Brewing

Anybody out there do any brewing?

Any stories to tell of good brews, incidents while brewing, not so good brews ect...?

My last batch was a delicious stout.
It tastes perfectly like a nice Beamish!
but...
during the boiling of the wort,
I let it boil too hard and too long

and then..
without checking the specific gravity
or caring too much about it
I added the full 5 gallons of water

it turns out that
it is a very very good tasting brew,

but weak!

bummer

I have been brewing for 20 years or so along with my two sons and son-inlaw. All of my brews for the past 10 years have been IPAs with around 8 oz. or more of hops.
Yes, I am a Hop Head!
My youngest son (41) makes a good cider that I enjoy. Cider is the perfect summer cooler for me.

Bob

I've been brewing beer for about 6 months.
I also like IPA and cant wait to start drinking it after it is syphoned off into the barrel. Its usually cloudy but it tastes great.

I've been brewing for about 14 years now, just extract and partial mash brews. This year has been particularly productive, I've made 55 gallons thus far (!).

Obviously, I share a lot, lol.

Currently:

About to brew an Irish Draught Ale.
In keg: My attempt at a "SurlyFest" clone, a rye Octoberfest-style lager.
In secondary: A "smoke" ale, made with cherrywood smoked malts.
In bottle:
A Belgian Dubbel
A Belgian Strong Golden Ale (my "house" ale)
A wheat porter
An oatmeal stout
A nut brown ale
A sparkling ginger mead
and one bottle left of a delicious Simcoe IPA. :(

Might go for a Grand Cru and another porter first thing in the new year, then it's time to start thinking about spring . . . .

I was an occasional all-grain brewer in the early 90s, then I moved to Minnesota and a hi rise apartment and never had space for the necessary gear and cleaning. Not to mention, if I did have an infected batch the downstairs neighbors on the 26th floor wouldn't have appreciated the seepage from the bottle bombs.

So by the mid 90s I started writing thousands of beer reviews and traveling a lot to festivals and such. By 2005, I got very tired of the new breed of beer geeks who just like uber hops or under-attenuated Imperial Stouts.

So, I gradually just faded away - but even living back east again, I always have micro beers on hand - I just don't seek out the so-called "latest and greatest".

I'm with ya on the Imperial Stouts. I want to pour them on pancakes. Good for cooking, but expensive!

And as for being a beer geek, I'll genuflect in the direction of Belgium, but other than that, I'm not really uppity about anything.

You could explore Belgian beers forever and not get tired...

But, I did get tired...LOL...

I will generally always have the relatively affordable St. Bernardus Abt. 12 around as a high gravity malt bomb and I still like Duvel (no "Duvel-clone" has ever approached its distinctive dryness).

My wife wont allow me to brew my beer in the house so I have to use a shed outside.
My last batch of beer froze.

#8 - Ouch!

I just found this dormant group after just linking LT in a Homebrewtalk post.

I started homebrewing in Fall 2009 when a random recipe run through over 700 cookbooks on LT came up with Continental Light Lager in Patrick Baker's The New Brewers Handbook. I'm using the two plastic bucket, Grolsch bottle newbie setup. Finished: Dogfish Head 60-minute IPA; AHS Dry Stout; AHS Ordinary Bitter; Redhook Double Black Espresso Stout; AHS Lemongrass Ginger Ale; Belhaven Scottish Ale; Anchor Porter; AHS Holiday Chocolate Stout; Berghoff Dark.

Drinking: Redhook Double Black Espresso Stout II; Samuel Adams Boston Ale; Abt 12; Neolithic Yellow River Braggot (AKA Chateau Jiahu in Sam Calagione's Extreme brewing : an enthusiast's guide to brewing craft beer at home; Munich Spiced Porter; 60-minute Tamarindia Ale. Bottled: Oaked Imperial Whiskey Stout (first taste 1 March 2013).

Penciled in Future Brews: Red Hook ESB; Belgian Trappist Ale Quadrupel; Allagash Grand Cru; Innis & Gunn; AHS Summer Crisp IPA; SWMBO choice; Chrysanthemum Honey Rye Ale; SWMBO choice; AHS London Calling Ale; SWMBO choice; AHS Gluten-Free Pale Ale; SWMBO choice; Pliny the Elder; SWMBO choice; Redhook 8-4-1 Expedition Ale; SWMBO choice; Red Hook ESB II; SWMBO choice; Terrapin Reunion '10; SWMBO choice; AHS American IPA (II); SWMBO choice; Mexican Amber Theobroma; SWMBO choice; AHS Special Bitter; SWMBO choice; Non Bitters/IPA; SWMBO choice; Victory HopDevil; SWMBO choice; Experiment TBA; SWMBO choice; Red Hook ESB III; SWMBO choice; Non Bitters/IPA; SWMBO choice; AHS Cascadian Dark Ale; SWMBO choice; Experiment TBA; SWMBO choice; AHS Fall ESB; SWMBO choice; Non Bitters/IPA; SWMBO choice; Bell's Two Hearted; SWMBO choice; Experiment TBA; SWMBO choice.

Some interesting choices of what to drink, many I haven't tried as the craft beer scene got to dorky around 2005...

I still find Bell's Two Hearted Ale to be the best-balanced yet non-cartoonish American IPA.

Good beer was worth searching for in the 1960's, so the dorkiness has just makes it an easier search.

Two Hearted is a very good IPA. I'm not a fan of Bell's Hopslam. If you like Two Hearted, then I would recommend Dogfish Head 60-minute, Victory HopDevil and O'Dempsey's Inukshuk.

From the future brews above, the Red Hook ESB is now drinkable, and SWMBO changed the Belgian Trappist Ale Quadrupel to a Scaldis Belgian Special Ale (first taste 2 June 2013).