First State Brewers Blog

I just got this email, so I thought I should share!

—–Forwarded Message—–
From: Patrick Fossett
Sent: Mar 5, 2006 12:40 PM

Subject: 2006 Hurricane Blowoff Homebrew Competition

Howdy and Please Participate in the 2006 Palm Beach Draughtsmen Hurricane Blowoff. This is a blanket email going to all homebrew clubs listed with the AHA. Info is contained in the word doc attachment enclosed. Entries can be registered and paid for via PayPal on our website http://www.palmbeachdraughtsmen.com

We are also attempting an international practical joke on our announcer during the awards ceremony. If you would be a good sport please name all your entries �Hello, my name is Dan Oliver and I�m an alcoholic.�

Good luck and Happy Brewing

Patrick Fossett
2006 Hurricane Blowoff Head Steward
Palm Beach Draughtsmen

Tomorrow (Saturday) at noon will be the all-grain demonstration at HDYB. I am actually getting there around 11am to unload and get the strike water heating. My intention is to be ready-to-go at noon with the mash-in. I may delay until 12:15 to give folks a chance to show up.

We will be brewing my Amarillo Pale Ale, and I am also bringing several gallons to share (whatever is left in my keg) so folks know what it is that we are brewing. I typed up some instructions I will use as well as printed a recipe sheet … I made 15 copies, so the first 15 that show up and want them, they are yours (I expect the demand will be much less than that).

I think the good AG stuff will be over by around 1:30 or so… after that, its just boil, cool, and pitch…. but it will take until 4:30 or so and I doubt folks will hang around that long.

My car is packed with toys - Hope to see you there.

OK. So, in response to my February 23rd post entitled “HopQuest”… I have formulated a recipe to be brewed at the end of March. Its name will be “Hopocalypse”. I’m sure you can imagine the tap handle label graphics already…

The short of it is: 9 oz of hops for 5 gallons, around 1.080 OG and hopefully near 1.016 FG, for something near 8.5%ABV.

I’m trying hard to put most of the additions at the end (flavor and aroma) and in the secondary as dry hops. I feel pretty good about the hop bill, but am still struggling with the malt bill. Here’s the hops totals (times and quantities are scattered):

3oz Columbus
2oz Amarillo
2oz Simcoe
1oz Centennial
1oz Chinook

About 2/3 of the hops are added during the last 15 minutes or during the dry hop. I tried to go a little easy on the bittering additions (MH, FWH, 60min, 45min, 30min) so I didn’t blow out someone’s tastebuds with bitterness alone. As it is, the Promash calculated IBUs are 120+… I had some Cascade thrown in there at one point, but I had that sudden “what’s the point” moment and pulled them out in favor of more Columbus (I do have nearly a pound, afterall).

Malt bill so far is as follows:

10 lb Pale ale
6 lb Vienna
1 lb Crystal 10
2 oz Chocolate

I think I might need a darker crystal in there as well… Like I said, I’m struggling a little with what malt bill would build a backbone for all those hops.

I’m thinking of mashing around 149 so it is good and fermentable. I’d hate for it to finish high and the malt mask some of that hoppiness.

I am a little frightened. I think that is a good thing.

And I’m not just talking about the picture. My gorgeous, loving, tolerant wife let me buy 15 pounds of buckwheat honey from Fruitwood Orchards up in New Jersey. That’s enough honey for me to make roughly 40 gallons of our house “porter”, the Sirius Black Honey Ale. I’ll brew 20 gallons of it at the end of March with the borrowed equipment from Jerry Carney.

And now, a beer haiku:

My honey’s sweetest
Wild, potent, gorgeous and dark
Buckwheat is good too

Heh. Thank god I’m not an literary major… I need to stick to engineering.