This is right after we finished bottling, James took the pic while I closely examined a Sam Adams.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Spiced Lemon Wheat - Bottling Day
It was bottling day for the Spiced Lemon Wheat this past Sunday, as James and I santized 22 12oz bottles, bottle caps, measuring spoon and cup. We filled up half way with One-Step sanitizer, gave it a good shake, let sit for 20 minutes. Probably the most important part of the process is sanitizing, if you don't sanitize well you get skunky beer, and we all know Bud has that market cornered right?? It probably took us about an hr or so to finish bottling, can't have any air get into the wort as it drains into the bottles from the fermenter, eventually I have to rack to a secondary, instead of bottle priming.
This is right after we finished bottling, James took the pic while I closely examined a Sam Adams.
This is right after we finished bottling, James took the pic while I closely examined a Sam Adams.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Spiced Lemon Wheat
Above , James is stirring the wort after all the ingedients are in, I had to take the pic before his arm fell off, poor kid should work out more lol..Below, James is stirring wort after lemon juice, corriander seed, nutmeg and cinnamon added
Some ingredients
January 11th, 2009 Decided it's time to brew the Spiced Lemon Wheat, I've read alot about this one on the forums and am dying to taste it, so I hired a brewers apprentice, James to help.
Since his friend was here at the house, they were working on a school project together, I took care of all the sanitizing , while driving his friend home everything was soaking.
We need to do some additional prep for this batch, we need 4 tablespoons of freshly squeezed lemon juice, 3/4 of a teaspoon of Crushed Corriander seed, 1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg, and a 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon.
Once I got home, I sliced 4 lemons in half and squeezed them into a sanitized measuring cup, then had James pick out the pits, took him awhile but it needed to happen. While he was doing that, I was crushing corriander seed in a container, once James had finally finished getting the pits out of the lemon juice, he took over the crushing corriander seed job.
I went to work and added 4 cups of spring water into the sanitzed pot, had James pour in the lemon juice, drop in the Corriander seed and measure out a half teaspoon each of nutmeg and cinnamon and added both, and stirred. Next up, we poured in a 1lb can of Golden Wheat UME and a can of Whispering Wheat Weizenbier, stirred til my arm was about to come off, then had James stir til his arms were about to come off. After stirring , we poured the wort into the fermenter, stirried like crazy, added yeast, waited another 5 minutes and stirred.
In two weeks we'll bottle it up, we should have the bottles from the West Coast Pale Ale, if not I'll make sure to drink some Sam Adams in the mean time.
Raspberry Wheat
December 21, 2008
Yesterday I was able to bottle up the West Coast Pale Ale to free up the fermenter for the next batch, Raspberry Wheat. This may turn out to be a favorite of mine since one of my favorite Microbrew beers is a Raspberry Wheat, Abita Purple Haze. Raspberries go great in beer, it is the perfect fruit for beers, Cherry is right behind.
My wife Sally and James were spending the day in the mall, which gave me plenty of time to get brewing. I grabbed the wisk and measuring cup, stuck it in the fermenter, dropped a tablespoon of One-Step sanitizer in, added a few quarts of warm water, shook everything, and let it set for 15-20 minutes. Then I added some sanitizer to the blender and the 4 quart pot I use to make the wort. I drained the sanitizer from the fermenter into the pot and blender, gave the blender a nice shake and let it and the pot set for another 15 minutes, if there is one thing I have learned is the sanitization process is the single most important in homebrewing.
Poured 4 cups of spring water into the pot, then added a packet of Booster, (I'll start using UME later), These ingredients add the additional sugars needed to create the appropriate amount of alcohol. Booster simply adds the required sugar, and UME's add the required sugar and additional flavor. Once the Booster was added, it took about 25 minutes of nonstop stirring to break it up, since it clumps when added to water.
While waiting for the Booster to dissolve, I opened a can of Oregon Fruit Red Raspberries in Heavy Syrup, poured it into the blender and purreed it for almost 25 minutes.
Once the Booster is fully completely dissovled, I brought the water to a boil and held it for 20 or so minutes, then turned the heat off and added 1lb can of Whispering Wheat Weizenbier, then stirred that up for another 15 or so minutes, this is called wort.
I poured the wort into to the fermenter, then added the purreed Red Raspberries, boy did that smell good :). After stirring that for another 15-20 minutes, I cracked open the packet of yeast and threw it in, waited 5 minutes, stirred and closed the fermenter.
January 4th, 2009.
Bottling day for the Raspberry Wheat, dropped a tablespoon of One-Step Sanitizer into the pot, along with a few measuring spoons that'll be needed later, added warm water. Then took another tablespoon of One-Step in another pot, mixed it up nicely, and filled 22 empty Sam Adams bottles, laid a cap on top and shook each bottle, this way the cap gets sanitized also. Since it was midnight when I decided to to this, I thought I'd have a few Sam Adams Cherry Wheat while bottling, have to empty out more bottles for later right?
