Dec 02

How To Use 11lbs of Raspberries – Batch 34

Raspberry Chocolate

Hmm.... Raspberry Chocolate

So, if you have 11lbs of raspberries, want something reminiscent of chocolate and raspberries, and you love beer, what do you do?  Easy!  Make Papazian’s Unspoken Passion Imperial Stout.

Raspberries

11 lbs of Raspberries

So, this freaking expensive beer makes 6.5 gallons, and takes 6lbs light malt extract, TWO 4lb stout kits, 1.5lbs crystal malt, 1/2lb black roasted malt, 3/4lb roasted barley, 1/2lb chocolate malt, 3oz strong bittering hops (I used Chinook), 2oz of Cascades, and 11lbs of raspberries.  As I said, FREAKING EXPENSIVE!  Fortunately, I had some side work I did that was Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=480

Nov 30

Holiday Cheer – Batch 33

Holiday Cheer beer label

Holiday Cheer

It’s that time of year again!  Time to make some good holiday beer!  I wanted to start this one sooner, but given I didn’t have any money until recently I couldn’t exactly buy my supplies.

For this years batch I did a few things different.  First, I used the actual Saaz finishing hops, as opposed to the Hallertauer I used last year.  Second, I didn’t add the honey and 1/2 of the liquid malt extract until 15 minutes left in the boil.  Third, I used dried orange peel that I bought in the seasoning section of the store.

The problem with the orange peel from the store is I had no idea how much to add.  I did some Googling, and found that 1 Tbsp is equivalent to one medium size orange.  So, I went with that, adding 4 Tbsp of dried orange peels at the end where the recipe called for it.

This morning I took the initial gravity, 1.060, and pitched the yeast.  Took an initial taste, and whamo!  Bitter, just as I would expect, with tons of backend sweetness.  Oooh, going to be a good holiday season!

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=477

Nov 19

A Six Pack a Day Keeps the Doctor Away

A new study from Spain shows that drinking six beers a day leads to a healthier heart.

Seriously, I’m not making this up.

Check the new story on this here.  Very interesting to see all the health related benefits that moderate alcohol consumption has.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=475

Oct 30

Bottled My Oatmeal Stout and Pilsener- Batch 32 and 31

Top Drop Pilsener

Top Drop Pilsener

Tonight I decided to bottle all my beer, which is my Pilsener I’ve had in my fridge for 2 months, and the Oatmeal Stout I did a week and a half ago with my friend Mike.

Bottled the Pilsener first, getting 46 out of it.  Final gravity came out to be 1.012, giving me an alcohol content of 4.7%.  One thing that worried me was that I was seeing a lot of carbonation in it.  Bubbles coming up to the top.  I wonder if my fridge was too cold for proper fermentation after I transferred it to my secondary.  The hop pellets had completely dissolved in the beer, and were swirling around in it, which will create a bit more sediment in the bottles than I had planned on.  There is definitely a chill haze to it, but it has a nice, light color and a smooth taste to it.  As long as it doesn’t get over-carbonated in the bottles, it should be nice.

Oatmeal Stout

Brett's Oatmeal Stout

The Oatmeal Stout is the one I’ve been drooling with anticipation for.  Final gravity on that came out to be 1.016, giving an alcohol content of roughly 4.5%.  Tasting it, it was dark and nutty as I remembered it, plus it had a hint of sweetness in the after taste.  Not much, just a little tease saying “Hey, there’s more going on in this beer than you think.”  This will have to sit in the bottles for 2 weeks, as that’s just the way it is with stouts.

I’ve got plans for making a mead next.  I have everything I need for it already, except the honey, but let’s just say I’ve got a connection on getting that for no cost.  I may do more Oatmeal Stout too, if I can find an investor who will front the cash, as I’m broke.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=468

Oct 21

Oatmeal Stout – Batch 32

Oooh... Oatmeal Stout!

Oooh... Oatmeal Stout!

Last week my friend Mike and I went to Steinbart’s to check it out, as he’s never been there before.  Of course, I can’t walk in there without getting something, so we left there with ingredients to make an oatmeal stout.

Mikey- The Man, The Legend.

Mikey- The Man, The Legend.

Now, I’ve made this particular stout before, and it turned out awesome!  This time, I wanted to spice it up a bit Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=453

Oct 11

Tracy’s Framboise- Batch 24 Bottled (Finally!)

Tracy's Framboise

Tracy's Framboise

Tonight we bottled Tracy’s Framboise that’s been sitting in the fermenter since March 1st.  All that time sitting there had me extremely curious as to how it would turn out, especially since the trub in the fermenter looked nasty.

