Wow, six months since last posting. You’d think by the lack of reporting that the Bier Werkes is defunct. Au contrare! While we have not achieved full capacity, we are still quite an active operation.
2009 provided us with a good base of brewing knowledge. We had our share of novice failures. The raspberry wheat crash and the loss of the glass fermentation vessel was the most vicious example but the Imperial stout debacle perhaps the most disappointing. The acronym for the brew, A.S.S., was a foretelling of the taste. P.U. Another two batches were lost to higher summer temperatures in the fermentation cellar. These were expensive lessons.
The successes are mounting. We have brewed many batches of good drinkable beer. Beer I would put up against local microbrews. They are that good.
Recently, Santa delivered a grain mill to Dave and I am shopping for a larger vessel for boiling the wort. Our next phase will be toward better consistency. We’ve added kegging to the process also and Dave’s got his keg fridge up and running. Bottling is easier for sharing but the convenience and taste of fresh draught beer at home can not be overstated.
Our good neighbor John provided us with some hops rhizomes from his mom’s farm and picked buds from this year’s crop. Soon we’ll be crushing our own grains and growing our own hops. This will add a whole new dimension to our processes.
We are currently addressing a gub’mint conspiracy to disrupt our electronic communication channels. We think the MegaBrewers are behind it, donating large amounts of cash to administration officials in return for imposing harassing regulations on us beer farmers. Who knew a neighborhood brew club could attract such a high level of attention? We must be doing something right! Really, it is just a matter of a couple of the Werkers acquiring and using personal email rather than their work addresses. But the whole conspiracy theory sounds better doesn’t it?
For Christmas my nephew Sean, the offspring of That In-law and Anonymous, bestowed upon me a masterpiece of his own making. It is a Periodic Table of Brewing big enough to cover a large wall. All of the styles are represented along with gravity scales and color codes and elements enough to make your eyes and mouth water. He needs to publish and copyright it immediately before some beer thief steals the idea. It’s brewtiful!
So you see, the Bier Werkes is still up and running. Last night, our four hearty brewers toasted the Werkes into the new year with a new slogan –
We Brew It, We Drink It!
It is just over one year since we popped the top on our first home brews.
Happy 1st Birthday to the Brownsboro Farm Beer Works!
Friday, January 1, 2010
Thursday, June 4, 2009
The Yeast Beast
I think Dave’s suffering from a yeast infection. It’s all he talks about. He is consumed by it. Two weeks ago he performed the normal tasks related to brewing a batch of beer. The beer is from a hundreds year old recipe brewed on the farm of Thomas Jefferson. I was not there at the outset of this endeavor but all seemed to be going well when I arrived. We managed to get through the process and sealed the bucket for the fermentation stage.
Dave started to get a little itchy 2 days in when no visible signs of fermentation were present. He then revealed that the proprietor of the brew supply store warned him about the expiration date of the yeast packet. He assured the nice lady that the dead yeast she was selling him would be fine. To his credit, now he says, “I may have been wrong.” May have been Dave? Still, he decided to wait until the weekend to deal with the issue.
He added a second helping of yeast one week after the initial batch. Twelve hours later he called a “Code Blue brewing disaster.” This is when Dave found religion, well sort of. He asked, “Have I offended Silenus? (Silenus is a Greek god of beer and a drinking companion. He is usually associated with his buddy, Dionysus. He is often featured as a bald and fat man, with a big beer belly. He is normally drunk and it is said that he had to be carried either by donkeys or satyrs (in Greek mythology, satyrs are wood-dwelling creatures with the head and body of a man and the ears, horns, and legs of a goat).”
Last night, the third attempt at yeasting Dave’s brew was made with live active yeast taken form the batch I brewed on Sunday. Today, he’s still got nothing. The homebrew help sites and forums were all checked for possible reasons and ways to save the brew. Dave came up with a list of possible to do’s. Last on the list, number 7, was the word “pray.” Quickly evaluating the situation, I advised the inflamed biermeister to forgo steps one through six. The following was his response, which Mike thinks should be included on the label of each BierWerkes brew.
