What I did for beer today

Racked to make room in a primary fermentor, then filled two fermentors in a two-brew day.

 

Made my first brew ever today! Everything went about as smooth as it could, all of the numbers and measurements worked out well, and the yeast is already doing its thing (I think).

It appears that I may have happened into an extra plastic Ale Pail by way of a packaging mistake, as my kit came with two regular Ale Pails, no bottling bucket. Might be working on my second batch earlier than anticipated!

 

Brewed my spring beer, an Irish red ale....

 

I set up and converted my old chest freezer into my new ferminting/lagering chamber and got my German Pilsner in the new digs... Currently 30 min into the boil of my SWMBO's "Scooby's Brown Ale" -which aught to be an interresting batch seeing as how I am chucking a packet of Safale US-05 into the mix with the European Ale liquid yeast... we'll see how it goes.

 

I spent ANOTHER day reading up on eBrewing, with plans to start working on the switch (punny!) this year.

I also bought parts to build a hop spider a la Li'l Sparky and cleaned out a carboy after racking my Saison to keg (last week. Yikes!)

Tomorrow I'm picking up a Mr. Beer fermenter for a few bucks so I can start experimenting with small batches.

I'm excited about this phase of my brewing. Confident enough about my skills, but still so much out there to explore!

 

Reading Ray Daniels' "Designing Great Beers" on the bus back from NYC. Dry hopping my English IPA when I get home.

 

Racked 10 gallons of bock to kegs and then scrubbed out my 38-cubic-foot lagering freezer so the bock would have a nice clean place to live for the next 7 weeks. It needed it- it was getting pretty gross.

 

I worked on my new brew rig this morning and I am having a homebrew right now.:cross:

Gotta get this thing done because pipeline is quickly disappearing.

 

Bottled 5 gallons of milk stout, capped them with wax, and then watched the first season of Californication. Life win.

 

I told myself that until I got my taxes filed I would not brew anymore beer for motivation to get them done. Therefore I filed my taxes finally tonight!

 

Took a gravity reading on my APA and then dry hopped it w/1.25 ounces of cascades

 

Tonight, I sanitized a keg to rack a Hobgoblin clone, blended a few batches for my quasi-solera project, I'm in the midst of corking & bottling about 17 gallons of sour/funky beers, and drinking an Oud Beersel Gueze....naturally, the better-half is out of town.

 

Ask not what beer can do for you but what you can do for beer.. I organized my beer utilities and now bbqing a chicken lovin my sweet choco stout! Yeeeeeaaaahhh boi!

 

I woke up at 5 am to pitch yeast on the batch I brewed last night and couldn't get down to pitching temps before 11pm. I need to ask for a wort chiller for Father's Day.

 

Took gravity readings, and bought grains for a parti-gyle brew tomorrow

 

Trying to decide what style to brew this weekend.

 

Racked Octoberfest to Secondary now figure out what to brew next before I run out of my American Amber in the keg.

 

Drank a couple Bell's Third Coast Beers just so I could harvest the yeast. Such a sacrifice ...

 

Bottled a gallon of beer I pulled off when racking my wheat to secondary for the blueberry treatment. I dry hopped it with citra, great aroma off it. Just did it because with the 4 pounds of blueberries I could not fit it all in the 5 gallon carboy. I also picked up some Scottish yeast for a rye brown ale I am planning to split between 002 and the scottish yeast.

 

Racked 5 gallons of oatmeal stout to secondary and added bourbon-soaked oak chips. Can't wait for this to be done!

 

Bottled my Oberon clone (named Ober-rated). Cleaned up the brew area a little bit...

 

Inventoried ingredients, organized Beer Smith, made two recipes to get rid of older grain quickly, purchased new ingredients for the next month and watched an air lock bubble. Now I'm on a forum talking about it.......

 

brewed a danish pils. decoction mash... yay! oh - flooded my kitchen twice (just water) filling pots and forgetting... TWICE!- that's a record. also started a wild apple banana ferment- one of the oak dowells from a lambic batch is jammed all up in there...

 

Balanced the beer lines in my keezer, and replaced the blowoff tube from my DC's Wry Smile Rye IPA with an airlock now that fermentation has slowed down a bit.

 

Bought a pound of various hops and added them into Beersmith. LBHS rcvd a big shipment with all sorts of hops that haven't been locally available in 6-8 months....

 

Bottled the first batch of my own recipe of nelgs pale and cleaned about 80 bottles to bottle up my other pale tomorrow...had to clear my schedule for march no days off except for tomorrow..which of course will be brew day!

 

today I checked the temp on my fermenting Porter...still at a nice 65F at day 10!

I also washed 24 bottles and returned them to the bottle rack.

Decided to brew my Cream Ale kit this weekend.

 

Brewed my first SMaSH recipe, and kegged two beers!!!

I'm excited that my pipeline is finally getting up there!!!

 

My parents dropped off a pound of honey from a local farm near the neighborhood I grew up. I will be using it in a saison. It was trade for me dog sitting for them, well that and a growler of beer from Carton Brewing.

 

Went to the LHBS today and picked up some Centennial hops for dry hopping my current batch as well as some Simcoe since they were in stock along with some new bottle caps they got in and some priming sugar.

 

Took a gravity reading for my batch of huckleberry wheat. Been in secondary for 1 week.

 

Added super clear agent to my Irish red....

 

What I did maybe it should be what I'm doing all day for beer!! Dragged myself outta bed hoper on the bus from san Jo to Los altos brew shop pick up ingredients for my "easy street wheat" clone now heading home to bottle my pale and brew my street wheat....ahhhh life is good can't wait to crack a stout!

 

Went to the LHBS and bought the supplies for a demonstration brewing class our club is doing for the public next week as part of Tampa Bay Beer Week. Updated all of the member email addresses and I'm about to send a promotional/newsletter email. Brew club activities cut into brewing a bit, but it's bringing lots of new people into the hobby, which is another kind of fun.

 

Brother and i went to local brewpub, had a couple pints, toured the brewhouse and got some behind the scenes looks at some really cool equipment! Went from there the the LHBS and got the stuf for our Belgium Wit (thats in the mash tun now) and a second round of a Kiltlifter clone. It's gonna be a good day tater!

 

got 2 2gl buckets to use a secondary fermenters. so i can add coffee and vanilla to my choco milk stout. and vanilla to my orange cream ale ("creamsicALE")

 

I racked a lager to secondary, brewed a Scotch ale and a Canadian Lager.

 

Racked two hearted to secondary. Brewed lakefront fixed gear.

 

Transferred my RIS to a bourbon barrel...

 

I drove 20 mins to get earth mags for my new stir plate?