Wedding Wheats 3

I finally got time to brew my third and final brew for Matt's Wedding.  The other two brews have turned out fantastic so he is going to have a really hard decision choosing his signature brew.  The hefeweizen is clean with a banana, clove, and malty finish.  The Salt Creek Wheat has a nice bright flavor of citrus with a salty sour finish.  Now it's time to make a brew that has my favorite characteristic, hops.

This beer is a 50/50 weizen/pale ale.  It's a combination of German and English with American hops.  The yeast is a German Alt yeast, which is typically used for cold fermented ales, but I am using this yeast to give the beer an bit of yeasty fruit.  The hops I am using are two of my favorites, Amarillo and Warrior.

5 lbs. White Wheat

5 lbs. 2 Row 

.5 lbs. Carapils

.5 oz. Warrior 30 minutes

1 oz. Amarillo 10 minutes

.5 oz. Warrior 5 minutes

2 oz. Amarillo Dry Hopped 7 Days

Dusseldorf Alt Yeast WL036

I mashed at 148 degrees, but my mash came out a little cool which could account for my original gravity being a little at 1.049.  The ABV should be somewhere around 4.5%.  The brew day went well other than that and I even had time to make some homemade pizza.  I've been looking forward to this new brew the most.

Wedding Wheat 2

So my wife and I have had a big week.  We are now parents.  Our first son, Wilder Kirby was born at 8:59 on the morning of July 3rd.  He and his mama are doing great and I couldn't be prouder.  He is a great little boy who loves to eat and sleep.  He also has a ton of blond hair.  I eventually want to make an Imperial IPA in honor of him, but in the mean time, I am making three different wheat beers for my friend Matt's wedding over Labor Day Weekend.

Wilder is about 10 hours old.  The beginning of a great new chapter

My first wheat beer was a Hefeweizen, and it is still fermenting.  I transferred it over to secondary fermentation on Thursday and the airlock keeps bubbling, even today.  I haven't taken the gravity to see if it's finished, but I have some time before I need to rack.

I decided the second wheat beer was going to be my favorite Witbier.  I've made this one a few times before and I always seem to forget to add the acidulated malt after I mash, but I remembered today and got a great original gravity.  I wanted 1.045, and ended up with 1.052!  I named this brew Salt Creek Wheat because of the salt in the recipe, and I also cross Salt Creek everyday on my way to work.  This isn't like your normal Witbier.  It doesn't use bitter orange like most, but it uses acidulated malt to achieve that bright, citrus flavor.   It also uses sea salt to give it a crispness great for summer.  

5 lbs. White Wheat

3 lbs. 7 oz 2 Row

2 lbs. Acidulated Malt

.7 oz Tettnang 60 minutes

1 oz Corriander

.75 oz Sea Salt

Safale S-04 Whitbread

I mashed in the white wheat and the 2-row at 150 for 60 minutes.  I then added the acidulated malt and about half a gallon of water to bring the mash temperature back up to 148.  I sparged and collected about 7 gallons of sweet wort.  I boiled for 60 minutes adding the Tettnang as soon as I saw my first bubble.  I added Irish moss with 15 minutes left, and ended with corriander and sea salt with 10 minutes left.

I was happy to fill my wait time during my brewday with Wilder.  I'm always excited to try a new brew, and sometimes waiting is so hard.  But finally, after waiting 9 months for this one to mature, I get to enjoy this new creation called Wilder.  

Two Wheats down, one to go...

Wedding Wheats

A couple of weeks ago, my friend and my brother's roommate, Matt Jones, stopped by and had a proposition.  Matt is like a second little brother to me.  He was my brother's friend in elementary school, and joined cub scouts with him.  We went through Boy Scouts Together, and we both have our Eagle rank.  We've been to many mountain tops, on numerous hiking treks, and we've even shared a few homebrews over the years.

Me (front), Matt (middle), and My Brother (Back) sitting on a boulder half way up Mt. Harvard in Buena Vista, Colo.