“Oh Silenus! I beseech thee. Grant thy humble servant success in brewing. Give unto me strong, flavorful, nutritious beer. May my fountain of beer never run out. Consider now that my mug is dry. The unnatural state causes great stress and angst to me and all of my family. My brewery moans and suffers from this awful plight. Heal thy bucket and give us bubbles aplenty.”
Such a compassionate and heartfelt plea such as this surely will be heeded by the Great Silenus.
Dave has decided to go to the bottling stage immediately. Somewhere we hope all the gods and satyrs are smiling, and blessing us with a cure for the yeast beast that has been plaguing Dave’s brew. A potent potable is all we ask as salve for the brewer’s sullied soul.
Dave started to get a little itchy 2 days in when no visible signs of fermentation were present. He then revealed that the proprietor of the brew supply store warned him about the expiration date of the yeast packet. He assured the nice lady that the dead yeast she was selling him would be fine. To his credit, now he says, “I may have been wrong.” May have been Dave? Still, he decided to wait until the weekend to deal with the issue.
He added a second helping of yeast one week after the initial batch. Twelve hours later he called a “Code Blue brewing disaster.” This is when Dave found religion, well sort of. He asked, “Have I offended Silenus? (Silenus is a Greek god of beer and a drinking companion. He is usually associated with his buddy, Dionysus. He is often featured as a bald and fat man, with a big beer belly. He is normally drunk and it is said that he had to be carried either by donkeys or satyrs (in Greek mythology, satyrs are wood-dwelling creatures with the head and body of a man and the ears, horns, and legs of a goat).”
Last night, the third attempt at yeasting Dave’s brew was made with live active yeast taken form the batch I brewed on Sunday. Today, he’s still got nothing. The homebrew help sites and forums were all checked for possible reasons and ways to save the brew. Dave came up with a list of possible to do’s. Last on the list, number 7, was the word “pray.” Quickly evaluating the situation, I advised the inflamed biermeister to forgo steps one through six. The following was his response, which Mike thinks should be included on the label of each BierWerkes brew.
“Oh Silenus! I beseech thee. Grant thy humble servant success in brewing. Give unto me strong, flavorful, nutritious beer. May my fountain of beer never run out. Consider now that my mug is dry. The unnatural state causes great stress and angst to me and all of my family. My brewery moans and suffers from this awful plight. Heal thy bucket and give us bubbles aplenty.”
Such a compassionate and heartfelt plea such as this surely will be heeded by the Great Silenus.
Dave has decided to go to the bottling stage immediately. Somewhere we hope all the gods and satyrs are smiling, and blessing us with a cure for the yeast beast that has been plaguing Dave’s brew. A potent potable is all we ask as salve for the brewer’s sullied soul.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Anchors Aweigh!
With each batch of beer we brew our techniques improve a small notch up the scale. I would still place us in the novice category of all grain brewers but so far we’ve brewed products that are not only consumable but are entirely quaffable. To date we have brewed the following:
Summer wheat (2 batches)
Kolsch
Brown Ale – partial extract
Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Imperial Stout
Black Ale – from remnants of the Imperial Stout
Raspberry Wheat – 2 batches, one crashed
Strong American Ale
The Bourbon Imperial Stout is still awaiting bottling. All others have been bottled and the first three batches have been completely consumed.
Our biggest flaw, disregarding the one dropped carboy, has been recordation and measurements. We’re just not good enough at these yet. Despite this we were able to repeat the success of Dave’s wheat with Robert’s first batch. The recipes were slightly different due to availability of ingredients at the local brew supply store but we came fairly close to both the style and flavor we were shooting for.
Due to this success, Robert is already talking about repeating his recipe. This is a good thing. I don’t know one successful brewery that doesn’t have its foundation beer. Usually there are more than one. It’s your go to beer. The beer you know you can rely on when the selection at the brewpub starts looking like a list of exotic vacations to places you have no intention of ever visiting. So you order the old comfort brew, the one that brought you in the door to begin with and keeps you returning. For this reason, I’m dubbing the summer wheat style the BierWerkes initial anchor ale.
