Updates

It's been a couple weeks since I updated as I was on vacation and busy with work.

The Grey Lady Clone that had way too much spice and was small, I added a gallon of water and 1lb of honey (to counter the added gallon of water). When I did this I put it in the secondary. After another week of fermenting the new sugars here I added it to the tertiary fermenter (another secondary) where it currently sits. Sometime this week I will bottle/keg it and check the final grav. My calculations for actual SG work out to be 1.061.

The Dupont Special turned out to be 5% alc and tastes pretty light but has some slight Bavarian qualities. I also noticed some strage off flavors, as I did with the Angry Ogre vs Warrior so I will have to see if the off flavors disappear with age like the AOvW.

I also created the recipe for the next planned brew, which is the Bourbon Drunken Irishman. It will be an Irish Red and Scotch Ale hybrid with 15% Rye added to it, then bourbon soaked oak chips added to the secondary. It has an SG of 1.091 so I had to use Scottish Ale yeast with the Irish Ale, so 2 packs of yeast! It should be VERY complex and interesting tasting. Can't wait for it to age. This brew is planned for August 8th.

Also, found out about this video today and its a great watch. Enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwy6XMN30CA

Brew #4 - The Grey Lady Clone #1

Well the brew went well, but I was too wrapped up in other things and didn't account for boil off, and adding more water, etc. We ended up with 3.5 gallons instead of 5, and the spices should have only been there 10 minutes but I couldn't fish them out so they stayed the whole boil. Next time need to use string or something... but we live and learn and this is what brewing is all about. It came out really spicey, but other than the spices it seemed to be tasty. The SG was 1.054.

The Dupont Special was also bottled and finished with a FG of 1.010.

Brews update

Brew#2: I tasted the Jamaica Me Crazy Nut Brown and its sweet, nutty, has some coffee flavor, and overall pretty similar to the coffee. I need to let it age a bit I think to see how it changes in character, I can only expect it will mellow some and if so it will be a really good beer. With that in mind I bottled all of it instead of half kegging. The FG was 1.012, bringing the alc % to about 7.4% wowzers. It also had great clarity. This should be a great and very tasty beer.

Brew#3: I slapped The Dupont Special into the secondary, and measured the SG in process which measured out to 1.010 so its already low and pretty much ready. With the added honey it was brought up to 1.036 so this should have some alcohol, as well as be pretty light and tasty. I quickly tasted it and it had some of the bavarian hefe taste, but still needs some time. It was a little darker and heavier in taste than expected so we shall see how the secondary treats it.

Brew#1: Did another taste of this and its mellowed out a lot. It has some great qualities now. Its seems very similar to the style of Lagunitas IPA, with a great malt bed and lots of noble bittering hops, but not much on the floral, spicey, or citrus hops. It has plenty of Centennial on the nose and little taste, lots of Warrior on the taste, lots of crystal malt taste, a touch of alcohol in the mouth, its got a thick mouth feel to go with it, and its got a great flavor. Aging should only make it better. Just by how well this is coming out already I am very happy with how out brewing process is coming along.

Jamaica Me Crazy Nut Brown = brew #3

I guess technically this was brew #2, but it was an experiment to test out some new eqp. and it was a solo project. This beer was a nut brown ale that had brown sugar, which I attempted to model after the coffee from Lala Java. I actually added a batch of the coffee right to the secondary this weekend.

Yesterday I moved it to the secondary, and it was very clear, which is a good sign. My SG was 1.068, projected at 1.070, so it started pretty good. Projected finish is 1.017 to stay a little sweet, and I measured as I was going into the secondary and got 1.014 so I'm already there. That gives it about 7% alc too, and might be a little dryer than expected. I think this will be a really interesting beer when its finished. I'll let it sit in secondary for a few more days and then bottle half for aging and keg the rest I think. It has an SRM of 19.5 with IBU of 33.