What I did for beer today

[user 103238]

Strangest brew day ever. Decided to brew the Nutcastle from BCS - simple grain bill, simple recipe, brewed it several times before. It was -35° outside, so as usual in the winter I brewed inside the garage with the door slightly cracked. In the afternoon my wife mentions how cold the garage was before we brewed. Eventually discovered that the zone for the radiant heat in the garage had frozen before we started brewing - but having the garage door cracked about a door sure didn't help the system thaw. We finished the brew to find that the hose from the faucet was frozen, so using the CFC - and dumping the water into a frozen slab of concrete - was no longer an option. In any case, the yeast had been pitched after the wort cooled in the fermentation chamber, a 100,000 BTU heater is running to thaw out the floor, and after a couple of homebrews I'm ready for this day to be over! Thankfully the wife was the one who determined the freeze up happened before the brew session began, so I haven't been directed to sell all of my brewing equipment!

 

[bleme]

Shared my Baltic Porter, American Brown and American Amber ales with friends and family. Everybody was able to find something they liked!

 

[Qhrumphf]

Brewed one yesterday. Racked one to secondary yesterday. Washed yeast after racking. Will repitch it into the two I'm brewing today.

 

[unionrdr]

I've got a bunch of bottles to scrub after the holiday.Wish I could've brewed those 3 5G batches of hybrid lager the beginning of the month. The weather was perfect temp-wise. I've got a few jars of WL029 yeast in the fridge screaming "brew with meeee!".

 

[BGBC]

Brewed an extract ginger beer, my own recipe. No idea how it will turn out, but it's a small batch experiment.

Bottled two gallons of dry hopped cider. Both versions tasted great (cascade and citra/willamette). Targeting a low carb.

 

[user 103238]

After two days of running the propane heater both zones finally opened up and we have heat flowing to the concrete pad again! And equally important, the beer is happily fermenting away in the fermentation chamber!

Strangest brew day ever. Decided to brew the Nutcastle from BCS - simple grain bill, simple recipe, brewed it several times before. It was -35° outside, so as usual in the winter I brewed inside the garage with the door slightly cracked. In the afternoon my wife mentions how cold the garage was before we brewed. Eventually discovered that the zone for the radiant heat in the garage had frozen before we started brewing - but having the garage door cracked about a door sure didn't help the system thaw. We finished the brew to find that the hose from the faucet was frozen, so using the CFC - and dumping the water into a frozen slab of concrete - was no longer an option. In any case, the yeast had been pitched after the wort cooled in the fermentation chamber, a 100,000 BTU heater is running to thaw out the floor, and after a couple of homebrews I'm ready for this day to be over! Thankfully the wife was the one who determined the freeze up happened before the brew session began, so I haven't been directed to sell all of my brewing equipment!

 

[Dave37]

After two days of running the propane heater both zones finally opened up and we have heat flowing to the concrete pad again! And equally important, the beer is happily fermenting away in the fermentation chamber!

Good to hear it was a somewhat easy fix for you. When I read your original post I thought you might be in for lengthy $$$ey project.

Cheers.

 

[campbelldm1]

Cleaned a keg and filled it with citra pale ale.

 

[slbradley01]

Racked a 10 gallon batch of Kolsch Wheat. It's been In the primary for three weeks. Put five gallons directly into a corny. Put the other five onto 3lbs of frozen raspberries and blackberries that I picked over the summer. Wow, it was beautifully clear, about 1.010 down from 1.051 starting gravity. How long should I give this on the berries before I rack to a corny?

 

[govner1]

Set up my Hop Rocket w/ barbed SS connectors so I can use as a filter or hop back.

 

[Melana]

Cleaned another keg and put it into service, kegged a hoppy amber and another amber, racked 5g of amber, and tackled another blonde.

 

[skemp45]

Bottled my pumpkin ale I have been putting off for ....... well some time now!

 

[JonM]

Brought my helles upstairs (after slowly ramping the temp a bit over the last couple days) for a diacetyl rest. I tasted it the other day and I didn't taste any diacetyl, but since this is my first lager I'm crossing all the T's.

 

[govner1]

Cleaned out the keg from my Belgian IPA, cleaned draft lines, hooked up serving line to my Whole leaf hop Columbus IPA. Now for a sample!

 

[Qhrumphf]

Checked on my fermenters, and added ice to swamp coolers where needed.

