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Jo3sh posted:I don't actually care if I win or not. I'm in it to make beer I like drinking and to participate in the fun. Maybe someone will be turned on by it; if not, I guess I'll be forced to drink it myself. Or you could make the dickale.
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Nov 8, 2013 18:07
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| # ? Jun 3, 2024 11:44 |
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What's that fruit that smells like farts? I don't think people have used that in a beer. Maybe anyway.
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Nov 8, 2013 18:17
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Durian? I'm not sure what it smells like other than bad.
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Nov 8, 2013 18:27
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Galler posted:Durian? I'm not sure what it smells like other than bad. Introduce a lacto culture by slathering limburger crumbles in yogurt.
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Nov 8, 2013 18:44
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Galler posted:Durian? I'm not sure what it smells like other than bad. Yeah that's it. Make a beer with that!
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Nov 8, 2013 18:48
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The-Bean posted:Apple season over here in the UK! Please do share. I put my new apple grinder to the test last night and it performed poorly. Chunks of apple kept getting wedged in between the drum and grinder box. I don't think I had enough angle on the screws for the heads to bite properly. 2 hours later I only managed to press a gallon of cider. I gave in this morning and ordered a real fruit crusher off Amazon. Hopefully it doesn't suck because I've got nearly 1000 pounds of apples in my garage waiting to be pressed, and some proper cider apples being delivered this weekend. In other news I cracked open my first proper lager, an Oktoberfest, a few days ago. Still a little undercarbonated but it came out very clear and clean. Nice to drink but I don't think it was worth the extra effort of lagering.
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Nov 8, 2013 19:05
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Rabbit turd tincture?
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Nov 8, 2013 19:08
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Possibly got an unintentional infection on my smoked blonde. Not entirely sure. I'll leave it alone for a bit and see what the poo poo on top starts looking like. 
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Nov 8, 2013 19:55
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Finally scored a vial of ECY BugCounty, so freaking giddy! No idea what I want to do with it yet... whatever I make, it's gonna be funky and sour as holy hell.
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Nov 8, 2013 20:52
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Dilemma: pitched 2 packets of US-05 into a pale ale on Sunday, got a very vigorous fermentation. Just checked, and it's reached what Brewtoad predicts should be its FG- it started at 1.057 (overshot our target 1.054), and it's at 1.014 When I just dry hopped, I still saw a large krausen, and it's down to bubbling around once every 10 seconds. We really wanted to use this yeast cake for this Old Chub clone tomorrow, but do you guys think it will be safe to bottle this tomorrow? Or should we just rack to secondary in the carnboy that I forgot we had until this very moment :facepalm: oh well,at least we bought the hops in bulk.
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Nov 9, 2013 03:27
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firebad57 posted:Dilemma: pitched 2 packets of US-05 into a pale ale on Sunday, got a very vigorous fermentation. Just checked, and it's reached what Brewtoad predicts should be its FG- it started at 1.057 (overshot our target 1.054), and it's at 1.014 No. Its not ready if its still fermenting or just finished. I wouldn't consider bottling earlier than 2 weeks; I keg at 9 or 10 days, but nothing happens if fermentation keeps going. The old fashioned method is 3 days at stable FG before bottling.
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Nov 9, 2013 03:31
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Also don't dryhop until fermentation ends because yeast in suspension (that plans on dropping out/flocculating) will drag hop flavor down with it, and the CO2 it's pushing out will take hop aroma with it. Plus if you want a clean yeastcake for another beer it's a cleaner process to move your original beer to secondary first before dryhopping.
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Nov 9, 2013 04:00
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Jacobey000 posted:So my efficiency is getting so painfully low (low 50s last time), I've started fly sparging recently and think the speed I'm sparging at must be too high. Something I've noticed is my grain bed kind of slumps to the middle while the edges move away (like a cake in a pan). Is this due to possibly channeling b/c I'm draining too fast? Quoting my previous post b/c this thread moves too fast - help.
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Nov 9, 2013 04:16
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Jacobey000 posted:Quoting my previous post b/c this thread moves too fast - help. How long does your sparge take? Anything under a half hour might be too fast. Are you mostly draining your grain bed before you start sparging? You should drain until it more or less looks "dry" on top - that way you're kind of rinsing through completely, instead of just "watering" down the initial sugary wort. Matching up your outflow with your input is kind of tricky too. Also, the bulk of the fermentable sugars are produced during your mash, as I'm sure you know. Pay attention to your mash temps. If you sparge above 172 degrees, you'll know you're NOT getting all of the fermentable sugar out of your grain bill because you'll get "starch" haze in your finished product. When in doubt, you can always extend your sparge (which gives enzymes more time to convert starch to sugar) AND/OR you can sparge with more water and boil it down.