Brett siphoning beer

Brett siphoning beer

Siphoned the beer into my bottling bucket, then took the final gravity, which came to 1.004.  Wow, talk about a lot of fermentation.  Almost all of the original 1.044 has been eaten up by those Belgium yeasts.  Alcohol came to 5.25% given that final gravity.

Nasty Looking Beer Trub

Nasty Looking Beer Trub

Brett prepping to take final gravity

Brett prepping to take final gravity

The Hydrometer Reading

The Hydrometer Reading

Once the final gravity was done I added the raspberry flavoring to the batch.

Adding raspberry extract to beer

Adding raspberry extract to beer

Now, this presented a problem, not in terms of how much to add, but in terms of how much fermentable sugars are there.  If the syrup has some or a lot, then the beer can over ferment in the bottle.  If not any and I short the amount of bottling sugar, I won’t have well carbonated beer.  Doing what any trained scientist would do, I guessed.  Added all the extract, then used 1/3 cup corn sugar for bottling sugar.   A bit nervous, but hopefully all goes well.  I’ll keep checking on the bottles through the next few weeks.

Beer Yeast being pitched

Beer Yeast being pitched

Next, I pitched the yeast.  I added corn sugar to a tad bit of water, heated it up to dissolve, then added the yeast once the water got back down to reasonable temperatures.  The reason I’m pitching new yeast was that I’m pretty sure after all this time the old yeast is mostly gone from the beer, thus will need some fresh yeast for bottle conditioning.  I used Safale 33, a Belgian strain.  Thought I had a generic ale yeast instead, but this is what I had.

Bottling Tracy's Framboise

Bottling Tracy's Framboise

Now, it’s time to bottle.  Started bottling, using some nice, pretty red bottle caps I picked up.  The beer has a wonderful color to it, and the flavor at this point is very dry (given the amount of fermentation), and tart.  Not a lot of sweetness, which would be hard to do given my current setup, but good.  Can’t wait to see what it’s like in 2 weeks.

Framboise in clear bottle

Framboise in clear bottle

Got quite a few bottles from this batch.  I hope Tracy loves this and treasures it!  It’s all for her!

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=440

Sep 16

Batch 31 Update- Top Drop Pilsener

According to Papazian, this wonderful beer should be transferred to a secondary fermenter after 2 weeks of lagering.  Given that it’s 2-1/2 weeks (roughly), it was time to do the transfer.

I desperately wanted to keep using the same fermenter that it was currently in, so I transferred it to my bottling bucket, cleaned and sanitized the fermenter, and then transferred it back into the original fermenter- all the time praying that I didn’t introduce too much oxygen into the beer.  The recipe calls for dry hopping 1/2 oz of crystal hops, but I decided to use 3/4 oz of Saaz instead.

I also took a gravity reading, and got 1.016.  After sampling the beer and cleaning out my hydrometer, I realized I didn’t let the temperature of the beer get up to room temperature before taking the gravity reading.  Oops.  Lesson learned.  Taste wise, the beer is really good.  Can’t wait till the final product.

Got 4 more weeks with this lagering till it’s done, which should put it out to October 14th for bottling, then another 2 weeks to bottle condition.  So, I won’t be enjoying this one till close to Halloween.  Sad thing is, by then I’ll be craving an oatmeal stout and not a pilsener.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=438

Aug 29

Craving a Pilsener- Batch 31

Yep.  I was craving a Pilsener.  But, rather than spending money buying beer, I decided to spend money to make beer.  And with an extra fridge to lager in, I decided it’s time to break it in.

Did Papazian’s recipe for Top Drop Pilsener, settling for a White Labs WPL800, given that I went to a different home brew shop than normal.

Knowing that a clear beer is the goal, I decided to use my hops bag with my hop pellets.  What a difference that made!  Filtering the crap out at the end was a piece of cake!

Also experienced my first stuck runoff with grains on this one.  I actually sparged the grains twice, and on the second round experienced the stuck runoff.  I figured I was trying to drain the liquid too fast, created a vacuum that compacted the grains and stopped the runoff.  My solution?  I stuck my spoon in and stirred up the grains.  Not the ideal solution, but it worked.

Cooled off the finished beer in the fridge, enabling me to pitch the yeast sooner than normal.  Once I saw signs of fermentation, put the beer back in the fridge to ferment.  Right now it’s sitting between 46 and 48 degrees.