Just like every homebrewer in history, I now have the chance to make his "signature" brew for his wedding coming up here over labor day weekend.  It's also a great distraction while I am waiting for the new progeny, my first son, to arrive.  We all know my passion is in IPAs, sweet hop nectar.  But Matt requested something light and summery, again, it's labor day weekend.  So I will make an IPA, because why not?  But I will also make a few different wheat beers and see which Matt will choose.

When crafting a wheat I like a good amount of wheat in my grain bill, over 55%, if it's any less, I am just trying to increase the head retention.  The wheat bill contributes very little to the overall flavor of the beer, but increases the silky, smooth mouthfeel.  This makes it an excellent choice when looking for something to casually sip on all night at, let's say, a wedding reception.

I decided to make three wheat beers and let Matt choose his favorite, the other two i will, sadly, have to consume myself.

My first Wheat will be a Hefeweizen.  Simple grain bill, mellow hop, and bold yeast flavor.  This traditional wheat beer is where it all started, and where I'm starting.  The wheat and barley will give it a subtle malty character with that refreshing smooth mouthfeel.  The Nobel Hop, Tettnang, will balance the sweetness with a little bite, and finally the yeast.  It will impart banana and clove notes, but keep the beer balanced and refreshing.  I love Hefes and I really look forward to this one finishing.

Too bad you can't grow these in a garden

Recipe:
5 lbs. White Wheat
4 lbs. 2-Row Barley
1/2 lbs. Carapils

1 oz Tattnang 60 minutes
White Labs Hefeweizen WLP300


Single Infusion Mash at 152 F
60 Minute Boil
Chill and pitch yeast

Small Boilover, nothing I can't handle... Need a bigger kettle

I thought about doing a protein rest at 122 F for 12 minutes, but decided against it.  I figured I would boil most of the proteins out, and hopefully the Irish Moss and a good secondary fermentation will clarify the beer as much as I need it to.  If I still have some protein cloudiness, I will add some gelatin filings.

I had a great conversion efficiency and my Original Gravity is 1.052, so this should be very drinkable at about   5-5.5% alcohol by volume.  All I can do is wait...

Hochzeit im Sommer Hefeweizen

Update: 7/23/13
I had a glass of the Hochzeit Hefeweizen last night and it was fantastic.  Rebekah, Wilder, Izzy, and I had just come home from a walk.  The cicadas were buzzing their twilight song and the warm, sunset light was slowing fading to night.  We sat on the front porch and I listened to Rebekah sing to Wilder while I sipped on a cold hefeweizen.

The aroma is very nice, malty, with some clove.  The initial flavor is very clean.  Banana and clove finish with a sweetness lingering until the next sip.  As with all wheats, the head lasted thought the entire glass and left a nice lace.  The mouth feel is full, but not thick, very sipable, with a nice carbonation bite.  Great beer for Sommer!

Copper Ale

I first made this ale back when I was a green brewer; however, when I tasted it, it made me feel like I had this "brewing thing" licked.  It was roasty, but not in a brown sort of way.  It was hoppy, but not in an ipa sort of way.  I was malty, but not too sweet.  I was a down the road, middle lane, complex sort of beer.  I could have brewed 50 gallons, and I'd love every taste.  So with all that in mind, I had to make it again.

I ran across the recipe on accident.  I got Midwest's "Bourbon Barrel Ale" recipe from my aunt and uncle for Christmas in 2006.  I but the oak cubes in some bourbon, but I couldn't wait for the beer to mature on them so I never added the cubes.  Instead I just racked the beer to a keg, carbonated, and enjoyed.  I have since modified the recipe and I think it's a little better.

13 lbs. 2-Row
1 lb. Biscuit malt
8 oz Brown malt
8 oz Crystal 60L
8 oz Wheat
4 oz Belgian Aromatic
2 oz Chocolate malt

1 oz Liberty 60 minutes
2 oz Williamette 30 minutes
1oz Fuggles 15 minutes
1oz Williamette 15 mintues

1968 London Ale Yeast

Bad Tastes...