Robert named his brew Little Fingers Wheat due to the help we received in the bottling process from his young son. It is light and fruity enough for those hot summer days but still has enough body and hop flavor for any time of year. It would go great with a burger as well as a pork or chicken dish. I prefer something a little darker with my steak but for those used to drinking the mega-brewer lagers with everything, I know they would enjoy the pairing. The beer is already a hit.
We bottled two more batches on Thursday. We’ve now got two weeks to wait for the finished products on Dave’s second attempt at raspberry wheat and my Old Grover Ale.
The Old Grover was brewed on President’s Day and is named in honor of Grover Cleveland. It is an American take off on an English Strong Ale - all American ingredients except for the English Ale Yeast. Cleveland, along with his opponent for elective office, once agreed to limit their beer consumption to two glasses a day during the campaign. After a couple of days of soberly sticking to this promise they decided that it was not as well thought out as it should have been. They did not want to break their pledge, so to stick to it on principle they switched from the usual small bar-sized glasses to large tankards. This is American ingenuity at its finest.
Old Grover goes on my list as one of my Beeroes (Beer Heroes).
It is now time to plan the next batches. I am considering a black lager (Schwarzbier) but may hold off due to the long dual fermentation and lagering process – won’t be ready until almost summer. It is a good season for a bock or an American Pale Ale, though.
The days are getting longer and along with the increasing light we are slowly bringing this project out of the dark ages. Now someone enlighten me with a cold one!
Summer wheat (2 batches)
Kolsch
Brown Ale – partial extract
Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Imperial Stout
Black Ale – from remnants of the Imperial Stout
Raspberry Wheat – 2 batches, one crashed
Strong American Ale
The Bourbon Imperial Stout is still awaiting bottling. All others have been bottled and the first three batches have been completely consumed.
Our biggest flaw, disregarding the one dropped carboy, has been recordation and measurements. We’re just not good enough at these yet. Despite this we were able to repeat the success of Dave’s wheat with Robert’s first batch. The recipes were slightly different due to availability of ingredients at the local brew supply store but we came fairly close to both the style and flavor we were shooting for.
Due to this success, Robert is already talking about repeating his recipe. This is a good thing. I don’t know one successful brewery that doesn’t have its foundation beer. Usually there are more than one. It’s your go to beer. The beer you know you can rely on when the selection at the brewpub starts looking like a list of exotic vacations to places you have no intention of ever visiting. So you order the old comfort brew, the one that brought you in the door to begin with and keeps you returning. For this reason, I’m dubbing the summer wheat style the BierWerkes initial anchor ale.
Robert named his brew Little Fingers Wheat due to the help we received in the bottling process from his young son. It is light and fruity enough for those hot summer days but still has enough body and hop flavor for any time of year. It would go great with a burger as well as a pork or chicken dish. I prefer something a little darker with my steak but for those used to drinking the mega-brewer lagers with everything, I know they would enjoy the pairing. The beer is already a hit.
We bottled two more batches on Thursday. We’ve now got two weeks to wait for the finished products on Dave’s second attempt at raspberry wheat and my Old Grover Ale.
The Old Grover was brewed on President’s Day and is named in honor of Grover Cleveland. It is an American take off on an English Strong Ale - all American ingredients except for the English Ale Yeast. Cleveland, along with his opponent for elective office, once agreed to limit their beer consumption to two glasses a day during the campaign. After a couple of days of soberly sticking to this promise they decided that it was not as well thought out as it should have been. They did not want to break their pledge, so to stick to it on principle they switched from the usual small bar-sized glasses to large tankards. This is American ingenuity at its finest.
Old Grover goes on my list as one of my Beeroes (Beer Heroes).
It is now time to plan the next batches. I am considering a black lager (Schwarzbier) but may hold off due to the long dual fermentation and lagering process – won’t be ready until almost summer. It is a good season for a bock or an American Pale Ale, though.
