The weather forecast for this weekend calls for 12+ inches of snow...sweet! I can't think of a better way to spend the snowed in weekend than sitting in front of the fireplace and enjoying some really good beer. Instead of buying more beer, I decided to check and see what I have available in my stash. Here's the run down:
Ommegang Hennepin
Ommegang Three Philosophers
Ommegang Chocolate Indulgence
Paulbeer Winter Ale 08 (my very own home brew, brewed with spices and stuff)
Stone Vertical Epic 080808 - Check out the Vertical Epic Challenge...I accept.
Stone Russian Imperial Stout
Stone Arrogant Bastard - You are not worthy.
Stone Oaked Arrogant Bastard - You really are not worthy.
Stone Old Guardian
Stone 13th Anniversary Ale
Stone / Brew Dog Bashah
Rogue Chipotle Ale
Rogue Imperial Red Ale
Cisco Indie Pale Ale
Cisco Captain Swains Extra Stout
DFH 90 Minute IPA
DFH Palo Santo Marron
DFH Burton Baton
DFH Chateau Jiahu
Victory Wild Devil
Southern Tier Choklat Stout, Blackwater Series
Southern Tier Raspberry Porter
St. Bernardus Abt 12
St. Bernardus Tripel
St. Bernardus Pater 6
St. Bernardus Prior 8
Chimay Red
Chimay Blue
Chimay Triple
Duvel
Orval
Sam Smith Nut Brown Ale

Is this the most impressive beer stash? Maybe not, but it's a work in progress. :) If you have any suggestions for the stash, drop me a note.

Over at the Kite and Key, there's a hand pump which is tapped into a firkin of the most delicious Victory Hop Devil. A few friends and I went there for lunch the other day and enjoyed some nachos and a couple of rounds of this deliciously hopped ale.

Now I've had Hop Devil on tap before, but there's something really special about it when served on the hand pump. Or maybe it's from the firkin. That led to the following discussion: Is a firkin naturally carbonated or is it force carbonated? And does force carbonation change the flavor profile of a beer? I thought the difference was that a firkin is not force carbonated but I wasn't 100% sure.

To confirm my initial belief, I did a did a quick Google and I came several awesome links that explained the differences. Here's one of those links. To summarize, a firkin carbonates naturally. Check out the video too.

I celebrated Presidents Day by brewing a beer "hopefully" resembling Stone's Arrogant Bastard.

The base of the brew is a pale malt extract with a mini mash of specialty grains. For the mini mash, I used the following grain:
• Half a pound of Vienne malt
• Half a pound of Munich malt
• One pound of Special B malt
• Half a pound of Biscuit malt
I mashed the grain at 152 degrees F for 45 minutes and then added the wort to the brew kettle that already had 4.5 gallons of water coming to a boil. At that point, I added 2 pounds of light DME and brought the water to a boil

Once the boil began, I added 3 pounds of pale malt extract and the first addition of hops, 2.5 ounces of Chinook.

With 20 minutes left in the boil, I added the final addition of pale malt extract and 1.75 ounces of Columbus hops.

With 15 minutes left in the boil, I added a half a teaspoon of Irish Moss.

I added 2 ounces of Cascade hops with two minutes left in the boil. Before I began brewing, I rehydrated a packet of Danstar Nottingham ale yeast. Once the wort was chilled to about 78 degrees, I aerated the wort for 20 minutes and then pitched the yeast.

I strapped my heating pad to the primary and turned it to low. I usually keep follow this process and the temp stays around 78 degrees. I wrapped the fermenter with a fleece and let it go.

My plans for this beer are to add 4 ounces of oak chips to the secondary after it is racked. By doing this, I hope to achieve the same flavor as the Stone Oaked Arrogant Bastard. I plan to rack this next weekend and I hope to bottle sometime around the first week of March.

That's all for now.

Yesterday I wrote about how cool all of my all-grain brewing equipment is. Well today, you get to see for yourself how cool it really is.

Ok, maybe it's not that cool, but I did construct the mash tun myself. Here are some pictures of the mash tun. The only thing missing is the digital thermometer which I will mount on the side.

These pictures are of inside the mash tun. The lateral copper tubing is the manifold. It drains the wort out of the tun. The horizontal copper tubing is the sparge arm. It rinses the grain bed with hot water.

