Holy Cow it's Malted Cider!

It seems that I have neglected to fill my watchers in on my brewing wherabouts for a long time now. I have not walked quietly into the night with an empty glass in hand! Nay, I have been in pursuit of the perfect brew, just too damned lazy to get to this blog to update. Chalk it up to full time work and growing family, I make no more excuses except to say that I look forward to hearing from y'all.

The wife came to me two weeks before Thanksgiving and asked for me to brew a nice beer for our Turkey Day. Ah, I love her, even when she speaks to me with beer ignorance. How can I possibly come up with something that will live up to my expectations in just two short weeks? What can I brew that will accompany the fine fare my culinary trained wife plans to put on the table? This query led me to the backyard, to start up the firepit, smoke a nice Rocky Patel and think. Think like the Thinking Man I was excepting for the fact that my hand was not on my chin but rather on my nose, with five dogs and a fire in the backyard it was steaming up like a Christmas Great Dane Poo.

Huzzah! Something struck me like a thunderbolt. Why not whip out a lovely cider? Cider is great, it works so well with Turkey and Mashed Spuds and Cranberries and stuffing and cheesecake and well, the list goes on, we were expecting twenty or so for dinner that day. It was time to get to work!

I have always enjoyed the ciders in bottle from the shop, the only problem was always their expense and the fact that I have never, ever brewed one in my entire life. That wasn't gonna stop me, I was not in a conservative mood. No two week heavily hopped ale for the table, no stinkin' way. It was cider or nothing else.

I jumped in my beat up redneck truck and hustled down to Costco, purchased four gallons of apple juice, pasteurized but not treated, natural with no chemical additives or ascorbic acid to kill the yeast. Then I made my way to the homebrew supply shop and picked up a #5 can of Munton and Fison LME (unhopped), I figured a booster would add balance to the force with this brew. Add a packet of Montrachet Yeast and my total take for the day was about 32 bucks for five gallons. Not bad considering a four pack of the commercial stuff requires at the very least a Lincoln note.

My philosophy as a brewer is the path of least resistance. I added the four gallons of apple juice to a five gallon plastic water bottle, uncooked. Why the hell not? It was already pasteurized and I was ready to smack it like a bitch with some strong ass yeast. I heated the LME on the stove with a little bit of water and added it to the batch, topping it off almost right to the top with five gallons. I threw caution to the wind, pitched the yeast to the batch dry and set it up in my Stepdaughter's bedroom closet to brew away.

Fermentation did not take long at all, it was well under way within two hours. After two days it was pumping CO2 like a fully carbed beer, this lasted for four days total, then on the fifth, sixth and seventh day it rested. No blowout of the airlock at all due to the acidity of the apple juice, if you try it at home be sure to top it off all the way to the very top with just a wee lil' bit of space for good measure. Don't worry, trust me!

One week in fermentation and the yeast was packed to the bottom like a bunch of Old West Chinese Coolies in the back of a railcar, this Montrachet sure did its job very well and left no room for loss. I was quite pleased with my situation.

I did not taste it at this time per my regular routine, I sent it straight to my beer cooler transferred to a nice corny. One week to rest, force carbed to serve and voila! My batch was ready.

Wow, this is an easy to make, easy to drink, well balanced and crisp with brilliant acidity brew. It also displays a nice head retention, I reckon due to the malt addition. It was a little "winey" the first week, but definitely on my higher scale of drinkable and enjoyable, what a treat it was for the family to play some foosball in the garage, all doped up on Turkey and smashing down cider. Fifty people showed up and everyone who tried it came back for seconds, more often than not thirds.

As the weeks went by, the "winey" flavor dissipated and it is still quite an enjoyable beverage to have around. Be sure to make a Black and Tan with this stuff it will surely blow yer mind clean off. Next year I will be sure to brew the same batch around early October in order to be ready for the Holidays. Oh, and if you like, don't forget to take a pint, reduce it and add sugar, it is a great booster for raspberries on cheesecake, I know this for a fact because cheesecake is the wife's favorite food and I pissed her off by eating too much of it. Ah well!