I've been running into a few issues with an off flavor in my beer.  It has a terrible medicine taste and is really astringent.  Almost like a box of band aids.  This has been the downfall of many of my past few brews.  Last year I made an Oktoberfest that had this flavor.  My last two Pilsners have had this flavor and I brewed a copper ale that I am going to have to throw out as well.  Needless to say, throwing away beer makes me a sad homebrewer.

I believe this flavor is coming from the chlorine in my water.  With every beer I make I have used some amount of tap water.  I typically boil the water and add metabisulfite to break up the chloramine as well.  I thought this was getting rid of any chlorine, but I think I'm wrong.

I have been focusing on the water chemistry of my mash water and using Reverse Osmosis water with CaSO4 (gypsum)  and CaCL2 (Calcium Chloride).   I've been trying to his a 5.50 PH on my mash.  I will then use tap water or a combination of RO and tap to sparge my grains.  This is probably where the chlorine is introduced.

There maybe a few more factors going into is such as fermentation temperature or even the crush of my grains, but I'm sure it has to be the chlorine in the water.

Today I am going to make an Oktoberfest, I know it's really late in the year, and use only RO with treatment.  This should give me a chance to see if it is chlorine or if it is a different issues in my brewing process.  I want to eventually filter all my brew water, but this is be best way to insure I have no chlorine in my water.  Wish me luck.

Citra IPA

Who doesn't love a great India Pale Ale.  It's hoppy, sweet, malty, light in color, you can drink them all day long.  And those amazing little hop cones giving it flavors of citrus, spice, pepper, grass, bubble gum, and grapefruit.  One of the issues of the IPA is the bitterness that can become overwhelming.  Since so many hops are utilized, the beer can become bitter and that can ruin all of the other great flavors.  In my other IPA I remedy this by using Nugget hops which have a great smooth mellow bitterness.  This time around I decided to use no bittering hop, but instead add a bunch of hops at the end of the boil to give it a nice flavor, aroma, and slight bitterness.

I used a fairly traditional grain bill:

11 lbs. 2-row Barley
1 lb. Munich Malt
8oz Crystal 20L
1 lb. Carafoam
(now the fun part)
1oz. Citra 20 minutes
1oz. Citra 15 minutes
1.5oz. Citra 10 mintues
.75oz Citra 5 mintues
.75oz Citra 1 minute
3oz Citra Dry Hop

I had a great brew day and I used my propane burner for the first time a while.  And my gravity is at 1.071 so it should be a nice warming beer.  It's had a fantastic smell coming through the bubbler on the fermenter for the past two weeks as well.  I took the thief and got a sample last night and it has the amazing orange flavor with some other citrus and a good alcohol balance.  It's going to be amazing cold, I just need to get another keg empty...

Weed Puller Rye Saison

It's funny how someone can get so far into home brewing and not pay much attention to the most important ingredient.  When you think about Coors, you think about cold Rocky mountian water.  When you think about Hamms, you think about the "land of sky blue" waters.  And yet, I've overlooked the water profile of the water I've been using out of my own tap.  Beer is really just water with a few other amazing things in it.  Brewers use water to convert starches to sugars, rinse the sugars from the grain, isomerize hop acids, coagulate unwanted proteins, the list goes on.  Therefore, it is, arguably, the most important ingredient in beer.


Lincoln, Nebraska has hard water coming out of the tap.  Hard water is good for beer, there are lots of great salts and metals that aid in making good sugars and complex beers.  But when it comes to making something light and easy to drink, sometimes these salts and create off tastes.  Plus bigger cities add chlorine and chloramine in the water and that can give beer a medicinal flavor.  Here is Lincoln's Profile:


Magnesium is about 16ppm
HCO3- is 246.44ppm (alkalinity)
CACo3 is 181ppm


When I'm brewing I add a little Sodium Metabisufite (or a Camden tablet) to eliminate the Chloramine from the water.  Chlorine will eventually evaporate out of the water if you let it sit.  I've never had an issue from there until I try to brew something very light.  I get an off taste, almost medicinal and very off putting.  It ruins the light maltiness and hop of a pilsner or pale ale.  This profile is great for a stout or a porter, but not something light.  I decided to start really paying attention to what style I was brewing and my water profile.  So with this brew, a saison, I decided to go with a 50% Lincoln water, 50% Reverse Osmosis from HyVee.

