Beer: New Techniques During Brew Day

I have been on the journey to brew the best IPA I can ever since I started brewing. Which is actually not too long ago. Last year around this time I was brewing 1.5 gallon stove top brews and adding 3.5 gallons of tap water to make 5 gallons. In this short amount of time I have already jumped to all-grain brewing. Can you imagine what I will be doing next year? I can't.

This next brew we are calling The New England 1020. It's going to be a what I call them a "New England IPA". Not as bitter and more aromatic. I get to experiment with techniques I've never used before. I am going to be using a HopShot which is a hop extract to add some bittering elements without adding too much flavor of the hop. Next I am going to be whirlpooling at 180°F with the addition of hops. This is going to (hopefully) create a blast of aroma in the face. I also just picked up this yeast strain which is a Conan clone. 

I will definitely try to take a lot of pictures and update as soon as I can! I have trouble taking pictures because I am having too much fun the whole time. Yesterday I finished up the labels on the Apple Pie Ale and took a few nice pictures. Here they are! 

Beer: Random Thoughts

This past week I have decided to not make a mess of my kitchen anymore and move my brewing operations down to the basement and outside. Conveniently I have a walk out so it makes things much easier. This weekend we get to try it out for the first time when we brew our New England 1020 IPA! I just added a dart board and other things to make it a bit more cozy. Next step is adding an old school tube TV with NES or SNES hooked up to it!

I have been drooling over a brewing system for about a year now. Whenever I see it all I can think about is this:

I am going to try to make that dream a reality next year. I don't know how I am going to do it, but I am going to do it. Everything about it is so perfect. It is called the Brew Magic V350MS System. 

• Specifications

• Model Name: Brew-Magic V350-MS Brewing System® (Patent Pending)
• Controller Type: Unitronics Vision 350 Touchscreen, 3-1/2″, 256 color, QVGA , Industrial type
• Software: ‘Magic-Soft®’ (Patent Pending) programming
• Kettle type: Heavy-duty stainless, 15.5 gallons with handles
• Kettle setup: Boil (lower), Mash (center), Sparge HL (right)
• Connector type: Stainless, 1/2″ Pharmaceutical quality Tri-Clamp
• Frame type: Commercial duty, powder coat, baked enamel
• Frame kettle decking: Stainless steel , removable for easy cleanup
• Frame Casters: Heavy duty swivel, two of the four are locking type (4.5″ T)
• Brewery Size (with Casters): 74.5″ Long x 62.5″ High x 20″ Wide
• Deck Height: Upper deck 39.5″ Lower deck 18″
• Height to top of upper kettles: 62.5″
• Height to top of lower kettle: 41.25″
• Weight: 289 Lbs.

Food: Chili is Back

For a long time, I had a chili recipe that was solid. But what did I do? I got bored with it. So I started messing with it. First was adding whiskey to it... fail. Next was adding ground turkey to it... epic fail. That was the final straw. A year later and I decided to start from scratch. I based it off of this recipe that I found online. I just needed the base for it and then I added my own flavors to it. 

Instead of 2 lbs of beef, I substituted it with some hot Italian sausage. I cut the casings open and just used to ground meat. Added some spices that I like to add to most of my food and called it a day. I didn't really take any measurements as I am still in the early phases of finalizing it. 

It wasn't as spicy as I would've liked it, but that's okay. I'm working on the base right now then I can layer it with more complex flavors. I can't wait to make it again! 'Tis the season for chili is a hearty food! My favorite time of the year.

Beer: Apple Pie Ale Bottling (Update)

We bottled the Apple Pie Ale this weekend. It tasted absolutely amazing. Extremely well rounded with hints of apple, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla and bready notes. Although we wanted it at about 8%, I think having it at 5.8% is actually better. Makes it very drinkable at any time. Also we were surprised at the clarity. You can see right through it!

While all this was going on I was preparing a chicken stock for Thanksgiving. I slowly simmered it for about 6 hours and then strained it. Simple recipe of celery, carrots, onion, parsley, salt, and pepper. 

Kyle did a little photoshoot with the Scotch Stout and The Quadrupel. I have to say it came out looking awesome! 

Food: Chicken Thanksgiving Pre-Game

This year, we are hosting Thanksgiving. We hosted it a couple of years ago and were pretty successful. My wife blogged about it and you can read it here. We looked around for the recipe we used and we could not find it anywhere. Oh no. So what do I do? I bought a chicken to practice a random recipe that I came up with and I can say it came out extremely delicious.

