5-12-11 stout, Steam

stoutmakerLeave a comment
Took this week off in order to do some brewing and actuially did quite a bit.

5-10-11
BREW DAY
Fogger stout-Dry stout

6 lbs maris otter
2 lbs flaked barley
1 lbs roasted barley
1.5 oz cluster hops @ 60 min
windsor yeast

First time brewing with a program. gonna use brew pal for the IPOD. but still dont trust these things so will use my better judgement when in doubt.

its 68 in the garage. prog says 2.8 gallons at 165 of water to mash at 152. thats seems high to me, I will use 3 gallons at 162. with my preheated tun it would have over shot. But I will keep some hot water ready just in case.

I win! Mashed in with 162 water and settled out at 153 about 1 min stir to get to 152.
Mash is pretty thick.
gonna sparge with 4.5 gallons 168 prog says 5.25.
I gonna get somehwere in the rangle of 2.25 to 2.5 gallons from first running and almost all of the 4.5 gallons back so thats almost 7 gallons to boil.
seems like I’m forgetting something.
full conversion
came up a little short on the first running. 2 gallons. can only fit about 4 gallons of water for second sparge. might have to top off with the rest of the hot sparge water.
She is black as night already.
wow, only got 3 gallons on second sparge. gonna need that last 1 gallon i kept ready.
I wonder if that flaked barley soaks up more?
ok starting boil at 6.5 gallon.
One of those days where its not getting much boil off

OG 1.046
Pretty tired of this Brewpal app. It crashes every 2 minutes. sucks. Just got the ibrewer app and so far it rocks.
5-12-11 – the Fogger Stout was really churning up yesterday, but looks like its pretty much done today.
Seems fairly odd for Windsor yeast. Doesnt look as black as i was expecting. But gotta let everything drop out first.

Got a Bonus today! a keg that I thought was StarSan was actually a ¼ keg of Old Republic Brown.

Today is also brew day again. We are going to try a new recipe this time. a California Steam beer.
Zerg Rush Steamroller-
8 ½ lbs 2 row
1 ½ lbs crystal 60L

1 oz northernbrewer @60
½ oz northernbrewer @15
½ oz northernbrewer @5
1 oz northernbrewer @ 0

s-23 yeast mash @ 150
well missed low again added a bit of boiling and the over shot to 154. but we are going to leave it.
getting 3 gallons first sparge.
Added 4 gallons of 170 water. and collected 3.5 more.
Boiled 60 and flollowed the above hops schedule.
pitched 1 pkt of safale S23 lager.


Had a couple of guest brewers from the Rackers show up to brew. Tim brought his system and brewed a Dos Equis clone. Bryan, and Al showed up to help and suck beers!

Apr 2011 Titletown Open

stoutmakerLeave a comment
4-7-11
MY HOPS ARE UP

cream ale is still bubbling. didnt think it would go this long being .040

4-18-11 quite a few things.
First. finally kegged the cream ale finished out at .006 is cleared pretty good but had a way to go. Has a slight slight taste reminesint to the cream of three. Must be the rice. good beer so far.

The Duck Creek Pale is finally coming around. Is just what I wanted. And not changing anything. and will call this recipe FINISHED. The entire keg is gone. have 3 bottle for the Open, and maybe the other ones left.

On to the English Brown. at first I thought it was thin. but after another week in the bottle I am changing my mind, maybe in another week it will be better yet.
I thought it was too light, but its is a nice nice brown in a glass.
but the taste is missing the points that i was looking for. needs more bready type flavor. its good as is, but not what I wanted. will try more busuit malt next time. maybe slightly more choc

4-30-11

Well the 2011 Titletown Open homebrew competition was this week end. of course at the Titletown brewing Co. It is put on by the Green Bay Rackers. I was steward for all three rounds. I love stewarding. You hear so much stuff about what beers should or shouldnt be, and what and what not to do to your beers.

This year I entered 3 beers. An American Pale Ale, an American Stout, and an English Mild.

The Pale ale didnt fair so well. Dont get me wrong here, its a great beer,, but not for the category. I made this one for me. I dont like bitter hopped beers so I moved most of the additions to the last 10 and 1 minutes. I got all kinds of flavors and aromas, just not bitter. Exactly the way I wanted it.

The American Stout was brewed specifically for this competition. I wanted something that I knew would be in style. I came up a bit short with this one took a second in the style. But fantastic because this is my first win of any kind!

The Mild, was actually not even going to go into the contest, because two people that tried it hated it. Albeit neither of them like beer in the first place… but I liked it so i put it in just to see what it would get since I had just made it, and the recipe was made on the fly as i was in the homebrew store. Well it ended up taking first in its category, and Best of Show!

