What I did for beer today

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Today I close transfered a partially carbed beer into a new keg after realising the lid was leaking. Went so far as to blast in co2 while exchanging said lid and gasket for another Only to realise it still leaked. So transfer to a known good sealing keg and figuring out and pressure testing gasket/lid combos on the offending keg to figure it out. Fun stuff. Oh at 11pm. Beer is neat.
 
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Bottling my 2024 barleywine brewed in Dec. Half in old style Fuller’s bottles, half in regular bottles in case, because I don’t like to give those Fuller’s bottles away. They don’t make them anymore.

Received a package from my semi-local homebrew shop with the odd things I need for my next couple batches. I’m planning:

- A Best Bitter
- An Oatmeal Stout with the same yeast to have ready by St. Paddy’s Day
- Some kind of bock, either traditional bock or maibock to have by the middle/end of April.

Then I’d like to do a lager with lemongrass. I have to see where I can get lemongrass stalks - Whole Foods or wherever. Or Apex actually has a lemongrass flavor.

Then I’ll have to place another order later when it starts warming up again for some wheat dme so I can make a hefeweizen/weissbier and the wife is asking for a cherry wheat this year.
 
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I got caught in a time pinch last big brew and had to use all of my 1318 and had to restart the line. Yesterday I picked up a smack pack and didn't notice until I got home it was born back on August 19 (!) It took most of the afternoon to warm up and inflate after smacking, but I went ahead and used it for the first round - a 5 liter starter.

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20 hours later it's just getting going - probably the longest lag I've ever had with this strain. I wonder how many cells were still viable. I'm guessing not a lot :confused:

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I just now checked the current SG and it's 7 Brix/1.022 when normally it would be finished at around 1.009 by now. Gonna have to leave it on the stir plate for another day at least. With no way to quantify the cell count I've been relying on the BrewUnited "Homebrew Dad" yeast calculator for that but this has been so out of band I'm wondering if I can rely on its prediction now...

Cheers!
I just smacked a pack of 1469 that has a Dec 2023 date on it. I got it free. I know it will come up. I used to own a store, I’ve found packs of Wyeast that fell behind stuff and I once smacked a found lost pack that was 3 years old. Though they might take a week or so, I’ve never had one not swell up. You’re making a starter - it will be fine. As one of the guys in my club says “All you need is 1 cell.”
 
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A little busy in the brew space today.
Started by dry hopping my mini single NZ hop brews, 1/2 ounce for each 1/2 gallon batch...

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...then I split my 1318 starter into two pitches plus a stash...

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...finished up by kegging the 4th batch of my all-Citra hazy DIPA.

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A good day!

Cheers!
 
Bottled and packed entries for Port City Plunder and Bluebonnet Brew Off, kegged a Belgian Pale Ale, collected RO and assembled the brewery in prep for tomorrow’s brewday, completed the three point calibration of my Tilt after changing the battery.
 
Since it's too cold to actually brew outside, I sat down with my recipes and started plotting out my brews for the coming year. I've been upgrading my system and trying out techniques, which constantly disrupted any semblance of an SOP, and the quality of my output has been all over the place. I've got a pretty solid setup in place now (hot and cold side), so I've decided to focus on honing my SOP and focus on some basic, classic styles and nail my consistency. This will include lagers, which I have not gotten the hang of yet.
 
I built a Still Air Box for yeast propagation and banking. I don't have the space for (or want to spend the $$$ on) a laminar air flow hood. This creates a near-sterile environment for working with yeast cultures. The photo is of a dry run. When in use, the towel lining the bottom of the box will be soaked in a sanitizing bleach solution and thoroughly run out. The entire box, test tube rack, and wire rack will be sprayed with 70% isopropyl alcohol. I'll place two individually wrapped sterile syringes, the yeast starter, cryopreservative, etc. in the box and let it sit for an hour with the arm holes covered to let any particles settle onto the bleached towel. All work will be done while wearing a K95 mask and nitrile exam gloves sprayed with Starsan.
 

