First State Brewers Blog

So updated the previous post with pics of the pump skid. Wort pump is the one with stainless fittings, cooling recirc pump is the one with brass.

In addition I grabbed some pics of my hops “trellis”:

Today I also pulled about 4-5 oz out of both my Abbey Tripel and Strong Dark Belgian kegs - You guys are screwed for the October brew competition… these beers are just fantastic. Even the Alucard Strong Dark, which I was worried about, has turned out fantastic - I honestly sat back and had one of those “holy $%!t… I brewed this” moments. My wife concurred - they are awesome. So, hopefully I’ll find a way to get a couple of them cold and bottled before the october competition. I also am looking foward to putting my low-octane alpha acid delivery vehicle, the Little Brave Red Ale, on tap - My hefeweizen kicked tonight. I am not suprised… all the warning signs were there. As soon as the kids hit the hay, I’ll be dragging it up from the basement and swapping it out. This also means… ANOTHER KEG TO FILL!!! Woot… my brewing continues…

Next up is the 10 gallon Amarillo Pale Ale batch, probably followed by an English Brown Ale. Amazingly enough, I’m burning thru my pale 2-row malts. I think I’ve half emptied the Maris Otter, and I’ve got maybe a few pounds in one of my bags of American 2-row. I’ll have to make another order to North Country Malt Supply sometime real soon. I need to get some more Golden Promise malt and peated malt for my wife’s scottish ales anyways, so I guess the timing is good. I’m a little suprised how fast all-grain batches can chew thru grain.

… And I’m not even brewing? I’m emptying carboys like they’re going out of style though. As of tomorrow, the only thing left sitting in a carboy to age will be my all-grain Oak-aged Vanilla Porter. I’m dropping the Imperial piece b/c this batch only had a starting gravity of 1.073… so it won’t be as strong as the last. Hopefully it’ll be good anyways.

I’ve kegged my Rise & Shine Oatmeal Stout, tomorrow I will be kegging Donna’s oak-aged 1850 scotch ale (high ending gravity… 1.030, as she likes it) and I racked the OAVP to its secondary today and polluted it with 4oz of oak chips and 2 vanilla beans. I also nailed another runner onto my deck for the Magnum hops - Which have finally reached the top of my deck’s railing. Japanese beetles are eating them alive… but I am doing my best to keep them off. Got a couple traps in the yard which are already decimating the population in our yard. I also assembled my pump skid, although I need to do a test run tomorrow with my wort pump using water. I’ll put a pic here when I get a chance.

So now I need to start formulating my plan of attack for this next brew - a 10 gallon batch of Amarillo Pale Ale. I don’t really know how I want to handle the yeast - Do I step up the yeast twice in starters, first in my 2000mL flask, then into a 1 gallon jug? Do I actually go out and buy another vial of yeast and do two starters in seperate flasks? The brew is going to be split into 2 fermenters anyways - I don’t have anything that could handle fermenting 10 gallons at a time, and even if I did, god save me trying to carry it down the stairs to the basement - I’d probably pull something… So, since I’ll have to end up splitting it in the end anyways… the two vials / two flasks thing is probably the only one that really makes sense. Maybe I’ll poll the guys over at the MoreBeer forums once they are back up from maintenance.

15 gallons worth in the kegerator, 30 gallons in the basement in kegs, 5 gallons in a carboy aging, and soon I’ll be brewing 10 more gallons - Yeah, this is the house of beer. Maybe sometime I’ll actually stop brewing long enough to drink some of it.

So as I predicted in my previous entry, I petitioned my indulgent, gorgeous wife (typically known as She Who Must Be Obeyed, or SWMBO) for more kegs so I could have more capacity than I’m currently at. The conversation went something like this:

Garrett: “So honey… Once I keg these next beers, we’re going to have 5 high-gravity beers in kegs conditioning…”
SWMBO: “So how many more kegs do you need.”
Garrett: “Probably 4. I just got that 14 gallon kettle to do 10 gallon batches, and I can’t brew anything because…”
SWMBO: “And how much are they?”
Garrett: “80 dollars, and that…”
SWMBO: “A piece?”
Garrett: “No, total including shipping… but that’s really not so bad…”
SWMBO: “So why haven’t you ordered more already?”
Garrett: “Well… because I wanted to get your permission first…”
SWMBO: “You’re so cute. Go order them.”

Honestly took less than a minute, and I was left with my jaw on the floor. So, I immediately popped on over to Homebrew Adventures and picked up 4 more unrebuilt kegs, with replacement O-ring sets for $16/ea. The shipping comes out to ~$4/ea, so $20 total. That’s as good a deal as going up to Philly’s Carbonator rental and buying them, however they are actually delivered to your door AND come with the O-rings. Great deal.

The promises I made to order were that I’d bring my lunch every day this month (no more expensive salads at the Barley Mill cafeteria) and that I always have a keg of scottish ale to put on tap for her. Seems like a small price to pay.

She’s so good to me.