Recent content by MBetz

Well, I guess that brings back to the ol' primary vs. secondary debate. Which is better to do longer to produce a more rounded out smoother beer when dealing with high alcohol?

Thanks for the input. I don't think I'll try and dilute it seems like that should have been done earlier and I just hate diluted beer, I feel like I can almost always taste it. I'm thinking I"ll check the gravity after a week in primary, if its done dropping I'll switch to secondary for...

Hm, not a bad idea about diluting a tad. However, at what point is it too late to dilute. Would you want to dilute beer after its done with its primary fermentation? I havent done any research but it goes against my intuition. Secondly, would diluting it decrease the time needed to condition...

So I decided to brew my first winter warmer. The good news is that I drastically improved my effeciency during this brew, the bad knews is that instead of a 1.071 gravity I ended with a 1.082. I used a Wyeast London Ale yeast that has an alcohol tolerence of up to 10%. I dont yet have my FG...

Pefect, thanks.

With an uber busy weekend schedule comming up I'm not finding enough time to complete my typical brew process all at once. I'm wondering if anybody has ever broken the process up into 2 seperate sessions and if they did how did it turn out, what where the pit-falls, etc. I'm thinking of...

What if you mashed at a lower temp, say around 149-150? Would that get you more fermentable sugar?

What is the issue with using too much crystal in a recipe?

This is my first attempt at home made recipe and I wanted to see if anybody has any feedback. The goal is for a big pale ale slightly on the malty side but not neccisarily sweet. I just got a huge supply of willamette hops from a farmoutside my house so I'll be using those. I also really...

So I've made about 4 batches of beer and each time I keep getting stuck at 1.020. I've used the dry foil packets of yeast and some slap packs. They all start with a good vigorous fermentation but can't seem to keep going. I like to ferment a little on the cool side around 65-66. Could that...

I recently took a Shakespear Sout clone and added about an oz of Hazelnut extract to it at flame out. It's been in the bottle for about a week and I opened a bottle just for a sampler. Carbonation has a little way to go as expected but eveything is there for my first truley great brew! the...

I always strain my wort through a metal mesh strainer, from a decent height too. It usually ends up in my bucket super foamy. I've turned out one decent beer using this method and I though I did a great job of oxygenating the wort. Am I really getting hot side aeration?

Hey all, I did a brew on saturday that really took off on sunday night. Monday morning I had to hook up a blow off tube because I had so much krausen coming out of the ale pail. I did do a 6 gallon batch so there was less room at the top than normal but it was still a lot of the foamy...

I just brewed a porter using 8 oz of chocolate malt and 4 oz of Patent Black Malt and its only a very dark amber color. Maybe I did something wrong.

Is they Crystal not a base malt? Are you talking about a 2 row pale or something?