The days are getting longer and along with the increasing light we are slowly bringing this project out of the dark ages. Now someone enlighten me with a cold one!
Saturday, February 28, 2009
What's the BF deal?
We had a meeting of minds last night. The four of us tackled some huge mysteries of life and brewing while lubricating our minds so that the ideas would slip out easily. We had a rather lengthy discussion regarding the cumbersome name that we christened the brewery with. All are in favor of shortening it to something quick and understandable but we didn’t really come to a complete consensus. We got stuck on whether we should call it The Bier Werkes or the BF Bier Werkes. But we all definitely agreed that BEER WORKS!
We had a lot of other ideas that fit with the BF theme. Brownsboro Farm, of course which is part and parcel of the original name. There is also Big Four, which gives a nod to an old railroad bridge that the city is converting to a pedestrian and bicycle pathway across the Ohio River. We are also four now as Robert has successfully brewed his first batch. There were many BF’s that were too foul to record here but were hilarious. So I think we finally decided that we should keep the BF in the title. The others may remember this differently, if they have any memory of it at all.
So just to make things legal I’ve checked and none of these names are taken by other breweries or any known company, public or private. So I’m copyrighting the names and slogans relating to the Bier Werkes. The following are now the sole property of the consortium of brewers who operate the bierwerkes. An application for trademarks has also been filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
BraunBoro Baurnhoff Bier Werke
Brownsboro Farm Beer Works
Brownsboro Farm Bier Werkes
BF Bier Werkes
The Bier Werkes
Bier Werkes
Bierwerkes
Beer works
Beer Works!
We were back at the Werkes early this morning. For the second Saturday in a row we hit the bottling line. Last week we suffered through Dave’s Sloppy Seconds without the proper tools. Sloppy was the key term. We had a little problem keeping the siphon flowing. Mike came to our rescue by buying a siphon tube, a tube in tube contraption that you pump once and beer flows. He showed up last week just as we were finishing the last bottles so we didn’t get a chance to use it then.
We gave the new draw tube device its first workout today and this sure smoothed the operation. Robert also came through with some high quality .5 liter flip top bottles that his sister smuggled in from Germany. She brought them in legally but smuggled sounds more intriguing.
This week were done with a five gallon batch in well under two hours door to door. Spillage was minimal. The suction cylinder worked so well we were able to draw the beer from the bucket until it was close to dry.
Our methods are getting much better. Our brew kit is coming together to the point where we have almost everything at hand without having to jerry rig unmatchable objects together as we did at the beginning. I am still in search of a larger brew pot. I’d like at least a 10 gallon, preferably fifteen. No hurry, in time something usable will turn up. We’ve got a good system for five gallon batches now and I’m more concerned with brewing good beer every time than expanding. We’ve come a long way from the borrowed turkey fryer days of past but we’re always on the lookout for cheap, or even better free, upgrades.
Next week we’ll be bottling two more batches and we’re going to take another shot at that raspberry wheat. Hopefully we can pull it off without it hitting the floor.
Until then remember BEER WORKS!
We had a lot of other ideas that fit with the BF theme. Brownsboro Farm, of course which is part and parcel of the original name. There is also Big Four, which gives a nod to an old railroad bridge that the city is converting to a pedestrian and bicycle pathway across the Ohio River. We are also four now as Robert has successfully brewed his first batch. There were many BF’s that were too foul to record here but were hilarious. So I think we finally decided that we should keep the BF in the title. The others may remember this differently, if they have any memory of it at all.
So just to make things legal I’ve checked and none of these names are taken by other breweries or any known company, public or private. So I’m copyrighting the names and slogans relating to the Bier Werkes. The following are now the sole property of the consortium of brewers who operate the bierwerkes. An application for trademarks has also been filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
BraunBoro Baurnhoff Bier Werke
Brownsboro Farm Beer Works
Brownsboro Farm Bier Werkes
BF Bier Werkes
The Bier Werkes
Bier Werkes
Bierwerkes
Beer works
Beer Works!
