Like a broken record, I prepared bottles, again.
Had to take care of my least favorite homebrew chore again today; de-label, clean, rinse, and sanitize bottles. The only good side to this is that there will soon be another batch bottled, hopefully this week. This time it will be the Dubbel. This also reinforced why I’ve got to get on top of kegging, one big “bottle” to deal with instead of 50 small ones.
No not bOObs, Bourbon Oaked Oatmeal Stout, and I just enjoyed the last one.
I wanted something different to drink but not too fancy, so I poked around in the cellar to see what I could enjoy but not miss per say. What I came up with was one of my homebrews from the Oatmeal Stout Experiment from February/March of ’07. It was the Bourbon Oaked Oatmeal Stout and it was creamy and mellow and delicious. I did not pick up on any negative affects in flavor (such as spoilage or oxidation), though I did think that both the bourbon and oak flavors had mellowed. I still have two beers left from this batch, two Coffee Oatmeal Stouts (breakfast stouts) that I plan on sharing with Heather K. sometime soon. I think I should do another five way split this year, any suggestions? Different dry-hops, different yeast strains?
So yesterday Karen and I bottled the Vader (Imperial Stout) and the Tripel (no name yet 😳 ).
Bottling is soooo much better with two people; an extra set of hands, someone to talk with, someone to help, it’s nice. So we bottled the Vader and the Tripel yesterday, two big beers that I’m (so far) quite proud of. I pulled off a tulip of each beer to sample. Both beers, IMHO, are delicious. The Tripel (according to Karen) is “sproink!” and very Belgiany, I liked it. And the Vader is chewy, sweet, chocolately, velvety, – very lushy. Hopefully these same attributes will carry over to the finished versions.
I not only tried a new technique (well, not new new but new enough to not be 100% comfortable with), but I tried two new techniques. First, since it seems to have been working better than my original style, I have been running the CO2 calculations through the ProMash calculator to calculate the amount of priming sugar I need. Originally I used 4oz of corn sugar in all my beers regardless of style, fermentation temperatur, or desired amount of CO2 level. Now I run it through the program based on like four different variables to get a number. To show you how varied it can be, I believe the Vader was 3.5oz of corn sugar while the Tripel was 6oz, I sure hope those bottles hold up. And for the second new technique I added bottling yeast to both batches! This is the one that really has me crossing my fingers. This is how it theoretically goes to me; these two beers are 9%+ alcohol and have been in secondary fermenters for 3+ months, there isn’t much viable yeast left to do the job of carbonating the beer (ala Gnarleywine style). So, I add the measured amount of corn sugar, and a measured amount of rehydrated dry neutral yeast to the bottling bucket and theoretically we now have lots of viable yeast ready to eat this fresh convenient source of food making my beers have the appropriate level of carbonation. The plus is nicely fermented beer. The minus is possibly hazier beer or worse over-carbonated beers or worse bottle-bombs! Keep your fingers crossed.
Anyone have any suggestions for a name for the Tripel? So far Skywalker and Mackass have been suggested. I am still open to names. Come on, make a suggestion, then you can take credit for it. Whatever . . .
So I made a step in the right direction to move from bottling to kegging, I bought my first batch of kegs.
A fellow BeerAdvocate I met at Guy’s house during his stout tasting was Aaron (leftmindedrighty). He lives in the Philadelphia area and works part time at the local homebrew store by him Keystone Homebrew Supply. We were talking about kegs and he said he could always get them through Keystone. He mentioned a fair price so I asked him to pick me up four. So yesterday at the Drafting Room we made the exchange. I can’t wait to play with these guys. I think the Abbey Ale and RYPA will be the first two in kegs.
OK, it’s actually 96 bottles, but who’s counting?