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Nov 9, 2013 05:04
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Jacobey000 posted:Quoting my previous post b/c this thread moves too fast - help. Its telling you to add the mashout water all at once to raise the temp of the grainbed up enough to stop any further conversion and lock in the sugar profile. Were you to simply add all of the water including the sparge water, its just no-sparge brewing. If you add more water to your mash, you should stir it up and then let it settle to get as much sugar in solution as possible (in my opinion). I'm not sure why or how you're getting such low efficiency; I got 82% on a recent batch sparge with a single LHBS crush. My procedure is using Beersmith's calculations for strike water, then adding the grains. I do a LOT of stirring at the beginning to get the grains throughly mixed and to break up doughballs. I do not really lose much temperature doing this for whatever reason, but it takes a good 10-15 minutes for me to mash-in. I usually go with 60-90 minute sacc rests these days and it takes at least an hour to complete the sparge, if not more, even on a batch sparge. I don't mash out either. I'd pretty much need to either see or hear your entire procedure to know what's wrong. It could be anything from a crummy crush (which you could fix by double crushing at the brew store) to dough-balls to not stirring enough in the mash-in or sparge.
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Nov 9, 2013 09:32
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Angry Grimace posted:I do a LOT of stirring at the beginning to get the grains throughly mixed and to break up doughballs. This! I use a keggle and I sometimes will have monster grain bills for a 10 gallon barleywine or something, but even with a normal recipe, you have to stir a ton. I have a nice extra-long maple spoon I use.
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Nov 9, 2013 13:35
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Bottling my sour today and, like every time I bottle something, I'm stressing out about how much priming sugar to use. Every priming sugar calculator is telling me that in order to get 3 volumes of CO2 in 4.5 gallons of beer at 65 degrees, I need 5oz of priming sugar. Does this sound right? The last time I used 5oz in 4.5 gallons of beer was in my first batch and every single bottle was a gusher after a couple weeks.
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Nov 9, 2013 13:53
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Angry Grimace posted:s at least an hour to complete the sparge, if not more, even on a batch sparge. This sounds like where I may be going wrong (sparging too fast). Thanks.
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Nov 9, 2013 14:44
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internet celebrity posted:Bottling my sour today and, like every time I bottle something, I'm stressing out about how much priming sugar to use. Every priming sugar calculator is telling me that in order to get 3 volumes of CO2 in 4.5 gallons of beer at 65 degrees, I need 5oz of priming sugar. Does this sound right? The last time I used 5oz in 4.5 gallons of beer was in my first batch and every single bottle was a gusher after a couple weeks. Gushers occur primarily because of some kind of "infection" or because your beer isn't finished its primary fermentation - but given that you're likely working with a fickle yeast like brett, gushers can happen easily even if you do everything right. How long has this one been fermenting? Sour ales typically take longer to "finish" fermenting - so you have a couple of options. You can wait another few months before bottling, and then use a normal amount of bottling sugar, or you can bottle now, and skip the bottling sugar (assuming you haven't already let it sit a bit longer than a normal batch). edit: the cause of gushers in an otherwise normal batch is almost always an infection. Clean, sanitize and rinse those bottles, racking canes, caps, etc. If you STILL get gushers, then you know you have an infection source somewhere post boil (most likely). It could be a scratched carboy or plastic primary that's housing something nasty. It could be your racking canes, or even a valve on one of your tuns.  trust no one
tiananman fucked around with this message at 15:42 on Nov 9, 2013 |
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Nov 9, 2013 15:31
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internet celebrity posted:Bottling my sour today and, like every time I bottle something, I'm stressing out about how much priming sugar to use. Every priming sugar calculator is telling me that in order to get 3 volumes of CO2 in 4.5 gallons of beer at 65 degrees, I need 5oz of priming sugar. Does this sound right? The last time I used 5oz in 4.5 gallons of beer was in my first batch and every single bottle was a gusher after a couple weeks. I've used as much as 4.6 oz of priming sugar and had no bad results. Since the beer has aged for so long, a lot of CO2 will have come out of suspension, so some extra sugar will kick it up a few points that its lost.