We were back at the Werkes early this morning. For the second Saturday in a row we hit the bottling line. Last week we suffered through Dave’s Sloppy Seconds without the proper tools. Sloppy was the key term. We had a little problem keeping the siphon flowing. Mike came to our rescue by buying a siphon tube, a tube in tube contraption that you pump once and beer flows. He showed up last week just as we were finishing the last bottles so we didn’t get a chance to use it then.
We gave the new draw tube device its first workout today and this sure smoothed the operation. Robert also came through with some high quality .5 liter flip top bottles that his sister smuggled in from Germany. She brought them in legally but smuggled sounds more intriguing.
This week were done with a five gallon batch in well under two hours door to door. Spillage was minimal. The suction cylinder worked so well we were able to draw the beer from the bucket until it was close to dry.
Our methods are getting much better. Our brew kit is coming together to the point where we have almost everything at hand without having to jerry rig unmatchable objects together as we did at the beginning. I am still in search of a larger brew pot. I’d like at least a 10 gallon, preferably fifteen. No hurry, in time something usable will turn up. We’ve got a good system for five gallon batches now and I’m more concerned with brewing good beer every time than expanding. We’ve come a long way from the borrowed turkey fryer days of past but we’re always on the lookout for cheap, or even better free, upgrades.
Next week we’ll be bottling two more batches and we’re going to take another shot at that raspberry wheat. Hopefully we can pull it off without it hitting the floor.
Until then remember BEER WORKS!
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Don't Spank The Carboy
Seeing those fermentation bubbles from a new batch of beer is like hearing a newborn baby cry. With your own hands you have brought new life to the world. And yes, the world is better for it.
The Bierwerkers have been busy this week. Two new batches were birthed on Monday, a strong ale and a summer wheat. Dave’s basement is starting to look like a warehouse. There are now six buckets of beer in varying stages of fermentation. He has set up a new desk for more counter space and better bottle storage. Mike ordered a siphon tube for better wort and beer transfer. I drafted a quick step guide that we can check off as we go through the process. It will help us remember little things like taking proper measurements at certain stages. We are still novices so these things are not yet ingrained into our brew psyche.
Robert did great on his first brew day. Things went longer than anticipated but when you do two batches its going to happen. We learned a lot about how and when to perform certain steps to avoid overlap.
We got Mike’s Imperial Stout transferred to the secondary fermenter but lost a draw tube. Oh snap! (hence, the new siphon tube) But, that was the only major mishap of the day. My beer was safely transferred to a glass carboy, so we also learned that as long as we’re careful we do not need to fear the glass.
I haven’t named my ale yet. We brewed on President’s Day so I’ll probably do some research on beer brewing presidents and work from there. We’re planning some bottling for Saturday so it’s not long before we taste our efforts from the second go round. Here’s some pics from Monday’s session:
Robert Chillin' with his wort
Bob taking the test tube challenge
The bierhouse
The Bierwerkers have been busy this week. Two new batches were birthed on Monday, a strong ale and a summer wheat. Dave’s basement is starting to look like a warehouse. There are now six buckets of beer in varying stages of fermentation. He has set up a new desk for more counter space and better bottle storage. Mike ordered a siphon tube for better wort and beer transfer. I drafted a quick step guide that we can check off as we go through the process. It will help us remember little things like taking proper measurements at certain stages. We are still novices so these things are not yet ingrained into our brew psyche.
Robert did great on his first brew day. Things went longer than anticipated but when you do two batches its going to happen. We learned a lot about how and when to perform certain steps to avoid overlap.
We got Mike’s Imperial Stout transferred to the secondary fermenter but lost a draw tube. Oh snap! (hence, the new siphon tube) But, that was the only major mishap of the day. My beer was safely transferred to a glass carboy, so we also learned that as long as we’re careful we do not need to fear the glass.
