What I did for beer today

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Tapped the Crystal/Mosaic IPA brewed 2.5 weeks ago today. VERY impressed. First IPA I've brewed in a while that tastes and smells like something I could get commercially. Please don't think I'm being conceited here; fresh commercial IPAs (in cans or bottles) have a distinct (to me) flavor/aroma that I just haven't seemed to be able to achieve in past brews. And I'm not talking about product that has sat on the shelf long enough to get that oxidized flavor. This one is balanced between malt and hops, with a very pretty head that lasts a while. The flavor has a depth that I haven't managed before. Not many competitions around here these c*vid days, but the husband just gave me the green light to enter the only one around here that this has a good chance in, and volunteered to take the entries up to Ballard since he has the rest of the week off. Anyone wants the recipe, not to make this TL;DR, but here it is:

8bs 2-row (I use GW)
1.5lbs Pilsner
1.5lbs light Munich
Mashed at 150 for 60 minutes, batch sparged
Preboil gravity was 1.035
SG at 1.062 after 90 minute boil
1oz Crystal at 60
1oz each Crystal and Mosaic at 10, 5, and flameout (both 2020 crop years from YVH)
2.5oz each Crystal and Mosaic dry hop for 7 days
Carbed to I don't know how many volumes of co2, looks right to me
 
Today I continued stepping up a starter of WY3333-PC German Wheat that I salvaged from the dregs of a keg.
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Wasn't planning to save this strain, but after the kristalweizen had a chance to condition a bit more, I really liked it. By then it was no longer available, and who knows when it will come into the rotation again.

So although I had fined it with gelatin, I figured there was nothing to lose by rinsing the small amount of sediment from the keg and trying it in a 100mL starter. There was a little activity, so I stepped it up to 1L. Crashed this overnight and decanted, then stepped up a final time to 1.6L

This time I'm going to freeze a dozen vails to be sure I have it when I need it.
 
I worked some management for my homebrew club's barrel program...

Herding cats to get drop-off of fill-shares and empty-containers on time...

Setting up NHC entries for good barrel aged beers the club produced...

Somehow I managed to turn the hobby I used to get away from middle-management into middle-management as well
 
Getting ready to bottle the Brown Ale I brewed at the city house last month. I remembered that I had used up most of my bottle caps on the last batch. Checked my stash and, sure enough, I had about 6 caps left. Checked the Ace Hardware website to see when the store about 5 minutes from my house closed (It has a HB department). 7 PM. Checked my watch. 6:38. Only hit 2 of the 4 lights on the way and walked out of the store with my bag o’ caps at 6:55. Now I’ve had supper and am thinking I might just have another beer and bottle in the morning.
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Spent some time cleaning the beer lines so I could switch out the 1 year old taps and put on the new Perlicks. Woe is me!!!! I forgot my taps were elegant European design and of course the Perlicks would not fit!!! The European faucets have a cone at the back, Perlicks like most American have a round ball 😳....😳😳. Silly me. So had to get on Ama all mighty Zon (Amazon) and rustle up some American SS faucet shanks. 2 Bev Rites on the way and get this...normally $16 each, they had 4 returned shanks in stock of that model and got 2 for $3.89! The Beer God's in the HBT halls of BeerValla have blessed my meager endeavors to ascend my unworthy taps to Perlick Nirvana!!! Oh yeah! Picture shows the European shank with recessed cone hole.
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Spent some time cleaning the beer lines so I could switch out the 1 year old taps and put on the new Perlicks. Woe is me!!!! I forgot my taps were elegant European design and of course the Perlicks would not fit!!! The European faucets have a cone at the back, Perlicks like most American have a round ball 😳....😳😳. Silly me. So had to get on Ama all mighty Zon (Amazon) and rustle up some American SS faucet shanks. 2 Bev Rites on the way and get this...normally $16 each, they had 4 returned shanks in stock of that model and got 2 for $3.89! The Beer God's in the HBT halls of BeerValla have blessed my meager endeavors to ascend my unworthy taps to Perlick Nirvana!!! Oh yeah! Picture shows the European shank with recessed cone hole.View attachment 719208
Yeah, silly me forgot these were European taps and I couldn't figure out why the beer cleaning attachments, I ordered 3 different ones , wouldn't fit to clean the lines..DUH !!! What's the old saying? Using too much of my own product!! Beer that is...yuk yuk 😎
 