It will be back to the drawing board soon, I have been in the mood for something strong and toasty, I will keep you updated as my mind wanders. Until then, have a great and prosperous New Year! Time to go police to dog poo in the backyard (first on the "list", many more chores to follow)

Homebrew Lager Rant

Beer as a natural product is a wonderful, delicious thing, a beverage as old as time itself. It is perfectly normal for a bloke to desire to drink beer, whether it is for the flavor or just to physically quench thirst. I personally have been known to sit at a table for half an hour enjoying a barleywine and maduro combination yet later in the week I find myself shoving a light lager down my throat as fast as I can as I am covered with lawn-mower sweat and grass. There are so many different ways a man can describe his fascination, nay, his love affair with beer that such a confession would take volumes and a lifetime of writing to achieve, suffice to say that to me the only thing more wonderful than beer is my woman and sometimes, frankly, beer wins out.

I have consumed many varieties of beer in my lifetime so far, and I can confess that my favorite list tends to swing back and forth from time to time. Mind you, I am not the sort of “seasonal” drinker that major breweries pursue, coming out with Winter Warmers in the Winter and Weizens in the summer. No, I would just as likely be the jerk who wants a Czech Pilsner on my patio in December or a Russian Imperial Stout in the dead of summer on my backyard swing with no breeze whatsoever. It really can and will really depend on my mood.

I have gravitated towards stronger beers in recent years, only because I don’t like to drink so much that I have to urinate every five seconds. There is nothing worse than to be in great conversation about something totally trivial and have to interrupt it because the only thing on the menu is piss-water, they don’t call it that for nothing, you know. Repeat trips to the bathroom are not enjoyable for one physically, not to mention offsetting to your friends/guests.

A great session beer for me these days can be as low as 4%ABV or as high as 10%ABV, depending upon the style. Barleywines or Triple IPAS are great when they are high in alcohol as they are heavily hopped to balance the warmth of the alcohol. Weizenbocks and Hellesbocks are wonderful, too, in that the malt sweetness can come into play, thus deterring the necessity of heavy hop counter-balance. Sometimes a great deviation from the normal can be a strong, Russian Imperial Stout, heavily roasted grains and chocolates tend not to mask the alcohol, but blend it in a different way on the tongue. You can feel the warmth going down the gullet but you don’t mind because your tongue is still toast-struck with roasted barley and chocolate malt.

Having been an active commercial and homebrewer for many years now, I must confess that I prefer homebrew to any commercial beer, bottle or keg, domestic or import. The incredible head retention on a homemade, all-grain brew is nothing short of monumental. Sometimes I think I can bounce a quarter off the head of my homemade Irish Stout. Even my lightest home beers carry Belgian Lace to the very bottom of the glass, every single batch every time. You just cannot get that from a bottle that has travelled halfway around the country and was produced on a large scale with economy in mind.

The only way to enjoy a great beer is to consume it right where it was produced, thus I am a true believer in brewpubs. The only problem with most American brewpubs is that they are limited in scope regarding their beer recipe library, most often times limiting their beer agenda to strictly ales as they ferment quickly, require less refrigeration and wait time. Most importantly speaking to this fact is that ales require a lot less fermentation and conditioning capacity than lagers, thus greatly reducing startup costs for new businesses.

Don’t get me wrong, folks. I think some of the World’s best brews are ales, including the diverse Belgians and British South Coast Beers. Ah, the London Bitter is a friend of mine! It is just that I have come to love and adore the clean, refreshing, crispy finish of a fine lager, especially one that is fresh and consumed on site on a small scale.

Lately I have been making beer-whoopee with the Brooklyn Lager, an excellent microbrew bottle from you guessed it, New York. It is outstanding as far as lagers are concerned and rivals even the very best pilseners and lagers from Czechoslovakia and Germany. I consider the Brooklyn Lager to be full flavored and surprisingly well balanced, finishing even on the tongue with minimal aftertaste and great tongue play of both the hops and malt alike. The Brooklyn Lager is a true pre-prohibition lager recipe, hearkening back to the days when real men drank real beer in real pubs.

