Brew Day Video

At long last, I filmed shots of brewing an all-grain batch of a Honey Double IPA and strung the clips together into an 8-minute video on YouTube.  It illustrates all the steps involved in brewing a batch of beer from milling the grains through pitching the yeast.

The beer turned out great and the honey flavors really shined through.
Cheers!

Batch Moving Day + Ginger Ale

Today was batch transfer day.  We had 10 gallons of Pale Ale and 5 gallons of IPA that finished in the primary.  One Pale Ale went directly in the keg with a sock of Ahtanum hops and the other went into a secondary fermenter.  The IPA with an original gravity of 1.064 went into the secondary fermenter at a gravity of 1.011, which equates to about 7% ABV with 70 IBU.  In addition to the three transfers, we made a 5 gallon batch of ginger ale with fresh ginger, lemons, sugar and water.  Here are a few shots of the action.

Dry hop Ahtanum:

Pale Ale transfer:

Washing bottles with recycled cleaning water:

Racking Pearl Malt IPA:

Ginger Ale:

Cheers!

Fawcett Pearl IPA Brew Day

Today we brewed the base malt challenge IPA for my homebrew club with 95% Thomas Fawcett Pearl malt and 5% Carafoam.  Hops are Columbus, Simcoe, and Amarillo.  The target ABV is 7% with 70 IBU.

Weighing the malt:

Heating strike water for mash:

Milling the malted barley:

Grains into mash tun:

Water into mash tun:

Vorlauft:

Lauter:

Measure hops:

Draining with first wort hops:

Boiling strong:

5 minutes remaining:

Racked into carboy and pitched yeast:

The original gravity was 1.064 and the yeast is Wyeast American Ale 1056.  Hopefully we can get it down to around 1.010.

Hard Way IPA Brew Day

Today was the brew day for a kegged beer to enter in the People's Choice Award contest for the Peach State Brew Off presented by the Covert Hops Society on 2/28/14.

It was a windy day, but the trusty Blichmann burner powered through.

There was a lot of steam!

After chilling, this golden beauty was racked to the carboy.

The yeast for this batch is Safale US-05 American Ale.  After it is finished fermenting and dry hopped, we will bottle a few using carbonation drops and keg the remainder.

Double Batch Brew Day

Saturday was a long day of brewing. We made a Northern English Brown and a Rye IPA

The Northern English Brown had Maris Otter Malt, Vienna, Special Roast, Biscuit, Crystal 75, & Pale Chocolate Malt.  The Rye IPA was Rahr American 2-Row, Rye Malt, Wheat, Carapils, and Carastan (C-35).  The English Brown started at 1.052 and I used California Ale yeast from White Labs.  The IPA started at 1.064 and I used Nottingham yeast from Danstar.

While the Brown Ale was boiling, we milled the grains and started the mash for the IPA.

Brown Ale transfer into the carboy:

Eagle-eye view of the IPA going into the carboy:

Cheers!

Classic Ale Brew Day

American Amber Ale

Pale Malt as the base

Caramunich for sweetness/maltiness 

Melanoidin for maltiness 

Chocolate as a pinch for color/flavor

Warrior, Simcoe, Citra, & Amarillo hops 

pine, citrus, tropical fruit, orange, etc.

Mashed at 154

Heating sparge water

Next we lauter to the kettle

Going with a single batch sparge

Sparge water a little hot, mash to 175

Vorlauft and drained

spent grains

Bringing it to a boil

Warrior addition made

Next is 45 minutes of boil

Flameout, Chilled, Racked to Carboy fermentor, & Aerated

Helper Cat Arlo

Original Gravity is 1.061

Pitched yeast & added blowoff tube just in case.  Fermentation will begin shortly!

Citra IPA Brew Day

Today, we brewed an all Citra Hop American IPA. This is batch 9 of this recipe, with small tweaks along the way.  The last batch scored second place for American style IPAs at the Music City Brew Off AHA BJCP homebrew competition in Nashville on 11/8/14.

The malt in the recipe was American 2-row Pale Malt as the base with Munich for breadiness/maltiness, Crystal 10L for light sweetness, Carafoam for body & head, & Melanoidin for sweet toastiness.  The hops were of course all Citra added as First Wort Hops, then 60, 15, 10, 5, 0, & Dry Hops.  The mash was a single infusion which rested at 152F.  We did a single batch sparge and 60 minute boil.  After chilling and racking to the carboy, we pitched Safale S-04 English yeast at 9pm into the 1.062 original gravity (OG) wort.

Black Rye Ale Brew Day

Today was an experimental brew day.  We took our Rye Pale Ale recipe and painted it black.  During the mash and sparge process, we had an esteemed guest stop by.

This was a 10 gallon batch, which tested the limits of our system.

Grist:

1. Pale Malt
2. Rye Malt
3. Vienna Malt
4. Biscuit Malt
5. Honey Malt
6. Crystal 75L
7. Melanoidin Malt
8. Carafa II Special (added to mash tun prior to sparge)

Hops:

• 60: Warrior
• 30-15: East Kent Goldings
• 15-0: Amarillo & Cascade
• Dry: Amarillo & Cascade

Yeast:

1. American Ale
2. American Ale II

Notes:
American Ale showed signs of finishing at about day 5, where American Ale II still had krausen, but little airlock activity at day 7.  This turned out pretty dark; hopefully it gives a touch of roast like a black IPA.