I haven’t named my ale yet. We brewed on President’s Day so I’ll probably do some research on beer brewing presidents and work from there. We’re planning some bottling for Saturday so it’s not long before we taste our efforts from the second go round. Here’s some pics from Monday’s session:
Robert Chillin' with his wort
Bob taking the test tube challenge
The bierhouse
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Renewed Spirit(s)
I guess the raspberry wheat incident hit me pretty hard as I have not been able to post a bierwerke report since. This weekend though the fire returned as a new brewer is joining the fold. Oh, we weren’t neglecting the werkes, two batches are fermenting and one is ready for bottling. Mike’s Russian Imperial Stout with bourbon infusion is still going to take a while but Dave’s sloppy seconds brew is ready for transfer.
We welcome Robert to the fold. Yesterday the two of us hit the brew supply store and got the ingredients for a summer wheat similar to Dave’s original recipe. My ingredients for a Strong Ale are still sitting in Dave’s basement awaiting time where we can brew it, hopefully that’s tomorrow.
Our last brew date was January 19, two days after our first loss (bow heads please). Brewing Mike’s stout was a hoot. He had so much grain, about 22 pounds, we couldn’t believe it. After we got his wort boiling we checked and there was still a good amount of sugar left in the sparge water. We continued to sparge enough out of it to get another five gallon batch of beer. We had some remaining hops from previous batches and Dave had cultured some yeast. So, there you have it, a no-recipe, complete from scratch brew unexpectedly culled from leftovers, thus the Sloppy Seconds moniker.
But alas, the time allotted to concocting the rescue brew prevented me from brewing my batch. The darn weather and power outages have also added to the delay. It’s a good thing I picked up a couple kegs from BBC to hold me over. And even an ice storm and loss of electricity doesn’t stop CO2 from pushing beer through lines. The beer remained at a cool temperature throughout the five days even unrefrigerated. At least Old Man Winter and Mother Nature didn’t knock my sanity closet out of commission.
Tomorrow we’ll see how adding new personality to the group improves the beer.
We welcome Robert to the fold. Yesterday the two of us hit the brew supply store and got the ingredients for a summer wheat similar to Dave’s original recipe. My ingredients for a Strong Ale are still sitting in Dave’s basement awaiting time where we can brew it, hopefully that’s tomorrow.
Our last brew date was January 19, two days after our first loss (bow heads please). Brewing Mike’s stout was a hoot. He had so much grain, about 22 pounds, we couldn’t believe it. After we got his wort boiling we checked and there was still a good amount of sugar left in the sparge water. We continued to sparge enough out of it to get another five gallon batch of beer. We had some remaining hops from previous batches and Dave had cultured some yeast. So, there you have it, a no-recipe, complete from scratch brew unexpectedly culled from leftovers, thus the Sloppy Seconds moniker.
But alas, the time allotted to concocting the rescue brew prevented me from brewing my batch. The darn weather and power outages have also added to the delay. It’s a good thing I picked up a couple kegs from BBC to hold me over. And even an ice storm and loss of electricity doesn’t stop CO2 from pushing beer through lines. The beer remained at a cool temperature throughout the five days even unrefrigerated. At least Old Man Winter and Mother Nature didn’t knock my sanity closet out of commission.
Tomorrow we’ll see how adding new personality to the group improves the beer.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Oh Raspberries …blphhhttt… : (
It’s been a good month since we started sampling our first batches. We’re all down to critical replacement levels. All three beers turned out to be entirely drinkable. This was a welcome surprise seeing as we used the fly by the seat of your pants production manual on that first weekend.
When I arrived, Dave was putting the finishing touches on the new mash tun. Our first tun worked but was small and the drain hose wouldn’t stay put. Dave and I cleaned up the modified cooler and heated water for the mash. We got a new burner and pot so we don’t have to borrow the turkey fryer.
We set out this morning to be a little more methodical in our approach but homebrewing we have found is more like a night at the Improv than some well choreographed play.
Our first small snag was the outside temperature. It was about eighteen degrees Fahrenheit when we began. The hose bib was frozen so we filled about five 5-gallon buckets with water from the kitchen sink to get us started. You just can’t hose things down in subfreezing temperatures and this makes a water reliant process a little more difficult.
