SCAAAARY! Teach a Friend to Brew

Well, not really. The only thing about brewing your own beer that's scary is fear of the unknown. Come on join in. Follow the link. Find a place learn about brewing beer.


Want to learn more about brewing? Oh, you already know how to brew! Well, whatever the case may be check out Teach a Friend to Homebrew Day :-)

Hey YOU! Teach a Friend to Brew

Want to learn more about brewing? Oh, you already know how to brew! Well, whatever the case may be check out Teach a Friend to Homebrew Day :-)

Fermentation Friday...I'm working on my entry...

Check our CNYBrew for October's topic. Do you remember why you brew? I do. I mean my story changes every time I start writing this damn thing, but, never you mind. I'll have it ready to go on Friday! (for a change)

I'm back baby!

Teach a Friend to Brew

Want to learn more about brewing? Oh, you already know how to brew! Well, whatever the case may be check out Teach a Friend to Homebrew Day :-)

Teach a Friend to Brew

Have you heard of Teach a Friend to Brew Day? It's November 7th this year. Hopefully you'll have an opportunity to help teach a friend to homebrew. WHAT!? You don't know how to brew? No problem go learn. I'll be over at Artisan Homebrew waiting for a big pot of water to boil so stop over. Mike will write it all up when he gets a minute.

This is right up my alley. Get together with some friends and brew some beer. Just don't all watch the pot at the same time. You know what they say about a watched pot. "It never boils."

For more information about Teach a Friend to Brew Day read Chipper Dave's excellent write up. Don't forget the AHA site too ;-) You can find a site near you and join in. Heck, you might even learn a little.

Worm Trail Wheat Ale: If you look closely...

...you might see...



...yeast ;-)

Heheh, seriously though. This is the beer we brewed together at Jeremy & Jackie's. Looks good and healthy to me so far.

Homebrewing on a stormy night...

The rain came down hard today. Afterwards the wind swept in to clear the skies and we were well into our brewing session over at Jackie & Jeremy's place with Mike from Artisan Homebrew. Some friends stopped by and watched the pot boil with us, added some hops, steeped some grains and had a couple beers. Hoping for a hoppy beer from the carboy. The Simcoe and Centennial should be up to the task. Mike's saving some amarillo for the dry hop. I can taste it already.

Thanks everybody. Had a wonderful night.

Dry Hop in Keg with Wire Mesh Tea Infuser Ball

I bought two of these at Walmart (cause it was open) for dry hopping the Garbage Pail Ale. One keg with Simcoe the other with Centennial. We'll see how it turns out.

Fill up the ball with hops, I'm using one ounce of pellets per five gallons, and drop it in the keg. Might try to hook it to the out valve stem (or whatever you call it).

I'll try to leaving the infusers in there for about a week.

If you are looking for books about home brewing including how to make your own equipment...

Amazon: Home Brewing

Nici the FriendFeeder exists!

So, Feedburner isn't lying to me. There are people over there at FriendFeed. Nici proved it.

(Interesting, how do I know this person is real? You can't believe everything you read on the Internet. I guess she could be a bot. Nah I'm not goin' down that road. Too much thinking involved. Red pills, blue pills, Why am I here?, you know.)

Now I must study. I need to prove the theory.

They FriendFeed therefore they exist ;-)

I'll probably need some help from these guys though. Why am I doing this? Good question. Can't remember. Its just as well, the original reason was probably something lame.

If you are reading this in FriendFeed show me you exist. Click through.

I'm just curious to see if anybody from FriendFeed does that type of thing.

FriendFeed people click here to leave me a comment and tell me what you think...er prove you exist.

And now back to your regularly schedule programming. Yikes, I have to send those hops out to Bard's Basement Brew. I resolve to do it tonight, now, right now, when I say now I mean now, if I say something I mean it, unless its just for effect, in that case it really isn't that I mean it so much...aaargh...

No bloggers were killed during the production of this post.

What happened to the Garbage Pail Ale?

BTW Fermentation Friday is next Friday at CNY Brew.

The fate of all five of those five gallon kegs of Garbage Pail Ale.

• Mom asked me to bring some beer to her holiday party and wait for it....that's right...I don't have to rush around like I do every other year and brew something. I can just save one of these. Whoohoo!
• Number two will be on tap in the garage as is. Hoping to have it clear a bit.
  
• The next one will be served this weekend at our neighborhood Fall Fest.
• And then there were two, one will be dry hopped with Simcoe and the other...
  
• ...will be dry hopped and poured at Artisan Homebrew if all goes well.

Questions?

