Recent content by greaper007

I was wondering if anyone has a keezer in a warm location like a garage, and if they have it hooked up to a kil-a-watt? I currently have a keezer, but it's in my cool basement and sips electricity. I wanted to build a small one that would go in a camping trailer and thus be subjected to...

Good luck, I was an airline pilot and hated it. Finally ended up leaving the career almost three years ago to be a stay at home dad. I was tired of the road, tired of working to pay for daycare, tired of compensation that didn't match the responsibility of being the captain. I can feel...

There's nothing wrong with anything that makes you happy. I just want to disavow the notion that you need these systems to make great beer, or that the hobby has to cost more than you save in buying beer from the store. If you're like me and you're still paying off student loans and...

My philosophy is don't get fancy. Use the simplest, cheapest system that works. You don't really need a RIMS or HERMS system, sure they look cool but they're not necessary to make decent beer. I think I'm up to about $300 total for my AG cooler, turkey fryer system. It's not pretty and I...

Sweating copper is super easy. The hardest thing about it is getting the water out of the lines that you're sweating. I finally learned an old plumbers trick to help with that. Stick a piece of bread in the pipe and shove it up a few inches, it will soak up the water while you're heating...

Concrete block and stucco is an option, so is a wood frame with cement board and stucco or tiles. For a straight wood look, I'd probably go with something like redwood or white oak (not red, the USS Constitution was made out of white oak). I like the concrete counter top idea also...

What's the procedure, do you put the peppers in the secondary? If so, for how long?

Just put a ball valve and stainless steel filter from a plumbing supply line on the cooler and batch sparge. The cooler will still be very usable, in fact I'd argue that's it even more usable! I upgraded to all grain with exactly the same equipment you did. I'm about 15 batches in and it's...

Sounds good to me. And even if the brew isn't great, it will probably be better than 90% of what your family brings over (if they're anything like mine :)). I bottle hef's after about a week and drink them a week later. They seem to taste great to me (almost as good as franziskaner...

Nice, now you have to make french fries.

Yeast and trub in dark beer always look more sinister than in your average pale ale.

I dig Bobby Flay too. You should try making your own bbq sauce, it's really pretty easy. I usually take a recipe from online and tweak it for whatever ingredients I have. I found a few recipes for Dr. Pepper BBQ sauce and it got such rave reviews that it's all I make now. I'll do a big...

You should be okay if the yeast kicks right away. You're making beer, not microprocessors.:)

I seem to think I've had that before, especially with a dark beer like a porter. How long has it been in the primary? Did you give it a taste? When I get nervous I always give it a taste, that usually calms my fears.

I do the same thing. There's nothing like a brew kettle on one side and a Weber on the other. Have any good BBQ recipes?