I am using Rye malt in this beer to add some dryness, a little spiciness, and some peppery notes.  I used pilsner malt to lend some European taste to the body as well.  I am using a Styrian Goldings hop to give it some northern European/Austrian flavor.  I used 1.5 oz for 60 minutes to bitter up the beer and 1 oz to give it some flavor at 10 minutes.  I'm really excited to see how this ones turns out.  My Original Gravity is 1.059 and the ABV should be around 6.5%, a perfect summer beer after mowing the lawn or pulling weeds in the garden.

Hopfenweisen or India Wheat Ale (IWA)

This beer is more of an experiment.  I was curious what my ultimate two "spring" beer styles would be like together, wheat and ipa.  Wheat beers are traditionally very mild.  They are very smooth and have a good mouth feel.  They stand alone, don't need any caramel malt or strong hops, they are very relaxing and just remind me of a cool spring day.

On the other hand, ipa's have a strong hop character that reminds me of all the little green things starting to wake up again and stretch their little heads from the cold wet soil.  The pronounced citrus and candy resin flavors give it a "waking up" taste.  That's why I felt these two styles could be suited to be paired.  A mild wheat back ground and a bright hop flavor.

I decided to stick with one kind of hop and use Amarillo.  It is a good all-around hop.  It has nice floral, citrus, spice, and orange like aroma and flavor and it's a good bittering hop because of it's low cohumulone content.  I also like a mainly wheat grist in my wheat beers so I stuck with a 50/50 wheat to barley mix.

6 lbs. Wheat Malt

5 lbs. 2 Row

1 lb. Caramalt

.25 oz Amarillo Mash Hop

.25 oz Amarillo 60 mins

.5 oz Amarillo 15 mins

1.25 Amarillo 5 mins

1 oz Amarillo 1 mins

2 oz Amarillo Dry Hop 7 Days

Safebrew 33 Dry Yeast

I've never really understood the purpose of a mash hop so I looked it up.  First Word Hopping is said to impart he same bitterness as a 20-minute addition and retain the essential oils that impart flavor and aroma.  This works because alpha acids and compounds that would normally boil off during the 60 minute boil are isomerized and stay with the wort for the most part throughout the boil.  The mash did have a great hop aroma from the very beginning.

Tin Pail Ale

I began transporting my beer in empty 12 oz bottles when I first started homebrewing.  This was very time consuming to do and I was always washing so many bottles.  I then tried using empty wine bottles, this was a little easier, but I was afraid the pressure from the carbonation would push out the cork.  I then discovered half gallon growlers and I'm never going to look back!

I have been transporting my beer recently and I decided to do a little research on the history of the growler.  Turns out at the turn of century, local breweries would sell their brew for a nickel or a dime to fill up a 2 quart tin pail.  Since refrigeration wasn't in every home, this made it much easier to drink cold beer.

In honor of this tradition, I decided to brew my next beer in honor of this pre-prohibition tradition.  I formulated a recipe using a good deal of flavor, aroma, and dry hops.  Also adding just a bit of chocolate malt to give it some rusty color.

9 lbs. 2-Row

1 lb Crystal 80L

2 oz Chocolate Malt

.5 oz Cascade 60 mins

.5 oz Centennial 15 mins

.5 Cascade 10 mins

1 oz Centennial 5 mins

1 oz Citra 5 mins

1 oz Citra 7 days dry hop

I mashed in at around 150 degrees and let it sit for an hour.  Boiled as usual and I used a dry yeast Safebrew 33.  I has a sharp bitterness at first taste and I wonder if this is because not all of the chlorine evaporated out of my mash water.  I am letting it sit a little longer to see if it mellows out.  It does have a nice grapefruit character and a good amount of maltyness.  

