Recent content by Wreckoncile

The plan is a month in secondary to really let the oak flavors seep in, but I'll start tasting small portions at two weeks to see how it's coming along. I don't have any CO2, so I can't do that, but the hope is that a month in the carboy won't be so long that the beer oxidizes too much and that...

Quick question: My RIS is in primary right now. The plan is to rack it to my carboy for secondary and add in some oak cubes that I have soaking in bourbon for a week. I'm just wondering how to do that. Do I add the cubes in first and then rack on top of them, do I drop the oak cubes in the...

I brewed a partial mash imperial stout on Sunday. My target OG was 1.090 but because I tried to use too much grain compared to the water capacity of my brew kettle (BIAB method), I ended up only hitting 1.070 (had to add water back into the boil in order to hit post boil 2.5 gallons). Lesson...

Cheap extract? That's a bit of an oxymoron to me. Admittedly, I'm a newer brewer but after two extract batches, I made the move to BIAB AG just because grains are much cheaper than extract for getting gravity points. I'd say make a three gallon BIAB version test batch, bottle them all in...

If I don't add more yeast, will I still get a full fermentation? I have no additional yeast on hand, and given my work schedule and the fact that I am going out of town tomorrow to watch my Chiefs play at San Diego, I won't be able to get any more yeast from my LHBS until Friday afternoon at...

So here's the deal: Yesterday, I brewed a 2.5 gallon clone of Avery's Old Jubilation (OG: 1.067) in preparation for the coming holiday season. My plan was to throw it on top of the Nottingham yeast cake I had for the smoked mild I had in the fermenter. The problem was that after I...

Another follow up question: I've heard one option is topping off, namely doing a strong runnings of 2.5 gallons that is about twice my target OG and then topping off with 2.5 gallons of water once I put in my fermentation bucket. My question is what if I want to do a high gravity RIS or...

Thanks for the advice, everyone. I'll make sure to get myself a three gallon carboy shortly. I've been wanting to get a better bottle anyhow for extended secondaries anyhow. A second question comes to mind in light of all this: The consensus seems to be that primary fermenting in an 8...

So here's the deal. I got the basic homebrewer starter set up back in August, have done a couple of extract beers already, and decided to try my hand last weekend with my first AG/BIAB style, a smoked mild. I enjoyed the AG process much more and although a bit tricky to control the mash temp in...

I just had this beer for the first time last week at a fancy steakhouse for my first wedding anniversary. Loved it and would've ordered a second bottle if not for the already high enough ABV and pricetag ($35 at said high end steakhouse). I will be trying to brew this sometime in the near...

Hello all, I live in Thousand Oaks, CA. I've been wanting to get into brewing for awhile now and just recently received a nice starter kit for my 30th birthday back in August. Since then, I've brewed one pale ale which came out decent but definitely not commercial brew quality. I currently...

Agreed with this. A lot depends on fermentation temperature. If your fermentation temperature is at 70F or above, chances are the full fermentation was complete well before 8 days (albeit with some fruity off flavors). If your fermentation was below 60F, 8 days might be too little...