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CornyKegs 728
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My pipeline was getting quite low at the end of last year - in large part because I did a couple of big beers at the end that needed a long time to age in secondary. Those have hit bottles along with several batches from this year so I'm up to 12 cases now with three more batches to bottle in the next couple of weeks. For the first time in a while, I'm happy with my pipeline! :rockin:
 
Well I am going to find out if I got my first infection today and I will be amazed if it is not infected. My last brew day since it is so cold and the hose is froze up I bring my boil pot into the house and use the kitchen sink to run my immersion cooler. Been doing this all winter long and it has worked great.

Well that fine brew day things did not work so good. I stuff the outlet hose down the drain in the sink and I guess as I was stirring the pot right at the end of cooling it down the hose came out of the drain. Yup it was flipping around spraying the bottom of the cabinets you know the dusty bits you never clean and water was dripping off and into the brew pot. And the sad thing is it was ready to pitch at that time.

I figured oh well I am going to run with it and see what happens and today I am going to open it up and see.

Fingers crossed :)
 
Almost forgot my happy brew day dance!

:ban::ban:


Mash almost done, got a late start. Might go for a double batch today, I have 2 empty fermenters now. Also started drinking some of my stock pile around noon. But still on my first beer after an hour and a half. One of my stronger brews so must take it easy on them.
 
I haven't brewed all winter, so my stockpile is getting kind of low. But I did spend $450 over the weekend ordering parts for my new electric setup. Figured if I don't get started on it it will never get built.

Big snowstorm here in Wisconsin. You would think by listening to the TV weathermen you should be stocking up on bottled water and canned goods. Is it just me or do they all make any big weather system going through seem like a major event these days? My theory is it is just an excuse for them to get more airtime, but I am probably just being cynical.

It took me a while but I finally figured out how to post pictures, so here is me any my first grandchild, and a grandson to boot!

IMAG0067.jpg


And a closeup of the handsome little man.

IMAG0072.jpg
 
I like the beenie myself. Fitting for the storm you are supposed to get I guess.

And yes I think they overplay the storms. It snows every year and every year it seems they are amazed that it is snowing
 
Rural,

Nicely done! Handsome boy! Good to hear everyone is doing well.

Vman,

Three now. They are starting to get fun. What is the saying? Something like, "If I knew that grandkids where this much fun, I would have had them first."
 
CreamyGoodness said:
He looks like a porceline doll :)
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I never really noticed before but in the first picture it does look like I'm holding a doll. Weird.

Thanks for all your kind comments. I do think he is quite perfect but then again I am a little biased. :) But I suppose there is the chance he could grow up to be a Vikings or Cowboys fan. Almost too horrible to consider....

You tend to forget how tiny they are, with all those perfect little fingers and toes. Just an honest to God miracle, both his very existence and the immediate connection and depth of feeling I have for him. No real way to put it into words.

And now before I get too sappy I'm going to get ready for work.
 
When I was a kid my mom told me that the only way I could ever pay my parents back for raising me is to give them grand kids. Now that I have two young sons I don't know how to pay them back for all the times they have babysat!

Maybe that's the point...
 
snaps10 said:
I brew every two weeks regardless of how much I have. The times when I blow through more than I brew make up for the rare times when I don't keep up with it. I give a LOT of beer away.

On a positive note: the city of Visalia is very enthusiastic for the opening of a brewery in the near future. The economic development department has recommended some locations they would prefer, and incentives were implied if those locations are utilized. Three potential 100% investors have emerged and would like a sit down, and a local sanitary dairy welder has just completed his business licensing process and is ready in the next 6 mo. or so to build his first brewhouse. Things seem to be on a roll.
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If you brew that much at 5 gallons a pop, I hope so. Otherwise you would have probably destroyed your liver in like a year.

BobbiLynn said:
You could make a voodoo doll and just set it next to the fermenter, or on top of it. If you can't sew, you can take a piece of fabric, stuff the head with something and tie a rubber band around the "neck", then tie knots for the arms and legs. Stick a couple pins in it and you are done! :mug:

I guess I'll bottle while waiting for the sun again. UPS finally delivered my supplies at 10 PM last night. No clue where they left it though, says left at "garage". Maybe they are calling hubby's barn a garage, or left at the wrong house in one of the family member's garages. We don't have a "garage".
Click to expand...

This is an interesting idea. Perhaps I shall make a voodoo doll for yeast and be nice to it instead. :D They actually can be used either way.

Varmintman said:
Well I am going to find out if I got my first infection today and I will be amazed if it is not infected. My last brew day since it is so cold and the hose is froze up I bring my boil pot into the house and use the kitchen sink to run my immersion cooler. Been doing this all winter long and it has worked great.

Well that fine brew day things did not work so good. I stuff the outlet hose down the drain in the sink and I guess as I was stirring the pot right at the end of cooling it down the hose came out of the drain. Yup it was flipping around spraying the bottom of the cabinets you know the dusty bits you never clean and water was dripping off and into the brew pot. And the sad thing is it was ready to pitch at that time.

I figured oh well I am going to run with it and see what happens and today I am going to open it up and see.

Fingers crossed :)
Click to expand...
I think you will be fine. IMO, sanitation is kinda overblown. I wash everything and rinse in hot water. I don't use a sanitizer, ever. I've never had an infected batch.
 