Initial gravity on this bad boy was 1.048.  In less than two weeks I’m transferring this to a secondary fermenter with some hop pellets in the bottom (not sure what I’ll use- most likely Saaz or Tettnanger’s).  Then another 4 weeks lagering.

Can’t wait to try this bad boy out!

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=436

Aug 19

My Liberty Brews- Bottling Batch 29 and 30

On Tuesday the  18th my brother in law and I bottled up both batch 29 and 30.  Given that both of these recipes used Liberty hops exclusively, I decided (albeit in a hurry and forgetting the names I had previously come up with) to give both beers names keeping with the spirit of liberty.

Liberty Pale Ale

Liberty Pale Ale

Liberty Hefeweizen

Liberty Hefeweizen

We started the bottling process around 2PM and finished around 4:30PM (of course, cleanup lasted a tad bit longer.)  We started with the pale ale, getting about 54 12 oz bottles and two 22oz bottles out of it.  Final gravity came out to be 1.010, giving an alcohol by volume of 5.25%.

The hefeweizen we got a lot less bottles, 44 12oz bottles and two 22oz bottles.  When we started transferring the hef, I noticed the sediment wasn’t very compact, and there were a few bubbles rising.  Uh, oh.  Looks like it didn’t finish fermenting.  To compensate, I only added 1/2 of my corn sugar I normally would for bottling.  Final gravity came out to 1.016, but given the unfinished state of the fermentation I would guess it would be closer to 1.014.  With the 1.016 figure the alcohol would be 5.8%, with the 1.014 figure it would be 6%.  Either way, it’s stronger than the pale ale.

I’m giving these guys a week and 3 days in the bottle before I start serving them, due to an upcoming get together with some friends on the 29th.  I’m hoping they’re good enough to drink by then, cause I’m drinking them then.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=428

Aug 12

Pale Ale and a Hefeweizen- Batch 29 and 30

Today had some friends over and we brewed two beers simultaneously.  Been thinking about what to brew for a few days, knowing today was coming, and was having my normal difficulties of deciding.  I knew I wanted a pale ale but didn’t care for the recipes I’ve seen, and I wanted to use my Liberty hops.  So, I made my own recipe for a pale ale, plus I decided on doing a hefeweizen ala Widmer style.  But, none of the pseudo Widmer clone recipes I cared for, so I made my own, since I wanted to use Liberty hops in that as well.

So, here are my recipes:

Brett’s Liberty Pale Ale (6 gallon batch):

7 lbs light malt extract syrup
1 lb British crystal malt (40 l)
.5 lbs Munich malt
.75 oz Centennial Hops (60 min-bittering)
.5 oz Liberty hops (15 min left- flavor)
.5 oz Liberty hops (5 min – aroma)
Safale US-05 yeast

Brett’s Half A Weizen (5 gallon batch):

7 lbs wheat extract syrup (60 wheat/40 malt ratio- thanks, Steinbarts!)
1 lb white wheat malt
.5 lbs Munich malt
1.5 oz Liberty hops (60 min – bittering)
.5 oz Liberty hops (5 min – aroma)
Safale WB-06 yeast

Doing both batches at the same time went well, especially since I had two helpers, Jeremy and Mike, both of whom thoroughly enjoy my home brew, and Mike in particular is displaying interest in doing it himself.

We mashed the grains in about 1/2 gallon of water at 150 degrees for 35 minutes (at one point we got to talking and the temp spiked on both, so we quickly added a bit more water to bring the temp down quickly).  We sparged the poor lazy man’s way, since there weren’t enough grains in the pots to justify dirtying my lauder tun.  Then we added more water, added 1/2 the malt extract syrups, our bittering hops, and away we went.  Once both batches had 15 minutes left we added the rest of the malt, and I nearly burned myself when the malt bucket handle broke and dropped into the pale ale.  Fortunately, I wasn’t hurt badly by the water splashing on my foot.  Also added the flavor hops to the pale ale at this time.  With 5 minutes left, added the aroma hops on both.  Once the boil was done, removed the heat, strained the hop pellets out, and poured into the fermenters.

Tomorrow morning I will aerate both, take the gravity, and pitch the yeast.  Then, will need to come up with clever logo’s for the bottles.  I’m having a get together with a bunch of friends on the 29th, so hoping these beers are good and ready by then.

Update:  Initial gravity on the pale ale was 1.050.  Initial gravity on the hefeweizen was 1.060.  Both smell wonderful and taste pretty darn good as they are.  Going to be some fine beers!

Permanent link to this article: https://www.brettgorley.com/?p=425