Yesterday I was able to bottle up the West Coast Pale Ale to free up the fermenter for the next batch, Raspberry Wheat. This may turn out to be a favorite of mine since one of my favorite Microbrew beers is a Raspberry Wheat, Abita Purple Haze. Raspberries go great in beer, it is the perfect fruit for beers, Cherry is right behind.
My wife Sally and James were spending the day in the mall, which gave me plenty of time to get brewing. I grabbed the wisk and measuring cup, stuck it in the fermenter, dropped a tablespoon of One-Step sanitizer in, added a few quarts of warm water, shook everything, and let it set for 15-20 minutes. Then I added some sanitizer to the blender and the 4 quart pot I use to make the wort. I drained the sanitizer from the fermenter into the pot and blender, gave the blender a nice shake and let it and the pot set for another 15 minutes, if there is one thing I have learned is the sanitization process is the single most important in homebrewing.
Poured 4 cups of spring water into the pot, then added a packet of Booster, (I'll start using UME later), These ingredients add the additional sugars needed to create the appropriate amount of alcohol. Booster simply adds the required sugar, and UME's add the required sugar and additional flavor. Once the Booster was added, it took about 25 minutes of nonstop stirring to break it up, since it clumps when added to water.
While waiting for the Booster to dissolve, I opened a can of Oregon Fruit Red Raspberries in Heavy Syrup, poured it into the blender and purreed it for almost 25 minutes.
Once the Booster is fully completely dissovled, I brought the water to a boil and held it for 20 or so minutes, then turned the heat off and added 1lb can of Whispering Wheat Weizenbier, then stirred that up for another 15 or so minutes, this is called wort.
I poured the wort into to the fermenter, then added the purreed Red Raspberries, boy did that smell good :). After stirring that for another 15-20 minutes, I cracked open the packet of yeast and threw it in, waited 5 minutes, stirred and closed the fermenter.
January 4th, 2009.
Bottling day for the Raspberry Wheat, dropped a tablespoon of One-Step Sanitizer into the pot, along with a few measuring spoons that'll be needed later, added warm water. Then took another tablespoon of One-Step in another pot, mixed it up nicely, and filled 22 empty Sam Adams bottles, laid a cap on top and shook each bottle, this way the cap gets sanitized also. Since it was midnight when I decided to to this, I thought I'd have a few Sam Adams Cherry Wheat while bottling, have to empty out more bottles for later right?
West Coast Pale Ale
Found a cool site for labels, says-it.com , played around and created a label for the West Coast Pale Ale above, just in time since it was my last brew; timing is everything :).
I need to do a better job cutting out the label though, too many ragged edges.
It went down pretty good
Brewed on 11/30/08
Carbonated 12/20/08
Bottled : 1/3/09
ABV : 3.7%
ABV : 3.7%
This is my maiden voyage in the home brewing arena, basic West Coast Pale Ale, I did alot of research on Mr.Beerfans.com before attempting this, wanted to get my first brew right, or at least drinkable. I sanitized everything with One-Step, went well, then made the wort, that went off without a hitch.
Left the fermenter in Jersey City for the 1st week of fermenting, but the temps there were usually 65%, I needed 68-70 so I was forced to bring the fermenter to Harrison, not going to be easy considering you are not supposed to move the fermenter during the process so not to let and air in. I drove REAL slow along Raymond Blvd in Newark on the way, not breaking any laws, not drinking and driving but not sure about kegging and driving. My wife was real understanding of my new hobbie and let me keep the fermenter under the kitchen table.
January 17th, 10.45 PM, A bouncing baby Ale was born!
Weight -12oz
Head - 2 in
Taste - Great!
I opened my first West Coast Pale Ale, was actually a success! Here's 2 pics of the newborn.
The Beginning of my brewing obsession
My wife Sally and son James gave me a Mr.Beer brewing kit for Father's Day, they figured if I'm going to enjoy drinking beer I might enjoy making it, boy were they ever right.
I went online and ordered a few recipes from the Mr.Beer website, and found Mr.Beerfans.com , a site dedicated to homebrewing with Mr.Beer, there are a great bunch of guys on that site who are extremely helpful for a newbie like myself.
I don't brew to save money. I brew for the comraderie involved with being able to "talk shop" with other homebrewers and commercial brewers. I brew so that I can build new equipment, refine techniques, and turn out a quality product that people besides myself like to drink. Beer is one thing that I know something about.
I went online and ordered a few recipes from the Mr.Beer website, and found Mr.Beerfans.com , a site dedicated to homebrewing with Mr.Beer, there are a great bunch of guys on that site who are extremely helpful for a newbie like myself.
I don't brew to save money. I brew for the comraderie involved with being able to "talk shop" with other homebrewers and commercial brewers. I brew so that I can build new equipment, refine techniques, and turn out a quality product that people besides myself like to drink. Beer is one thing that I know something about.
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