A Fine Blend

Flash floods and my back yard is under water: it's the evening of
Easter Sunday and the beautiful amber ale wort was brewed in less than
two hours only to be cooled and confined to a closet for eight days
until such a time as it was decided that my grandfather's glass carboy
was safe enough to hold the stuff for two more weeks whereupon it
shall be racked and combined with half of the ipa to make a fine blend
of ipamber.

First!

This is the first time I have brewed in quite some time. I have had these two boxed kits of IPA and due to some problems with my equipment I never brewed. Anyways, i got a new rubber ring and now I'm good to go. I cleaned & cleansed my buckets the other day, and today I cleaned & rinsed my brew pot.

The brewpot is on the stove, a-boilin', and the malt extract is in it's Brewpot Jr., getting warmer More Malleable.

In a few months we shall see and taste and smell what this creation has brought about.

More Cleanser

I love this new cleanser. In preparation for my Texas trip, I bottled a day early. I moved the secondary fermenter out to the dining room, sanitized all the tubes, the bottling bucket, and the larger bottles that wouldn't fit in the dishwasher the other day. I've streamlined my prep & cleaning routines to minimize time, energy, & mess.

I mixed up the priming sugar with a cup of water, and boiled it. As soon as it was ready I started racking from the secondary to the bottling bucket. I used vice grips to hold the siphon in place, which freed my hands to get the bottles ready.

I was able to set up a workstation where I could reach everything I needed without moving from my stool: bottling hose, empty bottles, bottle caps, capper tool, and storage for finished bottles.

After I cleaned up everything I wiped down the bottles in preparation for affixing labels. This brew is called True Long Way IPA.

Crap I just realized I was supposed to take the second gravity measurement yesterday before adding the sugar but I completely forgot to.

A Transfer

Yesterday I did some cleansing and then a few hours later racked the brew from the primary fermenter to the secondary.

Here's a video. Watch out, it may be too exciting for the internet.




Ps: A graduated Cylinder was obtained and measurements were taken.

Long True Way IPA

So I finished up brewing last night. It smelled good, about like I recall the first IPA smelling like. (Let's not get into a discussion about remembering a smell from one year ago.)

It took 2 hours & 57 minutes from first start to carrying the bucket to the closet. This time, along the way, I did an excellent job of keeping surfaces clean, cleaning utensils as I went, and in general not making a mess. It was so smooth that I don't really have any commentary.

Oh yes, one point of note: I actually took a sample for the purposes of doing a Hydrometer reading. I've never taken readings at the proper time (1st: before one adds the yeast; 2nd: before one adds the priming sugar & bottles.) While I have a hydrometer, I don't have a graduated cylinder to use. Hopefully someone can get me one *nudge nudge*

Boil
Soak grains
boil
pour two big cans of warmed malt
add pilgrim hops
stir
boil
add gold hops
fill up bucket with cold water
transfer wort
steam oak chips
add oak chips
pour yeast
stir wort
cap it

Hop to it

Last night I sanitized all the equipment I would need tonight to brew.

Tonight I started brewing at 7.45--which mostly involved pouring water, turning on burners, and opening up the beer recipe kit. Surprise!!!! The hops are different!! Instead of Chinook and Cascade, they put in Pilgrim & First Gold.

The instructions still refer to the Cascade & Chinook. Luckily a google search revealed the approximate alpha value of each, so I hope I get it right. More importantly, I hope my beer turns out as good as that first batch. Beginner's luck?

A New Beginning

On a trip to Mobile I procured two new recipe kits of the IPA, the first homebrew I made. Six batches later, it's been almost a year since I started homebrewing, but I haven't brewed in almost 6 months.

I took a break because one of my beers made me sick. This, obviously, confused my outlook on homebrewing. Unfortunately it was the tastiest of the last three batches I made, and it turned me off brewing or even drinking my own homebrew for quite a while. I finally decided to take what I had learned, and try to recreate the best beer I had made so far: the first one.

I obtained some top-notch cleansing agents for free from a contact in the equipment-cleansing underworld, and I'm ready to start again.

I desire great brewing, great bottling, great cleansing, and great beer.