Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Keg Secured and other items of note

So I picked up a keg to be converted, the next step is going to be cutting the top out of it. Not sure when I am going to get around to that, but I will do that eventually. Probably after it warms up.

OBC Holiday Party was last Saturday. Though I didn't get much in the way of beer from the Ring Toss, I did get 20# of 2 row and 4 oz of hops. There was some talk of making a collaborative beer with Yvette (who won another 10#), but I might just use it to make a pale ale for Ron, since I owe him a batch of beer for the fridge. It would make a decent Pale Ale, I think.

I need to get ahold of Kipp and see if he has any good cornies that came in over the past month or so. If so maybe I can pick up a few more kegs for a steal. :)

I need to rack a beer tonight and get it into a keg, so it can start carbing up. I'd like to have the Blonde Ale on tap for Christmas. I'm going to put the Yeast Cake into a jar, and use it to ferment Ron's beer. I think I'll keep this cake around for 5-6 generations, then start with a new one.

And that's all the news that fit to print for the moment! Have a happy holiday and we'll see you next year!

Thursday, September 11, 2008

A pleasent surprize

So I'm watering the roses this morning before we take off, and the neighbor comes out to his car to leave for work. He asked me if I still wanted that keg his friend had offered me when they were moving in, and I said 'Sure!', so he's going to work on that for me today.

Looks like I may be getting a keg for conversion after all, and for free as well!

Just another nail in the coffin for making 10 gallon batches.

Monday, September 8, 2008

Kegerator works great!

Kegerator is chillin away in the basement, seems to work very well and chills down fast. Gave it a good cleaning, and will be getting ready to punch the first tap through the door this weekend. I am so excited! Now I *really* have to get to work refurbishing those kegs! ;-)

Friday, September 5, 2008

Kegerator (potentially) Secured!

A friend of mine recently pointed me toward someone with a spare fridge, one that it seems will fit into the basement with no real issues. All they want in exchange is for me to fill a keg of homebrew for them. So, it appears that I will soon have a nice shiny kegerator in the basement to dispense beer from.

This means my next brewing project after getting the mashtun converted and the fridge chillin, is going to be converting the fridge to be the kegerator I want it to be. I'm thinking if I work it right, I can set it up to hold either 6 kegs of homebrew, or 4 kegs of homebrew and a commercial 1/6 bbl of beer/mead/what-have-you.

Tonight will be filled with moving things around to get this fridge into the basement and the basement reordered. I also probably need to get over to Trevor's place and get those champagne splits picked up.

Oy, brewing is getting crowded! Luckily, with a kegerator I can get rid of quite a few standard bottles, which will free up some space. Just like with the mashtun conversion, I'll be able to get rid of one of the crappy old coolers, which will also save space downstairs. Of course, this means we'll need to have a yard sale soon..

:S

Thursday, September 4, 2008

New Mashtun Secured!

Found a 70 quart Coleman XTreme cooler on sale at Bi-Mart this past weekend, which increases my mashtun capacity by 3 gallons. I'll probably start converting it tonight to just get that done for the next brew day, which is probably going to be next weekend.

Next up is going to be a fridge, to convert to a kegerator. Need to find a smaller size fridge to do that, but I already have a spot to put it in the basement. Just need to get it and convert. I have the parts to do a single tap already, minus the hoses, which are cheap enough.

Hop Madness follow-up

Hop Madness was AWESOME!

I am so staying there next year! Gonna brew, and drink, and drink, and pick hops, and drink drink drink :P

Friday, August 22, 2008

Adopt-a-Hop

So, Mike wrote to the listserv for OBC looking for someone to adopt some hop plants, and it appears I've scored some healthy Rhizomes for Willamette and Nugget Hops. I am hopefully meeting with him to retrieve those this evening at The Green Dragon.

After that, it's off to Dave's place to drop off his assorted bottles and breweriana that are currently at our place. and then back home for more cleaning and prepping for company this Saturday.

I'd like to maybe get some time in to brew a beer, but I'm not sure that is gonna happen. If so, it's probably just going to be something light and quick, like a blond ale. I'd also like to investigate the possibility of getting a kegerator. We'll see how the weekend unfolds and what craigslist has in store.

Also going to call that company again, to see if I can get someone on the phone that can tell me about selling me their kegs. If I can't buy what they need, I have a person in mind that can maybe make the deal. Maybe I can get a deal from him if I hook him up with a supplier :P

Monday, August 18, 2008

Iron Brewer 2 Judging Redux

IB2 judging was done last night at Max's Fanno Creek, after a false start last Wednesday at The Raccoon Lodge. My beer did not place, but then later someone told me they'd found another score sheet for me, which would have added an additional 35 points to my total score.

