Suburban Brewing

After a short break I’m getting ready to brew once again. This time I’ll be working on a Belgian Wit recipe. I know this is not really the season for this type of a beer but I don’t care about that. So far I’ve brewed 4 batches of beer and the last two came out pretty good. I let my friends and co-workers taste them and they could not believe this came out of my garage! In fact I have about 6 bottles left of each batch; friends are asking for more, that is not a bad problem to have.

Few changes on how I will proceed with my brewing going forward:

• From day one I vowed to be very analytical when it comes to brewing and to concentrate a lot on data collection, unfortunately as a beginner I just got overwhelmed at the start and did not keep good records. That has to change right away. If I ever want to achieve repeatability collecting data at multiple points is a must. Batch #3 & #4 were good but I can’t make them again.
• SMaSH Brewing was a great way of getting into brewing. I had hoped to continue this until I tried all the hop varieties I purchased along with different yeast combinations but at this point I will venture into more complex recipes. So SMaSH brewing is going on hold for a bit.
• Lower Temp. I’m finding that I overshoot the mash temp quite a bit in almost every brew. Even when I compensated for this by lower the strike temp it was still too warm. Need more control over it. To help with that I insulated my mashtun from all sides; the pot now looks like a cooler! Yes, maybe I should have used a cooler instead of a pot like everyone else does!
• Do not use an airlock for yeast starter with a rubber stopper. I broke my 2000ml Erlenmeyer flask while brewing batch #3 because the rubber stopper got stuck/glued to the glass, malt is sticky, I should have know better. Luckily I wore gloves when I attempted to take the stopper out while the flask shattered in my hands. I’ll be covering it with aluminum foil going forward as my brother had recommended (he has 12+ years of lab experience growing all kinds of funky bacteria)

Hmm….what else? I guess that is about it for now. Tomorrow I’ll be making my starter and I hope to brew on Saturday, although I’m a bit under the weather so lets hope the cold goes away by then!

November 7th is the American Homebrewers Association annual “Teach a Friend to Homebrew Day”. Many local brewshop will be hosting various events around this beer holiday as I’d like to call it 

This is a great opportunity to share our hobby with friends, neighbors and relatives.

If your shop is organizing an event on the 7th please let me know and I’ll add it to this post.

On Thursday during my lunch break I drove to  the newly opened Aristan Homebrew shop in Downingtown, PA.  As many of you may know it was pouring most of yesterday and I expected my ride from Malvern to Downingtown to be a slow one. Fortunately that was not the case and I made it in about 20 minutes. Upon walking into the shop I was impressed how well it was organized and stocked. I had a short list of items to pick up and found most of them rather quickly. Mike has the largest yeast selection I’ve ever seen. He has two refrigerators with one of them dedicated to White Labs strains while the other one housed smack packs and other varieties.  Since I exclusively use White Labs yeast seeing such a large selection made me very happy. I picked up Cry Havoc and Burton Ale yeast both of which were very competitively priced, actually they were the cheapest yeast as compared to 2 other local brew shops. I also purchased 4 bags of PBW as I can never keep enough of it on hand, I think I’ll need to get an 8 pound bucket of it soon and I purchased two carboy handles. In terms of malts  Mike has a very nice selection of specialty grains and extracts. I was surprised that for a brand new shop he even had MO on hand. For those who don’t have their own grain crusher there is one at the shop, and yes it is powered by a drill so you can crush your malt right on the spot or ask Mike to do it for you ahead of time.

As stated earlier the store is very well stocked, even though Mike mentioned there is more stuff on the way. I really like that everything is organized so nicely and without clutter. I do like the fact that he is open until 7pm during the week so those of us who work late can still make it in time to pick some last minute items before brewing. I am an equal opportunity type of guy so I will surely frequent this shop along with two other ones that are in my area. Overall I’m very happy to see another LHBS opening and would highly recommend Arisan Homebrew to anyone living in its vicinity.

Artisinal Homebrew
128 E Lancaster Avenue,
Downingtown, PA 19355

610-873-HOPS (4677)

Store Hours:
Tuesday – Friday:   11:00 am to 7:00 pm
Saturday:           10:00 am to 5:00 pm
Sunday:             12:00 pm to 5:00 pm
Monday:             Closed

Yesterday I tasted both of my brews. Batch 1 was brewed on 9/27, batch 2 was brewed on 10/3. Batch 1 being the first brew I ever made is still grainy and cloudy but drinkable. I’ve seen posts by new homebrewers who often discard their first few beers because they don’t think they’ll be “good enough” to keg or bottle. I plan on being patient, even with my first batch where I made some many mistakes while making it. I still think the cloudiness will subside over time once I bottle the beer.

