Recent content by standpoint

I picked up the sampler on a whim while at their store the other day. I have about 1.5 lbs of grain left over from my kolsch recipe, and was thinking of using it as steeping grains and making a simple 5 gallon extract batch using one of the hops from the sampler. I have no idea on how...

About 70°? I would check the actual temp. The difference between 68 to 72 I find is big for carb time. No way you don't have enough yeast.

I use belma in a honey porter recipe, and it works really well for that.

Are you sure you ended up with five gallons of wort? If you have less, that would account for the gravity difference.

I just used this yeast in 2 - 10 gallon batches of Kolsch. I let each batch sit in primary for three weeks, at 58 degrees. Still have an inch of yeasty trub on top. Easy to rack though, and the beer looked almost like orange juice the first day in secondary. A day or two later, though, and...

Personally, I DRY HOP in the mesh bag. Given time / cold crashing, any bit of hops will wind up at the bottom of the carboy, and easy racking into my bottling bucket ensues.

I tried dry hopping w/ pellets in a cheesecloth bag in my keg. Wound up w/ tons of hop particles in the beer - the bag dropped to the bottom of the keg and every pour would pull hops through. had to get the bag out of there - tried it twice, same result. Being that I like super clear and...

Freeze the hops?

I use 1010 yeast in a Kolsch recipe I have brewed many times. The beer tastes best when I ferment at 58. If warmer, like 64-66 I get a slightly different flavor to the Kolsch, and is a lot less 'lager-like'. When fermenting at 58, I've seen the batch take 2.5 weeks to ferment before the...

Did it taste sour prior to bottling?

Looks like an infection to me. If it's done fermenting I would chill it down in a secondary, keg and drink quickly

Here are the pics I took from this year's Bockfest: This is the old volume gauge for their fermentation vessel: This is the temperature gauge for the fermentation vessel (yes, paper!) Pic from the roof of the brewery:

I put 4 gallons in a five gallon bucket plenty. However, wheat yeast is typically pretty explosive and I highly recommend a blow off set up.

This year was my 17th Bockfest I attended. However this year I got to meet two brewers and they took me and my friends on a personal tour of the brewery. Super awesome, got to go all the way up on the roof and have a beer overlooking Bockfest. Got to see their original grain mill, new one...

To add to this, last weekend when it was -10F, I brewed an all grain 10 gallon batch. I mashed out in the garage, and wrapped it in two blankets. Only lost about 4 degrees over a 90 min mash. I use five gallon jugs for brewing water to make them portable. For cooling, I transfer from my 10...