Above is the outside of the mash tun. The first is the ball valve for draining. The second pic is of the connection point for the sparge arm. A hose connects the hot liquor tank to the mash tun where 160+ degree water flows through the valve and feeds the sparge arm. I plan to use a much thicker hose.

Here are the kettles used during the brewing process. The first pic is the hot liquor tank. This one was my go-to kettle for extract brewing. It is/was a turkey deep fryer and holds up to 7.5 gallons of liquid. I love the integrated spigot. The middle shot depicts my newest brew kettle and my old brew kettle. The last shot is the ball valve on the new brew kettle. The new brew kettle is a converted keg and can hold up to 15.5 gallons of liquid.

I currently do not plan to brew batches larger than 5 or 6 gallons. However, all I would need to do is swap out the hot liquor tank for another 15.5 gallon keg. Not bad.

There are a few other miscellaneous items not shown here. I have a pump that I use for wort chilling. I also have a home-made immersion wort chiller. It’s basically 20’ of soft copper tubing coiled up. Works very well and can chill a 5 gallon batch to yeast pitching temps in less than 20 minutes. I so can’t wait to play with these! Is it spring time yet?

It has been a while but I'd like to start blogging again. With a lot taking place at work, I found myself not having the time or energy to blog or brew beer. Deadlines at work and papers for school kept me fairly occupied. Now that the bulk of the madness is over, I can pick up where I left off.

Since my last post, I had a Belgian Wit sitting in a fermenter. It never reached bottling day. I let it sit for way too long and it lost its flavor. Believe me, the last thing I wanted to do was dump a 5 gallon batch but I had to. It smelled and tasted awful. Lesson learned - stick to a schedule.

During the holidays, I brewed a Christmas ale. A concoction of pale and crystal malts with a couple ounces of Hallertau hops and a couple of ounces of mulling spices. The beer is beautiful amber with a thick off-white head. I dropped the mulling spices in during the last 10 minutes of the boil and dry hopped the beer with 2 ounces of Hallertau hops. The result: an overpowering spicy beer with subtle notes of citrus. Lesson learned - use less mulling spices and less boil time. Other than that, the beer isn't all that bad.

I also finished the welding of my manifold and sparging arm for my all grain mash tun. Pictures will follow very soon. The all grain system is about 75% complete. The last main requirement is a stand that can support a 15.5 gallon keg converted into a brew kettle and a 7.5 gallon hot liquor tank. I'm drafting the plans for this now with the hope of completing it in April (yes, of 2009.)

In addition to my home brewing, I discovered some really great beers and pubs. Working in Center City presents many options for drinking and the guys I work with are excellent drinking companions. When we're feeling scrappy, we'll go to a bar we call the "W." Here we’ll enjoy rounds of PBR or Sierra. When we are feeling sophisticated or in need of good scotch, we hit the Prohibition Tap Room. This classy bar has so much on tap to offer and they never disappoint. Among some of the many craft beers on tap are Stone Oaked Arrogant Bastard and Slyfox Stout – a new personal favorite.

We are all looking forward to Philly Beer Week which starts March 6^th through the 15^th. Click the link to check it out: http://phillybeerweek.org/. There are a ton of events scheduled, most sponsored by local breweries and pubs & restaurants. It’s going to be a great time! If you are in the area, definitely check it out. I’ll post more about it as Opening Tap approaches.

Speaking of beer...I think it's about that time!

 

 

 

In the next few weeks, my entire team from work will be getting together for a week of meetings, presentations, more meetings, and possibly a scavenger hunt throughout the city. Since the company I work for is spread out across the country, it's not often that I get to see some my coworkers. To prevent from feeling completely disconnected with them, we communicate almost daily either via phone, email, or IMs. Of course it is mostly for work related subjects, but there are times where we just shoot the shit and talk about other things.

In preparation for the meetings to come (and of course the after work happy hours!), I decided to brew a special beer. I picked a wheat ale (or Blue Moon clone) because it is a very drinkable beer and a lot of people enjoy the taste. It also helps that the version I brewed last year was very good. ;)

This batch is a little different. I used the same base extract (5 lbs of Munton’s Wheat DME) and I also used the same pound of crushed wheat. I steeped the wheat in 152F degree water for 45 minutes and added the liquid to the kettle. I brought 6 gallons of water to a boil, added the DME and rice solids. I then added the first round of hops which were .75 ounces of whole Hallertau.