Honestly, that disappointed me a little, but I am not bitter. It was a fun contest to be in and I had some very nice compliments from a few pro brewers about the beer I submitted, and I guess that was all I really wanted - a little honest feedback.

Congratulations to Doug Savin and Alan Ruff, who took 1st place in both the People's Choice and the Pro Judging competitions. I am very jealous of the RR brews you won.

Now, granted I did not place, but a little advice for the organizers of next year's Iron Brewer -

* Please make sure that all beers get the same amount of score sheets, and they are all accounted for and tallied before announcing winners. Looking back, it seems I might have placed had the score sheets been properly tallied

* Have bottle forms and other paperwork on hand in case something occurs and someone has none. There are no printers at the bar, and the lack of bottle forms seemed to have the judges a little confused.

* Every other contest in the world seems to hand out prizes for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place. Why announce those as placing categories if the winners get nothing to show for it? The amount and value of swag handed out to the 1st place winners was pretty excessive, wouldn't you say? It should be divided up a little more next time.

Again, I would have handled it differently.

But then, I don't plan on being in a board or committee next year, either...

Someone else gets to carry the burden after November.

Of Barrels and Sour Beer

So, I had some of the Rum barrel Old Ale and the Bourbon Barrel Imperial Red last night. While neither was overly soured, it's painfully obvious that both barrels are infected with something, most likely Brettanomyces.

While a sour beer can be nice, it is a huge disappointment when it's not what you were going for. Several people have said they are flat out dumping their Impy Red, and for a home brewer, it takes a lot to say that because we usually hold out against all hope that the beer will somehow get better over time.

The sad thing is - because the Rum barrel is not stored at Dave's place, there is little chance of cross contamination.. but both beers have the exact same sourness, and it likely means that someone who participated in these 2 projects has an infection in their home brewery. I wouldn't blame anyone, hey it happens. It's more the fault of the people participating for not instituting more rigid standards and testing prior to filling the barrel.

At this point, we're going to get rid of all the barrels, step back, and try again using only fresh barrels from distilleries. If they last held liquor and have only been used once, the chances of contamination are far lower.

Here's hopin this can be worked out!

Friday, August 1, 2008

Searching for barrels

Our club is on the search for more barrels. Mark picked up two 30-gallon Brandy barrels today, and is on the hunt for a used White Wine barrel. Ron is looking for a small barrel for his place. Heck, even *I'm* passively looking for a smallish barrel (may look at getting the contact info for Mark's source, 30 gallons of BW in a brandy barrel under the stairs sounds SWEET!). I have a small 3 gallon one, and I have yet to age anything in it, but I'm thinking that toward the Winter I'll be making some beers that would be nice to have in that barrel for a while before I bottle them (Barleywine, Imperial Porter, Belgian Golden Strong, and Imperial Stout)

I still have 5 gallons in the Flander's barrel & 5 Gallons in the Old Ale barrel. I'll be putting 5 gallons in the Mead barrel in August, 10 gallons of a yet to be determined beer in a Brandy barrel, and perhaps another 5 gallons in the 2nd Brandy barrel whenever we get the recipe on that one.

As Jim said earlier today, "Maybe we should change the name to PDX Barrel Brewers"...

He might be right.

Monday, July 28, 2008

Russian River Brewing kickoff, Horse Brass

Went to the RR kickoff at Horse Brass tonight with Jeremie, Jenn, and Bree. Official start of RR sales in Oregon, with Pliny the Elder, Blind Pig, and Damnation making their debut. MMMMMMM, Damnation is officially one of my favorites.

Vinnie? Pretty damned cool, if you ask me. After getting cut off by god knows how many people, I finally pulled up a stool next to the man and had a good long chat before we took off. Told him about our club doing barrel aged beers, and what projects we had going.

He knew us as soon as I said it. Said he recognized the name of the club when he saw it on my shirt earlier.

I was floored.

Then he bought the table a round, and we talked a ton about the club projects. He seemed really impressed, and this makes me very happy, as well as proud of our club for getting the notice of such a famous barrel brewer from out of state.

We exchanged cards, and I'll be talking with him in the future about a possible collaborative project.

