Brew Day

Brewed the "Celis White" clone recipe from "Beer Captured" . This is my second time brewing this particular recipe. This is an excellent gateway beer between the Bud/Miller/Crowd and craft beer. Nice belgian twang, nice malty beer. Last brew I used Wyeast 3463 Forbidden Fruit yeast and it was a little more estery than I cared for. This time I made a 2 liter starter using Wyeast 3944 Witbier yeast. This should produce the more banana and clove notes.

Started off the day with a Rogue Double Dead Guy Ale. I LOVE regular Dead Guy Ale. A very malty Maibock style beer. This is Dead Guy kicked up a notch! 9% ABV and even smoother than Dead Guy. Very malty, lots of bready and biscuity notes. Extremely smooth and no alcohol harshness.

Here is the recipe as brewed:

2l Wyeast 3944 starter.

25.43 l of filtered water (carbon block filter)

Steeped 4oz of Flaked Wheat and 4 oz Belgian Aromatic @ 155deg for 30 minutes

Brought to a boil

Added 10 drops of Foam Control, 1 tbl yeast nutrient, 3lbs light pilsen dry malt extract, .75 oz Willamette Hops

Boiled for 45 minutes

Added .5 oz Willamette Hops, .75 oz Bitter Belgian Orange Peel, 1tsp Crushed Coriander

Boiled for 10 minutes

Added 2 lbs Wheat Dry Malt Extract, .25 oz Cascade Hops

Boil for 5 minutes

Added .5 oz Bitter Belgian Orange Peel, 1tsp Crushed Coriander @ flameout

Chilled to 70 deg and transferred to carboy

Aerated w/O2 @ 2lpm for 60 seconds (LOVE that foam control). Most of the bubbles are Star San (don't fear the foam).

Pitched yeast @ about 70 degrees F.

OG 1.051

If you havent invested in a Bazooka T

invest in one. This is what gets left behind. Hop matter, hot break, and junk.

Brewing at RAM Brewing, Puyallup

I got a chance to brew my Strong Scotch Ale recipe with RAM Brewing for the Great American Brew Festival (GABF) Pro-Am competition.
We didn't win but we had a great time making this beer and had an even better time drinking it!

Here are some pics...



One VERY full mash tun


Clearing up nicely after Vorlauf




I was told that I hold the record for dirtiest batch of beer...this is AFTER cleaning!

Myself and brewer Jeff Byrne on release day of "Goat Roper" Strong Scotch Ale.

Year in Review

A quick rundown of beers I have brewed over the last year.

1. Milk of Amnesia Imperial Irish Stout. This is my uncle John Woodmansee's stout recipe. This beer will mess you up! Made with Coopers hopped stout kit, a ton of dark dry malt extract, and a few packs of dry yeast. I think this beer ended up around 7.5% abv and it had a lot more fermentable sugar left in it. This is beer is VERY sweet and very thick. I still like grabbing a pint from the garage from time to time.

2. Freedom Fighter Scotch Ale. This was purchased as a kit from NW Brewing Supply in Anacortes. This was a wee-heavy Extract Kit with some steeping grains and Oak Chips. Not a big fan of this beer. Pretty classic Wee-Heavy profile but the oak gave it a nasty taste to it. Still aging in my garage. Who knows, someday it might be ok... :)

3. Milk of Amnesia Imperial Irish Stout part II. Kept the prior recipe the same minus about 2.5 lbs of malt extract and pitched a big starter of Wyeast Irish Ale yeast. This fermented out MUCH cleaner and brought the alcohol up to 9% abv. Also re-pitched a pack of Irish Ale yeast a few days before bottling. This gave me much better carbonation.

4. Celis Whit Whitbier clone. Found this in "Beer Captured". This turned out VERY tasty though it came out totally crystal clear...none of the classic Witbier cloudiness. The yeast (Wyeast Forbidden Fruit) was a little estery for my taste. LOTS of clove and banana tones. I would do this with Wyeast Witbier yeast and I would add the wheat malt as a late addition.

5. Sam Adams Cream Stout clone. Also did this from "Beer Captured". Did not taste like Sam Adams but it made a great Cream Stout. Great balance of creamy mouthfeel and roasty stout. This keg did NOT last long at all.

6. B3 Stout. Purchased the B3 stout kit from Morebeer.com. This beer rocked! A crowd favorite. Very nice balance between and Dry Irish stout and a sweet stout. This recipe was perfect with two exceptions. Yeast starter needs to be 2l and may benefit from a cleaner yeast like Wyeast 1053 and it needs twice as much Maltodextrin.

7. Hard Cider. Fermented out 5 gallons of Cedardale Apple cider with Wyeast Cider Yeast. I could NOT get this to settle out. I transferred it to a secondary vessel, cold crashed it, added finings..nadda still very cloudy, finally stop caring about clarity. Turned out VERY dry so I added 1/2 a bottle of Wine Conditioner and bottle conditioned. It came out good, VERY fizzy like a champagne though. Ended up around 8% alcohol.

8. Cream Ale. Brewed this as a test batch for my sister's wedding before we found out that I couldn't serve home brewed beer there. Turned out like a classic yellow fizzy beer. I hated this stuff BUT people that like BUD/MILLER/COORS loved it. Very clean, crisp lawnmower beer. Sorry didn't beechwood age it :)

9. Dead Guy clone (Ninja Maibock). Bought the Brewcraft Dead Guy clone kit with VERY high hopes (I love Dead Guy Ale from Rogue). I cultured some of Rogue's "PacMan" yeast but pulling yeast from a bottle of "Shakespeare Stout". After completion this beer fermented out a bit too much. I ended up with a 9% abv water...almost no taste at all! I tried this again after about 3-4 months in the keg and it is much better. Some sweet Maibock profile, no alcohol taste. This beer put me on my lips! You can drink pint after pint then it sneaks up and snaps your neck (hence the name Ninja Maibock).

