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After kegging a saison that I'd brewed last year with a blend sacc and brett, I brewed another saison the very next day and racked right on top of the old yeast. I do this often with my ales to save money an they take off immediately. This one though shows no signs of active fermentation after 3...

I grew 5 different varieties this past summer. All did very well and smelled green and resinous when they were young. When it came time to harvest however they all had an onion like smell. Afraid to use them and ruin a good beer, I vacuum packed them and threw them in the freezer. Talking with a...

What are some indicators that will let me know when it's time to harvest my hops? And when I do harvest, can I go straight from the vine into the kettle or is it better to dry them first?

This is my first year growing hops and today I noticed microscopic insects eating the leaves. They're white-ish /yellow-ish in color. Thankfully they haven't done too much damage yet but the plants are young and I'd like to keep the pests away as much as possible. Anyone know what kind of...

I've been thinking about brewing a Rauchbier, and I feel it's always good practice to try a few commercial examples first, so I picked up a bottle. This is just an amazing, well balanced, clean, smokey, refreshing beer. My grist would be something like: 85% Rauchmalt w/some Munich, Carafa III...

Since switching to all grain I've used BeerSmith and never questioned the amount or temps of the water it tells me to use. I always do a single infusion, batch sparge and light, medium or full body depending on the style of beer that I'm brewing with great results. So I tried something different...

I'm bored at work, it's Friday and it's possible that I'll be picking up a few extra kegs this Sunday. So of course I'm wondering what am I going to brew? I'll have 6 kegs and I want to lager a few beers before Spring so I'm thinking 3 lagers and 3 ales. What should I brew for keg #6? Lagers...

Today I purchased a copy of American Sour Beers by Michael Tonsmeire. I'm hoping that there's enough info in there to get me started as I'm dying to brew a beer (saison or a pale ale), put it into an oak barrel and inoculate it with brett. The brett would then live in that barrel and I could...

I brewed a Wee Heavy yesterday with a SG of 1.104. Its fermenting fine with a nice krausen 24hrs later but I seriously underpitched. Just 2 packs of wyeast 1728 Scottish Ale in a 1.5L starter for 6g batch. What are some techniques you folks use to keep those yeasts happy and hungry enough to...

I'm brewing a 5g all grain batch of Jamil's smoked robust porter tomorrow and I don't know what smoked malt to use. The recipe calls for 3lbs. of German smoked malt, which I'm assuming is Rauchmalt? I gave the recipe to my LHBS who informed me that he was out of "smoked malt" and only had...

Season 5 premiere last night was status quo for the show. What stood out for me was Frank's secret project. He had a lot of the right equipment but they took some "creative liberties" to make his rig look more interesting. Lol though when he starts adding the wood chips and bacon for smokey...

I want to experiment with a few varieties of hops that I have sitting in the fridge so I planned on splitting a 5 gallon APA batch into 1 gallon carboys and dry hopping with 1oz. from each strain. Wondering if anyone has experience doing this and/or if you have any suggestions on what hops to...

I recently took a very blue collar job at a steel mill where the idea of beer is "gimme my BMC and you can keep yer fancy ales!" Recent purchases delivered to the office really piqued everyones interest in my hobby so I brought in a Zombie Dust clone for my boss and two other coworkers to try. I...

Planned on taking my first kegged batch to a Xmas party tonight but it's not quite carbed enough. I've had it on 28 PSI since Friday night ~65 degrees, did the roll on the floor technique and then let it sit. Purged the keg a minute ago and set to serving pressure, pulled a pint and its not...

Anyone going to the TRASH holiday party this Sunday? I've been toying with the idea of joining a local club so I thought I'd come rub elbows with like minded individuals.:tank:

I really want to use this vile of WLP565 but even the warmest spot in my basement is ~70F. What products can you guys/gals recommend to keep my baby warm in these cold months?

Taking inspiration from Joe Eberhardt 's October article, I decided to get familiar with my jigsaw and build a carrier for my two new growlers. I repurposed a few scrap pieces from a retired book shelf and started sketching out the bottle shaped end pieces. I modified the dims from the original...

So I brewed my first AG batch yesterday, 5 gallons of APA. My assistant and I had a lot of fun and I'm sure the beer will be delicious but we did fumble our way through the day. Sunday morning 9am: My digital scale only measures about 900 grams at a time (my recipe is in oz.), no big deal, it...

I'm looking to plant rhizomes for the first time this spring and wondered since I get a lot of whitetail deer in my yard if they'd try eating the cones? Has anyone encountered this problem?

I'm building my first man cave and one of my first additions of course will be the bar. I'm done with bottling and want to make the switch to kegging my homebrew. I may still want to bottle a few though to give to friends so I was wondering how to handle carbonating the beer. Do you still add...