Recent content by mjrodney

My first exposure to home brewing was a friend who made something like beer in a large dark brown and tan ceramic crock (late 60's era). He used burlap to cover the thing, as I remember. I also remember that I only drank it once.

Have you identified any homebrew recipes that come close to those you miss having at your local pubs? Hello back from the west coast of Florida. :mug:

My all grain setup, with it's inherent dead spaces and boil/cooling losses, require that I start with 8 gallons of pre-boil water (to yield 5 and a bit gallons).......instead of the 6.5 gallons of pre-boil water that many recipes say I should be starting with. Should I adjust my grain bill...

The jury pool has spoken. I'll rack the middle layer, put it away for a bit, and get working on my next batch with my head on straight and my perf plate tight. Thanks......

It's been in the fermenter a little over three weeks. I don't usually secondary. Unfortunately, my error resulted in oatmeal oozing out of the valve, that at times had to be cleared with a sanitized wire to keep the dribble going. Much of the oozed out spent grain stayed in the boil...

Brewed an all grain batch but ended up with a disaster sparge. I failed to attach the short hose from the valve to the perforated false bottom. Duh. Now, after fermentation, I have the normal sediment at the bottom of the carboy, but I also have 3" of floating tsunami debris above the clear...

I did a test recently on a Sears Kenmore Your Typical Cheap Kitchen Range Large Burner. Here are the results. Large 9" Burner, 2500 watts/8530 btu's per hour. 7 measured gallons of water in a 10 gallon Tall Boy Kettle. Starting temperature from the tap, 108 degrees F. One full...

Current.. Les Baer 1 1/2" bullseye pistol with a Ultra Dot sight. Les Baer 1 1/2" bullseye pistol with open sights. Kimber Team Match II with a Marvel Unit I upper and Ultra Dot sight. Past..... Smith and Wesson Springfield Armory Colt It's an obsession not unlike...

Was the Blichmann leak and resultant flame large enough to pose a hazard to your surroundings? I've watched several videos where folks are using burners on the floor of their garage or basement, and I wondered about this.

Valuable info from this thread..... (StarSan).......ACTUAL kill time, which is between 15 and 30 seconds....... (StarSan).......Any starsan residue breaks down into yeast food once contact is made with the actual beer. I'm smarter today than I was yesterday. :mug:

My limited experience at this game has only seen one near, but astoundingly quick, and threatened boil over. Despite stirring at 7400 rpm and almost causing a fantail to erupt like a trimmed up power boat, the only thing that saved me was a spritz or twenty from a spray bottle of plain water...

Bought one several months ago for use in slow and low cooking on a Big Green Egg. For my uses, they are worth every penny because of their nearly instant accuracy. Now that I have joined the home brew community, the Thermapen takes on additional importance. If you want to read the...

Thanks for the tips! Two more kits are on the brown truck and heading my way now, so once they arrive and I rack my current first batch into the secondary, another batch will be started in the now empty primary. Additionally, I'll plan on buying a Better Bottle in the near future to add to...

The current plan is to bottle, after two weeks in the primary and two weeks in the secondary. After two weeks in the bottle, the plan continues by tasting one or two, taking a few notes and continuing to do so every week until little change is tasted from the previous week. I may need to have...

A monster no more. Now a temptress. The bubbling airlock has been re-installed. The bubbling is slowing. I hope my neighbor's can't hear me...... Whispering "baby talk" to my primary fermenter.......