Double Shot: Best Bitter and Brown Porter

I've never tried doing two brews at once before, but I was really getting behind on the brewing (or possibly ahead on the drinking; I blame Doctor Nik) so I'm giving it a try.  It makes for some logistical fancy dancing, as my brew kettle is also usually used at various other stages for heating water, and I've only got the one real fermenter (but I've got this old carbouy that I used for the wine...)

Brew #1 is a re-make of the Best Bitter that I did recently.  It came out nice - simple and crisp and appropriate for the season somehow.  Using the same kit as before.  Forgot to get a grain bill, but it weighed in at about the same starting weight, so here's what it had last time, but with the acid levels on the hops updated:

5 lbs. UK pale malt.
1 lb. Munich.
8 oz. UK crystal 145
4 oz. special roast.

1 oz. UK Fuggle (4.8% AA, 3.1% BA) @ 60 min.
0.5 oz. UK Kent Golding (5.8% AA, 3.2% BA) @ 60 min.
0.5 oz. UK Kent Golding (5.8% AA, 3.2% BA) @ 10 min.

More acid in the hops, and my wort temperature dropped down a bit low, so we'll see how that changes things.
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Brew #2 is a Brown Porter  Also failed to get a grain bill - came in at about 9.5 lbs.


1.5 oz. UK Kent Golding (5.8% AA, 3.2% BA) @ 60 min.
0.5 oz. UK Kent Golding (5.8% AA, 3.2% BA) @ 10 min.

Barley Wine

18 lbs. 2-row.
1 lb. Crystal 10.
1 lb. Crystal 90.
8 oz. Special-B.
2 oz. Chocolate.

~7 gal @168 F. = 1:15 @ 152 F

2 oz. Chinook (11.1% AA 3.1% BA) @ 60 min.
1 oz. Cascade (5.0% AA, 6.0% BA) @ 15 min.
1 oz. Cascade (5.0% AA, 6.0% BA) @ 5 min.
1 oz. Cascade (5.0% AA, 6.0% BA) @ 1 min. 
1 oz. Amarillo(9.3% AA, 6.1% BA) @ (fermentation slow; days)

initial S.G 1.062

Best Bitter

Best Bitter whole grain kit from the brew shop.  Bit light on grain, so predictably low SG and presumably low alcohol.

5 lbs. UK pale malt.
1 lb. Munich.
8 oz. UK crystal 145
4 oz. special roast.

1 oz. UK Fuggle (4.2% AA, 2.5% BA) @ 60 min*.
0.5 oz. UK Kent Golding (5.3% AA, 3.2% BA) @ 60 min*.
0.5 oz. UK Kent Golding (5.3% AA, 3.2% BA) @ 10 min.

* lost track of the time; may have over-boiled this.

1.028 S.G. orig.

Chico Stout

Based on the Sierra Nevada Chico Stout, apparently, which I have never had, so that doesn't mean much to me. Guy at the brew shop said it was very popular at their latest tasting, and that its a fairly standard "American-style" stout. I don't know what that means either, but I shall write it down, in case it comes to mean something later...

8 lb. American 2-row
2.5 lb. Munich
1 lb. Black Patent
11 oz. Crystal 60

4 1/4 gallons H2O @ 152 F
Sparged to ~ 6.5 gal @168 F

1 oz. Columbus (AA 13.9% BA 5.0%) @ 60 min.
1 oz. Cascade (AA 6.4% BA 5.9%) @10 min.
2 oz. Willamette (AA4.9% BA 3.5%) @ 0 min.

Yeast: WLP001 American Ale yeast.

Pale Ale (again)

Making this recipe again. Its not, as this badly-kept-up-to-date blog would imply, the first beer I've made since the last batch, but I don't remember what-all the others were. We _did_ however, just finish drinking the last batch, because I had a few things cellaring at once, so it got a good 9 months worth of keg aging. Don't know whether it was the aging or the recipe, but it was darn nice, so I'm making more.

Sort of. Didn't get a SG reading last time, so I can't match that. Nor did I write down AA ratings on the hops, and they were out of Centennial so I'm using Chinook. We'll see.

11 lbs. 2-row pale malt
0.25 lbs Crystal 20L
0.25 lbs Crystal 90L
1 lb. Munich malt

1 oz. Amarillo Gold (AA 9.3% Beta Acid ? 6.1%) @ 60 mins.
1 oz. Cascade (AA 6.4% Beta Acid ? 5.9%) @ 10 mins.
1 oz. Chinook (AA 11.8 Beta Acid ? 3.0%) @ 10 mins.
1 oz. Cascade (AA 6.4% Beta Acid ? 5.9%) @ 0 mins.
1 oz. Chinook (AA 11.8 Beta Acid ? 3.0%) @ 0 mins.

Initial S.G. 1.040
Final S.G. 1.004

Bookshelves

Anyone who knows Coz and I will know that we like books. Hell, Anyone who's passed me in the street on the way to work knows I like books. A fact probably much less-known is that I hate bookshelves. I don't hate them for what they do, I hate them for how badly they do it.

Most bookshelves are boxy things that are too deep - so you end up piling the books in in two rows, and can't see the ones in back. Or you just pile miscellaneous crap on the otherwise-wasted front of the shelf. And the shelves are too tall, so you stack them two rows high and then they collapse in a heap whenever you take anything out. And they waste all the space above the unit as a whole, while taking up more space than they need out from the wall. In short, they end up looking like this, which we just moved out of our bedroom:



I've been saying for half a year now that I wanted to just make my own, and last weekend I finally got to it. They're just pine, and they're a bit knotty, though straight. And the finish is a little rough, because I got some sawdust in the urethane. And the wall brackets are unevenly-spaced, because one of the studs was crooked. And I don't care; they're perfect:






They go floor-to-ceiling, and 10 feet across the whole wall. They're 8 inches deep, so they don't eat much of the room, and they alternate between just taller than a paperback, and just taller than a hardback. 100 feet of bookshelf, all for us! Apparently we don't own enough books... yet.

Pale Ale

A personal recipe from the guy down the brew shop - which kindness I have repaid by losing the bit of paper with his name on it, so I can't even give him credit for it. On this blog that nobody really reads but me when I'm trying to remember a recipe. Which is either consolation or insult to injury - I'm not entirely sure.

Anyways, no final SG for the last one, or any SG for this one, because the hydrometer got broke. I reused the yeast from the previous cream ale on this guy, and it got almost two weeks in the fermenter - partially because I had no hydrometer to tell when it was done, and mostly because I was sick as a dog and didn't want to deal with it. Fermenting was so vigorous that it blew the lid clean off the fermenter at one point, so hopefully it didn't get contaminated. But seriously? When the yeast is going _that_ gangbusters I don't rate the chances of your average bacteria...

11 lbs. 2-row pale malt
0.25 lbs Crystal 20L
0.25 lbs Crystal 90L
1 lb. Munich malt

1 oz. Amarillo Gold @ 60 mins.
1 oz. Cascade @ 10 mins.
1 oz. Centennial @ 10 mins.
1 oz. Cascade @ 0 mins.
1 oz. Centennial @ 0 mins.
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Just cracked the keg on this one; very nice. Got some hops to it, but not in the rip-the-back-of-your-head-off way that seems to be getting more and more popular with IPAs these days. I mean, don't get me wrong; I love a pint of Arrogant Bastard, but I'm not sure I want nothing but it in the keg in the garage, yes? Give the taste buds a chance to come reeling to their senses every once in awhile...

Anyways, this is a nice brew. Make it again.