Saturday, October 16, 2010

F*CK It's Cold

Origin:
It's getting cold out as winter approaches and I decided its time to brew a "winter warmer." I decided I would try to replicate my favorite warmer Widmer Brothers Brrr. This Brrr Clone should be quite the treat. I decided to leave out the onomatopoeia and just explain to the drinker, F*CK It's Cold.

Ingredients:
  • 11 lbs Light/Pale Malt Extract
  • 2.0 oz. Simcoe (12.7% alpha-acid, whole leaf)
  • 2.0 oz. Cascade (8.6% alpha-acid, whole leaf)
  • 1.5 oz. Nugget (12-14% alpha-acid, whole leaf, home grown)
  • White Labs California Ale Yeast (WLP001)
  • 1 3/4 lb. Crystal Malt (10°L, Crushed)
  • 1/4 lb. Crystal Malt (80°L, Crushed)
  • 4 oz. German Melanoidin Malt (30°L, Crushed)
  • 3 oz. Chocolate Malt (350°L, Crushed)
Procedure:

On Saturday October 16th I purchased the all my ingredients through Main Street Homebrew Supply Co. and brewed that day. This was a pretty standard brew with steeping the grains, pouring the malt, cooling, and pitching. One thing that I noticed that I have not before is when transferred to the primary from the kettle several distinct layers of sedimentation were created. The picture at the left shows the very distinct layers of sedimentation. This may be due to the Irish Moss because that is a new step in my brewing process and has to do with flocculation.
My friend Nick grew some Nugget Hops in his back yard and this year they finally began to produce some yield. He vary graciously gave me some of his crop and I'm using them for this batch. They are a little tighter packed than the standard Freshops I usually get but they worked out great. Once submerged in the boil they expanded to their full cone shape and did their job nicely. I worked the hops into the recipe and hop schedule shown below.

Hops/Ingredients Schedule:

QuantityIngredientBoiled for
1 oz.Simcoe Entire 60 min. Boil
1 1/2 oz.NuggetLast 30 min. of boil
1 oz.CascadeLast 20 min. of boil
1 oz.SimcoeLast 15 min. of boil
1 oz.CascadeLast 5 min. of boil

I pitched the yeast, measure the OG, and sealed it up. (In acutality I sealed it up, remembered to check OG and then sealed it up again)
Original Gravity: 1.070

UPDATE:
Today, October 29th, 2010 I transferred my F*CK It's Cold to the secondary after fermenting for a little less than 2 weeks. The results I am happy to say, were exceptional! After taking a gravity I began transferring to the secondary carboy to ferment. Near the end of the siphon the carboy was getting a pretty full, since I started with closer to 6 gallons, and I siphoned a couple of cups into a pint glass for sampling. The unfinished beer was in my opinion very close to Widmer Brrr. I am eager to see what the final result will be after secondary fermentation has completed. At around 6% Alcohol I think there is some further fermenting that needs to happen before it is ready to keg. Ill let it sit in the secondary for another week.
Gravity at Transfer: 1.024
Current Alcoh
ol:
  • ABW=105*(1.070-1.024)=4.83
  • ABV=1.25*4.83=6.04%
UPDATE 2:
Today, November 3, 2010 I kegged the F*ck It's Cold. Remeasuring the gravity to 1.022 i determined that the alchohol content is approximately 6.3%. While transferring I noticed that this beer has an extremely high level of clarity. Possibly the highest clarity beer I have ever produced. I don't know if i should attribute this to the irish moss or some other factor. I took a picture but it really doesn't convey what I am trying to show (shown right). I tried another sample and it tastes even better than it did before at sampling. I will most likely turn this into a seasonal brewing adventure. One note is that I started off with closer to 6 gallons of wort before I pitched because I was tired of the amount of trub that was getting transferred to my beer. This turned out to be too much. I think 5.5 gallons of wort will be enough to allow transfer without bringing any zombie yeast over, and still be enough to fill the carboy up and then consequentially the keg.

