Sunday, July 03, 2005
Busy weekend...
... And I'm not even brewing? I'm emptying carboys like they're going out of style though. As of tomorrow, the only thing left sitting in a carboy to age will be my all-grain Oak-aged Vanilla Porter. I'm dropping the Imperial piece b/c this batch only had a starting gravity of 1.073... so it won't be as strong as the last. Hopefully it'll be good anyways.
I've kegged my Rise & Shine Oatmeal Stout, tomorrow I will be kegging Donna's oak-aged 1850 scotch ale (high ending gravity... 1.030, as she likes it) and I racked the OAVP to its secondary today and polluted it with 4oz of oak chips and 2 vanilla beans. I also nailed another runner onto my deck for the Magnum hops - Which have finally reached the top of my deck's railing. Japanese beetles are eating them alive... but I am doing my best to keep them off. Got a couple traps in the yard which are already decimating the population in our yard. I also assembled my pump skid, although I need to do a test run tomorrow with my wort pump using water. I'll put a pic here when I get a chance.
So now I need to start formulating my plan of attack for this next brew - a 10 gallon batch of Amarillo Pale Ale. I don't really know how I want to handle the yeast - Do I step up the yeast twice in starters, first in my 2000mL flask, then into a 1 gallon jug? Do I actually go out and buy another vial of yeast and do two starters in seperate flasks? The brew is going to be split into 2 fermenters anyways - I don't have anything that could handle fermenting 10 gallons at a time, and even if I did, god save me trying to carry it down the stairs to the basement - I'd probably pull something... So, since I'll have to end up splitting it in the end anyways... the two vials / two flasks thing is probably the only one that really makes sense. Maybe I'll poll the guys over at the MoreBeer forums once they are back up from maintenance.
15 gallons worth in the kegerator, 30 gallons in the basement in kegs, 5 gallons in a carboy aging, and soon I'll be brewing 10 more gallons - Yeah, this is the house of beer. Maybe sometime I'll actually stop brewing long enough to drink some of it.
I've kegged my Rise & Shine Oatmeal Stout, tomorrow I will be kegging Donna's oak-aged 1850 scotch ale (high ending gravity... 1.030, as she likes it) and I racked the OAVP to its secondary today and polluted it with 4oz of oak chips and 2 vanilla beans. I also nailed another runner onto my deck for the Magnum hops - Which have finally reached the top of my deck's railing. Japanese beetles are eating them alive... but I am doing my best to keep them off. Got a couple traps in the yard which are already decimating the population in our yard. I also assembled my pump skid, although I need to do a test run tomorrow with my wort pump using water. I'll put a pic here when I get a chance.
So now I need to start formulating my plan of attack for this next brew - a 10 gallon batch of Amarillo Pale Ale. I don't really know how I want to handle the yeast - Do I step up the yeast twice in starters, first in my 2000mL flask, then into a 1 gallon jug? Do I actually go out and buy another vial of yeast and do two starters in seperate flasks? The brew is going to be split into 2 fermenters anyways - I don't have anything that could handle fermenting 10 gallons at a time, and even if I did, god save me trying to carry it down the stairs to the basement - I'd probably pull something... So, since I'll have to end up splitting it in the end anyways... the two vials / two flasks thing is probably the only one that really makes sense. Maybe I'll poll the guys over at the MoreBeer forums once they are back up from maintenance.
15 gallons worth in the kegerator, 30 gallons in the basement in kegs, 5 gallons in a carboy aging, and soon I'll be brewing 10 more gallons - Yeah, this is the house of beer. Maybe sometime I'll actually stop brewing long enough to drink some of it.
