Final brew activity of 2008...making dark malt

What a year for brewing! I managed to make 8 all grain batches and learn a ton about brewing this year. I wanted to brew today (new years eve), but instead I'll prep today and brew tomorrow. As it turns out, I don't have enough chocolate or black patent for the porter I was planning on making. Since making the brown malt went so well, I thought I would try to make these as well. So, this is my the last brewing activity of 2008 (besides making a starter for the porter).

Making dark roasted malts

CAUTION: if you attempt to make dark roasted malts you must have adequate ventilation in your kitchen because it will be smokey (i.e. a range hood that vents to the outside and/or a fan on high speed in a kitchen window). Keep an eye on the malt at all times because the high temperature could result in a malt fire (although I had no problem with this).

With the disclaimer out of the way, lets begin. I tried to match the taste and internal malt color with some chocolate and black patent malt I had, but really, what I made is going to be unique since the malt is not going to heat evenly when only being stirred every 5-15 minutes. This is not a bad thing.

• Spread malt on a cookie sheet. Don't fill it higher the the lip of the pan because it will spill when turning the malt
• place pans in the oven and turn the oven on to 450.
  
• turn malt with spatula and switch racks (if two pans are in the oven) every 15 minutes for the first 45 minutes
• at this point the malt was beginning to smoke a little (i.e. burn) so I began to turn and switch racks every 5-8 minutes
• I removed one pan at 65 minutes and the other at 75 minutes.
• The temperature varied between 400-450 because of the door begin opened so often.

Original 2-row on the bottom, 65min on the left and 75min on the right
(with a few untoasted barley corns )

As you can see from the picture above, there is some variation in the malt. So, while this might not give the same results as the chocolate and black malts, I think its going to give a great flavor to the porter. The 75 could have gone longer, but it was smoking up my kitchen! This would be a good project for a grill! I recommend doing this went no one is home and then baking something else like cookies or a roast to cover up the burn malt smell (I'm going with lingonberry jam thumb print butter cookies...we were just at IKEA) and to give to your spouse or roommate when they get home.

Happy New Year! I'll be cracking my bottle of Velvet Hammer from the Arbor Brewery at Midnight. I can't wait.

2008 Batch #8 Recipe: Bog Trail Brown Ale

Brown ales are fall ales, at least in my book anyway. This beer (when I get it in a keg) will be perfect after late-fall walks like the one pictured below on the bog trail at the Discovery Center west of Chelsea, MI. The tamaracks were stunning this day.

Wife and daughter at the bog

Making Brown Malt: I wanted to make brown malt by toasting 2-row brewers in the oven. I generally toast a pound of my malt for all my ales, but this would be a longer than normal toast. I used the information from Brian Richards's post on making brown malt with a slight modification. This method seemed to work well and the beer tastes and looks great.

• I started with 4lbs of 2-row split on two cookie sheets. I put the trays in the oven and then turned it on to 300ºF.
  
• I stirred turned the malt and switched the cookie sheets at 15 minutes. The oven was at 250º.
• At 30 minutes I turned the malt again and switched the racks. The oven was at 300º. I then turned the oven up to 350º.
• At this point, I turned the malt and switched the racks every ten minutes for another 30 minutes for a total of 1 hour in the oven.
  
• Then I pulled the sheets out and let the malt cool

I ended up with slightly less that 4lbs of brown malt due to driving off the moisture in the malt, so start with more malt than your recipe calls for. The malt was nice buff color on the inside and you could definately taste that difference.

Toasted brown malt on the left, untoasted 2-row Brewers on the right

Grain Bill:

• 10lbs 2-row Brewers (or pale)
• 3.5lbs brown malt
• 6oz Dark crystal malt L135 - I picked this up from Mike O'brien in Ypsilanti. It has an interesting raisin flavor.  I also tasted some great homebrewed historical stouts and a "chips and salsa" brew that was strange and amazing durning that visit...
  
• 5.5oz Carapils crystal malt

The Mash: I used an infussion mash starting at 150º for 15minutes then bumping up the heat to 157º for another 15 minutes. I kept the mash around 155º for another 30 minutes when the iodine test told me to stop. Sparged with ~5.5 gallons of 170º water and collected 6.25 gallons of run0ff.