My 2nd batch which has been in the primary for a little over a week tastes much better and has no cloudiness at all. There is no grainy taste to it at all and the hop flavor is very well balanced. Yes, I have to confess I did a bit of “continuous hand-hopping” for about 30 minutes, adding one cone at a time to the brew pot. The lack of cloudiness is probably related to the fact that I used Irish moss in this batch (I forgot to use it in batch 1).

The 2nd batch overall is a cleaner beer, thanks to extended Vorlaufing and filtering of the beer before I moved it into the fermenter. I moved both beers from the Primary into a bottling carboy as I’ll be bottling both beers this weekend while Batch 3 is brewing! Oh this is fun, fun, fun!

Looks like the newest homebrewing shop in the area is set to open this Thursday as reported by Bryan Kolesar earlier today. The name of the shop is Artisan Homebrew and they’re located at 128 East Lincoln Highway, Downingtown, PA.

I’ll be stopping over there on the opening day probably around noon-ish to scope it out!

I posted this question in the AlEiens forum last month and received a lot of excellent feedback. Here is my original question:

I’m thinking of getting an Igloo cooler and fitting it with 50 feet of 1/2 copper pipe, dump ice in it and run my tap water through it before it goes into my wort chiller (another 50 feet of copper pipe)

I’ve been reading alot of complaints from people that unless you’re using a counterflow chiller, whirlpool chiller or a Therminator type of chiller it will take along time to cool down 5-10 gal batches.

Since I’m putting my first all grain setup I’m thinking what would be the best way to cool my wort and maybe an iced pre-chiller could be an affordable alternative to the above solutions.

My other concern is sanitizing of a counterflow chiller. I think it is too much of a headache to make sure it is in fact clean in all the bends and that it is fully dried before next use. With a standard wort chiller cleaning the inside of it is not an issue. I’d rather be brewing than spending my time cleaning inside of a chiller!

So after getting feedback from couple experienced homebrewers I decided to go with a pre-chiller. I found a great deal on a 1/2 inch heavy duty pre-chiller on… Ebay! It is sold by a guy in New York.

I emailed the seller (Jeff) and asked if he could make a custom 66 ft pre-chiller and a 50 ft chiller for me. The 66 ft one would fit in my Rubbermaid 10 gallon cooler and the 55 footer would go in the boil pot. Sure enough he was able to make a custom chiller for me within a weekend. I paid for it on Friday, he shipped it on Monday and I had it in my hands on Tuesday. How is that for a quick turnaround time.

The chillers are of excellent quality, they’re made from 1/2 copper tubing and both of them contained heavy duty garden hose adapters welded directly into the copper pipe. Everything looks solid like a rock. I highly recommend these chillers. I believe Jeff is about to open an online shop for homebrewers called NY Brew Supply. There is a web site located here nybrewsupply.com (currently under construction but his Ebay store is fully operational).

I’ve used the chiller and pre-chiller combination during both of my brewing sessions. The 2nd time I used this combination I chilled my wort to 65 degrees in under 30 minutes. The pre-chiller itself was submerged in 45 pounds of ice which melted in about 25 minutes. I realize getting ice is an additional expense but it gives me a peace of mind knowing that my wort is exposed to bacteria for the shortest possible time.

In the end I would highly recommend a chiller and pre-chiller type of setup or some sort of combination similar to it. To me one of the most important factors is what I mentioned earlier; the cleanup. There is no need to clean the inside of the piping since no worth goes through it.

Pictures of the chillers to follow shortly…

Ingredients:

• 8lbs Maris Otter
• 4.00 oz 2008 Fuggles hops (whole)
• WLP001 California Ale Yeast
• 7.25 gallons Drexel Hill water

24 hours before starting my first brewing session I created a 2 qt yeast starter using Extra Light DME and one vial of WLP001 California Ale Yeast. After 24 hours on a stir plate I decanted the yeast, let it settle and cool down gradually in my basement. After decanting I ended up with a little under a quart of yeast slurry.

On Sunday morning I picked up 45 pounds of ice for my pre-chiller and boiled 7.5 gallons of water to get rid of the chlorine. I let it cool down to 168 degrees (strike temp as calculated in BeerSmith)

I preheated my mashtun to 168 degrees with 1 gallon of water and combined it with 6.25 gallons of water from the other pot. I dumped 8 pounds of Maris Otter into the tun and let it sit for 90 minutes. I did have an issue with temperature control, actually it had to do with the strike water being too hot by 10 degrees. When I dumped MO into the tun it lowered the temp to 164; that is no where near the high end of what it should be (155-158). So I left the pot open to cool down as quickly as possible. What I should have done was to perhaps use ice or ice packs (inside a plastic bag) to lower the temperature. I came up with that solution a day later, unfortunately. Although the strike water was too high I think it would be easier to cool it down versus heating it so in the future I think I’ll stick with strike water that is a bit warmer then needed. Since I’m so new to brewing I really haven’t figured out how this high temperature will impact the final brew, maybe someone with more experience can chime in.