After 45 minutes of boiling, I added a tsp of Irish moss, .5 ounces of bitter orange peel, and .25 ounces of whole Fuggles hops. Gave it a quick stir and then inserted the wort chiller.

After another 10 minutes I added .5 ounces of coarsely crushed coriander. With 5 minutes left until flame out, I connected the water chiller to the new pump I recently purchased. I submerged the pump into a 48 quart cooler filled with about 3 bags of ice and cold water.

The boil completed and I started the wort chilling process. This pump isn’t exactly the fastest one out there, but it got the wort cooled down within 30 minutes. I aerated the hell out of it and pitch White Labs WL400 (That’s their Hefeweizen strain of yeast).

There was a decent amount of foam on the top of the beer before I covered it. When I checked in on the beer the following morning, there was nothing. I started to think maybe I did something wrong. I decided to leave it be for a couple of days.

Well later on that day; I noticed the foam coming back. And back. And back again. It got to the point where I had to ditch the traditional airlock in favor of a blow off tube. I filled another carboy up with about a gallon and a half of water. For the blow off tube, I used 5 feet of medium gauge vinyl tubing that has a ½ inch inner diameter. I connected one side to the inner post of a fresh airlock and the other side was submerged in water in the other carboy.

This was certainly an interesting sight. I never had yeast go this crazy before. The foam was moving through the tube at a pretty quick rate. It resembled something strait from a mad scientist movie!

I have a video that I’ll post once I get it online.

See ya

Summer time is almost here. Do you know how I can tell? The release of seasonal summer brews. Brewers like Samuel Adams, Bluemoon Brewing Company, Sierra Nevada, and such all release seasonal summer time brews.

Over the next few weeks, I'll be reviewing each and posting about them here on my blog. The first round will be Samuel Adams Summer Ale, Flying Fish Farmhouse Summer Ale and Bluemoon Honey Moon.

Check back this weekend for a review of the three.

I had a very tasty IPA on draft a few days ago and it inspired me to brew one. Not following any particular recipe, I brewed what seems to be a pretty basic IPA. The recipe I put together is a partial mash:

• 6lbs Briess Light DME
• 1lb Victory malt crushed
• 1lb Crystal malt 40L crushed
• .5oz Chinook - 60 minutes
• .75oz Cascade - 40 minutes
• .75oz Cascade - 20 minutes
• .5oz Cascade 5 minutes
• 1/2 tsp Irish Moss last 15 minutes

I steeped the grains for 30 minutes at 152F and transferred the liquid to the brew kettle. I added the DME to the wort and when it started to boil I added the first round of hops.

Where the hell have I been?

It's been over a month since my last blog post. The truth is I really haven't had the time to write anything. Work has been extremely busy and taking up a good portion of my time. Some small/medium sized home projects have been lingering.

This weekend will be a nice homebrew session. Perhaps a nice Irish Red or Belgium Wit. Whatever I decide to brew, the most important thing is: this will be my first all-grain brew. I'll have pictures later this weekend of the session. Lots of em.
Check back Sunday.

There's been a lot of talk about Joe Strummer lately. Since I'm a fan of the Clash, I'm dedicating this entry to their late front man.

By order of the prophet, I decided to rack my pale ale in preparation for bottling. I was thinking about dry hopping this ale but I'm not sure if I want to. I have a small amount of hops on hand; Hallertau, Fuggles, Tetnang, and some bittering hops. I might use one of those, or I might just leave it as is.

Now over at the temple, the target gravity for this ale is 1.010 and that's where the beer is. I plan to bottle in the next couple of weeks.

The king called up his jet fighters because he was starting to worry about this batch. It was very active for the first couple of days, but then it seemed all activity in the airlock ceased. I did a gravity test and it was around 1.020ish. I stirred the beer a little and let it sit for another few days. I then did another test and it was at 1.012.

As soon as the shareef is out of my hair, (and as soon as it's ready to drink) I'll have a glass. I'm hoping for a good session beer and I think a nice medium body pale ale with a little over 5% ABV will do the trick. I've had several pales and some are very good, others are...eh. Some taste like vegetable stock was an ingredient. Can you say asparagus pale ale or maybe even Pea Juice Ale? I don't know about you, but I like my beer free of vegetables. The pales that are good are about 7 or 8 bucks a six pack. That’s a little pricey for an everyday beer.

Drop your bombs between the minarets and email me some suggestions at paul@paulbeer.com.

You know he really hates it.