First State Brewers' Blog

Today I brewed and canned 5 gallons of starter wort. It was quite a feat. I started at 9:30am, was canning around 2:45, and finished canning at about 6:30... Long long day. As a result I've got a little over 5 gallons ready for future brews, and actually have another 2 quarts in the fridge that I'll use to make a starter tomorrow for my Bastogne Belgian Ale yeast. I'm going to brew a regular Belgian Pale, then use the yeast cake to brew a massive Tripel. I'm pretty stoked as this will be my first all-grain tripel and will be using some new techniques I've picked up over the past year.

Last night we bottled the first 5 gallons of Black Honey Ale that's going into the cases I cleaned last weekend. Of course one case is walking out the door with Donna's parents tomorrow, and my guess is that the other will be leaving with my parents in a few weeks, however that's why I brewed 20 gallons of it.

I also need to free up some secondaries... my saison and fruity wheats are both coming due soon. Heating up the saison has totally saved it... it has significantly dried out, and will be very drinkable and tasty. I am not certain how the short "rest" it had at 1.030 will impact it long-term, nor the decreased yeast count during its slow decline thereafter, but at least its not 10 gallons of pond water. If nothing else, I learned a very valuable lesson about the WLP565 yeast, and not to EVER rack it to a secondary before 2 weeks, and to keep it at 75 degrees during the entire length of its fermentation.