Also got to say hi to Carl and his wife (Belmont Station), and a couple that just moved up here from Austin, TX, whose names escape me for the moment (Hey, it was 3 damnations... c'mon)

OBF 2008 Follow up

Sad I didn't get to meet the brewcasters from The BN - just wasn't in the cards, I guess... Maybe next time :)

Note - I will NEVER try to go (for fun) to the OBF on a Friday or Saturday again.. EVER. That was just retarded, the number of people they allowed into that tiny little space. They either need to expand the area for the fest, or start capping the number of people they let in by doing flights. There was no way we could have gotten to any of the taps at 5pm, the lines were 200 deep at each tap. You couldn't even see what you were waiting in line for, and in fact it could have easily ran out before you got to the front of the line. It was like watching cows charging the trough at feeding time.

Nope, not this kid. We turned in our GC for tokens and bailed after dropping off the O2 stone with Jeremie at the OBC booth.

The plan for next year?

Tuesday - Fred's beer & cheese tasting
Wednesday - Brewers Dinner
Thursday - Taking day off, going to parade and opening ceremonies for OBF. Perhaps volunteering for a shift in the morning, and drinking in the afternoon
Friday - Taking day off, golfing in the Brew-AM
Saturday - Ninkasi Breakfast
Sunday - HUB Hangover Breakfast
Monday - Liver Transplant

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Ninkasi Brewers Breakfast, OBF 2008

Saturday Morning found us at the Ninkasi Brewer's Breakfast, at Kell's in Downtown Portland. This turned out to be a really great time! The breakfast consisted of Eggs, Home Fries, Biscuits & Gravy, Bacon, and Sausage, along with Tricerahops IPA and Oatis Oatmeal Stout.

We had a few minutes to talk with Jamie and Nikos from Ninkasi, and this is a pair of really stand up guys. Cards were exchanged, and I'll be speaking with them in the future about some club work.

Thursday, July 24, 2008

Meet the Brewer @ The Green Dragon - Lagunitas

Went to the 2008 OBF Thursday edition of Meet the Brewer @ Green Dragon, and was treated to a great conversation with Tony Magee about his beers, Zappa labels, and his appreciation of our favorite bubbly beverage. He had apparently played guitar & sang earlier in the evening, but I missed that part. Seems like a pretty cool cat, though. Jeremie had a pretty good conversation with him about Kill Ugly Radio.

Lagunitas brought Pils, Pale Ale, Gnarlywine, and a Double Pale called Sirius to the table, and they were all great.

Met up with Jeremie & Jenn, and a great time was had by all!

The more I immerse myself in the local beer culture, the more I can see myself working in it. Maybe it's time I thought about getting a little more imbedded in the scene...

Sunday, July 20, 2008

Hopworks Urban Brewery, Homebrew Demo Follow-up

This was great! We both had a great time, and Ben made sure we were all taken care of. If they do this again and no one from the club volunteers, I am all over this!

As soon as we have a release date on the beers, I'll post it here!

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Meet the Brewer @ The Green Dragon - Roots

Jeremie and I quickly bottled our Belgian Rye Bock this evening using a CP bottle filler, then ran off to meet Jenn @ The Green Dragon. The guys at Roots had a pretty impressive selection to sample, and they were all pretty rare. I particularly enjoyed the 2006 Epic Ale, Mother Pucker, and their Flanders Red.

Also Ran into Corey Blodgett from CP Roadhouse and Ben from Hopworks. Had a discussion about the yeast we're going to use on the Saison we brew at the Homebrew Demo this Sunday. Said a quick hello to Jim Parker, and had to turn in early because of work the next day. Good Times!

Looks to be fun...

So, this Sunday at Hopworks Urban Brewery, Bree and I will be participating in a homebrewing demo.

The beer we make will be fermented at the brewery and placed on tap at a later date, which is mildly intimidating but nevertheless very interesting, since we'll have our homebrew on tap in a brewery :D

In any case, Bill from OBC and Mark from Plato's Republic will also be there on their respective systems doing the same thing, so we won't be alone in this.

We've decided we're going to do 10 Gallons of Saison. I've never made a Saison before, but the head brewer at Hopworks seems pretty excited that we're doing one, so I hope we do not disappoint.

If you're in the area, feel free to drop in! It starts around 12pm

Monday, June 9, 2008

Iron Brewer II Follow Up

Here's a few photos from the 2nd annual Iron Brewer challenge:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/26448971@N07/sets/72157605519073906/

The basic premise for IBC is just like Iron Chef - everyone is given the exact same base ingredients, and a secret ingredient is revealed before you start. Once the ingredient was revealed, you had 30 minutes to declare a style and begin brewing.

