School me on home brewing

[stm25rs]

I had my first bottle of my Saison du Vin yesterday, and it was amazing. Best beer I've made so far by a longshot, and good motivation to keep brewing. The other beers I've made so far have all been good, but never great.

 

It was Northern Brewer's Antithesis kit, only change I made to the recipe was to do half the LME at 60 min, and half at 30 min.

 

4 weeks in primary, 2 weeks in the bottle. I'm going to try to wait another week before drinking another, although I can't imagine this beer becoming any more delicious.

 

One of my roommates really likes Boulevard's Tank 7 - he was drinking one last night while I was trying my Saison. The colors were a dead on match for each other.

 

SPECIALTY GRAIN

- 1 lb Belgian Caramel Pils

FERMENTABLES

- 3 lbs Pilsen LME (60 min)

- 3 lbs Pilsen LME (30 min)

- 46 fl oz Alexander's Sauvignon Blanc grape juice late

addition (0 min)

HOPS & FLAVORINGS

- 0.50 oz NZ Nelson Sauvin Hops (60 min)

- 1.50 oz NZ Nelson Sauvin Hops (20 min)

YEAST

- DRY YEAST : Danstar Belle Saison Ale Yeast.

[stm25rs]

Sorry for the post whoring, but you guys are being slow.

 

I went to happy hour with my roommate and some of his coworkers, one of whom is a homebrewer, so we were talking about fall seasonals. He recommended using some "graham cracker extract" for pumpkin ales, you put it in post-fermentation, just a few drops for a batch.

 

Has anybody else used that stuff?

 

I want to brew a pumpkin ale this weekend. He, and people online, have recommended adding extra canned pumpkin+brown sugar, ideally roasting the pumpkin and brown sugar together.

 

Thoughts on pumpkin ales?

[SneakyFast]

I've never been a fan of pumpkin beers so I've never brewed one. I've read that canned pumpkin can get pretty sticky in the mash. I've also read that you don't really need to even use pumpkin as the spice additions pretty much cover it up anyway. GL with the beer.

[seabass07]

If you use enough pumpkin to taste it, your mash will be as thick as pumpkin pie.

[HipsterDoofus]

Sorry for the post whoring, but you guys are being slow.

 

I went to happy hour with my roommate and some of his coworkers, one of whom is a homebrewer, so we were talking about fall seasonals. He recommended using some "graham cracker extract" for pumpkin ales, you put it in post-fermentation, just a few drops for a batch.

 

Has anybody else used that stuff?

 

I want to brew a pumpkin ale this weekend. He, and people online, have recommended adding extra canned pumpkin+brown sugar, ideally roasting the pumpkin and brown sugar together.

 

Thoughts on pumpkin ales?

 

Sparge through the roasted pumpkin. Pumpkin in itself isnt really the flavor you get in the beer anyways. If you add it to the mash, youre going to have a bad time.

[stm25rs]

I'm just a lowly extract brewer. I've been doing some more research, and agree with the above, using real/canned pumpkin seems pretty pointless, other than for bragging rights.

 

Now I'm thinking maybe along the lines of a pumpkin spiced porter, something a little different than a standard pumpkin ale.

[seabass07]

Ferment in a pumpkin. Go big or go home.

[jayway]

Damn it! I got second in a contest my hb shop put on and the winner gets to co brew a 5 bbl batch of his recipe at Jack Russell Brewery that they distribute. Argh so close!

[stm25rs]

Damn it! I got second in a contest my hb shop put on and the winner gets to co brew a 5 bbl batch of his recipe at Jack Russell Brewery that they distribute. Argh so close!

 

I just registered for the homebrew competition at the Maryland Microbrewery Festival in Westminster. Best of Show for that competition gets to brew their beer at Dog Brewing Company, for draft sale at Buffalo Wild Wings throughout Maryland. That'd be awesome.

 

I'm going to enter my Saison du Vin. Competition is 9/27. I was surprised to see they only require 2 bottles for entry.

[lgtftw]

Are you entering an extract beer?

[jayway]

Nice, good luck! I love a good saison and that recipe sounds really interesting. Comp's are a great way to step up your brewing skills, those scorecards are priceless.

 

Got another I'm entering this week at a new local brew pub, Bone Shaker. The winner gets their recipe brewed on site and goes on tap. West coast IPA/IIPA's only so I'm excited. My IPA turned out spot on, 7 oz's dry hop in primary, then 2 oz hop tea in the keg and 1 oz dry hop in the keg made the aroma and hop flavor potent!

[stm25rs]

Are you entering an extract beer?

 

Yup, didn't see anything in the rules against it.

 

jayway - feedback is a big part of the reason I'm entering. I've given past brews out to friends/coworkers, but haven't gotten much of a response other than "thanks for the beer, it was pretty good."

[05LGTLtd]

Yup, didn't see anything in the rules against it.

 

jayway - feedback is a big part of the reason I'm entering. I've given past brews out to friends/coworkers, but haven't gotten much of a response other than "thanks for the beer, it was pretty good."

 

If you have any wine snob friends, try to give them a tasting. It takes an educated palate to pick out individual notes. Go to some Good wine tastings and start developing your palate too. There is a LOT of good wine out there. Look for a shop that has tasting dinners or closed tastings. You will have to pay, but it's worth it. You can impress the GF/Wife by taking her to a sophisticated event too!