Crash cool homebrew to clear yeast.

First of all, don't forget Fermentation Friday next week.

So you have some cloudy homebrew. Let's assume yeast is still in suspension. That is, yer yeast is floatin' around with a CO2 bubble caught in its gullet. (I'm makin' up the gullet part. Oh, and this is not the only cause of cloudy homebrew.) This here yeast problem recently happened to one of my homebrews.

[Time out, this isn't a big problem. If I wait, I'll bet the beer will clear, but, I don't want to wait so I'm looking to control the yeast. What is it with beer and the control we attempt to exert over it? Do you think that's where the wild yeast like brett comes in? Kind of like rebel yeast? Ok, back to how I will affect control over billions of little defenseless creatures.]

The five cornie kegs of Garbage Pail Ale just sat there in my basement while they finished fermenting. Off went the first one into a fifty five degree kegerator for a couple days. I poured some off waiting for the sediment to clear during the first couple pints. Six pints later over the next few days it still poured cloudy. Could it be that my yeast just doesn't like to flocculate? I am used to those English Ale yeasts that fall like rocks in water. What to do?

After a bit of thought something occured to me. Maybe I didn't cool it down enough. I realized that my process inadvertantly changed and affected my homebrew. Could it be this new kegerator fridge? Typically my homebrew would condition in the other "normal" fridge. I never checked it but, I have to assume it's like any other fridge and chills things to below forty degrees. This is the first beer I moved right into the kegerator which is temperature controlled by one of those simple Johnson controllers. I like my beer served around fifty five. Well that's all fine and dandy, but, I may not be cooling it down enough for the yeast to drop. After all it didn't really get much more than ten degrees colder when moved from the basement to the fridge.

In an effort to rectify the situation I will chill it to thirty seven degrees tonight and keep it there for a few days. After a few days I'll report back. If it doesn't work, there are other options. I guess there's always fish innards or stuff made from parts of other animals. I'm not picky. I only want to taste the beer without the yeast bite.

If you are looking for books about home brewing...

Amazon: Home Brewing

Do you use FriendFeed to track BeerBits2?

So, Feedburner says I have all kinds of Friend Feed subscribers. I'm just curious to see if they're really out there. Helloooo! Anybody out there? I just signed up for a FriendFeed account.

(Could that be what they want? Is this a trick? I'm getting paranoid.) Anyway...

If you are from FriendFeed, welcome. Over there on the right you'll see what this blog is made of.

Leave a comment and say hey.

Cheers!

October 2009 Fermentation Friday announced!

After missing last month's Fermentation Friday I'm feeling a bit out of touch, but, never fear we have another coming up next Friday. Travis, I gotta hand it to you. Lately I've been preoccupied with life. Not a bad thing, really. But, my blog posting slowed considerably in recent weeks. You inspired me to get away from my mobile phone updates, my lust for Autumn and even off the damn recliner and write. As I begin the entry for this Fermentation Friday, I'm smiling and thinking of all the reasons I brew beer.

I might even count yinz among the reasons.

Ahhh...morning time...

It's a bit more elusive than first thought. Haven't sat in the morning sunlight typing my thoughts in a while.

What's been happening?

Artisan Homebrew store opened in Downingtown. Had some fun helping Mike get some last minute stuff done. Need to stop over there again.

Kegged 26 gallons of pale ale. Conditioning four in the basement right now. One is on tap in the fridge. Thinking of dry hopping two of these kegs so I can compare the difference. Maybe a dry hopped cask ale?

Still have to send out the homegrown hops to Bard's Basement brew, yikes!

The ingredients for my first all grain ingredients await me. Maybe this weekend.

Still enjoying the barleywine from the keg in the basement at room temp with just a bit of carbonation :-)

Oh yes, it's also Monday which means the Monday Night Tasting could be in order. Hmm...

Don't foget Fermentation Friday Oct. 30th

Http://cnybrew.com

Travis at CNYBrew is our host. Look for the announcement soon.

Have you seen this?

If you like...

• Belgian bier
• biking
• Belgium
• Lambic beer
• great photos
• Brewvana
• gueze
• Poperinge
• feeling left out

...well go read this post at brewvana. I'm so jealous.

Artisan Homebrew set to Open Tomorrow

Press Release October 14, 2009

(Downingtown, PA)---Artisan Homebrew will open its doors for the first time on Thursday, October 15 in Downingtown, Pennsylvania. The homebrew store is located at 128 East Lincoln Highway in the heart of historic Downingtown and occupies the former Samovar Tea Shop.