Chest Freezer Kegorator Build

I got my first Kegorator from Craigslist for free.  It was a former kegorator with a hole in the side already.  It worked great when I got it home and I started with just one tap.  I painted the fridge with black spray paint and added my, at the time, brewing name (West Diamond).  I eventually added two more taps and it's held everything from Coors Light to Empyrian Ale's Third Stone to every batch of my homebrew so far.

With everything, I needed to expand.  Rebekah and I got a chest freezer from my uncle a when we first moved into our house.  His neighbors were moving and they didn't need it any more.  My uncle also didn't need it so that's how we ended up with it.  

The freezer measures 36 inches by 21 inches.  I decided to build a collar on top of the freeze so if we ever decided to turn it back into a deep freeze it wouldn't have holes in it.  I also purchases a Johnson Controls Analog Thermostat to keep the freezer at a refreshing 40 degrees.  I also noticed everyone stains the wood on their kegorator collars so I decided to go with a different look.  I found some stainless steel contact paper at Menard's so that's how I'm going to finish my look.  I detached the lid of the freezer and began construction of the collar.

I just used select pine board 1x8 for my collar.  I used wood screws and then routed the edges to match the round edges of the freezer.

Here's the Freezer with the contact paper on the wood.  It doesn't look too bad.  It is a little fake, but it was a quick way to finish the project in less than a day.  I also got some R6 insulation to line the inside of the wood on the freezer.  I just going to use the basic set up I had on the inside of the other kegorator for now. 

You can see the foam insulation on the inside of the freezer on the bottom left you can see the end of the thermostat.  After a long day of work, I thought I deserved a nice pint of Pale Ale.

Prost!

   

Snowed In Smoked Porter

 All week it seemed like I couldn't have a conversation with someone without the possibility of a big snowfall this weekend coming up.  Coworkers, customers, passersby, even people on the phone.  So Friday we prepared the car lot (I work at Anderson Auto Group) by grouping all the cars together so we could scoop around them easier.  It was wet and cold and everyone was soaked by almost freezing rain.  I made it back home before it really started coming down.

I still had to go into work Saturday morning, but we decided it wasn't going to be a great day to buy cars so we shut it down at about 10:45.  We received about 14" of snow and it's never been colder than 29 degrees.  So since I had the day off, I decided it'd be a good day to make a smoked porter.

I started with a clone of the Cut Throat Porter Recipe from Odell's Brewing Co. and changed it to my tastes.  I like a little smokey flavor in my porters, I made a smoked porter two years ago and I'm not big on dark beers, but this was my favorite by far.

9 lbs. 2-Row Barley
2 lbs. Smoked 2-Row Barley
8 oz. Caramalt
8 oz. Chocolate Malt
4 oz. Crystal 40L
2 oz. Roasted Barley

2.5 oz. Willamette for 60 mins.
.75 oz. Kent Goldings 2 mins.
.25 oz. Northern Brewer 2 mins.
Edinburgh Scottish Ale Yeast

Here's a picture of all that wonderful Willamette hops in the bag just before I put it in the boiling wort

The mash had a great smokey smell and had a great bitter smell to it as well.  I pitched the yeast and the airlock is nice an bubbly today so I should have a nice smokey beer to keep me warm the last few nights of winter.  Also, since the Groundhog saw his shadow, it'll be nice for the extra 6 weeks of winter.

 Here's my dog, Izzy, having fun in the snow

This beer has been very popular.  I shared it with some of my coworkers and friends and they have all really enjoyed this one.  It's not a thick porter, it almost has more of a brown flavor.  The smoke flavor is also very subtle.  The next time I brew this, I will add more roasted barley and and one more pound of smoked malt.  It will be just a bit more robust and smokey.  I'm looking forward to it.

