Jackpot

I hit the local packie, and got hooked up with a bunch of good stuff. I actually bought it, so I guess "hooked up" may not be the right term. But I'm still excited. I got Maudite, Fin Du Monde, Chimay Red, Chimay White, Chimay Blue, Westmalle Dubbel, and Allagash Dubbel. So that's about a week of tastings for me to report coming up.

Plus I'm brewing an American Wheat Monday, plus a few gallons of something simple to which I can add a ton of fresh strawberries we picked yesterday. Then transferring Big Slick and Doree Forte to secondary on Tuesday. It is an exciting week of brewing and tasting!

GSX-R1.104 and Big Slick and Dorée Forte

OK so now it seems GSX-R1.104 is slowed WAY down - could it be done already? I'll have to test it when it's a week old to see where it is.

And Big Slick has resumed activity, albeit slight activity. It is a good thing for Big Slick. We'll see about GSX-R1.104.

Oh yeah, and Dorée Forte is still going and it is two weeks old.

It seems like all three of the big guys will be going into secondary at the same time...

GSX-R1.104 and Big Slick

Well GSX-R1.099 ended up with an OG of 1.104, so I'll have to change its name to GSX-R1.104. I pitched yeast at like 1:45, so it was much quicker than an all grain batch. The fermentation was bananas, though. This morning, I could smell the fermenting gases in the living room, upstairs from the basement fermentation chamber. I thought, "well it must be really working". I got a chance to go down there, and found that the lid was popped off. The fermentation must have been so vigorous that it clogged the airlock, and eventually built up enough pressure to pop the lid on the plastic bucket. Good thing I wasn't using a glass carboy...

And I pitched the yeast starter to Big Slick, but it didn't seem to help. We'll see.

Gotta go

GSX-R1.099

Today I am brewing what I have called GSX-R1.099 (I know the picture is a GSX-R1000, but there isn't an 1100 this year, and I didn't want to call it Hayabusa - that would have to be a Japanese-style beer). It is a double version of the Fat Tire clone from the BYO 150 clones book. I am troubleshooting my high FG issue by doing an extract brew today. Four cans of LME make a gravity of almost 1.100. I think I will dose with corn sugar in secondary to make a OG of 1.100 just so I can call it GSX-R1.100.

Liquid Malt Extract is messy and annoying. This is barely any easier than All Grain brewing. We'll see how long it ends up taking.

I am also, as tradition has established, drinking the yeast starter beer while brewing. It gets easier each time to drink hop-free beer. Not sure if that's a good thing or not...

I am also making a yeast starter of WY1056 (equivalent of WLP001) to pitch to Big Slick at high krausen to revitalize the fermentaiton for secondary fermentation tomorrow or Wednesday (depending on when it gets going). What a day!

New Contact Info

Hello! I have a new web URL and email address. OK the URL has nothing at it, but it is www.brainardbrewing.com, and my new email is keith@brainardbrewing.com. This can be done from the link to the left, but I'm so excited, I just had to make a post of it!

Cracked Hydrometer

I am not sure if this cracked hydrometer is affecting my readings. You can barely see the crack to the left of the vertical line in the photo. It is not leaking liquid into the hydrometer, but still could it be a problem?

Homebrew Supply

Next up I am making a double Fat Tire clone from the 150 clones magazine put out by BYO. Since I've been having terminal gravity problems, I wanted to try an extract brew to see if it was my mashing that might be causing the problems.

I tried to go to Rob's Homebrew to get the yeast required by the clone (WY1272 or WLP051). I also wanted to get another vial of WLP001 to try to restart the Big Slick (IIPA stuck at 1.030). They didn't have any of it. I was stuck. On the bright side, they did order a couple of odd Belgian yeasts for me, which should be there this week sometime. But they're a half an hour away, so it's hard to know when I'll get back there.

I still needed my Double Fat Tire stuff. I wanted to try Zok's in Willimantic, but they're not open Tuesdays. So I ended up at Beer and Wine Maker's Warehouse in Hartford. Both are an hour away from me (in Mystic, CT), so it was a toss up. BWMW ended up being really cool. They had everything I wanted, and the owner was there working, and was very knowledgeable. They even had plastic PET 0.5L bottles, which I've been wanting for the NASCAR race this fall.

Funny thing about this recipe is it is an extract-based recipe, but they still have me mash the pound and a half (three pounds, since I'm doubling) of specialty grains. I have to "steep" the grains at 154°F for 30 minutes and then "rinse" them with 170°F water - sounds like mashing to me... So it will still take a long time anyway. I thought I was going to save two hours, but I guess not... We'll see how it goes. Probably brewing on Monday. Pray for good weather.