We were given the following common ingredients:

Grain
5.5# Maris Otter
5.5# Pilsner
5.5# Wheat
2# Munich
2# Amber (Biscuit)
2# Crystal 60
1# Carafa II Special
.5# Roasted Barley
.5# Aromatic
.25# Scottish Peat
.5# Rice Hulls

Hops
1.5oz Glacier (whole)
1.5oz Magnum (pellet)
1.75oz Amarillo (pellet)

Yeast
WLP001 California Ale Yeast

The special ingredients were:
Oak Spirals
Wine (Pinot Noir or Unoaked Chardonnay)

After making a few trades, I ended up with a few extra ingredients and decided to declare American Stout as my style. My recipe was:

Batch Size: 4 gallons
10# Maris Otter
4# Pilsner
1# Munich
.5# Biscuit
.5# Crystal 60
1# Carafa II
.5# Roasted Barley
.25# Aromatic
.5# Rice Hulls
1.5oz Magnum
1.5oz Glacier
WLP001 California Ale Yeast

Mashed @ 153 deg for 60 minutes, Boiled for 90 minutes, 1.5oz Magnum @ 90 minutes, .75oz Glacier @ 30 minutes, .5oz Glacier @ 15 minutes, .25oz Glacier @ 0 minutes.

Now, I should have declared Imperial, as I ended up with a starting gravity of 22.8 Brix on the Refractometer, which calculates to 1.091 SG. Or I should have just made 5 gallons. AH well, it'll be tasty!

For the special ingredients, I plan to saw off about 1/3rd of each oak spiral (medium toast American and medium plus French oak) and use those in the secondary for about 1 week before bottling. For the wine, I'm going to boil the priming sugar in it, which will hopefully cook off the alcohol but leave the flavor intact.

Well, that's it for now. It was a great time and I look forward to hopefully winning the comp when beers are judged in August ;)

Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Spring Barrel Tasting Follow-up

So, after the first part of the PDX Brewers pub crawl on Saturday, we came home, grabbed our stuff, and ran off to visit my mom in E. Wa. for picking up some of my tools and the 2008 Spring Barrel Tasting.

Didn't hit that many wineries this year, but mostly because we hit a ton of them during Red Wine and Chocolates in February. This year we hit:

Steppe Cellars
Pontin del Roza
Tucker Cellars

Ended up coming home with about 10 bottles, which isn't too bad considering 3 of them were gifts. Hooray for a full wine cabinet :)

PDX Brewers Pub Crawl Follow-up

While we didn't go for the entire pub crawl, we did hit the first 2 places (Hopworks and Hair of the Dog)

Hopworks Urban Brewery, you ask? FANTASTIC. If you live in Portland, treat yourself and go down to Hopworks as soon as you can. Their beers are amazing! (sadly, we didn't eat.. there wasn't time, and we weren't hungry anyway)

We had samples of their Pale Ale & Doppelbock while on the brewery tour, and the Bo Pils & Stout afterward.

Pale Ale - Just right, a great example of a PA.
Doppelbock - Good, a bit lighter than expected but very tasty.
Bohemian Pilsner - Gives Pilsner Urquell a run for its money, particularly since the HUB version isn't skunked from sitting in a green bottle.
7 Grain Stout - Dude. Bring a knife and fork, this Stout is a meal. I may run pick up a growler of this in the not too distant future, certainly before Ren comes for a visit.

HotD was a pretty standard visit. Had samples of Greg, Adam, Doggie Claws, and Blue Dot. Ended up picking up 2 bottles of Blue Dot, more to support Alan than anything else. I find that his Blue Dot Double IPA is always a little less hoppy than I expect it to be, particularly since it's billed as a Double IPA. In any case, it's still tasty :P

We went home after HotD, but the crawl went on to Lucky Lab, Roots, Horse Brass, and Belmont Station, with the West-Siders adjourning to the Little White Shed at McMenamins Cornelius Pass

Monday, March 10, 2008

2008 Spring Beer & Wine Fest

Well, the Spring Beer & Wine Fest is coming up, March 21st and 22nd:

http://www.springbeerfest.com/

I think if you haven't been introduced to these beers, you might find this to be a pleasant experience and should attend.

I will not be attending, however. I've had enough of all the beers listed there, and can find them all (mostly) locally. But another reason I'm not going is the fact that they brought in Pabst Blue Ribbon as one of their beers to taste. 0.o

*rolls eyes*

yea, craft brew fest...

whatever.