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I decided to move the site to my own personal site. Please check here for updates.

Filed under: Uncategorized

Terrapin Rye Ale Clone Brew Day

I brewed up the Terrapin Rye Ale Clone recipe I got from Can You Brew it podcast. The brew day went well. I decided to heat up both my strike water and sparge water at the same time, and just use a pitcher to move the water over. This worked really well and I’ll keep doing this until I eventually get a dedicated HLT. I ended up getting only 71% efficiency, but that was because I ended up with more than 5 gallons in the fermenter.

When I was brewing, my sight glass and ball valve I purchased from Bargain Fittings arrived. I put in the order Thursday and was shipped yesterday, and arrived today. USPS Priority Service is great! The sight glass will be great. I can’t wait to get it installed and brew again! Next time I promise to take some pictures.

Filed under: brew day

SNPA Gravity Reading update.

Took a gravity reading of my SNPA clone last night. Turned out to be 1.013.

That’s 5.5% ABV with 75% attenuation. That’s about what I expected to get from WLP001 since White Labs posts a 73-80% attenuation range.

Planning on kegging and dry hopping with about .8 oz of Cascade hops in the next couple of days to prepare the fermenter for the brew I’m planning on brewing this Saturday; a Terrapin Rye Pal Ale clone recipe. Should be tasty.

Filed under: Uncategorized, American Pale Ale, Clone, Gravity Reading, SNPA

Assistant brewer for a day.

On Saturday I helped out a fellow Tucsonan and HBT member brew a couple batches. We used my 10 gallon Rubber maid cooler as the mash tun, since he typically uses his 10g Blichmann  Boilmaker as his MLT and Boil kettle. The logistics of brewing two beers on the same day in a limited time frame, and limited equipment took it’s toll. I’m glad I wasn’t doing it alone!

Our first brew was a spin off of Saccharomyces’ Belgian Pale Ale. We mashed for about 45 minutes, then started recirculating with a march pump for about 15 minutes. This got the wort crystal clear. We then had to wait for the strike water and sparge water to heat up before getting the wort in the kettle. Even though we had a pump, we still ended up doing heavy lifting since it was just faster. This batch ended up at 76% efficiency, just above the 75% target. I had a hard time believing this since the grains were milled at the local homebrew shop (which gave me 68% efficiency on my first AG brew), but Aaron said he adjusted the mill to 0.030 inches. The crush looks similar to that of what I get from a friends Barley Crusher set at the default 0.039 inches. I think the mill over at Brew Your Own Brew is a little worn.

The second brew was an attempt to clone Red Chair NWPA from Deschutes. I must say this is one tasty beer. Very hop forward with a great Cascade nose and tons of hop flavor with a great malt characteristic. You can really tell they did a lot of late boil hop additions. This mash was a less than optimal. I had to leave about 30 minutes into the mash. We quickly recirculated for 5 minutes then fly sparged, collecting the wort in another container.  I heard that this batch ended up at 1.043 OG which is 55% efficiency. I guess that goes to show that a longer mash yields higher efficiency.

My Thermapen was a hit on this brewday. It displayed accurate temps at blazing speed. I highly recommend it. Here’s how to a Thermapen for 10% off. kingarthurflour.com always seems to have a 10% off coupon that you can find at retailmenot.com. It made such an impact that Aaron ordered one there on the spot.

Overall a very enjoyable experience and not as stressful as when you’re the brewer! I would gladly be an assistant brewer again.

Filed under: brew day, assistant brewer, Belgian pale Ale, brew day, Red Chair Northwest Pale Ale, Therampen

Tucson Homebrew Club meeting #2

I attended my second THC meeting last night. The topic was water chemistry. A pretty tough topic to talk about. Especially since it was not narrowed down in anyway. The speaker covered the different ions that contribute to the beer taste and yeast health. However, this was just a very brief overview. What did pique people’s interest though was how to adjust our local water to suite our the style that we are brewing.

They talked about the Chloride (CL) to Sulfate (SO4) ratio particularly. We sampled several beers that should have different CL:SO4 ratios that should extenuate the different malty to bittering flavors. These were Krušovice Imperial (Czech Pilsener), Left Hand Polestar Pilsner (German Pilsener), and Fullers ESB (Extra Special / Strong Bitter (ESB). Probably one more, but I can’t remember. As they talked about the BJCP style guidlines for each style, you can clearly tell how this ion ratio is affecting each beer fairly well.

This was just a small overview on water chemistry and further reading is needed. I would recommend Chapter 15 of John Palmers “How to Brew” and the four part podcast on the Brewing Network (1, 2, 3, 4).

As how this all relates to me: I’m currently at the point of just trying to dial my all grain process to hit my efficiency, mash temperature, and specific gravity. So, I’m not too overly concerned with the water profile. I know that to make GREAT beer, the water profile has to be taken into consideration. I’m purposefully avoiding most of it for now. However, as I intend on competing at some point in the future, I will begin working it into my brewing.

Filed under: THC, Chemistry, THC, Tucson Homebrew Club, Water

Sierra Nevada Pale Ale Clone brew day.

Yesterday, I brewed a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale clone recipe that I compiled after looking around at the other recipes I found online. The very simple grain bill and clean fermenting yeast should bring out the flavor and aroma of the hops.  I also used the First Wort Hop method with this beer. Employing this technique should further improve upon the hop aroma and flavor, as well as extracting a few more IBUs.

The brew day was far from easy. A fellow Homebrew Talk member gave me a new burner stand to stabilize my new keggle. The only problem with that was that the paint caught on fire and left of horrible fumes, smoke and smell. I spent several hours sanding away as much paint as I could off the bottom of my kettle and from the burner stand. I didn’t get to start brewing until about 4pm. I didn’t even bother with taking any pictures of my new brew space either. I was just frustrated with the whole situation and just wanted to get it done. I finished cleaning everything up around 10:30 pm.

Filed under: brew day, American Pale Ale, brew day

It’s been one year…

I’m putting this blog together to chronicle my adventures in home brewing. It’s been one year since I received a beer making equipment kit from my wife as a Christmas present. Since then I brewed four 5 gallon partial boil extract kits (Holiday Ale, Irish Stout, Best Bitter and an American Ale) and two 3.5 gallon all grain batches (quantity limited to 20 qt stock pot) totaling 27 gallons brewed to date.

As 2010 is only days away, I thought starting a blog would be the perfect way to share my progress.

Cheers!

Filed under: Misc.