oh definitely.



that happens to my girlfriend with certain types of yeasts. usually she just drinks a high life or two and it goes away.

rub some high life on it, hell yea

Put some Tussin on it

Ok, it's time to brew again. Summer always fucks me up, I'm discovering, because of the vacations. On the one hand it's great that I'm not home guzzling all that beer, so it finally gets a chance to chill out and mature a little. On the other hand, I ain't making more product, either, and when I get back in town I have 457 emails in my work Inbox plus bike problems and housework to do in my paltry spare time. So I've been home for 2 weeks now and am just now brewing.

Went to the store, got ingredients for 2 batches. First is a recreation of that very good double-ish IPA (7.1%), which was somewhere between 2 Hearted and Heady Topper. I changed the hop schedule a decent bit, with NO bittering addition this time instead of 1 ounce of columbus. Last time did a little first wort hopping, an ounce of columbus for 60, then a huge shot of -5, -3, whirl, and dry, totalling 13oz and mostly pellets of centennial, simcoe, and sorachi ace. This time it's 3oz of centennial as first wort hopping, nothing as proper "bittering," then a shitload of mixed Centennial pellets and whole leaf for -10, -5, -3 (plus some whole leaf simcoe), and then at whirl is another shitload on centennial plus some pelleted sorachi. Dry will be pellets of centennial. Total ounces is now 21. Next batch is slightly higher malt count (ws 14# 2 row, 1# Honey, next batch is 16 and 2). Similar hop schedule. Bill was $170 after a 10% discount the guy gave me out of pity. Big hop beers are expensive.

That turned into about 3 gallons' worth of soggy hop mass when I strained it out. Never again with so much whole leaf... jesus. And I swear I'm not getting the big green smell from the fermentor I got last time. I used 2 packs of dried Chico and it set up in about 2 hours to a slow bubble, now up to about 2 a second out of the big blow-off hose. Even though I had a larger post-boil volume, I still only got like 4.6 gallons. Those fuckers soaked up sooo much wort. And I scooped them out, strained, and returned as much as I could. Pellets only from now on, man. They just didn't have enough at the store. I need to order that shit online, a pound at a time.

That's been my experience with whole leaf too.

On to version 3. This time the malt is upped a little, to 16# 2 row and 2# honey malt. Nailed the mash temp - 155F, which is hard to handle at 6.5 gallons in a "6 gallon" kettle. Shit sucks. I need a 10 gal with ball valve.

Version 3 smells a little more hoppy and punchy than version 2, even though they were hopped pretty similarly. Odd. But version 2 rocketed down to 1.012 in like 3 days, which is kickass. I added about 1/4 cup of plain sugar when I pitched, so maybe that helped. Going to be out of town weds-sunday, camping in Maine, so I'll dry hop both Tuesday night and leave them in the primaries so the yeast can settle down and clean up in peace.

VERY excited to have 9.5 gallons of really good 7% hop bomb in the pipeline.

Moved my IIPA to the secondary.
3 weeks so far and it's weighing in at 8.9% ... and I think the gravity may still drop.
It is really dry and bitter and maybe even a little boozy (in a white wine sort of way).
I don't have all of the hops on hand yet but I'm going add the dry hops this weekend.

I also racked my 1 gallon of mead for the second time. It's now aged 4 months.
Smells like a real funky lawn clippings wine your grandpa made but it's going down so much smoother.
The color is a beautiful pink and it's extremely clear. Very drinkable already but I'm going to wait to bottle it for a couple more months.

What made the meade pink?

raspberries

My 1 gallon mead recipe.

47 oz of home sweet homestead raw honey
6 oz of raspberries
4.4 o of blueberries
24 Raisins

all organic though I don't really believe honey could be organic.

What did that gallon cost?

I don't want to talk about that.
Prob 25 bucks.

But if I end up liking it I will prob hit my uncle up for some large amounts of honey.
Maybe my dad will get back into beekeeping too.

I haven't taken part in the annual mead making festivities for my homebrew club due to the cost of honey. It is usually about $50 per brewer when they do the group buy. I just don't really want to bother with adding nutrients and stirring it on a regular basis. Most people I know end up using a drill and a paint stir attachment.

Kinda what I thought. "I think you have to be a beekeeper to do that shit. Or rich."

Did some math. The two batches I just did of 7%-ish big IPA worked out to be a little under $18 a gallon, and/or $1.85 per 12oz beer.

Dunno, gallon of mead seems to come out to a bit over 3 750ml bottles at around $25 ingredient cost - buying the cheapest commercial mead is $15 bucks a bottle at my boozeteria. Don't drink it like beer or anything but not ruinous.

valid point. this might be overkill but i thought it would be really fun to get 24 of these 187 ml single serve bottles for bottling this.
http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/187- ... -case.html

That doesn't seem inappropriate given how much work it is to make the meade. Especially if you repeat.

First attempt at a SMASH recipe yesterday morning.
https://vine.co/v/hZpVFiz53aO

I've made it to the big time, and my beer is featured on the same list as some of the biggest breweries in the country. I haven't even bottled it, so it could still turnout to be a complete disaster or mildly disappointing like the last beer I did for a festival/event.

http://greatnebraskabeerfest.com/index. ... =breweries

Ginger Pear Belgian Golden Ale - Patrick McCabe
Style: Belgian & French Ale A.B.V. 6.5% I.B.U.
Brewed as a traditional Belgian Blonde, similar to Leffe, this ale is made with crystalized ginger and pear extract in it.

that's pretty awesome!

that's super cool

Hell yeah. They need some slightly quirky recipes that still hold together as a good idea.