Recent content by Needsanamebrewery

Pale ale. It doesn't taste nearly as good as it looks.

Well last night I finally popped the top on the first of these puppies. They have been conditioning away for > 2 months at about 55*. The bad news is that when I popped the top, it was a gusher. The good news is that the half of it I got to drink was ABSO-FREAKIN-UNBELIEVABLY-GOOD. It...

OK, after two weeks in the bottle when I first taste-tested this brew I noticed that it was very twangy, and had an almost metallic taste to it. It was puckery-dry too, so I decided to let it sit for a couple of months. On Sunday I took one of the bottles out if its cool dark storage area and...

Welcome Barc! Nice to see a fellow Arkansan on HBT. I'm in Russellville.

UPDATE: After a month in the primary, we bottled this baby last night. OG was 1.052 and FG was 1.015. Bob, I took your advice and added another 2 oz chocolate. The Ringwood behaved quite admirably. After week one in the primary I gave the bucket a little swirl lest the little buggers were...

When I smoked it was a lighter, now it's a key or anything else I can wedge between my thumb and the bottle cap.

I too have noticed the BIG beer gets BIG scores. When I come across a beer I haven't had I check out the ratings, but I take those ratings with a grain of salt, afterall, nobody know what I like more than I do.

I used this yeast for My Nut Brown Ale/ and like the above poster I got great advice from Bob. I did not make a starter (didn't have any DME on hand--has since been rectified). It took a day-and-a-half or so to get going. Per Bob's advice I kept a close eye on the little buggers lest they go...

30 minutes? That seems a bit long for an ice bath/IC combo. Using this combo in hot weather I was able to get my entire 5+ gal of wort from boiling to 70* in 20 minutes; when the weather cooled a bit on the last batch I got it to 70* in 10 minutes. Now that the weather really has turned off...

Holy cow! 100% Munich LME ranges from $36-$45 for 8.8 lbs. It looks like AHS has 40% Munich for ~$10/3lbs. Decisions, decisions...... I really need to go AG.

Ooh la la, I had not heard of Munich LME so I did a quick google search. Thanks for that suggestion. Now if I can only find some. ETA: I read "drop" to mean drop completely. I see from the second response that it meant drop the amount. Thanks.

I played around with Beersmith and came up with this steep/extract recipe for an Irish Red: 96.00 oz Light Dry Extract (8.0 SRM) Dry Extract 80.00 % 16.00 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 13.33 % 4.00 oz Biscuit Malt (23.0 SRM) Grain 3.33 % 4.00 oz Roasted Barley (300.0...

1. Budvar clone 2. APA 3. American Amber 4. English Brown 5. Dry Stout 6. Rotating seasonal

So now you know that the water temp = the beer temp, so no need to keep opening the bucket. I do the same thing with water and frozen bottles. I keep the temp pretty consistent @ 65 by putting in a 1L frozen bottle three times a day. Keep playing around with it and you will find what...

OP, I'm interested to know how your water temperature (in the cooler) relates to the temp inside your Ale Pail. I assume it will be close. If this is the case, no need to open your bucket a couple of times a day to check the temp....just check the temp of the water.