First State Brewers Blog

Well, my 14 gallon kettle is shipped and on its way to its new owner - ME. I’ll arrive next friday, just in time for the weekend… I am very excited - I’ll be able to brew 10 gallons of Amarillo Pale Ale and Scottish Ale at a time. I’ve got most of the hardware for my pump skid ready - I am just in the process of working some of the oxidation / rust off the housings and baseplates so I can reprime / paint them before mounting. I haven’t picked up copper tubing for the HERMS coil yet - still trying to decide if I need 50 feet of 1/2″ coil - That seems like a whole lot of liquid to lose… maybe I’ll figure out a way to drain it so I won’t. All my stainless pump fittings will be here tomorrow along with a 10″ cartridge water filler. Not sure if/how/when I’ll use that, but the idea was I wouldn’t have to lug 10-14 gallons of water from the kitchen out onto the deck - I could fill in place.

My hefeweizen is kegged and on tap - and very delish, even for an extract batch. The Little Brave Red IPA is also kegged and carbonating at the moment - It’ll probably have a month or so to wait before it makes a debut just because most of the kegs in my kegerator are 80-90% full. My oak-aged scotch ale isn’t very oakey. I think I’m going to have to steam another 2 oz of chips and add them to the secondary. I’ll probably also put another 2 oz of oak cubes in the kegs with the beer… or maybe just an ounce.

The Native Rage IPA is ready to move to a secondary for dry hopping - Probably will tomorrow night. That beer was done fermenting in 2 days - no kidding. All airlock activity ceased on Tuesday, and it is at 1.018 for the gravity. I couldn’t believe it - Just goes to show you the power of pitching a whole active yeast cake - It went from 1.072 to 1.018 in 48 hours. You hopheads are gonna like this one, methinks.