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Brewed a Kentucky Common today, had a few glitches but ended up a few points over target.

I did a last minute swap of instant grits for flaked corn which caused the flow through the RIMS to come to a crawl on mash in. Luckily I was able to just increase the flow a little to remove the issue. On cleaning the false bottom I had all kinds of holes plugged with grits.

I gravity from the mash tun into the brew kettle and forgot to flush all of the air from the drain tube so I got an incomplete drain of the mash tun. I use a domed false bottom with it's output below the mash tun drain valve. Had to scoop the mash into brewing bag and do some squeezing to fill the brew kettle.
 
I built a Still Air Box for yeast propagation and banking. I don't have the space for (or want to spend the $$$ on) a laminar air flow hood. This creates a near-sterile environment for working with yeast cultures. The photo is of a dry run. When in use, the towel lining the bottom of the box will be soaked in a sanitizing bleach solution and thoroughly run out. The entire box, test tube rack, and wire rack will be sprayed with 70% isopropyl alcohol. I'll place two individually wrapped sterile syringes, the yeast starter, cryopreservative, etc. in the box and let it sit for an hour with the arm holes covered to let any particles settle onto the bleached towel. All work will be done while wearing a K95 mask and nitrile exam gloves sprayed with Starsan.
Nice work.
Have you considered Quats (Quaternary Ammonium) in-lieu of bleach for your mat?
A problem with bleach is that the chlorine is rapidly escaping the solution once it has gone, the disinfectant value of your mat is diminished or gone.
Quats won't do that.
 
Today I gave a new brew kettle a good scrub in preparation for brew day.
I plan on doing my first small batch (2 Gal.) as a BIAB this weekend or early next week.
I kinda wish it would snow for real so I could try using a snow bank in-lieu of my chiller during whirlpool. :)
So two firsts for me. I've been doing all-grain, three vessel 6 gal. batches for ~15 years and I'm looking forward to the easier to manage smaller batches and the simpler BIAB.
 
Today I gave a new brew kettle a good scrub in preparation for brew day.
I plan on doing my first small batch (2 Gal.) as a BIAB this weekend or early next week.
I kinda wish it would snow for real so I could try using a snow bank in-lieu of my chiller during whirlpool. :)
So two firsts for me. I've been doing all-grain, three vessel 6 gal. batches for ~15 years and I'm looking forward to the easier to manage smaller batches and the simpler BIAB.
I think you'll enjoy the simplicity of BIAB.:)

You'll probably find that the snowbank acts as a great insulator instead of chilling - you'll quickly melt snow around the kettle and then it's basically an igloo for your kettle 🤣
 
Nice work.
Have you considered Quats (Quaternary Ammonium) in-lieu of bleach for your mat?
A problem with bleach is that the chlorine is rapidly escaping the solution once it has gone, the disinfectant value of your mat is diminished or gone.
Quats won't do that.
No, I hadn't considered Quats. Even the bleach is probably overkill. The theory behind a still air box (SAB) is that you sanitize the interior and allow any particles in the air within the box to precipitate to the bottom over an hour or so. Then when working with cultures within the box nothing should fall into your culture. Just having something moist at the bottom will trap particles, and prevent them from rousing when you disturb the air while working, is considered sufficient. The bleach has the added benefit of killing anything that falls onto it while the air is settling, but isn't strictly necessary. I'm not looking to place anything on the towel while working in the SAB - there is a wire rack above it. Letting the bleach fumes dissipate before introducing yeast cells to the environment is probably a good thing.
 
Near Dark is bottled; hopefully my Irish red curse of the past four years is broken.
Took apart bottling bucket afterward, deep cleaned spigot, soft-scrubbed bubbler.
Leftover in the Weyerbacher glass that I didn't have a bottle prepped for tasted pretty damn good
 

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Cleaned up a keg that my rum barrel aged red rye ale is going to go into.