Yesterday kicked the wheatwine and Baltic porter (less than half a left pint in each). Today I was busy: cleaned both kegs and tap line, tapped the imperial stout, bottled some of the aforementioned stout for NHC, completed my registration for NHC, and racked my mead to secondary (definitely needs a lot more time to condition). Also attempted to change a post in one of the kegs that just kicked, but that sucker won't come off. Soaked it for a bit, but notta. Soaking overnight, give it another crack in the morning.
 
Pulled my office keg out of the refrigerator at work to check on things. Got tired of those 16 gram cartridges and leaky cheap regulators. My "real beer CO2 regulator" with a 74 gram cartridge is still working great after 2 months in the 'fridge!View attachment 719287
Wow...i just ordered a Mr Brew mini co2 regulator and a box of 16gm cartridges...i hope they work ok..😳...thought it would be nice for the summer and my smaller 3 gal keg to take to family gatherings..😳
 
Today my absolutely marvelous incredible husband took the trek up to Ballard to drop off my entry in the Reuben's Brews Hop Idol competition, so tonight I'm going to buckle down and break down all the cardboard that has found its way into my brewspace/garage so I can brew tomorrow. And clean the kitchen. And make him a fried egg sandwich, which according to himself only I can do right. Oh, and drink some of my own homebrew. And not complain that he ordered himself another fitness thing on AllMyMoneyzGon that will collect dust in the spare room.
 
I wrapped up another two-day double brew today. I did a German Pils yesterday (thank you, snow day!) and a Special Bitter today. I also kegged last month's obnoxiously large CAP and an Anchor clone. Not a bad 48hrs.

The primary objective of both days was to fire up my nifty new SS Brewtech Infusion mash tun and learn how to operate the vorlauf attachment. Despite the fact that I did a dry run while passivating the tun, yesterday was a beer-on-the-floor fiasco like I haven't had in years. Today went flawlessly, which was good because it would've sucked to soil my nicely mopped floor after yesterday's brouhaha.
 
I wrapped up another two-day double brew today. I did a German Pils yesterday (thank you, snow day!) and a Special Bitter today. I also kegged last month's obnoxiously large CAP and an Anchor clone. Not a bad 48hrs.

The primary objective of both days was to fire up my nifty new SS Brewtech Infusion mash tun and learn how to operate the vorlauf attachment. Despite the fact that I did a dry run while passivating the tun, yesterday was a beer-on-the-floor fiasco like I haven't had in years. Today went flawlessly, which was good because it would've sucked to soil my nicely mopped floor after yesterday's brouhaha.
I'm thinking about dropping the $$ on one of those myself, except I'm looking at the Blichmann, because I already have one Brewvision setup and the Blichmann comes with it.
 
Today my absolutely marvelous incredible husband took the trek up to Ballard to drop off my entry in the Reuben's Brews Hop Idol competition, so tonight I'm going to buckle down and break down all the cardboard that has found its way into my brewspace/garage so I can brew tomorrow. And clean the kitchen. And make him a fried egg sandwich, which according to himself only I can do right. Oh, and drink some of my own homebrew. And not complain that he ordered himself another fitness thing on AllMyMoneyzGon that will collect dust in the spare room.
😂😂😂😂😂
 
I'm thinking about dropping the $$ on one of those myself, except I'm looking at the Blichmann, because I already have one Brewvision setup and the Blichmann comes with it.

I'm with you on the Blichmann electronics. The objective of the new tun is to set the stage for a RIMS system based around Blichmann's BrewCommander. It's amazing what that thing can do!
 
