BakerStreetBeers
Well-Known Member
A question, but first a story.
My keezer completed and my first two beers force carbonated, I got the heck out of work as quickly as I could this afternoon, headed home, threw my LP of the Blues Brothers' 'Briefcase Full of Blues' (1st track: Hey, Bartender) on the turntable and hooked up my lines. I checked the flow and carbonation in a Petaluma Chile Cookoff beer tasting glass and poured my first ever homebrewed kegerated beer: a tall glass of my Golden Lemon 3-Grain Ale. Pushhhhhhht
Oh yeah, this is what it's all about. I feel so . . . civilized. The 3-Grain (Rye, Wheat and Barley) is pretty nice. Definitely more balanced cold and carbonated compared to last night when I racked it to the keg. And I am getting a hint of the lemon (zest added at flameout) that wasn't perceptible when it was racked. This recipe might need a little work, but if it tones down a bit with age, it might be very close to the warm weather quaffer I was reaching for.
I got the mail and wandered about the place a bit. Hmmmm, glass is empty. Guess I'll pour myself a #1 Baker Street IPA. Pushhhhhht This beer's got problems. Hop flavor is there (mostly thanks to some improvised dry hopping over the last week) but there's not a lot of structure. Still drinkable, though. Both could be a bit colder. Should I adjust the Johnson? Nah, not yet, the cornies haven't even been in there 24 hours.
A childhood friend called me from New York City halfway through my 2nd glass. I'm no stranger to lifting a glass while talking to distant friends and family on the phone, and my buddy is a crackup, but the smile I had on my face when we said goodbye was not something I've experienced recently.
Which is where the story ends and the question comes in. I started brewing (again) about 6 weeks ago. I sampled during transfers, of course, but usually while already having been drinking some sort of commercial beverage, beer or otherwise. This afternoon is the first time I have served myself homebrew in over a decade. The effects seem markedly different from what I have experienced, extensively and often, in the interim from commercial alcohol products of all varieties and provenance. It's not just that I feel more buzzed than I should after 3 glasses of beer, it's also that the buzz is notably more euphoric than that from other alcoholic beverages (and believe me that's a variety!).
I have 6 hypotheses (notice that this buzz still affords me the ability to correctly use words like hypotheses . . . I'm just saying):
1) It's just the cold, dude.
2) The fact that I have not been drinking (hardly, a cold remedy with rum and when I racked the beers to the kegs) has "attenuated" my tolerance and I'm just overwhelmed.
3) My mash efficiency is 125% and my hydrometer is broken and my beers are actually 12%+ ABV. (And because of the cold I am not noticing that my beer tastes of ethanol)
4) I managed to transfer 24 oz of vodka from my airlock into each batch of my beer.
5) It's just joy at finally achieving the dream of pouring my own!
6) Homebrew = better buzz = happy
My keezer completed and my first two beers force carbonated, I got the heck out of work as quickly as I could this afternoon, headed home, threw my LP of the Blues Brothers' 'Briefcase Full of Blues' (1st track: Hey, Bartender) on the turntable and hooked up my lines. I checked the flow and carbonation in a Petaluma Chile Cookoff beer tasting glass and poured my first ever homebrewed kegerated beer: a tall glass of my Golden Lemon 3-Grain Ale. Pushhhhhhht
Oh yeah, this is what it's all about. I feel so . . . civilized. The 3-Grain (Rye, Wheat and Barley) is pretty nice. Definitely more balanced cold and carbonated compared to last night when I racked it to the keg. And I am getting a hint of the lemon (zest added at flameout) that wasn't perceptible when it was racked. This recipe might need a little work, but if it tones down a bit with age, it might be very close to the warm weather quaffer I was reaching for.
I got the mail and wandered about the place a bit. Hmmmm, glass is empty. Guess I'll pour myself a #1 Baker Street IPA. Pushhhhhht This beer's got problems. Hop flavor is there (mostly thanks to some improvised dry hopping over the last week) but there's not a lot of structure. Still drinkable, though. Both could be a bit colder. Should I adjust the Johnson? Nah, not yet, the cornies haven't even been in there 24 hours.
A childhood friend called me from New York City halfway through my 2nd glass. I'm no stranger to lifting a glass while talking to distant friends and family on the phone, and my buddy is a crackup, but the smile I had on my face when we said goodbye was not something I've experienced recently.
Which is where the story ends and the question comes in. I started brewing (again) about 6 weeks ago. I sampled during transfers, of course, but usually while already having been drinking some sort of commercial beverage, beer or otherwise. This afternoon is the first time I have served myself homebrew in over a decade. The effects seem markedly different from what I have experienced, extensively and often, in the interim from commercial alcohol products of all varieties and provenance. It's not just that I feel more buzzed than I should after 3 glasses of beer, it's also that the buzz is notably more euphoric than that from other alcoholic beverages (and believe me that's a variety!).
I have 6 hypotheses (notice that this buzz still affords me the ability to correctly use words like hypotheses . . . I'm just saying):
1) It's just the cold, dude.
2) The fact that I have not been drinking (hardly, a cold remedy with rum and when I racked the beers to the kegs) has "attenuated" my tolerance and I'm just overwhelmed.
3) My mash efficiency is 125% and my hydrometer is broken and my beers are actually 12%+ ABV. (And because of the cold I am not noticing that my beer tastes of ethanol)
4) I managed to transfer 24 oz of vodka from my airlock into each batch of my beer.
5) It's just joy at finally achieving the dream of pouring my own!
6) Homebrew = better buzz = happy