It was the only Mild entered so I kinda knew it was mine the whole time. My god is it rough sitting there listening to the judges go thru there paces with the finals. Like someone mentioned, we should have videod (sp?) the table talk of the finals. so interesting how they bat everything back and forth trying to come to a decision. The good points, the bad points, their immpression of intent and interpretation on t he guidelines. just an amazing process.

All In all I am extremely happy with the results. Every brewer in the contest is a great brewer, and I’m glad I could compete with them.

Back to brewing. Summer beers are up next.


So, I need to name it…
**Officially named the mild… Old Republic Brown

March 2011, Pale, Mild and Cream ale

stoutmakerLeave a comment
3-5-11
First beer brew of the year. doing my Duck creek pale. the summit hopped one. 26 degrees in the garage.

9.5 pale 2row
1 lbs 40L
.5 summit @60
.25 summit @15
.5 cascade @ 5
.25 summit @5
.5 cascade @ flame out
US 05 yeast.

Mashing @ 154. 60 min with 4 gallons. Strike water was 165. mash seems a bit thin
got 3 gallons first sparge.
3.5 gall sparge water at 165. got just over 3 gall in second sparge. Grains really pack tight during sparge,, but did NOT get a stuck.
Really looks dark for only having 40L

3-9-11
I just noticed that I didnt use any irish moss. and its sure is cloudy,, but the kind of cloudy that I think will clear.
Is really churning away right now. temp is steady at 62. I must have had a huge boil off because I think I’m looking at no more than 4 ½ gall in fermentor. Readying recipe for this weekends brew. its gonna be a brown,, trying to determine if will be english or American,, Gonna pick up some Moose drool to sample,,

3-13-11
English brown.
7.5 maris otter
.25 chocolate
.25 Special B
.25 Buscuit
.25 special roast
1 oz fuggles @ 60
used widsor yeast

This was a rush job. Sunday night.. forgot I had bought the stuff. but it went well.
Mashed at 154. I used just over 3 gallons of 165 water. ( thought it was going to be a lot lower mash because I had left the grains in the car so temps were probably in the 30’s)
Really had a hard time sparging. partial stuck mash over and over. even added more hot water to thin it out but didnt work.
But got everything to go after a while. While the mash was 154,, the wert seemed really thick. even after the boil it seemed thick. Which I think is ok.
60 min boil and into fermenter. pitched yeast and into the box.

3-14-11
checked up on the brown and it is bubling nicely. deep dark brown,, looks fairly clear. appears normal.
Right next to it is last weeks APA. appears to be done fermenting, and is has cleared alot. lots of fallout.
Just realised that I have not taked any OG readings on either of these.
Gonna let the APA sit tilll next week and then keg/bottle.

3-18-11
took a look this morning and everything looks good. The APA is clearing nicely and am probably gonna get it into a keg this weekend, and also bottle a 6er of it for the Open. Still about 6 weeks off so should be long enough to carb and clear.
The Brown appears to be done fermenting. Was very close to blowing over but stopped just short.

3-26-11 the duck creek pale was kegged last week and has been sitting at prime pressure since. Taking first pull off it now.
slight haze, but i know i forgot the irish moss but it looks like the kind of haze that will clear with age.
After running the first pint of yeast off the smell of grapefruit has filled the room.
taste is a that bitter cascade, but not sharp on the tounge (just what I was trying to get by moving most of the hops additions to end of boil) and a big big grapefruit taste.. But is less sweeter than I was looking for. not dry (again i forgot to take readings) but tastes very green yet. I think time will make this better. as it sits i give it a 8 on my scale of 10.

3-26-11 Also kegged up the brown ale but I am not so sure thats what i got.
Everything about this beer is exactly what I was looking for. (as far as I can tell while uncarbbed)
except i minor thing.. Its not brown. and i dont think its even close to brown. Dark golden maybe. how the hell can it go from really brown to not at all brown in a week? I even checked the name to make sure i had the right beer.. weird. ah well, I’ll take another look at it when its carbbed up..

3-30-11
starting to heat sparge water for a cream ale
its 40 degree out sunny no wind. movie while brewing GI Joe rise of t he Cobra

here is what I came up with
7 lbs 2 row
.5 lbs vienna
1 -14oz box of minute rice
.5 lbs 20L
1 oz cluster hops (divided in to 1/3s 1 @ 60, 1 @ 20, 1 @ 1
US05 yeast
doughed in 3 gallons at 158 to get a mash temp of hopefully 150
and missed it. 145,, gonna add a bit of boiling to bring it up about half gallon
150 it is
90 min mash because of the rice but was converted at 60
got 2 gallons first wort,, second sparge water is 4 gallons useing 3 gallons of it rest use to make boil volume. got about 6.5 gallon total for boil

everything normal,, 60 min boil. heavier than normal boil looks like.
OG 1.040
looks like wads of white glops all over fom the rice.

3-31-11

gonna rack and bottle the mead tonight or tomorrow. cant wait to see how this is. Got enought for a 3 gallon batch just a waiting for the signal.