Brewing Activities (2021)

Including, or maybe especially, coconut?

I get all that, but does it smell like dirt?

 

Building up a starter for the Pilsner I will be brewing next weekend. Gonna need a lot of yeast plus some extra to keep the culture around for subsequent brews.

 

Kegged an IPA I brew a couple weeks ago. Gravity sample was so good. I could have just chilled it and drank a few pints flat. This was the one with Bootleg Biology’s “Conan” they call it Classic New England strain. I made extra in my yeast starter to try it in an actual NEIPA. Got my new Spunding valve yesterday also. I’m impressed by the quality. Spundit 2.0 went from 1.059 to 1.014 smells like Citra in the nose. The taste is more bitter malty piney. I think I nailed what I was going for.

 

What's up my homebrew buds! I just bottled and labeled my third brewski. A quick tasting at bottling has me really excited for this one. I based it off the 'Merican Saison from the Mad Fermentationist and it was my first time dry-hopping and certainly won't be the last time. 2 oz of Mosaic, 1 oz of Citra, and 1 oz of Nelson for 4.5 days gave this saison a really nice tropical punch that I think should pair well with the co-pitch of ECY Saison Brasserie and Bootleg Biology MF Blend. Hoppy, floral and hopefully some funk developing over the coming months. Next up on the brew schedule is my attempt at a Taras Boulba clone. Cheers friends!

 

I freestyled this weekend doing my first BIAB... it's now a hazy DIPA. Flaked Oats, flaked wheat, honey malt, 2 row, carapils, a random pound of Golden Promise I had from some kit a while back, a 6lb wheat LME, and some corn sugar since I used LME. Chinook bittering, Amarillo, Citra, Azacca late/whirlpool and dry hop. Verdant yeast. OG 1.079

 

I'm a sucker for cool bottles and labels, and if that beer tastes as good as the packaging looks, I'm sure it's delicious. Nice work!

 

This will turn out to be the best beer you’ve ever brewed lol

 

Quasi-Brewing Activity. Just took the final exam for the "Science of Brewing" course from KU Leuven via edX, and my head hurts.

 

In a good way or a bad way? Would you recommend the course?

 

I would recommend it. I definitely learned some things. And it does go pretty deep in some areas, even including a bit of Organic Chem. (Not too much, thankfully.) For the final, my head hurt in a mostly good way, I guess. The questions made me think hard, because some of them mixed concepts from various modules in the same question. But I had to think not just about "facts," but about how Belgian brewers/scientists (i.e. the people who put the course together) may think about things a little differently than American brewers. And so there were a couple questions where the difference between a correct and incorrect answer was arguably a matter of perspective/assumed context. Overall, I'm glad I did it.

 

Not quite "brewing" but I made some sourdough Borodinsky rye. I didn't have the premade rye malt powder it called for, so I took some crystal rye malt, ground it in a mortar, and filtered it through a fine mesh. Worked great! The resulting bread has a great balance of sweet, sour, and savory flavors and since it's 100% rye, that rye flavor is really in your face (which I love). The crumb is pretty moist but not gummy.

 

Did you pass? :-)

 

Heh. Yeah. Managed a 96.

 

Good job! Hang that puppy on the fridge.

 

Rock on vikeman

 

I don't know about surprising, but some things were new and interesting. e.g., the stuff on foam retention was extensive and way beyond forum wisdom and BYO articles. (No offense to BYO. Magazine articles are a very different thing). I think I got more out of it than I did from Bamforth's "Foam" book.

Wait. Here's a surprising thing. I think everyone pretty much knows that beers tend to lose bitterness over time. The surprising thing for me was that this is at least partially due to an oxidative reaction, and results in staling aldehydes. i.e. yet another way (two ways) O2 screws your beer.

My understanding is that if you complete the course, you get to keep online access to all the materials "forever." I expect that'll probably come in handy.