10. American IPA. Brewed this from "Brewing Classic Styles". This beer was incredible. Easy drinking IPA. The only change I would make would be a piney-er or more resin-ey hop profile like Stone IPA butVERY clean and drinkable.

11. Strong Scotch Ale. Based this off of a More Beer kit. This turned out VERY clean and drinkable. Took 1st at the Puget Sound Pro-Am. Went on to brew this at RAM Brewing in Puyallup and is now named Goat Roper Scotch Ale and is being served on tap in Puyallup.

12. Stout. Made a version of the B3 stout for friends 21st b-day. Added 2X the maltodextrin of the original recipe and used Wyeast 1056. This was VERY clean beer and served very well at the party.

12. Pale Honey Stout. Based off of More Beer kit. Mix of Honey Pale Ale and B3 Stout. This stout is great. Nice low-alcohol session beer. Thinking about adding coffee to this to kick it up a bit.

13. Blackened Brutal Bitter. Purchased the Rogue Blackened Brutal Bitter kit from More Beer. This beer is terrific. Nice roasty profile but with the finish of an IPA.

Tips from the trenches

Since starting to brew a year ago I have spend countless hours reading about brewing, listening to people talking about brewing, and of course brewing!
This is a brief compilation of lessons learned over my first year cutting my teeth in this hobby (not in any particular order).

1. Understanding the process. I started out by reading Charlie Papazian's "The New Complete Joy of Homebrewing". This book does an excellent job of breaking down the brewing process, ingredients, etc. Another must read title is John Palmer's "How to Brew". Palmer has excellent info, this book will push your brewing to a whole new level.

2.No matter how bad you screw up it will usually end up being beer, or vinegar, or bad wine. So don't worry, just brew something!

3. SANITATION SANITATION SANITATION!! Brewers are just janitors who can cook :). Keep things clean, especially things coming into contact with unfermented beer. Nothing gets uglier quicker than nasties in your unfermented wort. Also stay away from Bleach as a sanitizer. Stick with Star San (my first choice) and Iodophors (my second choice).

4. Yeast. Yeast is an incredibly important and often overlooked ingredient. All yeasts are not created equal. Buy good quality liquid yeast and grow nice, big, healthy starters. You will notice such an improvement in you beer once you start using the appropriate yeast and you start pitching big healthy starters.

5. Extract Brewing. No matter what some brewers will tell you, Extract Brewing is NOT the devil. I have made lots of REAL good extract beer, good enough to win awards up against all-grain brews. Refine your brewing process, use fresh ingredients, keep everything clean, use lots of healthy yeast...that is what matters. That being said, all-grain brewing is the ultimate way to take control of your brewing. Don't let anyone tell you that Extract Brewing isn't real brewing.

6. Podcasts. Listen to the Brewing Network's podcast's. The Sunday Session, the Jamil Show, Brew Strong and the "Other" show are a wealth of information. They will also make your spouse homicidal if you make them listen to it in the car on road trips.

7. Kegs. Get away from bottling. I have found peace and inner happiness by not bottling for hours on end! Kegging is one of the best things that will happen to your beer and to your sanity. Transferring 5 gallons of fresh beer into bottles is time consuming and exposes your beer to oxygen...no bueno! Being able to completely control the carbonation, dry hopping in kegs, addition of additives like coffee...all things that are made easy by kegging. It is something that everyone puts off because of the expense and then immediately wishes they would have done it months or years ago. I now bottle for competitions or for friends and there is a VERY simple way to do this straight off the keg and without buying a counter-pressure filler...keep watching the blog and I will show you how to do it in the near future.

8. Enter a competition! If you have any interest in refining and perfecting your recipes, entering a competition is the way to do that. Your friends will chug your beer all day and blow sunshine up your ass about how awesome your beer is..mainly because it is free and cold! Not to say that I blame them. If you truly want un-biased objective feedback on your beer enter a comp. It usually costs only a few dollars and it can help you detect fix flaws in your beer.

9. Monitor your gravity. THIS is how you know when your beer is finished. Disregard the airlock or the instructions on your beer about leaving it in the fermenter for X amount of weeks. Take gravity readings throughout your brewing process. Once you see that gravity number stabilize (this will be different for every batch of beer) and level off you are done.

10. Brew Something. There is no better learning tool than trial and error. Brew and brew often. you can read all the book you want but this is where the rubber meets the road. Pay attention to your process and sanitation and get brewing!

11. Fermentation. Process of transferring all of your beer into a secondary fermentation vessel is normally totally unnecessary and potentially damaging to your beer. Unless there is a compelling reason (aging, clarification, etc.) leave your beer in a single fermentation vessel until you bottle or keg the beer.

Brew Strong!!

Joel

New Blog

There is nothing quite like that new blog smell! Fresh out of the wrapper!
My name is Joel Pratt and I am a homebrewer and beer lover. I started homebrewing in August of 2007 and I have been hooked since!
This blog is meant to share my experiences as a beginning brewer, tips and tricks that I think are worth passing on, and beer information.
There are THOUSANDS of beer and brewing blogs out there...and mine is no different.
So enjoy and I hope this will help new brewers and beer geeks to explore their passion.

Joel Pratt