Tonight I played my favorite homebrew game: de-label, clean, rinse, sanitize, and cover bottles in preparation of bottling – yeah! Actually, I got lucky, out of the 96 bottles only 12 needed to be de-labeled. Other than that it was really just going through the motions. Oh yeah, don’t you hate it when you become “smart” after years of being “stupid”? Actually, I guess it has only been a year, since we’ve been in the new house, but I figured out a way tonight to save myself some back-breaking work. Typically I would fill my coolers for soaking and stuff on the floor which meant at some point the coolers full of liquid (10-12 gallons / 80-96 pounds) had to be lifted and moved to be drained. Instead this time I set up my coolers on stools (about three feet high) and was able to just hook up a hose to the valve and open it to let gravity drain the liquid except for maybe the last two gallons. I am so smart, S-M-R-T! Anyway, it just made too much sense after I did it.
I’m pretty sure these bottles will be used this weekend to bottle the Vader and the Tripel.
Well, I guess the expired tube of yeast I used with the RYPA was a non-issue.
Geez, this was a two month expired tube of White Labs California Ale yeast 001, looks to be doing just fine. Actually, I have never seen this yeast blow-up like in this picture, normally it is a much more mellow yeast. I wonder if the rye would have anything to do with it…?
I also just realized that I am basically maxed out right now. I have four beers in secondary fermenters and one beer in primary (still one empty carboy), and I used my last carboy stopper with the RYPA. So technically I could still brew one more and just not put a stopper in the top of the carboy, use a blow-off tube or something. But hopefully I’ll have two or three of the batches bottles by the 13th of January which should be the next brew day with my brother doing the long anticipated Uncle Tupelo Honey Stout, which would be ready in time for St. Patrick’s Day (already!). We’ll see …
Looks like I just brewed the last beer for 2007, a Rye IPA or RYPA. It’s been a good year beer-wise, actually just based on number of batches (19 brewed, 25 total variations) it has been the best year yet!
Today was a pretty good brew day, five hours and fifteen minutes and 87 songs on the iPod. It was the first time I have used rye, it was the first time I tried a new “filtering” technique, I didn’t run into any problems, I transfered the Abbey Ale, I got to re-sample this years Cider (still needs to come up on carbonation), and I was off from work today – not bad. With the ground water being as cold as it is now my chilling time has really been reduced and as long as I stay on top of the janitorial through out the day I have become pretty close to hitting five hour days recently, shweet.
I’ve been meaning to try a recipe with rye now for a while. I have judged a couple recently, all of them IPAs, and I thought that would be fun to try. I’ve heard horror stories about people using rye and having awful stuck mashes or that the grain is so oily (I saw no indication of this) that it destroys head retention. We’ll see. I thought the spent grains smelt of pancakes and the boiling wort smelt of maple syrup so who knows what flavors are going to emerge.
I’ve been trying to think of a way to filter my wort from the kettle before it reaches the carboy. The biggest issue I have is with my pellet hops, especially in a hoppy beer like an IPA. With whole leaf hops when used in conjunction with a false bottom they form their own filter bed and the wort runs very clear. With pellet hops they are broken up into iddy-biddy pieces and are very difficult to restrain. I used to use nylon bags to put the hops in but this lowers their effective rate – clearer wort but less efficient hop usage, more expensive plus it was never that clear. People have talked about using a stainless steel scrubby as a filter, but I have never been able to figure out a way to attach the scrubby to the back of the spigot. I use a Bazooka screen in my mash tun to filter the grain matter from the liquid, so recently I have been toying with the idea of buying one for the kettle and seeing how that works, but this hasn’t happened yet. So today I figured I give the scrubby method a shot. What I did to keep it in place instead of attaching it was to lower it down on the inside of the spigot post chilling the wort with my long stainless steel spoon and actually hold it in place with the spoon. I figured out a way to jam the spoon in between the lid, kettle wall, and wort chiller and it actually held itself. Surprisingly it seemed to work pretty well. Except for maybe the first and last quart or so it ran almost crystal clear and never seemed to slow or clog. I did lose some wort by using this method, about a half gallon, but I guess that would have been a pretty trubby half gallon anyway that would have basically fallen out of suspension. So it seems like a pretty neat idea that I will have to try again, though I still think I may order another Bazooka screen.
