Scouting...

Photo from a walk...

Time to taste the Porter

The almost Baltic porter smells of dried dark fruit. You can see the cloudy milkshake here with lots of yeast in suspension.





Minus the bready yeast bite it has lots of promise. Accidentally forgot the CO2 headpressure. Fixed that.

Healthy Yeast Cake + Barleywine Wort = ...

Sent from my iPhone

Boiling wort...

On a walk...

Catching up with you...

As the not quite Baltic porter ferments away next to the two batches of cider I'm anxious to taste and keg both. I think the pasteurized and non-pasteurized juice batches seem like they will indeed be different. The non-pasteurized tastes quite sour and it must be close to 1.01 sg. Haven't tasted the other yet.

On the agenda next is a big beer, perhaps a barleywine and/or an imperial stout using the yeast cakes of the two not quite Baltic porter batches.

Other than that I'm hoping to dry hop the last two batches of Garbage Pail Ale. One for Mom and one for Dad.

Still waiting for the right time for an allgrain batch. Don't forget November's Fermentation Friday is coming soon.

Split batch yeast problems...

You heard about the garbage can heat shield. Worked well, not bad for ten dollars. Brewed an almost Baltic porter last night for the test run. Decided on ten gallons split between two fermenters. Maybe your brew sessions work out smoothly, but, mine always seem to wind up with a bump in the road or two.

Last night with the water ready for steeping I realized only one of my fermenters remained empty. Yikes, with two batches of cider going I'd forgotten. Wow, cider is too easy to make. Then I remembered the bottling bucket that sat soaking in iodophor from the day before. Bingo, with plastic wrap for a top an semi-open fermentation would do just fine. Some people don't like the extra hiding places for infecting agents around the spigot. Used it a few times for this before so, I went with it.

One bump in the road can generally be overcome without much cursing, however, two hiccups test my resolve. While putting up the water, gathering equipment and making last minute recipe adjustment the Belgian Abbey II Wyeast smack pack remained saggy. By now it should be bursting at the seams. I warmed it a bit thinking that might help. Brewing continued. After the wort finished cooling I transferred half to the carboy and half to the bottling bucket. Now for the yeast. Pitched the slightly puffier Belgian Abbey II in one and Safbrew s-33 dry yeast in the other. Content to see it through 'til morning I hit the sack.

Woke up to a slightly overcast sky promising a mild and sunny Autumn day. Skipped the teeth brushing walking straight to the basement to lift the cover I laid over the fermenters the night before. A puffy tan krausen pushed up toward the plastic wrap on the bottling bucket. This lessened my worries about the open fermentation. No such luck in the carboy. Deep brown wort with a few bubbles on the top laid lifeless in the glass. My mind went to work thinking of yeast. No other yeast in storage here at the house. The local homebrew store was open, just a car ride away. Wait, what if I just pitch some of the fermenting beer from the bottling bucket into the carboy? That's it. After grabbing my beer thief I realized it could be easier than that. The bucket has a spigot. No need for the thief, I'll just pour some right in. I'm already seeing signs of fermentation a couple hours later.

I'm not sure I would know what to do if a brew session went as planned.

Wort...

Heat shield from garbage can...

I'd had it with my Bayou Cooker. Too much clearance, too much breeze,
too long to boil....so picked up a garbage can cut the bottom out and
voilà heat shield.

Fermentation Friday November 2009: The Beer Bits 2 Homebrew Community

Thanks to Just Another Booze Blog for hosting Fermentation Friday for November 2009. I know I'm early, but, with my record lately I better get it done ASAP.

Our mission...

Please tell us about your homebrew communities. Are you into the BN, BA, weblogs and other 1337 f0rm5 of 21st century brewing? Do you while away the evenings in crowded halls with you area's finest, sampling and talking homebrew into the wee hours? Does your brew crew keep you sane? Or do you get your fix sitting at the bar plotting the next move? How do you keep them all going and what does each bring to your life?

So now I have to go on about these jack asses I brew with. Well. I might as well start with Jeremy the bastard who single handedly shook me out of my brewing slumber after more than four years. Jerk. Then there's Brian who keeps drinking my beer so I have to make more, especially the malty ones. Brew your own damn beer! I can't leave out Gavin who keeps telling me I need to open a brewery and stops short of lending me the money. Can't really complain too much about him though, he's growin' some kick ass hops and even sharing. I keep asking Matt to stop by, but somehow he's too busy...whatever. Oh, and who can forget good ol' Dad. The one who answers the phone sayin', "It would be nice to have some homebrew about right now." I guess I owe the guy somethin', heheh. Ok, glad I got that off my chest. I'm just kidding of course. These guys have been very supportive and helpful over the years. They drink beer like nobody's business.

