Blog Expansion

So, my wife and I went fishing last weekend, and ended up with quite a large amount of Salmon. I'm going to be trying a few things I've never done before, smoking fish (Smoked Salmon), drying fish (Salmon Jerky), and curing fish (Gravlox). I am going to post that stuff here as well, because quite frankly, I pretty much consider anything that's homemade as "home brew" of one kind or another. Hope you don't mind!.

Having a Berry Hydromel on tap is going to be dangerous, I can see that already. Turned out fantastic!

Now with an extra 10% slacker!

Yep, still super slow on the posts, sorry about that. Taught my friend Alan how to brew the other day, made a nice Beamish clone. Going to rack that today along with the multi-berry hydromel (mead) and get them carbing up in the kegerator. More later I'm sure, but for now its back to work!

Back on Brew posts

Yea, I'm a slacker... sorry!

Just brewed my Diabolical Double Red, 1.078OG, should come out to about 8.5%abv when all's said and done.

Did ALTered States for the IB3 beer, a recipe based on the malt grainbill for an Altbier, but used a Kolsch strain for fermentation because A) I didn't have an altbier strain around, and B) I didn't have the fridge space for a lager. Beer turned out pretty close in flavor to an Alt (as compared to commercial beers), but has a very perfume-y aroma, likely due to the cereal secret ingredients we were given to use for Iron Brewer.

We also did a batch of 'Ruby, Don't Take Your Love To Town', our Raspberry Wheat beer. Beer is crystal clear and awesome, but we used a few too many Raspberries in this batch so its quite tart. Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm not sure that we used the right yeast strain on it this time around, I'll have to go back and check notes.

Finally, we have the fresh hop IPA I made, waiting to go into a keg or bottles. I might try and bottle this one up, so we'll see. I have enough of these hops left that I can make 1 more batch. Turned out real nice, I look forward to having this one around :)

On deck for brewing next: Fresh Hop IPA, Spring Reign clone, Moderately Impoverished Dick (a variant of the Poor Richard's Ale, without the Molasses), and an Oaked Whiskey Barleywine

CItra Hops

My friend Steph got ahold of about 4 oz of Citra Hops, so for Big Brew, we combined making her 1st All Grain batch with about 2 oz of these hops. Made a simple IPA, but did Citra as the last hop addition a few minutes before flameout and then dryhopped with some.

Best. IPA. EVAR.

This beer was sooooooooooooooo good, I can't even begin to explain it. It's like getting hit in the head with a grapefruit... so citrusy and tropical, but still bitter and thirst quenching.

I really hope I can pick up some of these in the fall. If I knew where the fields were, they would be in danger of having "Migrating Rhizome Disease"..

'I'm sorry officer, I have no idea where these hops came from, they just spontaneously sprouted here! All 12 of them! Honest!'

Ramblings

That dry hopping idea didn't turn out well at all.. in fact, I think it tasted worse after the dry hopping, alot like drinking liquid grass - I dumped that beer and picked up my 7.5 gallons of Brandy Barrel Tripel. I've heard we're getting a fresh barrel, and might be doing a belgian golden strong next, which sounds great!

1st PDX meeting of the year was last night. I look forward to what's going to be happening with the club this year, the new board seems to have everything well in hand. I'll probably end up doing some helping out this year, but I'm not sure I'll be in a full-fledged committe position. I kind of want to just kick back and brew, submit to comps, perfect techniques... we'll see what happens

1st Brew of the year and other bits

Made my first brew of the year on Sunday, a nice hoppy red ale.

I am a little concerned that there was no fermentation activity this morning. If it's not fermenting tonight, I'm going to have to pop and pitch that Pacman yeast; I don't want to wait too long and waste it.

I also got sick of the caramel flavor in that Blonde Ale I butchered, so I put 2 oz of dry hops into the keg. I'll try that after I get the BW gone and see if it helped. If not, I believe it's off to the flavoring factory.

In bonus news - I forgot about the Tripel at Garrett's place. That is a damn fine beer, and I can't wait to get my grubby little hands on it!! I should have it between this weekend and next, which means I have to finish off my Barleywine keg :)

The next 2 items on the agenda are to get the top cut off the keg, and get the tap put through the fridge door and ready to serve

PDXBrewers Holiday party

The PDXBrewers holiday party was last night, and I think it went quite well. It was my last act as a board member for PDXBrewers, but as last acts go, it was pretty good. I think the new board members have it all in hand and will do a far better job than we did, though I think they should consider the following for next year:

* Rent a room someplace that is open later: Maybe we should go back to Lucky Lab for the party next year, but anyplace that is open later than 9pm would be great. I actually felt like MFC was angry we were there so late.

* No beer judging: No more judging at the party - it was too confusing and people were distracted from other things we were trying to get done at the party, not to mention the fact that we had to vote twice.

* More varied centerpieces: I thought we did a good thing by getting the Unibroue beers for centerpieces, but everybody and their mother brought the same beers, which made it kind of suck

Overall, it turned out OK, and I'm going to go borrow Ron's mill all the time :P

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!

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.

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! ;-)

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

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

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

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!

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.

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