Oh yeah, the yeast seemed to be doing fine. I originally had a sanitized digital probe that I left in the starter to moderate the temperature. When ever it fell to low (60-62) I would soak the beaker in a hot bath to raise the temperature up higher (75ish) to help stimulate the yeast. I had to babysit it a little bit soaking it maybe three times over 36 hours, but appears as if it will be doing just fine. If I don’t see visual fermentation within 24 hours (longer than I am typically patient for) I will take out an insurance policy and dump a pack of neutral dry ale yeast into it too.
Nothing to special going on here, working on a heavily moderated yeast starter.
Heavily moderated? Why so you may ask, well the yeast is two months expired. I’m honestly not too worried that there will be some sort of action, I am more concerned just how much and when will it happen. I had bought this yeast and the WLP500 I’ve been using on the last three batches at the same time. I originally thought I was going to use this yeast. Well, things change and now is now. I plan on brewing a rye IPA in the next couple days dubbed the RYPA (stole that one from an idea from Jack Curtain suggested to Dock Street which was never used, so I am going to use it). Two pounds of rye, almost 15% of the grain bill, should definitely add a nice rye spice and maybe some slickness to the beer, plus Magnum and Willamette hops – nice!
This is a short Abbey Ale update. The picture and information are basically a week old. Not that long ago in the grand scheme of things, but long enough.
This beer blew a crazy long lasting thick chunky-monkey style kaursen. Partially it is because it is a third generation yeast that was used, partially because this yeast WLP550 blows big and fluffy anyway, and partially (in my opinion) because it is being fermented at slightly lower than optimal temperatures. I think the beer will turn out great, but I’ll suppose we’ll see in its own time. I plan on transferring it to a secondary fermenter sometime this week after Christmas.
Yesterday I brewed another Belgian-style beer, this time I am just calling it an “Abbey Ale” for now. Belgian-esque with no true BJCP guide to match it to. Hopefully reddish, spicy, and lower (6%) in alcohol then the other Belgian brews I’ve done.
Vader, Tripel, Dubbel, Abbey Ale
I’ve been on a Belgian beer kick recently which is humorous to me for a few reasons. One, I haven’t brewed any Belgian-style beers (not counting 2007) in years, and now three back-to-back. Two, often people choose to brew Belgian-style beers in the late spring and summer because the yeasts that are used are not as temperature sensitive as most yeasts and still work fine (some say better) with a warmer fermentation. Plus it often takes several months to age a Belgian-style beer before it is ready to be drunk, so if you brew in the Summer it would be aged properly by the Fall or Winter when you’d like to drink them. And three, I sort of brewed these “backwards”. I say that in the sense of I used the same yeast in all three batches (WLP550) and flipped the yeast from one batch to the next. Most times you would go from your weakest beer to your strongest beer alcohol wise, instead I did the opposite to help try and preserve the color of the Tripel. Knowing that the yeast will carry over a small amount of color from previous batches, and knowing that I really wanted my Tripel as light and golden as possible (though it looks reddish/amber above), I chose to start with the Tripel. I had debated doing the Abbey Ale next to avoid any color carry over from the Dubbel to the Abbey, but instead did the Dubbel second feeling as though the yeast would be more in shape to handle the Dubbel coming off of the Tripel. Dunno . . .
You figured I brewed the Tripel 10.20.07, the Dubbel 11.22.07, and the Abbey Ale (12.9.07) won’t be ready to transfer to secondary probably close to 12.23.07, so that is about two months that this yeast will have been “on beer” between these three beers. Hopefully that’ll mean that they are nice and strong and not weak and burnt-out. Hey, if the big guys can do it why can’t I?
