08-08-08

Deathbrewer

Really? You dont think oxgenating and using some yeast fuel would work?

Are we going to co-ordinate a time for brewing so we can post as we go? Or just brew when you recover from the night before....

Ya, relax on the starters. You can get a nice starter with absolutley no effort by using a few bottles of Goya Malt Drink. It's in the ethnic (Portugeses) section in your grocery store. It's an unfermented beer in a botle. Pour one bottle and a cup or so of water into a growler, shake like mad. Add yeast, cover with an airlock and walk away. You can add more the next day if you want. For a big beer like the RIS, I'd aim for a pretty full growler, maybe 4 bottles of Goya total. Put in the fridge for a few days before to settle out the yeast, then pour off most of the Goya leaving an inch or so. (It's beer at this point but I've honestly never even tried it. Beer snob.) Shake up to mix and you are good to go. Almost instant starter.

paulthenurse said:

Ya, relax on the starters. You can get a nice starter with absolutley no effort by using a few bottles of Goya Malt Drink. It's in the ethnic (Portugeses) section in your grocery store. It's an unfermented beer in a botle. Pour one bottle and a cup or so of water into a growler, shake like mad. Add yeast, cover with an airlock and walk away. You can add more the next day if you want. For a big beer like the RIS, I'd aim for a pretty full growler, maybe 4 bottles of Goya total. Put in the fridge for a few days before to settle out the yeast, then pour off most of the Goya leaving an inch or so. (It's beer at this point but I've honestly never even tried it. Beer snob.) Shake up to mix and you are good to go. Almost instant starter.

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Yeah, I've heard of this technique before but I've never tried it. I'll have to check it out soon!

paulthenurse said:

Ya, relax on the starters. You can get a nice starter with absolutley no effort by using a few bottles of Goya Malt Drink. It's in the ethnic (Portugeses) section in your grocery store. It's an unfermented beer in a botle. Pour one bottle and a cup or so of water into a growler, shake like mad. Add yeast, cover with an airlock and walk away. You can add more the next day if you want. For a big beer like the RIS, I'd aim for a pretty full growler, maybe 4 bottles of Goya total. Put in the fridge for a few days before to settle out the yeast, then pour off most of the Goya leaving an inch or so. (It's beer at this point but I've honestly never even tried it. Beer snob.) Shake up to mix and you are good to go. Almost instant starter.

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Wow, that sounds like a really simplified way to do a starter...no DME mess. I'm going to have to try that out!

shunoshi said:

Wow, that sounds like a really simplified way to do a starter...no DME mess. I'm going to have to try that out!

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With DME starters are no-brainers anyway....I don't see what the big fuss is here.

If you can brew extract beer, you have the skills to make a starter.

brewt00l said:

If you can brew extract beer, you have the skills to make a starter.

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That's the problem, at least for me. I've never used extract, nor bought it, nor read much about it. I was taught by another AG brewer, who told me that extract was inferior, therefore that is what I learned. *shrug*

chriso said:

That's the problem, at least for me. I've never used extract, nor bought it, nor read much about it. I was taught by another AG brewer, who told me that extract was inferior, therefore that is what I learned. *shrug*

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Cut open bag
measure desired amount
pour slowly into boiling water
mix well

...it don't get much easier than that 'cept poping the cap on a malta.

You're growing yeast, not making some major flavor component to your beer so don't get all hung up on the fact that you're using extract. Even if you pitched a big a$$ all-extract starter into a RIS, you think you are going to taste any of it?

If you are worried about the extract "tainting" your brew, crash cool the starter and decant the liquid and just pitch the slurry by itself.

When doing the mash should I put all the malt together? I have 14lbs of pale and 6.25 of specialty. Thats 20+lbs of malt.

I have a 48qt cooler Im using for my tun.

brewt00l said:

If you are worried about the extract "tainting" your brew, crash cool the starter and decant the liquid and just pitch the slurry by itself.

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Nah, I'm not worried about "taint", I'm just explaining the historical cause of my hesitation to embrace the world of extract.

Hey, for those of you who have already received the 08-08-08 kit from AHS, what are they using for the light chocolate malt? It doesn't look like they have that listed as one of the grains they carry.

Lil' Sparky said:

Hey, for those of you who have already received the 08-08-08 kit from AHS, what are they using for the light chocolate malt? It doesn't look like they have that listed as one of the grains they carry.

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https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showpost.php?p=458152&postcount=160
In my sig as "AG Recipe"

The answer is, they're not. They dont have it, and we designed around it.

This is EXACTLY what I sent them and EXACTLY what comes with the all grain kit. Extract subs *ME for the pale malt.

Cool. Thanks, Chriso!

Lil' Sparky said:

Cool. Thanks, Chriso!

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Yer welcome

LIL

I got mine from AHS- They not only kick ass but they have my buisness for good as they did me right on shipping.

I usually get cornholed cause im In Alaska.

So, who's bottling and who's kegging this? I'll be kegging capable by the time this is ready, but thinking I want to bottle it instead so that it can last longer in my celler .

I'm definitely bottling this. I only have 4 kegs right now and I don't want to put one out of commission for 8 months. Plus that way I can finally try to make cool labels and give gift bottles.

I think this RIS will be my final farewell to bottling. I can use up whatever good bottles I have left, then tuck it in the cellar for a long, long time.

After that, though. Heh heh. I know what my beer will live in.

I will both bottle all but one cornie. Let it age baby!

I'll just reinforce Brewpastor's "let it age" comment.

I've had a bottle of my now 2-year-old imperial stout in the fridge for quite a while. The last time I sampled a bottle was months ago. Last night I decided to crack it open and was pleasantly surprised on how great it was. I'm glad I still have a 12 pack of this hanging around.