I did a nice brine for a little over 24 hours. Pretty simple. Salt, sugar, olive oil and water. It definitely helped in the juiciness of the chicken. I would've liked to do it for a little longer but didn't have enough time. Unfortunately, I don't think I will be able to do it for Thanksgiving because the thought of leaving a turkey in a bucket in our basement brining freaks my wife out. We won't have enough room in the refrigerator.

With it I also cut up some fingerling potatoes with some salt, pepper, paprika, garlic and olive oil. They came out extremely delicious as well!

I'm not 100% sure the measurements for the chicken as far as seasoning, but I can tell you what I put on it! I call it the Duffy mixture because I pretty much use it on everything. It is a mixture of salt, pepper, paprika, adobo, sazon, and garlic. I can't wait to make the turkey for Thanksgiving! Next year I got approval to actually go to a farm and pick out my turkey. 

After the delicious meal I went to my buddies house for a beer tasting. It was a night filled with extremely weird beers. We had: 

• Lagunitas Brewing Company - A Little Sumpin' Wild Ale 
• De Proefbrouwerij - Long of Tooth
• Two Roads Brewing Company - Route of All Evil
• Freigeist Bierkultur - Abraxxxas
• Tröegs Brewing Company - Blizzard of Hops
• Freigeist Bierkultur - Geisterzug Gose Rhubarb
• Nikenjayamochi Kadoya Honten Co. - Ise Kadoya Genmai (Brown Rice)
• Maine Beer Company / Half Acre Beer Company - Sapping Mammoth IPA
• Tree House Brewing Company - Good Morning
• Ourbeer Brewing Company - Hoppy Brown (Disaster)

Some were gross, some were okay, and some were just mind blowing. Two that stood out the most to me were Good Morning (American Imperial/Double Stout) by Tree House and Abraxxxas (Smoked Lichtenhainer Weisse) by Freigeist Bierkultur.

Food: Kick the Microwave. Easy Popcorn.

Yes, microwave popcorn is easier. But for me, there was so much more I wanted from my popcorn. I wanted to make it any way I wanted to without purchasing a million different boxes. So what did I do? Started making it from scratch. Well, I mean I didn't grow corn stalks and pick my own cobs. It's extremely simple to make, and I'll tell you how I do it.

You can use any oil but I prefer extra virgin olive oil. I am obsessed with the flavor and aroma of it. Start off by coating the base of a sauce pan with the oil. Heat it on medium and put one kernel in. This is a timer to let you know when to put the rest of the kernels in.

Once the kernel pops, pour enough kernels in to coat the bottom of the pan. At this stage, if you want to make kettle corn just add a spoonful of sugar.

Cover the pan. Shake the pan back and forth to keep the kernels from burning. Make sure you keep a good grip on that cover as those kernels start popping at an extremely fast rate.

Once the kernels stop popping or slow to about every 5 seconds, they should be done. Pour it into a bowl and salt immediately. Salt to your taste. Everyone has a different palette. You can also add any other ingredient you want here such as butter. Now go put on a great movie and enjoy! 

Drink: Syrah Wine Adventure (Update)

I got a text from my brother yesterday that went like this:

I know it sounds crazy, but I do wish I was there with him. It's a lot of work, but it is so rewarding. This is one of the reasons I absolutely love brewing beer. It's something I created from scratch. Although wine is a little different. I've noticed (in the short amount of time) that wine people really don't like breaking the mold. Whereas in beer, that is my goal every single time I brew. I know it's really hard because everyone has done everything already, but I still try to create a unique brew every time.

So throughout the day he continued texting me with pictures and stories of what is going on. This made me wish I was there even more! Early on in the conversation there were texts saying "Pump is amazing but dangerous. I just shot a stream of sanitizer 10 feet across the yard" and "5 gallons/minute" and "Was more expensive than I expected, like $400 or something". Then, 3 hours later "Pump broke!!!!". Oh no. One thing about these type operations is nothing EVER goes 100% smoothly. You have to be able to think fast and think on your feet. I instantly told him to go to the brew store and he was already on his way. Brothers think alike huh?

At least I am not there to help with the cleaning up! Sorry Joe! Now we play the waiting game. Everything is now going to sit in the barrels for up to almost a year I believe. This is where I would go insane. At least with beer I can drink it in a couple weeks and it is delicious. Oh well! I cannot wait until next year when we do this again!