Nov 2010 stout, Wheat brew

stoutmakerLeave a comment
11-4-10
Cracked a bottle of the American stout. Holy mother of Zeus, is this good. Best beer by far I have ever made. Its only been bottled like 2 weeks, so its real young with this many hops and low carbed but lord is it good.
I do not see any reason at all to change anything with this recipie. needs a name though.
Dead Horse Stout? Dead Horse Ale? Abyss?
have to think about it.

11-13-10
Kefgged the Crop circles. Seems pretty good

11-15-10
Brew day
American wheat 11-15-10
4 lbs wheat malt
5 lbs pale two row

1/3 oz amarillo hops 60
1/3 oz cascade 60

1/3 amarillo 15
1/3 cascade 15

1/3 amarillo 1
1/3 cascade 1

US-05 yeast

40 degrees outside
heating 3.5 gal water to 162 (only have 9 lbs grain this time) 1/2 campden tab

way under shot temp got 143 boiling that last .5 gall to raise
ok that raised the temp to 151 and I’m gonna say good. Mashing for 60

heat 3.5 gall sparge water. the other half of tablet. (start at the 1/2 hr mark so its ready)
first runnings-3 gallons
second-3 gallons

pretty cloudy.
6 gallon start, 60 min boil left 4.5 gallons. more evap than usual. did not top up.

OG .044
FG .006
—————————————————–
noticed that I will need to start warming the mashtun for winter. Temps were way off
The dryer winter air is really makeing the evaporation more. lost 1.5 gallons when normally only 1

Oct 2010 dark cider, Staghorn, Crop circles2

stoutmakerLeave a comment
10-01-10
Bottled the DARK CIDER yesterday. couple things with this.
1- I was sorta expecting to have a different tase to this than just cider. I guess that happened, but you really , and I mean really need to be in there looking for them.
2- its way better than any cider I have made before. Its more appley and a better mouthfeel than the normal thin cider.
3- its more sweet than I thought it should be, but I didnt use champange yeast or US -05 like normal, the yeast cake was from a stout with Windsor yeast. that may have been a part of it
4- I do not see how this will improve with age,, its great right now, right out of the fermenter.

I did not prime this batch as it tastes to great to mess with
I am delclaring this a success and procede with batch 2 but maybe add some black patent to it.

****review****
10-04-10 New Glarus Brewing co.
Staghorn Octoberfest.- By the lable I guess its supposed to be a Red. yep I’d call it red. Almost no head what so ever. And little if any smell to it, something there though. like watered down bread maybe.
Uh oh its got that “organic” taste to it. I dont know what it is,, but every organic beer I’ve ever had has this one taste to it. lemme look at the bottle. well it doesnt say nothing about organic on it

Thin. really need to look hard to find tastes. not much flavor of anykind. like budlight with a bit of crystal 60 added to it.
Maybe I have a cold or something, but I am getting no taste and no smells from this at all.

Must be high alc though as I can feel it on the tongue. I’m not sure flat is the correct term here,, but the carbonation seems fairly low,
Even after all of that I still kinda like it,, but will reserve my rating for another day to see if I can taste or smell it.

10-19-10 Crop circles2
kinda cool out here to day low 50s.

strike water to 160. try to get a mash of 148-151
4 gallons strike.
160 was just a smidge to low I got about 145 coulda left it, but added a bit more boiling water ended at 152. pretty thin though.
collected 3 gall from first
3 gallon of sparge water to 170

1 oz of saaz hops split into 3 piles
1-60
1-15
1-0
at the 15 also put in irish moss. this stuff is so light you really need to clear it.

everything went good.
watched hitchcocks the lady vanishes, listen to ACDC Highwayto hell
**update**12-15-10 that kinda coconut taste that I keep getting inthis batch and the last batch i found out is yeast. the guys from the club think this recipie has to much rice and corn for the barley to convert. gonna try and add some 6 row to it next time. for what ever reason i did not starch test these batches.
**update** 2 1-8-11 I found some baltica brewing lager. a nice 8% beer that tastes exactly the same as my beer. exactly. same thickness, same slight haze same coconut taste same color. I am going to start litigation right now. hah. but i wonder if my beer is really a fault then? after all it did ferment down to 1.010 from around 1.052ish. so something had to convert. still gonna 6 row it.

Sept 2010 cider, Stout

stoutmakerLeave a comment
9-11-10
yep 911
I decided to keg up the stout today. I was going to bottle, but I just didnt feel like it.
I again was surprised at how cloudy even a black stout is. I know this was the yeast that I stirred up when I jammed the siphon rig down the bucket.
I need to find a clip or something to keep it off the bottom so I dont get this everytime.
And I was also surprised to see how little yeast trub was there. I was thinking there should be the normal inch on the bottom, especially since I used two packets of yeast. The first packet (Nottingham didnt fire again so had to re-pitch). There was just barely a 1/2 inch.
Just realised that I forgot to take a hydrometer reading. hmm damn.

***UPDATE*** 5-11-11 just opened one of these babies. And as I had mention before these are just plain cloudy. Black, but looks like mud pouring out. After 8 months i dont think they will settle out. No where near any roasty, way over carbbed. Need to leave out the 120L i think.

Dark cider
Oh well. back to the stout kegg
So after I siphoned off, I swirled up the rest ofthe yeast and what beer was left and I pumped about 5-6 good squirts of the yeast slurry into my 3 gallon carboy. I then dumped 2 gallons of apple cider on it.
That was 4 hours ago. right now its chugging so hard I may have to get the blow off tube.
I dont know what the yeast from a stout will do to cider but juice is cheap this time of year.

Started to pick up a few items here and there for the next batch. Gonna be an Imperial Stout. gonna have to be a partial mash because my tun aint big enough. maybe even a double tun. 1 for the mashables and one just for the adjuncts. I can fit 4 lbs in my small one. The roast barley and crystals and black can go steep away in there that way I can mash about 11 lbs in the big one.
I have been tasting quite a few and the ones that seem to taste like cascades are what I’m starting to like. so gonna take a look that way I guess.

9-25-10
Stout day. Cooked up an American stout based on the sierra nevada stout.
Black Feather Stout
I had a can of golden extract so, this is gonna be a partial mash.
– 1 can extract light
– 5 lbs pale malt
– 3 lbs munich
– 1 lb black patent
– .75 60L
– .25 roasted barley this was just to fill er up to 10 lbs of grain

1 oz magnum hops 60 min
1 oz cascade hops 15 min
1 oz willamette hops 5 min

Strike water to 165 to settle to mash at 152 for 60 min collected exactly 3 gall
sparge 170 3.5 gallon collected 3 gallons.
didnt seem to lose to much during boil ended up with 5 gallons.
used irish moss for the first time at 15 min.
Used us 05 yeast. Its 65 in basement.

9-26-10 checked on the stout and its chugging pretty good. hot as hard as I was expecting but it is sitting on the cement floor keeping it cooler.