 

I learned a lot by tasting raw ingredients before putting them into a batch. Then noting how the finished beer tastes and comparing. Actually that helped me more than anything. Hops, adjunct grains, malts, sample them all. It doesn't take much, soon you will know what to add to get a specific note when you want to alter or create recipes.

 

When I was brewing, I did a few pumpkin beers. Partial mash with fresh pumpkin. If you keep the spice down, the pumpkin does come through. I really don't care for pumpkin pie spice beer, but straight pumpkin ale is worth the effort.

[SCHM1AN]

Just started my first homebrew batch 2 weeks ago. Going to transfer it from the primary to the secondary this weekend. Being a complete and total noob at this, I didn't take any gravity measurements as I didn't have a clue what a hydrometer was... I'll be picking one up before I start my next batch on Sunday

 

And I thought the mod bug was addicting...

[BarManBean]

Just started my first homebrew batch 2 weeks ago. Going to transfer it from the primary to the secondary this weekend. Being a complete and total noob at this, I didn't take any gravity measurements as I didn't have a clue what a hydrometer was... I'll be picking one up before I start my next batch on Sunday

 

And I thought the mod bug was addicting...

 

Good stuff!

 

As far as gravity readings and whatnot, if you're doing an extract brew it's pretty hard to screw up. If you want to make sure there's booze in there just stick your head in the fermenter and take a smell. Careful tho, it'll burn

[SCHM1AN]

Good stuff!

 

As far as gravity readings and whatnot, if you're doing an extract brew it's pretty hard to screw up. If you want to make sure there's booze in there just stick your head in the fermenter and take a smell. Careful tho, it'll burn

 

I'll report back this weekend how it tastes. It is from extract, so I'm temporarily relieved that perhaps my beer won't taste like sewage

[lgtftw]

just stick your head in the fermenter and take a smell. Careful tho, it'll burn

 

[jayway]

What should I make next? I should have time to brew a batch on Sunday so I need ideas. An all brett PA is almost done fermenting finally, that was a slow bugger.

[RWebb]

100% bret?

 

I like making BIG beers! I vote IRS or BW.

[jayway]

100% bret. Grew up a big 2 step starter of WLP644. Took over 3 weeks to hit 1.010, just tossed in the dry hops. Sample tastes great, unique fruitiness and I didn't get any of the typical barnyard bret character.

 

A big beer... my efficiency sucks but I could try something new. Imperial Red maybe. What's a BW?

[DeltaNu1142]

I want to brew something so bad... but I ordered a keg of Lagunitas IPA, and they got me a 1/2-bbl instead of a 1/4-bbl. I can't fit my homebrew keg in my kegerator alongside the 1/2. Plz help me drink beer.

[BarManBean]

Just kegged up 10 gallons of our pliny clone

[DeltaNu1142]

I caved and brewed an all-grain blackstrap molasses porter on Sunday. The 1/2-barrel occupying all available space in my kegerator will need to get drank in the next 25-30 days. Our Halloween party, I'm thinking, should clear at least 6-7 gallons, which would get me down to around... 3-4 gallons remaining, maybe. I'm drinking as often and as much as I can in the meantime, and for the best reason I've ever had. I drank more in college by an order of magnitude, but I still never discussed beer using gallons as the unit of measure.

 

The name of my porter... just due to the depth of its blackness... Black Steer's Tuckus Molasses Porter Not Ebola Molasses Porter. I changed the name because I'm going to be bottling a few and bringing them on a plane.

 

http://i.imgur.com/hkz10co.jpg

 

The most interesting thing about this porter recipe is that it uses a saison yeast. The spicy/peppery note is supposed to cut down on the heavy molasses flavor that is likely to get stronger with age. So I guess we'll see.

[cryo]

I had been having great luck until my last two batches.

 

We decided to brew an Octoberfest my wife wanted and after switching into the secondary fermenter it started to develop a film across the top. We ended up bottling it but it didn't carbonate. After force carbonating in my kegerator it was drinkable and had alcohol content but wasn't great and you could tell it wasn't right.

 

Fast forward to our next batch of wheat beer. After 2 weeks in the primary things looked great. Switched it into the secondary glass carboy and within 3 days it started to develop a film again. Basically a film that breaks apart and sticks to the sides as its drained. We quickly kegged it and carbonated it as the film was developing very quickly from a few small spots to almost the full top covered within 24 hours. Its almost too sour to drink and still measured at 5.2% like it should have.

 

I have been using starscan sanitizer *spelling* and the second time we made sure everything was 100% clean and sanitized as well as went through the whole process with the same steps as the first few times we brewed with great success so I don't know where we went wrong.

 

We were using all the same cleaners,sanitizers and equiptment so I'm not sure why we have had trouble twice in a row when multiple batches before came out perfect.

 

We are thinking of secondary fermenting in our bottling bucket instead of the glass carboy this next time just to be able to scrub it rather than use the glass carboy and be stuck with using cleaners and no physical contact other than the cleaning brush

 

Any insight or opinions will be greatly appreciated.

 

Dave

[seabass07]

Get some food grade lye and soak it in that. Most cleaners that we use won't break down a pellicle. It will protect the bacteria from the cleaner and sanitizer. That's the purpose of a pellicle. You need something that can eat through the organic matter and start from scratch. Just be careful as there are many dangers associated with lye, obviously.

 

There's a reason that breweries use hot caustic before sanitizing. Most other cleaners aren't up to the task.

 

You're kegging, so why secondary? You realize that a keg works as a secondary and it will let you pour off the sediment. Do your aging in kegs. There's no need for secondary unless you're aging on fruit or something along those lines.