Speaking of wild side, transferred what I will now call my "Sour Lemonade Extra Blonde Ale". No idea what I was thinking when I brewed it. Just gave me chills thinking about it. 2-row and corn sugar were the primary ingredients. It almost glows. Fermented simple sugars with a hint of grain and hops. No idea what I was thinking except was out of ingredients and felt the need to brew anyway.
 
BobbiLynn said:
Speaking of wild side, transferred what I will now call my "Sour Lemonade Extra Blonde Ale". No idea what I was thinking when I brewed it. Just gave me chills thinking about it. 2-row and corn sugar were the primary ingredients. It almost glows. Fermented simple sugars with a hint of grain and hops. No idea what I was thinking except was out of ingredients and felt the need to brew anyway.
Click to expand...
Maybe dry hop something? The strong alcohol taste and aroma from the sugar usually condition out after a couple months.
 
BobbiLynn said:
Speaking of wild side, transferred what I will now call my "Sour Lemonade Extra Blonde Ale". No idea what I was thinking when I brewed it. Just gave me chills thinking about it. 2-row and corn sugar were the primary ingredients. It almost glows. Fermented simple sugars with a hint of grain and hops. No idea what I was thinking except was out of ingredients and felt the need to brew anyway.
Click to expand...

Put it away, it will probably be delicious by the summer. May I suggest using recipes? ;)
 
Leadgolem said:
Maybe dry hop something? The strong alcohol taste and aroma from the sugar usually condition out after a couple months.
Click to expand...


Like blueberries and turn it into a weird type of wine? Or I have some extra northdown hops in my freezer. Tastes like a mix of bud light and cheap white wine.
 
brewingmeister said:
Bobbi this is your winging it coming back to bite you in the ass. Brew for deliciousness, not just to have something to do.
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Yeah, yeah, ouch, this one hit hard. Awful!! Happens a lot when I cook too, even the dog won't always eat my soup. What not try this? Then I find out later why not.
 
CityOChampBrew said:
How can you learn almost nothing? Have you never experimented or done any smashes?
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For 4 years, never did any experimenting, just followed recipes to the T, worrying about every step. Mostly extract kits. But now my eyes are wide open. I have been learning, since I started experimenting a few months ago.

:eek:
 
BobbiLynn said:
Like blueberries and turn it into a weird type of wine? Or I have some extra northdown hops in my freezer. Tastes like a mix of bud light and cheap white wine.
Click to expand...
That's not a bad idea. I haven't had a great amount of luck getting a lot of blueberry flavor without a lot of berries though. IMO, juice is better for blueberries.

Hmm, maybe something tart? Cranberries come to mind, or black cherries. Both are pretty flavor dense, so it isn't going to take all that much to adjust the flavor. I would stay away from tart cherries though. You tend to get a cough syrup flavor with those + alcohol.
 
Hey, shoot for the moon and hit the ceiling. Happens to the best of us. Experimentation is great and all but throwing too many new variables in the mix makes for trouble...or more likely something you don't want to drink.
 
BobbiLynn said:
For 4 years, never did any experimenting, just followed recipes to the T, worrying about every step. Mostly extract kits. But now my eyes are wide open. I have been learning, since I started experimenting a few months ago.

:eek:
Click to expand...

Perhaps a more calculated experimenting, just changing on variable at a time from a known starting point, would work. Rather than throw this all together and see if it glows. ;)

Better yet, get with a group of people and everyone brews the same beer but with one change. My club did a single hop experiment where we ask breed the same ipa but each with a different hop. Leaned a lot real quick.
 
Well I got lucky:rockin: I popped the top of the fermenter and no infection. I guess it is true that you really have to work at ruining a batch to ruin it.

When I started brewing I was winging it from the get go. I took my first recipe and cut the fermentables down wanting a lower abv. It was not great but not bad either.

I have been working on consistency as of late. I am tired of having one batch taste great and then brew it again and it not so good. Mash temp control and fermentation temp control is what I am striving to maintain now. But I changed mash tuns and mash procedures and have been chasing my tail trying to hit my temps all right on the money.

The more you learn the further behind it seems I get :eek:
 
From simple minds come simple pleasures. I was in walmart yesterday pretty much hating life when out of the corner of my eye I saw a 18 gallon recycling bin. You can stack them and since the front is angled while they are stacked still get into them. I bought one to insure I can fit a full bag of grain into it and shazam it works. Best part though is they were only 12 bucks :rockin:
 
Glad your beer was not infected, v-man, and congrats on the find.

I got a picture of my sour lemonade extra blonde ale, but it looks sort of normal in the pic, in real life, it doesn't look that dark. I saved a gallon of it to experiment with and dumped the rest(taste was terrible and wanted to free up the larger fermenter). Was a small batch, about 3 gallons. I'm kind of leaning toward adding cranberries to it. Would canned cranberries be okay?

100_0908.JPG
 
Ended up buying a bag of frozen strawberries instead of cranberries while out picking up hubby's prescriptions. And I have a little wine yeast in the fridge, might add a little of that too. See what happens.

I am following recipes still about half the time, so have more great batches going than bad ones!
 
Leadgolem said:
If you brew that much at 5 gallons a pop, I hope so. Otherwise you would have probably destroyed your liver in like a year.
Click to expand...

I brew that much at 12 gallons a pop! ::rockin:: (don't do the math)

All in the name of recipe development.

Left a message for the sanitary welder. I'm thinking if he isn't ready to go full blown yet maybe buying a Chinese 5bbl system and having him modify it when we take delivery. Hes pretty excited about building though, and seeing as he builds dairy tanks and equipment a brewery should be easy.
 

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