Comments on: Big and tree beer

By: Mark Grieve

Mark Grieve — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 21:15:00 +0000

Hey Bradley,
I googled myself despite warnings that doing that to excess would cause me to go blind. I’ll keep it up till I need glasses. Imagine my surprise when I found that my name keeps appearing on your blog. I need to brew. I finally kegged a beer that had been in primary on top of my microwave for about 16 months. The CO2 setup has a leak that I have to track down. Also need to clean the lines and tapper.

I have a package for you. I bought whole wheat rotinni when regular was not available. I’m afraid the stuff just isn’t to my liking. I’ve got a pound or two that I would like to send your way. I’ll drop it off sometime.

Are you brewing this weekend? I have pager duty so I can’t get far from home. I need to make some porter but I only have light syrup. Not really a problem I guess. Maybe I’ll just do it.
Mark

By: Bill H-D

Bill H-D — Fri, 14 Jul 2006 17:33:14 +0000

Ah! good to know re: the extracts.

By: cbd

cbd — Thu, 13 Jul 2006 17:02:24 +0000

Hey, thanks. I called the shop; they don’t actually make the extracts but package them from bulk. So it looks like I’ll be heading for the mash tun!

By: Bill H-D

Bill H-D — Wed, 12 Jul 2006 18:48:27 +0000

Our local homebrew shop, Things Beer, is connected to a microbrewery, Michigan Brewing Company that makes their own extracts. They sell the extracts with instructions in kits, any specialty grains or other stuff, all in pre-measured quantities. Makes it dead easy for us beginners. We used the Williamston Wheat kit for our hefe.

So far I’ve made three brews from their kits and couple with my own combinations of ingredients: Trout River IPA, Lily’s Red Ale, and the about to be bottled Wheat.

By: cbd

cbd — Wed, 12 Jul 2006 17:43:14 +0000

Super. I wouldn’t worry about blowoff. Nice thing about it: hard to get bad bugs in when everything is going the other direction.

What kind of extract did you use? I’m unhappy with the Munton’s and Alexander’s as well, and I can’t find Ireks anywhere. I may go back to all grain just to get good hefe.

By: Bill H-D

Bill H-D — Tue, 11 Jul 2006 20:45:39 +0000

The hefeweizen tasted fine at racking time, so I think we just had a smaller-than-recommended-carboy problem. First time using the all liquid yeast in the little vial too rather than the activator pack. We’ll bottle in another week or so.

By: cbd

cbd — Tue, 11 Jul 2006 14:55:03 +0000

I like doing multiple batches because I can pitch on yeast cakes. Especially for big beers, that helps fermentation get off to a good start, and prevents infection from wild or other yeast (the bug I want will run off any others). And I save a few bucks on yeast, too. Since I brew a lot less during the school year, now’s the time to put some beer away for the long haul. Right now I have four batches going, and expect to add pale ale today or tomorrow (though I’ll be bottling the maple porter soon as well).

Wild yeast infection usually means something went wrong in inoculation (did a healthy yeast culture get in the beer quickly?) sanitation (were all the ingredients and equipment boiled or chemically treated?) or fermentation (was the beer moved from primary to secondary to bottles in the right time, with good sanitation practices?). Some wild yeast don’t affect the flavor of the beer at all (many strains of Brett). Some make it gnarly and nasty.

I’ve had two infections since I moved here, one caused by a cracked carboy, and one caused by waiting too darned long to bottle (five months). In the first case, the beer had a little “ring around the neck” but tasted fine. In the second, there’s a little bite in the aftertaste, but it’s a stout so it’s forgivable.

And I frequently bottle beers with gravities of 1.010-1.020, so I don’t think that’s “too high” at all.

By: Bill H-D

Bill H-D — Tue, 11 Jul 2006 14:04:03 +0000

Sounds like a great batch! I’ve not graduated to doing multiple brews at once - but you have me thinking…when it gets toward winter, I am going to do some lagering.

Thanks for the tip about the bigger carboy - I am going to go with that next time for sure.

Also, here’s the passage about the over-active yeast I mentioned, about a possible cause of vigorous fermentation he calls a “gusher infection” caused by wild yeasts:

“If the beer seems to be bubbling too long, check the gravity with a hydrometer. Use a siphon or turkey baster to withdraw a sample from the fermentor and check the gravity. If the gravity is still high, in the teens or twenties, then it is probably due to lower than optimum temperature or sluggish yeast. If it is below 10 and still bubbling at several per minute, then a bug has gotten hold. The beer will not be worth drinking due to the lack of flavor.”

http://www.howtobrew.com/section4/chapter21-1.html

Not sure what he is talking about.