We compared recipes to see which one we should approach first. Dave chose a Raspberry Wheat. His first brew was a wheat so adding the raspberry puree should be simple. I chose a Strong English style Ale and Mike is going for a bourbon infused Imperial Stout, very ambitious. We decided early that we’d only attempt one brew today. It’s much easier to concentrate on mash temperatures, sparging, wort boil and hop additions when you’re not jumping between batches. I deferred to Dave since, one, its his house and two, his batch calls for a half hour less boil time.
The new burner brought the water to temperature quickly. We deposited the grain in the tun and added the heated water.
Mike showed up and brought in his supplies. We had an hour for steeping so following the cleaning of carboy fermenters and preparing the kettle and hops for the wort boil we did what brewers do with a little down time. We sampled some of our previous product and shot the bull about what great brewers we are and how we can be better.
After an hour, we began the sparge. The new tun drain worked great. It’s larger so the grain is more spread out. The drain filter worked well with little particle deposit into the wort.
We re-lit the burner and brought the wort to a boil being very careful to keep a watchful eye on the pot. We achieved boil quickly, reduced the heat and Dave added the first helping of hops. We did some further cleaning and kibitzing.
Mike had to split early so Dave and I were left to finish the boil, cool the wort and make the transfer to the fermenter. First we had to puree the raspberries and add them to the carboy. Dave fabricated a funnel from a plastic water jug and I spooned the puree into the funnel while he mashed it into the glass receptacle. This was a highly laborious process. The raspberries were previously frozen and we had left them outside after we ran them through the blender. Dave nearly got frostbite holding the funnel in place. His numb fingers would come back to haunt him.
We added the finishing hops and a small bit of Irish Moss, a clarifying agent. Ten minutes later we killed the flame and began the cool down. Our improved cooling coil was nothing but a decoration today due to the lack of hose water. We had to go old style and let the outside temperature work its magic while we assisted with a few transfers between a sanitized bucket and the brew kettle. We used a siphon hose to transfer the wort into the glass carboy.
Dave thought we filled the fementer a little too much. He was concerned about overflow during fermentation. We decided to use the hose and jug method to let the CO2 out of the huge jar rather than fuss with the small plastic gas release valve. Wee took a minute to set the system up. This method is more efficient and you have less chance of blow out due to better gas release. Dave was going along with this and then suddenly decided again that there was too much in the bottle. There was about three quarters of a gallon of wort left in the bucket. He would just pour some off and do an additional ferment in the bucket.
Dave lifted the glass carboy to pour.
Do you have any idea how much a glass carboy with five gallons of beer along with four pounds of soaked raspberry puree weighs?
Do you know how hard it is to pour a five gallon jug of liquid with the outside slippery from beer?
Do you know how hard it is to pour a full five gallon slippery glass jug of beer with your fingers still numb from funneling raspberries?
Well ……. we found out.
CRASH!!!!
Not a cuss word was spoken. We were in shock. I’m still in shock. It happened so fast … crash … glass and beer everywhere. A whole morning’s work went down the drain, a full batch of beer down the drain. Heck, we’re lucky there was a drain.
It was quiet, real quiet, a beer drinkers nightmare but we weren’t sleeping.
We reacted fairly quickly in our stunned haze and cleaned up as much of the glass and beer we could without the benefit of a working hose. Dave was completely dejected.
I could find no words to console him. He shook my hand, nearly pushed me out the door and said he was heading for the showers.
The Bier Werkes took a major hit today. This close to having another batch bubbling away in the basement and it explodes right in our faces. There’s not a thing either one of us could have done to prevent it. It just happened. There was no way to improvise a fix for this one. As they say … at least no one got hurt. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.
Yet, we live on to brew another day.
Long live the Bier Werkes!
When I arrived, Dave was putting the finishing touches on the new mash tun. Our first tun worked but was small and the drain hose wouldn’t stay put. Dave and I cleaned up the modified cooler and heated water for the mash. We got a new burner and pot so we don’t have to borrow the turkey fryer.
We set out this morning to be a little more methodical in our approach but homebrewing we have found is more like a night at the Improv than some well choreographed play.