 

[Dave37]

Took big whiffs of my RIS and Belgian dubbel bulk aging in the carboys. The vanilla addition in secondary has the stout smelling amazing. Also did a temperature accuracy check on my temp controller and the liquid inside my fermenting bucket over 24 hours. Still spot on at +\- 1*

And threw my starter for a simcoe and Columbus IPA I'm brewing tomorrow in the fridge.

 

[Espresso]

Spread the gospel of home-brewing, I may have a new convert.

 

[provball96]

Well having already done a quick cider using the lalvin 1118 I finally got everything together and did the honourable first brew, the cerveza clone for my wife that bought me the five gallon kit for xmas. Needless to say I can't wait to get my Caribou Slobber from the Northern "pole" Brewers into primary! Hoping to have that going next weekend. Such a cool forum to find and plenty of great advice and comments for a beginner in what my four year daughter and I are calling science experiments, she likes the cider so far (of course the unfermented stuff). My young cider already tastes great, dry and delicious not sure if it will make the months that it needs to truly reach its potential, but there is always a carboy to start another batch in. Cheers!

 

[bleme]

Needless to say I can't wait to get my Caribou Slobber from the Northern "pole" Brewers into primary!

I'm drinking that clone right now, or at least what it ended up for me. I had ordered it pre-crushed because I wasn't going to get my mill for a couple weeks. Things got busy and I ended up brewing it 3 months later. The grain tasted fine so I just went with it. My OG was much lower than expected so after a week of fermentation I added 14oz of brown sugar and 2oz of maple syrup. Turned out great.

The moral of this story is that things won't always go perfectly and you beer won't always come out tasting just like you think it should. But if you roll with the punches and improvise, you will still make great beer.

 

[jjefrey]

Cleaned out my fermentation chamber after a blowoff created a bit of a mess

 

[SupervisingChildren]

Spread the gospel of home-brewing, I may have a new convert.

Hallelujah!

 

[SupervisingChildren]

Well having already done a quick cider using the lalvin 1118 I finally got everything together and did the honourable first brew, the cerveza clone for my wife that bought me the five gallon kit for xmas. Needless to say I can't wait to get my Caribou Slobber from the Northern "pole" Brewers into primary! Hoping to have that going next weekend. Such a cool forum to find and plenty of great advice and comments for a beginner in what my four year daughter and I are calling science experiments, she likes the cider so far (of course the unfermented stuff). My young cider already tastes great, dry and delicious not sure if it will make the months that it needs to truly reach its potential, but there is always a carboy to start another batch in. Cheers!

Congrats on the first beer!

Kegging my cider tomorrow, but cleaned 3 kegs and sanitized 2, and put my fruit coctail blonde on gas :thumbup:

 

[BrewinHooligan]

Working on a recipe for a RIS I plan to brew this weekend.

 

[histo320]

Brewing my None More Black Vanilla Stout. Halfway through the mash right now and things are going perfect....so far.

 

[Dave37]

Brewing my None More Black Vanilla Stout. Halfway through the mash right now and things are going perfect....so far.

Nice im 90% done with my mash. Im brewing a pale with 2row and vienna and about 3/4 of a lb of C 60. Jsing columbus and simcoe for hops. Simple batch im experienced with because this is my 1st time messing with my water profile so i am looking forward to seeing how the salt additions effect my brew.

Cheers

 

[1fast636]

Boiling my 26 stitch ipa (chinook ipa) mashed in last night then the stitches and the little man started acting up so got mash fully done and cleaned up. Boiling today, also goin to make my assistant brewer some spent grain biscuits

 

[Dave37]

Boiling my 26 stitch ipa (chinook ipa) mashed in last night then the stitches and the little man started acting up so got mash fully done and cleaned up. Boiling today, also goin to make my assistant brewer some spent grain biscuits

I saw the aftermath pics from the hospital man. That was gnarly. Sorry to hear that happened. Glad youre back at it already. Way to get back on the horse.

Cheers.

 

[Dmlsys23]

Volunteered to either steward at Columbus Beerfest or man the booth that my LHBS will have there, whichever the owner wants more.

 

[1fast636]

Thanks yea stupid Christmas lights and me having no HB in me is what this all resulted from lol, oh well only set me back a few days on brewing but it has screwed up play time with brewing assistant and the toddler so they both have been acting up

 

[histo320]

Finished brewing my None More Black Vanilla Stout. Pretty good brewing day overall. Had a little problem with a stuck sparge but other than than no major problems. My mash efficiency was a bit lower than I anticipated 82.5 not 87.5. OG was supposed to be 1.054 and ended up being 1.058 due to it being 14F outside.

Overall a very good day.