   

Smokin' Oinker Bacon Ale

This next brew was inspired by my friend Drew Urbanovsky.  One day at work we were coming up with the ultimate business idea.  He thought any bar that would incorporate beer, bacon, and boobs would never go broke.  Well this next brew takes care of two of those.

When I think of bacon, I think of roastyness, smoke, and salt.  So in developing the recipe I added 2 oz. of chocolate malt to give it some brown color and some roastyness.  I also added 8.2 oz. of Caramel 60L malt to give it some sweetness and a little more color.  Also a nice malt base will give the beer some depth.  I also wanted to try some high alpha acid hops for the bittering hop.

9 lbs. 2-row Barley

8.2 oz. Caramel 60L

2 oz. Chocolate Malt

1/2 oz. Yakama Magnum 60 mins.

1/2 oz. Willamette 2 mins.

5 oz. Cooked Bacon

1968 London Ale Yeast

I brewed and poured the cooled wart over the flocculated yeast of the Chief Pale Ale.  It was fermenting almost immediately.  I will add 5 oz. of cooked bacon when I transfer it over for secondary fermentation.  After that I will taste it daily until the beer has the right amount of bacon flavor.

Here's an updated picture of the Kegorator with my current brew numbers

Last night I cooked the bacon for the "Dry Hogging."  I heated up the oven to 425 degrees and placed the bacon on a cookie sheet.  

I then dried the bacon and let the grease from the bacon drip off.  I then dried the bacon with paper towels and placed it in a muslin bag and I will daily test the flavor of the beer until it has he right amount bacon flavor.

Chief Pale Ale

In my last post I explained Warrior the 1981 Rabbit Diesel truck.  Well this post is about her sister, the Chief, my brother's 1981 Rabbit Truck.  He bought her in Colorado and was driven back to Nebraska, well, about three quarters of the way and at about Ogallala, NE the water pump went out and she was flat-bedded the rest of the way to Kearney.

This is not a picture of Chief, but it is the same color, apart of her orange hood...

Since Chief is a nice pale yellow, I decided her most fitting dedicated brew would be a pale ale.  I wanted to do something with some hop flavor but still a nice malty-ness.  I decided to start with a 2-row barley base and add some caramel malt with some carapils as well.  I also wanted to stick with a traditional English hop, so I went with Willamette for the bittering, aroma and dry hop.

10.5 lbs. 2-Row

8 oz. Carapils

8 oz.Crystal 40L

1 oz. Willamette 60 mins.

1 oz. Willamette 20 mins.

1/2 oz. Willamette Dry Hop

I carbonated the beer today and it has a very nice flavor.  The hops are subtle and not over powering but it still has a little sweet and malty finish. I think next time I'll try a little more dry hop.  But over all, a good Pale Ale.

Warrior Double India Pale Ale

I have a new girlfriend.  Her name is Warrior, yes, my wife knows.  She has a few issues and obviously needs quite a bit of attention, but I'm excited at my new relationship.  And my new beer is inspired by her.

She's a 1981 Volkswagen Rabbit or "Caddy" Truck.  She has a 1.6L Diesel engine, no turbo, so 56 horsepower.  Still the last owner thought it was a big truck so she's got dual chrome stacks, a 3" lift, and emblems that say "Size Matters" and "Turbo" (even though she's naturally aspirated).  She's equipped with a 5-speed manual transmission so that mean about 50 miles to the gallon.  She's dressed in forest green with orange pin striping.

Now I can't get credit for finding this treasure.  My brother Eric helped me find this beauty.  His first truck, also a '81 Rabbit came from Colorado.  His yellow truck with an orange hood named "Chief" was the first in his fleet.  The second truck, Warrior, found him.  Along with a third, an '80 Rabbit, and a parts truck.  Deciding he had too many projects, he turned one over to me.

I named this truck "Warrior" for a few reasons.  One, it plays off the name of my brother's truck, "Chief".  It is also the name of one of my favorite types of hops with a high alpha acid content.  It is also green so, as a home brewer, it reminded me of hops.  It was also a leadership position I help in a group, the Scarlet and Cream, in college.