FINAL BEER GRAVITY:
  • ABW=105*(1.070-1.022)=5.04
  • ABV=1.25*5.04=6.30%

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Another one bites the foam

I finished off the last bit of my Rapist's Wit today. An overall great drinking experience but now I have 2 empty kegs that need filling. Anyone have some ideas on what I should brew next. I was thinking about trying to do a bourbon barrel aged BRRR like the Widmer Brothers are releasing under their limited release brothers reserve. If you look closely at the BAC it's coming in nicely at 10.4% up from the 7.12% of the original. Any other suggestions?

Friday, October 1, 2010

Bottling: like kegging... but smaller

There is a very different process when bottling than when kegging. Though different; the concept is the same, make sure everything is very clean and put it in a new container. Some brewers have a slightly different methodology of bottling beer, that being said, this is mine. I am not saying this is the only way or that there are not better ways of bottling, but this is the process I use.

Sanitization: The first thing I do is grab my trusty fermentation bucket, I don't use the sanitization bucket because the beer will be touching the vessel. Since my sanitization bucket has acquired an abundance of scratches (bacteria hide-outs) I only use it to soak equipment in. Fill with water and place 2 tablespoons/five gallons of iodophor to sanitize. Place the hydrometer in the water for sterilization and proceed to the dishwasher. Taking my bottles from their storage boxes I hold up to a bright light and visually inspect each bottle. Ensuring there is no visible trub left over from the previous bottling. If there isn't, I place it upside down in the bottom rack of the dishwasher. It is important that bottles are visibly clean or the probability of off flavors in your beer goes up to around 100%.

The settings of the dishwasher are important here. Some modern dishwashers have a "sanitize" setting and that is just what you need, to sanitize your bottles. If it doesn't, set to the highest heat setting with drying. Turn any energy star settings off this is not going to be efficient. The heat, not the water, is what does the heavy lifting on dishwasher sanitization. Do not add any cleaning solution to the dishwasher, pure water will work great as long as the heat is there. In the top rack I place my siphon, and a bottle cap filled strainer. This will sanitize all your equipment along with the bottles and be ready for you when the bottles are. I chose not to put the hydrometer in dishwasher because I don't know if it is dishwasher safe or if its going to break since it is a sealed vessel. This precision measurement isnsturments accuracy may be damaged by the intense heat. So this is sanitized in the fermentation bucket as described above.

Preparing for Bottling: Now that the dishwasher has started you've got some time to kill, the heating/drying cycle will take longer than normal. The next step after the dishwasher cycle is completed is to empty the fermentation bucket of its iodophor solution and place below the secondary fermenter. Now slowly begin the siphon of the beer into the sanitized fermenter. While transferring you should boil 1-2 cups of water and dissolve 1 cup of corn sugar into the boiling solution. The sugar will give the yeast something to produce CO2 and carbonate the beer once in sealed bottles. There will be a very small increase in alcohol but nothing to write home about. You can use more or less sugar for more or less carbonation but I have found that 1 cup is perfect. However, too much sugar can leave you with exploding bottles.
Quickly cool the sugar water and cover. Once the beer has completely transferred take a gravity reading and record. Add the cooled (~80 °F) sugar water to the beer solution making sure to minimize aeration.

Bottling: Place the now full fermenter on up high and begin transferring to bottles once you clean the siphon. This next process works best if you have a beer wench, or someone else helping you. Using the siphon and a bottle filler fill each bottle as close to the top as you can. When the bottle filler is removed it will displace just the right amount for airspace in the top of the bottle. Place sanitized caps on the top of each bottle and using a capper to seal it up.
Now the hard part wait for about a week while the beer carbonates. Below is a picture of my bottles that I had laser etched with my logo. This is pretty expensive but my friend works for a laser etching company and he and I spend several evenings etching these little guys. Totally worth the beer and pizza.