The Boil:  Added one ounce of Northern Brewer when the boil was reached.  At 30 minutes I added 1/2 oz of cascade (from Heritage Hops).  At 45 minutes I added another 1/2 oz cascade. Turned it off at 1 hour and added 1/4 oz centennial.

Cooled and pitched Safbrew-04.  I've read that this yeast is a super fast starter that can cause problems, so I didn't make a yeast starter like I normally do and I put the fermenter on my back porch where it was slightly cooler.  I had a quick start and no problems.  This yeast is fast, it was done and almost totally settled out in 1 week.  The beer tastes great.  Now if could just find time to keg it...  The OG was 1.058 and the final is 1.012.

2008 Batch #7 Recipe: Rye Pale Ale

This beer was a first on two accounts: my first high gravity all-grain (high to me anyway) and my first RPA. yum.

RECIPE:

For a 4.5 gallon batch (will it all fit in my mash tun, we shall see...):

• 11.75lbs 2-row brewers (or pale)
• 3.6 lbs rye malt

Heat 3.8 gallons H2O to 130 degrees. Add malt. Hold this protein rest for 30 minutes @ 120-124 degrees (NOTE: I totally screwed this up by heating the water to 150 degrees (duh!! I haven't brewed in months, give me a break!)). Add 1.9 gallons of 200 degree H2O keep mash closer to 150. mash until iodine tells you otherwise.

Sparge with 3.8 gallons of 170 degree H2O. Keep 4.9 gallons in the brewpot.

Hops:

• 1 oz Nothern Brewer (from the hopyard) at boil
  
• 30 minutes .75 oz Cascade (from the hopyard)
• 15 minutes .750z Cascade (from the hopyard)
• 2 minutes .75 oz Cascade (from the hopyard)
• OFF .25 oz Centennial (from the store)
• dry hop .3 oz Centennial at transfer

Yeast: Safbrew S-33 started prior to brewing.

This beer has been fermenting for nearly a month; it started at 1.076 and is down to 1.o245. Its chugging along very slowly, but the yeast hasn't dropped out yet. When it does, I've acquired some oak "infusion spirals" from The Barrel Mill for further testing...

Swill by any other name...

Don't get me wrong, I occasionally indulge in mass-market beer. In fact, there are cans of High Life in my fridge right now. So, while I was at one of our local grocery stores the other day stocking up on can goods and newspapers to stuff in my cloths this winter (see: Hooverville) I noticed Budweiser's American Ale was on sale. Being curious, I thought I would try it. I'd read a few posts about it, so I wasn't expecting much. But, I thought I would try the beer brewed with "caramel malt and cascade hops." My official opinion: don't waste your money. You can't taste the hops (even though they claim to dry hop on the website) and there is only slightly more body than regular old Budweiser. It was nice to drink while installing my bamboo floor, but High Life would have done just as well (and its cheaper even when the ale is on sale). On the positive side, its a lovely color and I dig the label (except for the part where they claim to have invented a new style of beer, come on guys really) and it has a pry-off cap so I can at least reuse the bottles. They seem to be trying to market it to craft beer lovers since they are underwriting our local NPR station and we all know that NPR listeners only drink good beer. The website is actually pretty cool. For another review see what Brian at All Things Homebrewing has to say.

Where's Your Original Gravity?

Brad Sancho's is in Milan.  Michigan not Italy (you can tell, because its pronounced like its in the Midwest...)  Anyway, I had an opportunity to visit Original Gravity Brewing Company yesterday and talk with Brad about the brewery and watch as he finished up a batch of brew.  

Brad went directly from homebrewing with this homebrew system (a very nice setup I might add):

To this 7 barrel system:

Not bad, huh?  He still uses the homebrew system for small batches.   The brewery has an open layout and a relaxed atmosphere, and unless you are in the bathroom, you can see all the brewing equipment from every seat in the house.  I tried the Porter, Pale Ale and the Amber during my visit.  All of which were top notch, I went home with a growler of Amber.  It's a full bodied amber, slightly on the hoppy side (good for these fall days we've been having).  Like any good brewer (home or otherwise) he's always looking to make his beers better and experiment with new recipes.  A pumpkin brew is next on the small batch system.   OG has been open for 4 months now, so if you haven't had to chance to check it out I would recommend a visit.  Milan is only 15 minutes from Ann Arbor right off of US23.  Not to mention it's smoke free and kid friendly so bring the whole family!  For another blog perspective, check out this post from Michigan Beer Buzz.