After 90 minutes I started to transfer the wort into the boil pot but before doing so I recalled what Dave Miller wrote in his book about transferring wort into the boil pot. He said it should take between 40 to 60 minutes to do the transfer. Basically the flow of the wort has to be very gentle and slow so the grain bed doesn’t collapse plus the slow flow helps to improve efficiency. With that knowledge I timed the flow out of the ball valve so it would take 50 minutes to fully drain. The first gallon or so I recycled back into the tun gently to remove any grain residue until the wort came out clear. My pot has a false bottom which helped with that.

After the wort drained into the boil pot I started to boil it for 90 minutes. Once it started to boil I added 2 oz of the hops at 90 minutes and 2 more ounces at 60 minutes. At 75 minutes I immersed my chiller in the wort to sanitize it for 15 minutes in the boiling wort. This is where a major problem occurred; I had iced water running through the chiller already which in turn caused the boil to stop! I panicked a bit at this point and increased the propane flow to bring the wort back to a boil. This turned out to be another mistake because the heat from the wort melted all 45 pounds of ice in my pre-chiller in a matter of minutes. In the end I was not able to bring the wort back to a boil and instead added more ice to my pre-chiller and continued the cooling process. It took about 30 minutes to lower the temperature to 68 degrees. I’m sure time would have been shorter if it wasn’t for the fact that I turned up the heat on full power for few minutes mid-way through the chilling phase.

Once chilled I drained my wort into a 6.5 gallon carboy and aerated with an aquarium pump for the duration of it being filled. Once full I pitched my yeast, covered it with a airlock and moved it from the garage to the basement.

Within 12 hours the yeast was going crazy! The airlock kept popping like mad releasing a lot of CO2. This was a good sign. As I finish this post on Sunday my beer has been fermenting full 7 days. I tasted it yesterday and it is not bad, a bit grainy but that is because it is still green. It is very hoppy as well so maybe I overdid it with 4 oz of hops but the flavors will most likely even out over time.

I brewed another batch today which took me half the time of the first batch. I made correction in the areas where I erred last time (ie the high mash temp and lowering of the chiller filled with ice water). I am hoping both batches will be good, so far both are looking good!

Yes! Finally! I brewed my first beer on Sunday. I will have an indepth report later this week as I’m away on business today and tomorrow.

In a nutshell I have learned that it takes alot of work, skill and patience to brew. After my first brewing experience I have even more respect for all amateur brewers as well as the professionals! As Ali G would say; “Respek”

What is the best way of learning how to brew beer? What approach should a novice take? There are so many variables, options, choices and procedures it could be perceived as overwhelming. Those are some of the challenges facing someone who is just starting out. Last week I came across an interesting article on something called SMaSH Brewing posted on the Brewer’s Friend website.

SMaSH stands for “Single Malt and Single Hop” and just by reading this you can figure out it involves brewing beer with just one type of malt and one type of hop, simple enough, and that is exactly what it entails. Instead of creating complicated recipes with multiple grains and hop varieties why not start with the simplest combination. By doing a SMaSH brew you can learn how each type of malt, hop and yeast impacts the final product. Over time with a bit of experimentation I’m hoping I’ll be able to put together a unique recipe based on my taste preferences. There are thousands of home brewing recipes out there, including many clones of commercially available beers but what fun is to replicate someone else’s work if you can make something new all by yourself!

For my first brew I will be using Maris Otter with a single hop and domestic ale yeast from White Labs. I plan on varying the hops and yeasts for a long time before I start adding or changing my base malt. I have MO, 10 varieties of hops and 5 different ale yeasts, that will give me tens if not hundreds of combinations to explore. I don’t see a need to get all fancy and start mixing 6+ malts, one should be enough for now. Plus from what I’ve been reading people who switches to the SMaSH method have been producing outstanding brews. Lets see if I’m as lucky!

As mentioned in earlier post things have been coming together nicely over the last few weeks and I’m almost ready to brew my first beer (or two). I’ve put together my brewing tower last week (pictures and details coming in seperate post), all of my equipment arrived with the exception of one pot which could possibly delay my first brew day but I’ll deal with that later.

I purchased 55 pounds of Maris Otter from BYOB and bought 10 varieties of whole hops from Hops Direct. They were blowing out 2008 crop at unbelievable prices so I picked up 10 pounds of hops. Yesterday I went back to BYOB and crushed 25 pounds of MO and picked up While Labs 001 California Ale yeast.

Can you smell the hot wort yet?