Yes, I’m talking about a bunch of blue collar guys taking some time off after their hard, sweaty day of work to meander into their local pub, quaff down a lager or two and have a po-boy to see them through until they get home. No televisions with ESPN, no music on the radio, just a wooden bar top with a stein, and friends around you, cigarette/cigar in mouth and joke on the lip. These guys didn’t wish to hang around drinking gallons of Bud Lite, they wanted a couple of full-flavored beers, enough to give them a “how doyado?” before they got home and put up with the screaming wife and chitlins.

Back then there wasn’t time to worry about fat grams and carbs. They burned that shit off in the first hour of work. No, they wanted flavor, they wanted fulfillment. There was nothing between a man and his beer except a smiling barkeep. Life was too short to worry about their waistline like a little bitch. These men, whether from the city or country alike, had strong arms and heavy hands. They fought wars, they planted crops, they riveted steel on skyscrapers. The sewer water contained in a bottle of light lager today would have insulted them and they would probably have performed a classic spit take and thrown the bartender out to the street.

Yeah, I must say that Garrett Oliver has made an impression on me. His craftsmanship shines through the bottle and rivals or exceeds beers that have been brewed in Europe for centuries. But isn’t that the way it is with America in general? It seems that we are always underestimated, until the time comes for ass-saving, that is. I can’t tell you how many Brooklyn Lagers I have enjoyed in my backyard, admiring the foliage that my screaming wife plants in the ground. Sometimes I wonder if she plots my own plot, but I’m afraid to tell her I have no life insurance to speak of. There is some kind of truth in beer I get from drinking his Lager, almost like he doesn’t need a paid political advertisement or government codification in order to authenticate the awesomeness of the brew, it is just as it is, elegant and wonderful, especially tonight. Thanks, Garrett!

Black Beach Weizenbock #36

The Captain was a God among men. Not only was he a sweet fella that I watched almost every morning as a young child growing up, he also happened to be one of the bravest Marines of Iwo Jima. It is nearly impossible to imagine that such a great, easygoin’ person could be so courageous under the dire circumstances of Black Beach. If it was not for the brave actions of Sgt. Bob Keeshan (Kangaroo) leading his troops off of Black Beach under heavy fire, a lot more men would have died where they lay on that beach that day. Ooh Rah for Bob Keeshan, may he guard the Halls of Heaven ‘til the end of time. This beer is a true Wheat Bock, 100% wheat billing mixed with rice hulls. I split the ten gallon batch in two and pitched Czech Pilsener and Saflager (Dry), respectively. I'll ferment in the primary for two weeks, transfer to secondary and ferment another three weeks, bottle/keg and condition for another four weeks. This brew should be ready sometime in June so it will be a great addition to my beer cooler when I take the dogs to Honeymoon Island...Beer, umbrella, Maduro, Dogs, beautiful wife in bikini, excellent gulf view. Who could ask for anything more, man?

Rusty Well Deck Pink Grapefruit Mojo #35 True Organic #2

Rusty Well Deck Pink Grapefruit Mojo #35 True Organic #2

Tuesday, March 24, 2009:

Ingredients for Fourteen U.S. Gallons:

One Wheelbarrow full to the top of Pink Grapefruit
Five pounds cane sugar
Five pounds Orange Blossom Wildflower Honey
Pasteur Champagne Yeast to size (dry)

The weather was beautiful, I staged my new Black and Decker juicer on top of the tablesaw at the edge of the garage floor and propped up the fermenting bin to catch the juice. Cutting and juicing was easy except for the fact that Black and Decker is not what it used to be and the juicer gave on me. Borrowed Bill’s Braun juicer and it worked like a horse the rest of the session, approximately one hour. Straight juice, pulp and all, minimal seeds and high sugar content with perfectly ripe fruit.