I would highly recommend that anyone that makes this brew stash some away for at least a year if not longer. If the results are good, we could do swaps again in a year and compare to the previous results.

I want to brew this as a countertop partial mash, so that's 4# grain with .5# DME and nearly 4# LME for a regular recipe. My problem is converting it from AG to this partial mash. Would someone please fill me in on how to do this so I don't have to ask this annoying question anymore? Please?

Edit:

Ah I found the recipe for the partial mash, never mind.

My kit is on its way!

Smelling the airlock bubbling is like sticking my nose in a bag of hops. :rockin: Smells AWESOME!

There's a new pack of yeast in the refrigerator that I KNOW I didn't order. :rockin: Wonder where the rest of the ingredients are...

Man, I can't wait until Christmas!

^^^and the SWMBO thinks she can be sneaky...

Brewed my 08.08.08 this morning in between wrapping presents and cleaning the house. Next weekend is looking really busy so I figured I better get this beer brewed while I have the chance. Efficiency was a little below expectations so I will have to add an extra # of DME but it looks and smells great. It is going to be hard to leave this one untill August. Luckily I have most of a batch of RIS I brewed this August.

Craig

Maybe I should make it a policy to brew RIS of some kind in any month divisible by 4 - In other words, April, August, and December. Then age each batch 8 months.

Look forward to doing mine OH SO SOON!

ups sucks!! to damn slow waiting for a delivery from freshops so i can brew this

chriso said:

Maybe I should make it a policy to brew RIS of some kind in any month divisible by 4 - In other words, April, August, and December. Then age each batch 8 months.

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I have a similar policy, I only brew RIS's on days that end in "Y" :rockin:

CBBaron said:

Brewed my 08.08.08 this morning in between wrapping presents and cleaning the house. Next weekend is looking really busy so I figured I better get this beer brewed while I have the chance. Efficiency was a little below expectations so I will have to add an extra # of DME but it looks and smells great. It is going to be hard to leave this one untill August. Luckily I have most of a batch of RIS I brewed this August.

Craig

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I still need to check my gravity but this huge sure seemed to finish fast. Pitched my yeast at about 11am. By 10pm it was going like gang busters. No blow-off but I'm guessing it was close. The next evening I add an extra pound of DME in a quart of water to bring my OG up to the desired 1.088. By the morning of Christmas Eve (48 hours after pitching) the bubbling had stopped. I'll check the FG this evening just to make sure its finished because that seems to be an incredibly quick ferment for a beer that big.

Craig

Due to some "circumstances," I am considering using a lager yeast for this.
BLASPHEMY?

or am I just making a roasty baltic porter?

Thoughts?

I picked up my supplies at the LHBS tonight. No warrior! Oh, oh. I substituted 2 oz of Target at 10.0 AA. I ran the numbers a few times and it seems that if I use 1.9 oz I'll be right on. Brewing in the morning.

Picked up my goods today for this puppy. The starter is rolling tonight and I'll be making this sometime in the next 3 days. The best part is that Midwest happened to have 3 oz. of Styrian Goldings in their hops fridge and I snagged them all. Looks like Orfy's Hobgoblin has now been slated for the beginning of the year.

brewed this yesterday had to sub out the warrior for nugget but it's busting the top of the airlock now!

HOLY CRAP I almost forgot to order the ingredients for this until today!!! (Family visiting for Christmas distractions and all.) Ordered mine today from my LHBS in Tallahassee, and luckly they had everything, even the Warriors. Will be here on Monday just in time. PHEW!

Brewed the 888 today. Ended up with 1.084 and left things as they were.

Had a little misadventure along the way. I have been using quick disconect plastic fittings between my manifold and the outlet with a piece of plastic hose connecting them. It's a clever little design, you push the hose into the fitting and it grabs. You can't pull back on the hose. If you push on an inner ring just next to the hose it releases the hose and you can remove it. Well, aparently the heat made the connnection a bit dicey because the next thing I knew I was stirring the mash and there was the plastic hose floating on the top. CRAP!!! Now my manifold isn't connected to the outlet. So we ladled out the mash into a few buckets, reconnected the hose and poured the mash back in. It actually was a good thing, as the temp was a bit too high and this brought it right in line. After that everything went according to plan.

We did joke about making molasses, that is some serious brew. It's bubbling away now in the next room. Love that sound.

We ended up doing the partigyle thing and made a mild out of the grains after we got our 888. There was still plenty of residual sugar remaining so we filled up the mash tun again and ran off just under 5 gallons of what ended up being a halfway decent mild brown ale. We hopped that with one oz of EKG in the boil and an ounce of Fuggles with 5 minutes left. Should be nice, it tasted fine after the boil, if a little on the light side at 1.034.

PTN

I had a great time brewing this 2 days ago. Ordered from Austin Homebrew Supply. This is my 5th brew, and it was the extract version Austin offered. I transferred it from the kettle to a 6.5 gal carboy, and it just dribbled through the hose, it was so thick. Got it bubbling away right now, and it smells great through the airlock. I felt like this may be the first time I got everything right (*crosses fingers*) on a brew session, so I am looking forward to trying the final result. ...Just 8 months away from confirming...

I was scared, I had no activity after 24 hours..... turns out my temp was at about 62*F. Moved upstairs to a warmer room, now it's 68-70ish. Got a good krausen building up, yeast is startin' to do its thing. This is with WL051 Cali V.

2nd runnings batch, with added sugars (brown+molasses), is also at a good krausen already, and smells fantastic. Used the S-04 on this one.

Any suggestions for a Horizon hop substitution?

Galena or Magnum are best.
Recipe Post, last two lines for all subs.