Cleaned up a second hand Keglsnd regulator I picked up cheap on eBay. No idea where this had been stored and/or how it's been abused in its earlier life but it was covered in black mould and one of the dials is full of what looks like digestive biscuits crumbs.

People are weird.
 
Found the appropriate power supply for my $3 bin store Malstrom stir plate, during research for said power supply I notice the sales info states "starters up to 5 gallons".

I never thought about spinning up a carboy, those typically become 5 gallon brews and wash the slurry afterwords... but I had to test it.

They were right, even my medium size bar will draw a funnel all the way to the bottom! Yes I am easily amused. This might come in handy for imperial stout day.

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I've taken one of my hazy DIPA recipes and dialed it down to a 4.5% hazy pale and will be brewing it tomorrow, and I was getting set up for it this afternoon. Decided to go ahead and grind the grains, and while I had the barley malts going through my barley mill I put four pounds of white wheat through my wheat mill sitting on top of a bucket. But there's like no humidity here right now with one of the longest cold dry snaps we've had in awhile, so I was getting some pretty good static electricity blasts holding the cordless drill until I figured out to grasp both the drill and the mill to turn them into little shocks instead. Never had that happen before...

Cheers!
 
Just about done with the mash on my first session hazy brew...

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[edit] Fly sparge in progress...

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[2nd edit] Hit the prescribed pre-boil volume and gravity on their respective noses, so in theory the FG is preordained. We'll see about that later 😏 Meanwhile the HLT and MLT are clean and the 170°F hop whirlpooling is happening...

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I have never brewed anything so small as this 1.048 ale and there have been a few revelations. Like, end of runnings SG of 1.011 (yikes!) and how quickly a small mash can change recirculation temperature vs my usual 65~75 point brews.

Aaanyway, onwards!

[epilogue] All gassed up and ready to rock!

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Somehow I ended up with the full 11 gallons to the two carboys - at 1.051 OG, 3 points higher than expected. Gotta be a measurement error somewhere but it's not something I'm gonna lose sleep over 🙂

Cheers!
 
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Saved a stout extract kit from extinction; will be brewing it, with some modifications in a few weeks. Did a bottle inventory, and the bottles that the Irish stout'll be packaged in will probably see the end of their long service. Dismantled and cleaned my bottling buckets; one is going to the curb tonight, spigots are soaking in Starsan. Thawed out a frozen bottle of my pumpkin ale.
 
I have a few beer flight paddles I've made, but nothing for serving full-size glasses. I made this yesterday, from leftover cutoffs of red elm and some oak dowels.
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Nice Job Max!
I've been wanting something similar to carry pints outside but just haven't gotten around to it. A little inspiration here.
 
I dumped 4 gallons of used starsan solution into my boil kettle. I found that starsan does a great job of dissolving the build up on the heating element better than anything else that I have tried. It removes almost all of the build up and what doesn't simply fall off is very easy to brush away leaving the element sparkling clean. Who knew?
 
I dumped 4 gallons of used starsan solution into my boil kettle. I found that starsan does a great job of dissolving the build up on the heating element better than anything else that I have tried. It removes almost all of the build up and what doesn't simply fall off is very easy to brush away leaving the element sparkling clean. Who knew?
I didn't.

How long does it need to sit in the starsan.

My elements are on tri-clamps and they get scrubbed after each use but still get some build up over time when I give them once over with barkeepers friend. Soaking sounds easier.
 
Kegged my Kentucky Common yesterday, hydro sample tasted pretty good. I used WLP029 German ale yeast which is normally very clean but I got some esters this time.

Also brewed an American Amber yesterday. Both the amber and Kentucky common will get entered into a contest.

Today I am on bubble watch, the amber started up just fine.
 
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Finally bottled my Grodziski.
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And, I didn’t look into the fermentor until I was nearly done, needing to tip the FV to to get the last bottles of goodness out. 😱 it tastes fine but who knows what will happen as it conditions at room temperature. So, I guess I won’t be keeping this slurry. If it turns sour maybe I can turn it into something else. Lichtainhainer, (sp?) perhaps?
 
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