BIG Brew Today

Big brew day today…my buddy Jack is in from Spokane and we’re going to do a very large American Stout; a clone of Brooklyn Brewery Black Chocolate Stout – one of my perennial favorites. Too bad Andy isn’t here…he used to be pretty good at this.

Here’s the grain bill:
15.5 lbs pale
1 lb chocolate
¾ lb white wheat
½ lb roasted black barley
¼ lb flaked wheat
3 oz black patent

That equates to 18 plus lbs of grain. Yeah baby! We’re looking for an OG of 1.090 plus! If I can bring her down to a target 1.023 FG, she should come in at 9% ABV with good attenuation.

I’m going to mash in at 154 degrees to get some extra sweetness and mouthfeel. This should be a very large beer suitable for drinking in January on these bitterly cold southwest Louisiana nights:)

Here’s the hops bill:
2 oz Kent Golding 60 min
½ oz Amarillo and ½ oz Kent Golding 15 min
½ oz Amarillo and ½ oz Glacier 5 min

The estimated IBU is 46. Did I ever mention that Garrett Oliver is one of my beer heroes?

I also made a yeast starter using Safale 05 dry yeast on Tuesday night / Wednesday morning to assure that there would be a sufficient quantity of the little buggers to address the high gravity wort head on!

Stay tuned for brew day details! There will also be stogies involved and endless college football. I only hope safety professional Jack can be of some assistance lifting these heavy containers…

My Boat Babe

I was drinking a homebrew on Friday night while preparing for a Saturday fishing trip and discovered this in my boat. Isn't she beautiful? I'm crazy about my boat babe...

Then, when I went to get a refill, I came back and the neighbors were in my boat.

We had good Friday night...

Brew Plan

Here's my brew plan for the remainder of the year. For me, I have to put it in a spreadsheet to make sure that I don't have multiple events occuring with any single piece of equipment. Thanks to Mark's advice, I'm going to brew the Brooklyn Brewery Black Chocolate Stout next week and let it condition for a good long time until I drink it in, say, January. While that is going on I'll brew up a batch of Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale in time for the Holidays, followed by a Bell's Two Hearted Ale that will be ready after the new year.

I happen to have all of the ingredients for all of these all grain brews in my refrigerator as I type. That's because if you buy more than $100 of merchandise from Austin Homebrew Supply they throw in the shipping for free. 50 plus pounds of grain with no shipping charge. I love it when that happens...

Better Red than Dead

That's the name of the recipe for my Irish Red ale that I used from one of my prior year's Zymurgy magazines. Last year's initial try was tasty but came out looking more like a Porter. So I adjusted my specialty grains this year and the result is just about what I was looking for. I think a bit more tweeking and the color will be perfect next year. The flavor is awesome, however. This continues to be one of the best beers I've ever brewed - perfect for Fall. It's becoming my official Octoberfest beer. This is a wonderful session beer; I could easily drink six of these and still want more.