Listened to Rush and smoked two great sticks, one Macanudo mild and a no-name torpedo that was probably a Rocky Patel special. No boiling, no special treatment, just straight slicing and juicing until fermenters were full and fruit was gone. Simplified the sugar and honey on the stove, added some ice to cool it down, pitched the yeast directly to the must and staged in the closet. I added a lot of yeast, four packets, two in each fermenter. Some of the packets were quite old and I am certain that they have suffered in retention even though stored properly.
Fourteen gallons of juice (!!!) out of one wheelbarrow full of fruit just hanging out in my neighborhood, not being eaten, juiced, or used for any purpose whatsoever. Total cost of batch including yeast and sugar primers was less than ten bucks. Wow, one of the reasons why I like the direction I’m going in is because it is actually cheaper than brewin beer! After two days it is working like a champ, just like the Tangerine Mojo. I will keep you posted !!

Nutty Bruce's Brown Ale and Tangerine Mojo update

Bruce, Mike and I couldn't have asked for a more luscious day to brew. I woke up this morning and it was crispy by Central Florida standards, roundabout 55F or so. Good coffee morning, good chilly morning to suck down a cup of joe, meander out into the backyard and fill my kettle with water to heat.
There are so many great things about simple, backyard brews, and one of them is the fact that you can actually leave your backyard to run errands while your kettle heats up. I found myself truckin' on down the road in the GMC with the wife going to the Lowe's Garden Shop for mulch, flowers and other things to solely keep her happy. We were on our way home going down our neighborhood street when I saw someone putting down a beautiful red oak from their backyard. Thirty minutes, that was just enough time to fill the bed of the truck with a couple cords of fine wood for next winter, oh and by the way my "frustrated with the wife" workout (chopping wood can be extremely therapeutic when you are angry). After all this I still wasn't hot enough to strike a mash.
Mike shows up on a triathlon bike weighing less than my finger and Bruce shows up in his truck full of glass carboys and away we go!
Striking the mash, we shared stories and worries about the future. I could bore you with them but I won't, suffice to say we did what all men do in the backyard, talked about taxes, culture etc. whilst whittling wood and watching the kettle. The day warmed up to a perfect seventy two F. and we were just loving the clear blue skies, no wind and perfect weather. I would classify this day as one God has blessed me with, I couldn't live in a more wonderful place in the world.
We tasted my Tangerine Mojo, which has already been racked from primary and into secondary. Most of the heavy fermentation leg work is done but there is still quite active Champagne yeast working around raw, wonderful pulp. Mike commented that it tasted like a Mimosa and I agreed only to add that it had a pleasantly sour element on the top like a Belgian or Biere de Garde. Yeast and pulp alike are continuously settling and I will probably be racking it from tank to tank for quite a while. The champagne strain is so complete in fermentation and crisply dry without being a tart. I'll rack it til it's clear of pulp and then prime and bottle, this mojo is a cocktail that needs to be served chilled and naturally carbonated. Hard to believe it only cost me time and a couple of packets of cheap, dry yeast. Everything else except the sugar was free and living in Florida that stuff is like sand.
As for the Nut Brown, I hadn't made it in many years and was looking forward to reintroducing Victory Malt to my system. The strike temperature was little low but the setpoint for starch conversion was well within the parameters. We had an excellent boil and cool down, transferred to Bruce's glass carboys for him to take home, ferment in his closet, fill his keg and enjoy. One seven gallon carboy will use the Nottingham strain while the other three gallon carboy will use the French 1056 dry strain version (Safale '56). Man oh man, what a day, what a beer, the relatives up North are still dealing with snow and we get to play in Eden!