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Nov 9, 2013 18:00
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wattershed posted:
I had been wanting to try to get back into all grain brewing, but didn't want to buy any more equipment for a while, and you just reminded me that I have two of those coolers laying around doing nothing  Looks like I'm buying a shitload of grains after I clear out some of these fermenters! Or maybe I can get my 15 gallon fermenter into a usable state, and make a huge batch of something...
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Nov 9, 2013 19:07
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tiananman posted:Gushers occur primarily because of some kind of "infection" or because your beer isn't finished its primary fermentation - but given that you're likely working with a fickle yeast like brett, gushers can happen easily even if you do everything right. Actually I'd say a lot of people use way too much priming sugar and that causes gushers. The standard most kits give is to use 5 oz per 5 gallons which is too much for pretty much any beer, and then a lot of people end up with less than 5 gallons of beer as well which makes things worse. If you get gushers because of an infection you'll almost always be able to smell/taste it.
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Nov 9, 2013 19:54
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I think it takes a developed palate to understand the difference between too much carbonic acid and an infection, especially without training. Try to eliminate variables by using a good priming calculator, Northern Brewers has worked decently for me, and sanitizing anything that touches the wort/beer after boil. If you're getting gushers following sanitizing procedures and while priming on a conservative side, then there is likely a problem with your equipment.
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Nov 10, 2013 04:14
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I find the solution for figuring out when a beer is done is to shove it in primary, put it somewhere dark, and forget about it for a month or so until you bring up the next batch of beer and remember you have to bottle everything if you want it ready in two weeks for Thanksgiving. That reminds me, I need to brew that Tripel.
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Nov 10, 2013 05:37
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 Homebrew Secret Santa signup! General rules: Know what's legal to do and what's not legal to do, have fun! Signups will close on thanksgiving and i'll email people their santees a day or two later. 3rd year in a row, yay!
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Nov 10, 2013 07:17
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How do I ensure sanitization with fresh juice that I'm gonna squeeze for a wine though? I don't wanna boil the stuff, though I suppose if I kept it at 135*F for a couple hours that could work...
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Nov 10, 2013 07:18
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Paladine_PSoT posted:
Is there a resource for figuring out if it's legal or not to ship beer?
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Nov 10, 2013 07:37
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Beer4TheBeerGod posted:Is there a resource for figuring out if it's legal or not to ship beer? It's illegal to ship via USPS, it's not technically illegal, however it does go against their policy to ship via UPS or FedEx. Definitely don't tell them you're shipping beer. I usually say things like "camping supplies". "live yeast samples" is the go to but it's pretty obvious. YMMV, IANAL, et. cetera.
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Nov 10, 2013 07:55
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Paladine_PSoT posted:
Any other Ausgoons going to sign up for this? What do people normally send? Couple of bottles of homebrew?
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Nov 10, 2013 08:26
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It was supposed to be really warm for the next few days so I started a sour mash berliner weisse on Friday night. I did a pretty similar grain bill to the one in this recipe, but I mashed and sparged to my boil kettle and then threw in 200g of unmilled pale malt once the wort had cooled to about 40degC. Right now it smells and tastes like the juice from the bottom of a hot bag of garbage, but it's getting reasonably tart. I think I'll probably give it a full hour boil tomorrow afternoon to try and drive off some of the nasty flavours a bit more. Pretty excited to see if I end up with something that's actually drinkable at the end of this.
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Nov 10, 2013 08:40
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Paladine_PSoT posted:
 I'm an idiot!  quote:Hello Everyone! Welcome to the third installment of the SA Homebrew Secret Santa! As always, by signing up for this you attest that you are of legal age in your area to receive beer from internet strangers. Please consider all applicable laws for delivery of beer. I'll just put yes to send & receive beer then! 
Fluo fucked around with this message at 09:24 on Nov 10, 2013 |
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Nov 10, 2013 09:03
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Anyone have experience doing a solera? I plan on doing a sour solera and I have a few questions: - Should I leave the beer on the yeast cake for the entirety of the aging? Leaving beer on a yeast cake for 7+ years seems like a bad idea. - I plan on adding peaches to these, brewing one a year with each peach harvest from my tree. How long should these sit on the peaches? That's about it really. I'm mostly concerned with how it works in regards to leaving the beer on the yeast/fruit.
