 days or longer. You will see a big difference.

Get out there and scrounge up some cornys. I have 10 right now and it is barely enough.

dollhousebrewery said:

My first, about 3 weeks ago, is gone.

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Wow, three weeks and your beer's gone!?! I've still got a week or more left in the secondary at three weeks. I don't know about everybody else here, but most of my ales don't really start to taste good until at least six weeks out, and even longer than that for an Oameal Stout!

I am not so worried for now. Once I start brewing beers of choice, 3 weeks will not be nearly long enough. I just needed to get a grasp of all grain. I needed to figure out some numbers, and learn how to do it. For these 3 oatmeal stouts, I am not worried about them being around long.

I hear you on the learning part. I drank green beer for the first year I was brewing, lol. Now, my palate can't take it. I hate tasting the beer at transfer now just because of the yeasty flavor, but do so anyway to see past the yeast flavor and get a heads up on the brew. Fastest beer I have ever tasted that was ready to go was 3 weeks from pitch to glass, and that was at the brewery I interned at (thanks Marks and Ritchie by the way). It was a light ale, but was mostly water anyways and a staple of young Texas Tech women, lol. I guess their wheat was only a little bit longer than that, but always tasted better when the serving tank was almost empty a week or more later (at least to me, these kids all drank it green).

The only beers I can palate in the 1st couple of weeks after the kegging is a wheat beer. Other than that I give them 3-6 months at room temp before I tap it. The aging is really something that does not get enough talk around here. Don't let your friends drink green beer or they may make fun of your beer when they leave.

Truer words can't be spoken!!!!!!! Age is everything!!!!!!!! I'm a minimal 1 month ager at least for most ales anyway. Haven't done any lagers on the home brewing scale yet, but those will come when I get another couple of kegs.

Well, once I have multiple kegs, aging wont be such a problem. I want to age, I just dont have the resources. I hate bottling, so thats out of the option for me. I will put up with green beer until I get a few more kegs.

dollhousebrewery said:

Well, once I have multiple kegs, aging wont be such a problem.

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wanna bet It dosent matter how many cornies you have you still wont let it set...:cross: Or at least I cant.. I just cant wait to taste it. I have 20+ cornies and I brew 12 gal batches @ a time and for some strange reason I just cant keep them FULL
JJ

Keeping them FULL and not emptying them are different. I have to empty mine, or I could just start leaving them in the secondaries longer...

dollhousebrewery said:

Keeping them FULL and not emptying them are different. I have to empty mine, or I could just start leaving them in the secondaries longer...

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leaving them in secondaries is a great idea. Its a great way to ensure that you cant get to them.
Good luck
JJ

Jaybird said:

leaving them in secondaries is a great idea. Its a great way to ensure that you cant get to them.
Good luck
JJ

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I second this notion. Leave in sec longer, don't carb with priming sugar and buy some damn beer if you have to!

Sounds like we all need sponsors to go to when we feel the need to "peek" LOL. I am fermenting in a sanke for primary, and have it under 15 psi pressure with a adjustable pressure relief valve on my sanke tap. The beer side of the tap has a tester spigot on it and I have tasted and checked gravity with a refractometer (simply as a reference not an absolute gravity read) about 2oz a day since it was about 5 days old. It is remarkable how from one day to the next it can taste so different. Today it is ready to remove the tap and let it carbonate to 30 psi, then I get to crash cool it and transfer to 2 5 gallon sankes. What does everyone bet I can't let it go a full month in the 5 galls without a taste again, lol. I might can as long as my other beers hold out, but my friends are getting hooked on craft beer so now it has many imbibers, LOL.