A friendly place for friends who drink

seatazzz · Apr 8, 2018

Just over 2 years now. Went the whole route from extract, to partial mash, to all grain in a mash tun that most of you guys would have cringed at, to the cobbled-together three vessel system I have now. Husband's contributions have been as chief taster (only when it's completely carbed, he hates green beer), occasional heavy lifter, and mostly turning a blind eye when his wife gets the brewing bug and goes out and spends $$ she shouldn't at the LHBS. Sitting here this morning agonizing over the fact that the co2 tank is about to tank (lol) so there goes the brewing budget for this week. Sigh. It's a cold rainy morning, my favorite kind of weather for brewing.

ThirstyPawsHB · Apr 8, 2018

Between the house projects, and the overtime to pay for it, ramping down for a bit. Bottling my last beer tonight, a free Northern Brewer extract kit which looks like will be like 3.5% for some reason.[emoji53] Other wise loaded for a while...

Available....
-True Barrel RIS
-Cherry Quad
-True Barrel Quad
-Raspberry/Cherry Tart experiment
- Stout
- Mango Hard Lemonade
- West Coast IPA
- Soon to be Red

seatazzz · Apr 17, 2018

Absolutely plu-perfect Raspberry Cream Ale I brewed a couple weeks ago. First beer I've completely bottled since early last year. Don't know if I can replicate it, was a second runnings off a Pliny clone, added corn & biscuit to the mash after pulling the Pliny wort. Fermented with 5 pounds of raspberries, and bottled with not priming sugar but homemade raspberry syrup. Light, refreshing, NOT sour, just a perfect raspberry taste with a hint of malt. And it will last a LONG time since I don't have enough room in the fridge for 24 22's.

ThirstyPawsHB · Apr 17, 2018

seatazzz said:
Absolutely plu-perfect Raspberry Cream Ale I brewed a couple weeks ago. First beer I've completely bottled since early last year. Don't know if I can replicate it, was a second runnings off a Pliny clone, added corn & biscuit to the mash after pulling the Pliny wort. Fermented with 5 pounds of raspberries, and bottled with not priming sugar but homemade raspberry syrup. Light, refreshing, NOT sour, just a perfect raspberry taste with a hint of malt. And it will last a LONG time since I don't have enough room in the fridge for 24 22's.]

I need to try fermenting the raspberries instead of adding in secondary for flavor. Used WL644 for a tart taste in a Friek to mimic a sour..but not quite what I wanted. Pliny is pretty simple malt bill. Must be the biscuit your tasting?

Jayjay1976 · Apr 17, 2018

Hello gents. I'm enjoying a jarrylo smash ipa right now which turned out pretty good. No pic just now but it came out pretty clear with a sturdy head of foam.

seatazzz · Apr 18, 2018

PianoMan said:
I need to try fermenting the raspberries instead of adding in secondary for flavor. Used WL644 for a tart taste in a Friek to mimic a sour..but not quite what I wanted. Pliny is pretty simple malt bill. Must be the biscuit your tasting?

The actual beer itself is pretty light, maybe 4.5%. Used the Pliny grain bill from beersmith, however I upped the two row to 17lbs since I intended to do a second runnings batch. Once I had the Pliny wort out (all first runnings, adding some water at the beginning of the boil to get it up to my preboil volume) I added 1lb of biscuit and 2lbs of flaked corn to the tun and let it mash with the sparge water while the Pliny boiled. And yes, I think adding the raspberries to the fermenter (no wait time, they went in right after the yeast) rather than doing a secondary helped quite a bit. Going into the bottling bucket it was very tart with a great raspberry flavor. However I do think using raspberry syrup as the primer rather than straight sugar really did the trick. The syrup was made with 2.5lbs raspberries boiled with 2 cups sugar and water, adding some more water as it boiled down. Wound up with two quart mason jars of it, used all of one for the primer on this. I don't like sour beers or lambics; what I was going for in this recipe (and pretty much nailed it) was a light beer with a slightly sweet raspberry flavor.

I did this beer last year using a simple blonde grain bill as the base, however I really like it better with the corn & biscuit instead. If I do it again as a standalone, I'll use 8lbs two row, 1lb biscuit, and 2lbs flaked corn. It will probably wind up a bit stronger. The yeast I used is what I call my "house" yeast, basically washed Nottingham, and this was 2nd or 3rd generation, I think.