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Nov 10, 2013 13:21
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Paladine_PSoT posted:
Stoked this is happening again, I was only able to send ingredients last year but sent some hilarious stuff. I got a bunch of fullroundactions's beer in return and they were super fun to try, he also wrote up an awesome description of each. Midorka posted:Anyone have experience doing a solera? I plan on doing a sour solera and I have a few questions: It's funny you are also considering this, it's seriously so cool. Jacobey000 and I were talking about this last night and I figured that after 4 or 5 years of doing regular pulls: the trub and yeast cake at the bottom from the build up of additional wort being added would eventually be too much to continue using. Think about how big that cake will be after you've dumped 10-15 gallons of new wort in there every 6 months. I think you'll definitely be able to taste the progress of each batch as you go, and you'll know when it's time to replace and dump the cake and just refill again. You don't have to lose the bugs, just dump the cake. The barrel will still be super inoculated after that long. About the peaches, if it were me I would do a pull on the barrel and rack on top of the peaches in a different vessel. Definitely don't add that to the barrel, you want what's in the barrel to be a crazy base for other beer experiements. hellfaucet fucked around with this message at 13:58 on Nov 10, 2013 |
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Nov 10, 2013 13:51
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Paladine_PSoT posted:
Woop! I've got some really fun stuff to send out this year. If you don't get me again B4tBG feel free to still send me some saison d Noel. 
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Nov 10, 2013 15:15
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ShadowCatboy posted:How do I ensure sanitization with fresh juice that I'm gonna squeeze for a wine though? I don't wanna boil the stuff, though I suppose if I kept it at 135*F for a couple hours that could work... Winemakers use sulfites. MoreWine has some detailed guides on winemaking and sulfiting that may help.
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Nov 10, 2013 16:14
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Midorka posted:Anyone have experience doing a solera? I plan on doing a sour solera and I have a few questions: You're aging one for for 7years? I'd say do it how they do lambics 1 year on yeast cake then transfer to secondary, transfer on to of peaches for 4weeks prior to bottling after 7 years I think you'd need to add some fresh yeast when you transfer ontop of the peaches/if you're going to bottle. (In Radical brewing they say peaches aren't gonna be great so it's worth adding some apricots if you're going to use peaches too).
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Nov 10, 2013 16:16
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Fluo posted:You're aging one for for 7years? I'd say do it how they do lambics 1 year on yeast cake then transfer to secondary, transfer on to of peaches for 4weeks prior to bottling after 7 years I think you'd need to add some fresh yeast when you transfer ontop of the peaches/if you're going to bottle. (In Radical brewing they say peaches aren't gonna be great so it's worth adding some apricots if you're going to use peaches too). Lambics are aged for the entirety on the yeast cake cause all the bugs can feed off the dead bugs circle of life style so its probably not a taste problem as much as running out of space, but as hellfaucet and Fluo recommends you want to referment with fruit in a secondary. You leave it for as long as it needs it. Its done when its done. Wild Brews mentions commercial lambics generally do it about 6-9 months to fully ferment everything the fruit brings to the party but you honestly just need to taste sour stuff to know if its done or not.
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Nov 10, 2013 16:33
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zedprime posted:Solera is where you continuously top off a soured vessel after what you take off for blending, so you can keep going till the stuff goes off but its not like literally aging for 7 years. I was going by radical brewing lambic, still reading Wildbrews.  I'm up to production methods (p117) in Wild Brews at the moment, really need to finish it but keep getting sidetracked but I told myself I wouldn't brew a sour beer untill I finished it.  (Going to target myself to finish it by wednesday now, as it seems I don't know poo poo lmao).Yeah what zedprime said! Fluo fucked around with this message at 16:49 on Nov 10, 2013 |
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Nov 10, 2013 16:43
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I made an IPA a couple weeks ago and tasted it for the first time last night. It had a really strange taste - it started off very bitter but then became almost sweet. It's really interesting and I quite like it, but I'm just trying to figure out where the sweetness is coming from. It didn't finish with a high gravity and the flavor isn't malty, so I'm suspecting it's the honey I added. I used about 2 lbs (~2.5 gallon batch), and added it late in the boil - would that be enough to cause this? For bittering hops, I used just under 2 oz Chinook, so it should be plenty bitter. Again, I really like the transition from in your face bitter to smooth and sweet; I just want to figure out what is causing it. Any ideas?
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Nov 10, 2013 17:32
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| # ? Jun 3, 2024 11:44 |
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Paladine_PSoT posted:It's illegal to ship via USPS, it's not technically illegal, however it does go against their policy to ship via UPS or FedEx. Definitely don't tell them you're shipping beer. I usually say things like "camping supplies". "live yeast samples" is the go to but it's pretty obvious. YMMV, IANAL, et. cetera. "yeast samples in growth medium"
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Nov 10, 2013 17:49
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