I was inspired by these diesel trucks to make some dedicated brews, an IPA and a Pale Ale for Chief.  Today was my day off so I decided to start with the IPA.  This is a strong IPA, it'll be around 8% by volume with plenty of Warrior hop flavor.  It has a nice amber color and it had a  roasty smell while it was in the mash.

Recipe:
16 lbs. 2-row Barley
2 lbs. Amber Malt
2 oz. Warrior Hops
2 oz. Summit Hops
1 oz. Warrior Hops Dry Hop
.5 oz. Summit Hops Dry Hop
1968 London Ale Yeast

I started my mash at 152 degrees and a stiff mash as well.  I let it sit for an hour and then began sparging.  I did a 90 minute boil and I started adding my hops at 10 minutes after the first bubbles appeared.  I mixed together the Summit and Warrior hops in a bowl, I added .5 oz. of the mixture every 10 minutes.  This should give the beer a nice variety of hop bitterness, flavor, and aroma.  The dry hopping will also give it some grassy, resin flavor.  I can't wait to try this beer.

I did something stupid though, I haven't brewed in a while, and I know that isn't an excuse, but I forgot to sanitize my fermenter.  I had just rinsed it out, but there could have been some bad critters in it anyway.  I had already pitched my $6 yeast so I decided to just chance it.  So we'll just see what happens.  Again, cross your fingers...

So it tastes great!  The beer turned out fantastic and is a great dedication to the truck.  It has a great malty-ness and a great hoppy bitterness.  It also has a nice grapefruit citrus flavor.  That color came out great too.  I think this is my favorite double IPA recipe so far.

Birthday Märzenbier

I'm posting this a little late but my birthday was November 22nd.  For my Birthday I received some grain and hops and I decided to do a little brew/birth-day.  My favorite beer to drink would be an IPA but my second favorite is definitely Marzen lager or Oktoberfest.

Here's the recipe:

8 lbs. Pilsner Malt
4.5 lbs. Vienna Malt
8 oz. Carapils
8 oz. Caramel 40L
2 oz. Mt. Hood 60 mins
1 oz. Hallertau 2 mins

I didn't do anything too epic in the process.  I had a nice steady mash temperature of 151 degrees.  I thought about batch sparging, but since Marzens are very malty beers I decided to just sparge on the fly.  I did a 60 minute boil adding two ounces of Mt. Hood for my bittering hop.

I pitched the Wyeast Bavarian Lager Yeast and let it sit for two weeks at 50 degrees.  I lager it in a keg for 4 weeks at 40 degrees.

The beer turned out nice, it has nice head retention and a sweet malty aroma.  It reminds me of Ayinger or the more traditional Oktoberfests.  Its a little sweet but that could be because of my colder lagering temps.  It still has a great Amber color and it cleared out very nicely.  I am excited too because today I have a 50 lb. bag of 2-row Barley showing up in the mail with enough yeast and hops for 4 recipes.  So more on this to follow...

Harvest Sweet-Strong Cider

Today is my second attempt at a hard apple cider this year, more accurately, this is the second Tuesday in a row I've tried to make this.  Last Tuesday I used three gallons of awesome apple cider from a local farm called Kimmel Orchards.  I like their cider especially since it's not heat pasteurized, it's UV pasteurized.  This means it retains more of it's "apple-ly" flavors.  Last year I made cyser (cider and honey) with this cider.  Well this year I didn't get so lucky.  I added honey and sugar to get the gravity up to 1.110 and pitched some dry Windsor yeast, and nothing...

So I added two tsp. of yeast nutrient... nothing.  Frustrated I thought maybe my yeast didn't activate or the gravity was too high so I activated some wine yeast and pitched that... nothing.  More yeast nutrient...nothing.  I was about to tear out my hair.  I finally added two gallons of apple juice thinking the gravity was too high... nothing.  So I looked on the juice jugs and it said it contained 1/10th of a percent of Potassium Sorbate.

