Who's Brewing this Weekend? 2/14-2/15

Throwing a little BIAB galaxy APA. All whirlpool hopped with 3 oz and 3 oz dry hop. 4.5 gallons of hoppy drink.

 

Finished my second brew yesterday, NB's North Coast Red IPA. Woke up this morning and quickly realized that I needed a blowoff tube! I bottled my first attempt earlier this week and I'm cautiously optimistic. At this point I'm totally hooked - just had to explain to my wife why I need a stir plate.

 

What ... You could not fit any more glasses on the table?

 

As I was adding my yeast yesterday I realized I forgot to add Irish moss and yeast nutrient. This should be a lesson for all of us. Never brew without having at least one beer!

 

Amen!

 

Brewed my Southern Hemisphere Rye IPA yesterday. Pearl, Rye, Crystal 40, little flaked oats. Dr. Rudi, Nelson and Galaxy huge late additions, US-05. As I brew and improve my process, I find that I need to improve racking into my fermentor. My spoon whirlpool left a lot to be desired, and my stove top kettle does not have valve mods... yet. Got a little under 3 gal in the bucket though.

 

Didn't brew this weekend, but I took gravity samples of my wee heavy and ESB and they're both right about where they need to be. The scotch ale was pretty tasty, too, considering it was warm and flat! The ESB sample seemed fine, but I had it second and my taste buds were out of commission by that point. I guess I'm ready to package these, except I'm not sure I have enough bottles in the sizes I want for the Scotch ale and I can't find any friggin' keg lub in this city to keg the ESB. Anybody know if keg lube is essential when you have a brand new keg with fresh o-rings?

 

Went to amutual friends house yesterday. He was trying a recirculating step mashing for the first time with new equipment and it was giving him fits. Stuck sparge, cavitation, melting insulation, ect. I ended up leaving. There was nothing I could do and I wanted to get home before midnight

He Ended up with fully converted malt extract. He just didn't have to go through New York to get from LA to Seattle.

 

Coffee milk stout is boiling away at the moment. Despite my subjective preference for base malt being somehow objectively and quantifiably wrong, the final recipe was:

6 lb 2Row
4 lb Munich
.75 lb Pale Chocolate
.33 lb Roasted Barley
.25 lb Carafa Special II
.75 lb lactose

37 IBU, 90 min boil. Thanks to all for the constructive input.

Also bottled an ordinary bitter.

 

Brewed 11 gallons milk stout yesterday for NHC. Pump head had stripped threads so went gravity instead of pumps. Surprisingly simple, but slower (I forgot what a pain it is to volauf and recirculate manually).

 

Brewed a Bitter with a light touch of American hops towards the end of the boil (Amarillo, Simcoe, Cascade). Hoping this doesn't taste like a lightly hopped toasty APA.

 

I've read that strawberries can contribute some unpleasant off flavors, but I can't comment personally since I've never used them. Also, I've found that cherries (at least the sweet cherries) don't stand out very much when I use them ~0.5lbs/gal. I have used raspberries though, and find that they stand out very well even at 0.6 lbs/gal.

As for myself, I planned on brewing Sat or Sun but the weather prevented me. So I spent the holiday on Monday brewing. Not bad, except it was so cold that anything liquid besides the boiling wort was freezing. I think I achieved one of my quickest post boil chills though.

 

This is why every beer I brew has at least 1/4oz hops at 10min.