Our first small snag was the outside temperature. It was about eighteen degrees Fahrenheit when we began. The hose bib was frozen so we filled about five 5-gallon buckets with water from the kitchen sink to get us started. You just can’t hose things down in subfreezing temperatures and this makes a water reliant process a little more difficult.
We compared recipes to see which one we should approach first. Dave chose a Raspberry Wheat. His first brew was a wheat so adding the raspberry puree should be simple. I chose a Strong English style Ale and Mike is going for a bourbon infused Imperial Stout, very ambitious. We decided early that we’d only attempt one brew today. It’s much easier to concentrate on mash temperatures, sparging, wort boil and hop additions when you’re not jumping between batches. I deferred to Dave since, one, its his house and two, his batch calls for a half hour less boil time.
The new burner brought the water to temperature quickly. We deposited the grain in the tun and added the heated water.
Mike showed up and brought in his supplies. We had an hour for steeping so following the cleaning of carboy fermenters and preparing the kettle and hops for the wort boil we did what brewers do with a little down time. We sampled some of our previous product and shot the bull about what great brewers we are and how we can be better.
After an hour, we began the sparge. The new tun drain worked great. It’s larger so the grain is more spread out. The drain filter worked well with little particle deposit into the wort.
We re-lit the burner and brought the wort to a boil being very careful to keep a watchful eye on the pot. We achieved boil quickly, reduced the heat and Dave added the first helping of hops. We did some further cleaning and kibitzing.
Mike had to split early so Dave and I were left to finish the boil, cool the wort and make the transfer to the fermenter. First we had to puree the raspberries and add them to the carboy. Dave fabricated a funnel from a plastic water jug and I spooned the puree into the funnel while he mashed it into the glass receptacle. This was a highly laborious process. The raspberries were previously frozen and we had left them outside after we ran them through the blender. Dave nearly got frostbite holding the funnel in place. His numb fingers would come back to haunt him.
We added the finishing hops and a small bit of Irish Moss, a clarifying agent. Ten minutes later we killed the flame and began the cool down. Our improved cooling coil was nothing but a decoration today due to the lack of hose water. We had to go old style and let the outside temperature work its magic while we assisted with a few transfers between a sanitized bucket and the brew kettle. We used a siphon hose to transfer the wort into the glass carboy.
Dave thought we filled the fementer a little too much. He was concerned about overflow during fermentation. We decided to use the hose and jug method to let the CO2 out of the huge jar rather than fuss with the small plastic gas release valve. Wee took a minute to set the system up. This method is more efficient and you have less chance of blow out due to better gas release. Dave was going along with this and then suddenly decided again that there was too much in the bottle. There was about three quarters of a gallon of wort left in the bucket. He would just pour some off and do an additional ferment in the bucket.
Dave lifted the glass carboy to pour.
Do you have any idea how much a glass carboy with five gallons of beer along with four pounds of soaked raspberry puree weighs?
Do you know how hard it is to pour a five gallon jug of liquid with the outside slippery from beer?
Do you know how hard it is to pour a full five gallon slippery glass jug of beer with your fingers still numb from funneling raspberries?
Well ……. we found out.
CRASH!!!!
Not a cuss word was spoken. We were in shock. I’m still in shock. It happened so fast … crash … glass and beer everywhere. A whole morning’s work went down the drain, a full batch of beer down the drain. Heck, we’re lucky there was a drain.
It was quiet, real quiet, a beer drinkers nightmare but we weren’t sleeping.
We reacted fairly quickly in our stunned haze and cleaned up as much of the glass and beer we could without the benefit of a working hose. Dave was completely dejected.
I could find no words to console him. He shook my hand, nearly pushed me out the door and said he was heading for the showers.
The Bier Werkes took a major hit today. This close to having another batch bubbling away in the basement and it explodes right in our faces. There’s not a thing either one of us could have done to prevent it. It just happened. There was no way to improvise a fix for this one. As they say … at least no one got hurt. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.
Yet, we live on to brew another day.
Long live the Bier Werkes!
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