I went to my LHBS (Local HomeBrew Shop) and talked with Kirk.  He said that since it contained PS or Sodium Benzonate that yeast couldn't multiply and therefore couldn't ferment the cider.  So I broke down and went to Super Saver and bought some Pasteurized cider that didn't contain PS or SB.  This is some unfiltered stuff I found on sale for $3.95 a gallon:

I heated up about a gallon of it on the stove and added 1lb 6oz. of honey.  I also added about 6 lbs. of sugar so I could get the gravity up to 1.110 just like before.  This should make the cider strong and sweet just like a Muscato or a desert wine.

I also wanted it to have some fall flavors like a nice sweet mulled cider.  I added three cinnamon sticks, three tbs. of whole cloves, 2 tbs. of whole all spice, and four pieces of crystallized ginger.

I pitched some champagne yeast and put the lid on.  Cross your fingers, let's hope the airlock starts to bubble...

Wednesday morning update, the air lock is bubbling, and we have fermentation...

I went to switch over the cider for secondary fermentation and I go to pick up the bucket, it's empty...  I freak out and my mind reels to figure out what happened.  I used the bottling bucket to ferment in and it leaked out through the spigot and into the crawl space under my house.  In the mean time, the cider that wasn't supposed to ferment, started bubbling.  So I go from my five gallon batch in the basement to a three gallon batch in the keg.  I just wish I got to taste both batches.

36th State Prohibition Lager

I was inspired to brew this beer from watching the new Ken Burns documentary Prohibition.  Two of the major ingredients in this beer I grew in my home garden.   I used ingredients I grew just like a pro bootlegger.  I named it 36th State Prohibition Lager because Nebraska was the 36th State to vote in favor of the 18th Amendment, Ratifying the Bill.  The corn for the mash I grew in the back yard, and the Mt. Hood aroma hops was my first experiment in growing hops.

Above is my Nugget vines growing on the arbor in my front yard.  I have Mt. Hood on one side and Nugget on the other.  The Nugget is crazy and almost noxious the way it grows.  I was excited to get an ounce of Mt. Hood out of my first year.  Below is my homegrown corn grits.

I tried making this beer very different than what I'm used to.  My target gravity was 1.040.  I filled a large kitchen pot with one gallon of water and filled my brew kettle with 4 gallons of water.  In the smaller one I added my three pounds of dried and milled corn and a hand full of 2-row at 133 degrees, I turned up the burner and held it at 152 degrees for five minutes.  In my brew kettle I added seven pounds of 2-row and one pound of Marris Otter pale malt and held the temp at 140 degrees.  After the five minute rest in the smaller pot I boiled the corn for 30 minutes and it turned into a thick grits, almost like mashed potatoes.  After the 30 minutes I added the grits to the brew kettle and held the temp at 152 degrees for 30 minutes.

 
After the sanctification rest I poured the mash into my mash tun and began sparging with hot water.  After a 35 minutes sparge I began the boil with one ounce of Cluster hops.  At 45 minutes I added Irish Moss, and finally I added .7 ounces of homegrown Mt. Hood hops for a nice aroma.  This beer was also the easiest to boil with no "boil-over".  My Mt. Hood leaf hops below (they smelled amazing).

I cooled the wart and pitched some dry American lager yeast and took the beer to my root cellar to ferment at about 60 degrees.

My original gravity was 1.040, exactly where I was aiming.  I'll start secondary on Tuesday the 25th of October.

The lager turned out interesting.  It has a very European Lager flavor, a very stark bitterness that lasts a long time on the tongue.  The flavor is very smooth and it has a very light taste.  The color is also very very pale.  The experiment was successful on the bottle conditioning.  It has a good carbonation and the bottles make quite a "pop" when you open them.  Although, you need to drink the whole bottle that night because the next day it is almost too flat to drink.  Over all, not too bad for a beer I grew half of.