Son's school gave us less than two weeks notice with mandatory participation in the district science fair. I'm not sure why shooting off an email to en entire school district using the bulk email system is harder now that all of us are on our computers, but ok.

So, what experiment could we do that we have the materials lying around? Something involving fermentation, perhaps?

No, not beer, it's only 5th grade! :p

But we will be testing out the theory that more yeast will make bread rise faster, using no yeast (control), 3 different amounts of yeast, and sourdough culture (no bread yeast) to see the differences in a standard flour-water-salt-yeast dough base.

Tomorrow I get to reward myself with making beer. And eating bread. A lot of bread.
 
Son's school gave us less than two weeks notice with mandatory participation in the district science fair. I'm not sure why shooting off an email to en entire school district using the bulk email system is harder now that all of us are on our computers, but ok.

So, what experiment could we do that we have the materials lying around? Something involving fermentation, perhaps?

No, not beer, it's only 5th grade! :p

But we will be testing out the theory that more yeast will make bread rise faster, using no yeast (control), 3 different amounts of yeast, and sourdough culture (no bread yeast) to see the differences in a standard flour-water-salt-yeast dough base.

Tomorrow I get to reward myself with making beer. And eating bread. A lot of bread.
He could still do a project showing the different stages of how taking natural materials ( Wheat, fruits ,water, yeast) combine to make beer or wine which many many people still don't understand the process. Most people through out the centuries understood how to make beer but didn't understand the scientific process . They only knew that usually it worked.
 
Won't one strain just eventually win out in a fermentation?
I've always read if you want to mix strains you ferment separately and blend the beers.
I'm a yeast afficiando but by no means an expert. To have a repeatable dialed in result, you're correct that blending the fermented beers is the way to go.

I believe that one yeast may become dominate but probably won't kill off the second yeast in say 5-10 generations. And typically you start getting yeast mutations in the ballpark of 8 generations.

There are combined strains for sale. WLP085 is a vault strain that is a combo of WLP002 and rumored either WLP006 or 007. I've done at least 6 generations of the WLP085 and didn't notice a significant taste change.

Today I shared my recent bottle carbonated yeast off at the LHBS with about 10 people. A London Porter clone: 5 British Ale Clone Recipes - Brew Your Own using:
Pub (A Fullers strain and it's always come out on top compared with WLP002)
WLP085 (WLP002 and rumored WLP006 or WLP007. I first got this during a visit to WhiteLabs in San Diego, and a refill during the vault purge)
WLP017 (one of the Whitbread multi-strains)
S-04 (one of the Whitbread multi-strains)
WLP017/S-04 fermented out and then combined in the bottle as a Whitbread mixed strain)

Clear preference for Pub and the Whitbread combination by everyone.

I'm going to retire WLP085 from my yeast library. I have brewed dozens of batches with it, and always thought it was "special" since I got it at White Labs and most people haven't even heard of it. Truth is, I prefer other yeasts and want to thin out the yeast herd in my library.

I will also just slap together the S-04 and WLP017 in the stir plate and bank in my yeast library. I won't use these seperately moving forward.
 
Wow...i just ordered a Mr Brew mini co2 regulator and a box of 16gm cartridges...i hope they work ok..😳...thought it would be nice for the summer and my smaller 3 gal keg to take to family gatherings..😳
they work just fine. it gets quite expensive to carb & serve with them, so try to carb with a 'big' tank or naturally first.
 
For the 2nd time had to use the most excellent method posted in the Bottling/Kegging thread to get my IPA to pour something other than foam. Seriously overcarbed, poured nothing but 3/4 glass of foam every time. At this early hour I'm sipping on a perfect pour of it. Later will do some more cleaning in the brewery and place a grain order, since I used all I had left of base malt in yesterday's brew.
 
Doing the 6th batch of my Galaxy neipa tomorrow. Got the big 1318 starter crashed and split three ways (two to pitch, one for the next round), staged the rig which is almost done being filled with RO, got the grains measured for the morning crush, and the salts ready.
One last check tonite before bed and should be ready to rock in the morning...

Cheers!
 
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