For Mike Hamara, proprietor, the opening represents more than just months of securing the location and preparing the site for a retail homebrewing business. Hamara realized over 4 years ago that the suburban Philadelphia areas of north Chester County and west Montgomery County lacked the presence of a homebrewing shop.

"I couldn't believe," Hamara says, "that for an area so rich in craft breweries, quality beer & wine bars, and beer distributors, no homebrewing shop was there to service the needs of the area's homebrewers."

Mike has worked at Exton Beverage for the past 9 years (and previously at Spaz Beverage and Mr. Bottle) which has given him insight into the industry. "Customers would come into the beer distributor and share with me stories of mail ordering for homebrewing supplies," he says, "or driving as many as thirty-plus miles just to get the ingredients or equipment needed to get a brewday going. If their brewing session had begun and they had forgotten something, they were out of luck. At that point, I knew that I should do something about it."

His new shop will stock homebrewing supplies for both beginners and advanced brewers. "For less than $100, a new homebrewer can come in to Artisan Homebrew and get all of the equipment and ingredients needed to brew their first batch of beer. But, the most advanced all-grain homebrewer will also find what they need as well."

The home winemaker can also find equipment and ingredients needed to turn out batches of wine at both beginning and advanced levels of technique.

Once up and running, Hamara expects to hold special events at the shop to encourage homebrewers and winemakers to share their creations and share their homebrewing stories. “My goal is to try to bring together individuals who share the passion for making great beer and wine.”

Artisan Homebrew will be open Tuesday thru Friday 11am to 7pm, Saturday 10am to 5pm and Sunday 12pm to 5pm. For more information, contact Mike Hamara directly at the store at 610-873-HOPS(4677) or email at ike@artisanhomebrew.com

Garbage can beer to be legged tonight...

Shouldn't be a huge deal really. Lots of siphoning and cleaning.
Five or Six kegs depending on headspace.

I brewed 26 gallons of beer in a garbage can ;-)

Put the starter batch to good us. Cross your fingers to see this American Pale Ale ferment to completion in a garbage can (food grade) without any major flaws.

Took about six hours to brew about twenty or so gallons of beer plus the five gallon starter for a grand total of about twenty six gallons. I've been thinking of doing this for a long time, but, it didn't all come together until last night. Some of the highlights include siphoning twenty gallons of beer into the fermenter in my basement from outside. Brewing a five gallon batch of starter beer the night before. Having two kettles going at once. Using almost an entire thirty-three pound jug of malt syrup. Staggering the boils so I could keep both batches going in parallel as much as possible. Aiding in the process was my old turkey fryer burner under the second kettle. When it came to chilling the beer, I chilled the first, transferred to the fermenter and chilled the second during the transfer of the first.

We're not done yet though. After the initial, basically open, fermentation I'll rack it off into five gallon kegs for a secondary, and closed, fermentation. This gives me more leeway allowing the beer to sit without getting infected.

Whew! :-) Now, about that all grain batch.

EDIT: Nate asked how much it cost...

Approx 25 gal batch made from
1 x 5 gal starter batch
2 x 10 gal main batches
Both use late extract additions to increase hop utilization and keep color light.

STARTER BATCH
Wyeast Amer Ale II yeast $6.25
no steeping grains
1 oz Northdown $1.56
malt extract (see below)

MAIN BATCHES
yeast - pitch the entire starter batch into main batch
2 lbs steeping grains - $4.50
4 oz Sladek $7.5 (bought by the pound)
2 oz Northdown $3.12 (bought by the pound)
malt extract (see below)

33 lb pilsner malt extract - $78
might be a pound or two more

Approx $100 for approx 25 gal of extract homebrew. Less than $10 a case. Assuming I didn't make any mistakes in my math and memory.

Not included in price...
propane?
ice for chiller?
equipment
sanitzer
my time

The bard has checked, thus claiming his prize...

I'll be shipping the hops to him soon. As for the rest of you. Well, we'll have to have another drawing around here someday :-)

Hey, just brewed a starter batch of some kind of American Ale. I'll use the yeast from that to brew a bigger batch later this week. Still sitting on the all grain ingredients. Maybe next weekend.

And the winner of 10 ounces of homegrown hops is...

My hop picking expert was honored to conduct the drawing...



Bard's Basement Brew! Please send me your snail mail address information @ beerbits2@gmail.com I'll ship the 10 oz. of homegrown hops to you shortly. Let us know how you incorporate them into a beer.

Congratulations Bard's and thank you to everybody who entered the contest. Most of all, thanks for the all grain brewing advice :-)