Outside of my brewing helpers, I can count several others among the influential brew-illuminati. Ted, Tom, Del, Bryan and Mike are some that come to mind. Have you ever brewed a "Dead Cat Saison" or "Liver Slayer"? How about a Flanders Red? What about a wild ale with wormwood? Did I mention that one of them owns a homebrew store? Hell, Bryan, my neighbor and good friend has his own craft beer site and brewed a saison that just keeps getting better. BTW thanks Patrick for not homebrewing.

Now it might seem like I have a vibrant community of homebrewers around me, and I do. I don't always reach out to them, though. I'm kinda one of those dudes who enjoys figuring things out for themselves. I don't want to embarrass myself I guess. Funny thing is that I have the most fun when working things out with others. Is this when we all have a group hug? Anyway, here are a few of the local influences. They are not just homebrew-centric some venture into craft beer as well.

Artisan Homebrew for being my Local Home Brew Store :-)
Sly Fox for Monday nights and fer showin' the Stillers games ;-)
Victory Brewing for inspiration and good beer.
Exton Beverage for their sixtel inventory and the people who work there.
Keystone Homebrew for supporting the homebrew community so well over the years.
Monks for the beer dinners and wonderful owners.
TJ's for their excellent beer selections. (and they link to my site)
The Drafting Room 'cause they really know how to do craft beer.
Iron Hill for sharing their yeast with me on occasion.
BUZZ homebrew club. The closest club whose meetings I've never attended. (just call me hermit)
The Brew Lounge for being the closest website to my house. I don't want to swell his head.

Mentioning TBL is a good segue to the world of blogs and all that cool stuff on the Internet. Why would I include these people? Many of whom I have never met. Well, you have to remember that I'm the guy who keeps to himself a bit. That means I need to do some research on my own. Here are some sites that stand out...gotta get a beer I'll be back...Ok, I'm back. While I've never met any of these people I would have to say they have had a significant impact on my brewing.

The place where I learned a ton about using soda kegs :-) Thanks Paul.
The Real Beer discussion community.
A recipe database called The Recipator.
Beer Smith software.
PFIFF! for existing and expressing that in words.

So there you have it. Homebrewers, stores, breweries, brewpubs, friends, relatives, neighbors and even the ones represented in bits and bytes make up my homebrewing community.

November Fermentation Friday Announced!

So Just Another Booze Blog let the cat out of the bag. Yep, they're ready to go as the host of November's Fermentation Friday. This month is a bit tricky though. Why? Well, here in the States we're celebrating Thanksgiving the same week. Which means people will travel and the focus might stray from blogging. (spoken by the truely distractable, me) SO, feel free to post anytime that week.

Also, I'm not sure what a JABB care package is, but, you'll get one if your website refers the most visits to Just Another Booze Blog's site from now to the new year :-) Truth be told, these here Fermentation Friday blog carnivals are all about the referrals after all. Not that we're breakin' any records yet.

Oh yeah, the topic is all about your homebrew community. That's right, you get to write about the folks involved in yer neck of the woods. Thanks Just Another Booze Blog.

Cider: Have you made it before?

Yeah, I'm taking the plunge. I have a batch fermenting right now. The details...

5 gallons of unpasteurized sweet cider from a local cidery (I guess that's what their called)

1 carboy & airlock

1 packet of Safale s.04 yeast

1 lb of locally collected honey from Exton Bee Company

Estimated O.G. at 1.050 (1.044 + .07 for the honey)

My plan is to let it ferment down to 1.015 and taste it. Once I get it where I like it I'll keg it and cold crash it. I'm thinking that might slow down the fermentation enough for me to share it with friends and family for the holiday.

Here's some good reading on the subject.

Juice, yeast and sugar experiments...
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f32/results-juice-yeast-sugar-experiments-83060/

A thread giving nice overview of progressively more complex ways of making cider...
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f32/i-thought-i-would-share-some-info-139409/

Couple people stating how they do it...

http://www.brewingkb.com/brewing-cider/cider-campden-tablets-1622.html

So have you made cider?