Time to Get Serious

Tomorrow, I brew! It's been a while so I can't wait to get at it again. I've kegged my last batch from last brewing season (for me, brewing stops in the summer) which I've renamed December Lager since its nothing like a pilsner like it was suppose to be (more on that later). I was coming back from running an errand in Lansing so I stopped by the Michigan Brewing Co and picked up 50lbs of 2-row and some rye malt. I'm going to attempt an Imperial Rye P. A. This will be me first attempt at a high gravity beer, so it will be a challenging way to start off the brewing season. I'm hoping to get a barrel to age it in as well. The barrel age rye from Founders I had a the Michigan Brewers Guild Summer Beerfest was amazing. The beer below is the December Lager (aka Mystery Pils), kind of dark for a pilsner huh?

The politics of brewing

Summer is a slow blogging time for me. It's also a slow brewing time for me as well. I just now kegged my "pilsner" I brewed in December. Its not true to style in the least; more of a bitter lager with flowery notes. I'm starting to like it though...that was the last beer in a carboy, so I will have to start the mash fire soon.

This is a beer blog so there will be no partisan politics this election season from me. However, I thought it would be interesting to see who was making the decisions on the three most important beer related political events of the last century: prohibition, the repeal of prohibition and the legalization of homebrewing.

President Woodrow Wilson (Democrat) Vetoed the National Prohibition Act, however as we all know, this veto was over-ridden by congress and the USA went beerless from 1920-1933.




FDR (Democrat) repealed prohibition in 1933 when he signed the Cullen-Harrison Act. But, those 13 years virtually destroyed brewing in this country and only the past few decades have seen brew-culture regain its proper standing.




Congress passed a bill in 1978 legalizing homebrewing (whoo hoo) which President Jimmy Carter (Democrat) signed into law in February 1979. Thanks for the valentine Jimmy!

Agian, this is a non-partisan blog and I'm strictly an independent. However the Presidential Beer score is Democrats 3 - Republicans 0.

Beerfest and Barley Harvest

The Michigan Brewers Guild Summer Beerfest was last weekend and was a great time as always. We really do live in a great beer state. The selection was amazing. I was big on trying the bourbon barrel beers which Founder's had two stunning examples of. Rye P.A's were a new one to me with several example present (I can't remember who was brewing them...) that I really liked. I think my next batch is going to be an imperial rye P.A. Great job to everyone who was involved with the fest. The next day I harvested my barley. More on that later, including how a scythe just fell into my lap (figuratively of course, otherwise I would still be in the hospital).

Two sheaves of barley.

On the water

No, this isn't the Chicago to Mackinaw, but Sunday was a great day for sailing. It was my first sail since I re-patched the previous owner's sub-par Bondo patch on the bottom of the hull. Working with epoxy and fiberglass is fun! I would go into the details of the repair but this is a homebrew blog not a sailboat repair blog. Sailing and beer, of course, have a long intertwined history. Without the Europeans' desire for curry, we wouldn't have India Pale Ales, and what a shame that would be. In honor of my new (but very used) sunfish, my next batch of brew is going to be an Imperial IPA. More and more Michigan breweries are making this style so I think it should be dubbed GLPA (Great Lakes Pale Ale) So, if anyone has a good all-grain recipe let me know, I've haven't made a high octane all-grain yet. Happy sailing and brewing!

Barley Up, CO2 gone

Its been a while since I've blogged. With spring comes all sorts of projects and with summer come even more. I hope the recent solstice found you with wheat beer in hand. I've very excited about my barley project. I have a 20 x15 foot space in my garden currently occupied with the feathery heads of barley. Its a 6-row variety which is all I could find for sale in Michigan. Next year I will locate a 2-row variety and I hope to have it available through my new business, Heritage Hops, LLC, for other folks who would like to attempt to brew a REAL homebrew! My hops are coming along nicely as well. I went down to the basement to pull a draught of my pale ale...and nothing. I believe there is a leak in my system. I'm guessing its in my picnic tap. Anyway, I'll have to get the old tank filled up soon. I guess that's one problem with kegging...a fairly big problem if you don't have a backup CO2 tank!