Soda Soda Tangerine Mojo #31 2009

Soda Soda Tangerine Mojo #31

Friday, February 13, 2009:

In an effort to get back to the ultimate grassroots brewing I have decided to take my neighbor Pat’s tangerine tree hostage. Actually, the truth is that Pat is a really great guy but he just doesn’t like to pick fruit, which is a terrible shame for him because he happens to own a tangerine tree twenty feet tall that contains some of the best juicers this side of the State. In order to feed my brewing habit and create a symbiotic relationship with Pat I have volunteered to pick his tree clean.
Try picking twenty gallons of tangerines by hand with your wife standing in the driveway laughing at you. After my first bucket I climbed up the center of the tree, grabbed it with both hands and shook like hell, hundreds of beautiful fruit falling gently to the grass and a look of awe from Leah. Without batting an eye she looks at her friend DJ and tells her “ I bet he was thinking of me when he did that just then”. The truth is that I never would think of something as violent as throttling my lovely wife but I thought it was funny, too!
Seventeen gallons of fruit later and I found myself juicing like a madman in the kitchen. By the time my sissy boy juicer gave out I had about five and a half gallons, with which I also added one pint of Boston Hill Wildflower Honey, four pounds of sugar (simplified) and tossed in two packets of Pasteur Champagne yeast, pushing the airlock on and sending to my closet for a couple of weeks.

There is also a story behind the name, Soda Soda Tangerine Mojo. It just so happens that one day when I was a young and stupid Marine in the Philippines we had staged all of our amphibious vehicles in a bayside submarine base called Subic. While pulling maintenance duty one afternoon there was this little Philipino fella that kept coming by with a wheelbarrow full of Coke, Pepsi and ice, yelling “Soda, Soda. Soda Soda!” It was a wonderful song that kept in my head all of these years.
Oh, and also, one of the staple drinks at the time on McSai-Sai Boulevard was the mojo, some violently wonderful cocktail comprised of local fruit and rum and/or vodka or miscellaneous alcohol, whatever was available. A few glasses and you were schnokerred to the point of stumblization, especially if you were a twenty one year old who was just getting off a boat after two months.
This will be my version of mojo, in honor of a Philippino dude who sang a song that stayed with me my whole life and a long gone place that created a fantastic Island drink that was just as memorable.
I will keep you posted when it goes in the bottle!

Getting Rid of Gas

I cannot stand the fact that propane is so expensive. I usually go through a small tank every 2 to 3 brew sessions, finding myself packing the empty cylinder in the back of my truck along with Abby (Great Dane/Sharpei and Momma's Girl) and trekking to the corner gas station or nearby Home Depot for an exchange. It can cost as little as fifteen and as much as 25 bucks for new gas. That can be just over eight bucks per brew, and considering the grain and hop bill for a ten gallon batch can run as much as 40 bucks you can see that it is slowly beginning to get expensive to make the brew these days.
Let us not be crazy here, though. Even fifty bucks or so for ten gallons of fine handcrafted brew is a deal, going for something less than fifty cents per glass, adding in electrical and cooling costs. Overall in my entire brewing career I have been most pleased with direct fired propane systems as compared to electric steam generators and other methods. There are benefits, the first that comes to mind is the quick flash point and pleasant caramelization effect on some of my ales. It is also awful nice to have strike-temperature water from room temperature in the same amount of time it takes for me to realize that Gilligan is not getting off the Island in this episode.
My friend turned me onto a welding buddy of his who erected one of those "tree" systems with three burners and gravity feed, all the nice stuff any brewer would want. I went to see the system and slobbered all over it like Abby over a biscuit for about an hour or so. Look how simple it is, you don't even need to climb a ladder to fill the hot liquor tank, see the quick disconnect (OOOHH, AHHHHH), etc. No more ladling! No more overaeration of wort! Even heat distribution from several points of contact! Easy cleanup! It all sounded like a brewer's dream and I am sure that there are many brewers out there who would love a system like that one, Jay surely did a fantastic job on it. Perhaps one day I will be able to convince the real BOSS (translated:Wife) of the family to shell out the 800 smackers or so to set myself up with the "Tree".
Then, as usual, I climbed out of my little dreamworld and stepped back into brewing reality. One of the main reasons I got into brewing to begin with was to save money, how in the world am I gonna save money by spending so much on equipment? I guess I'm the kinda guy who would rather spend a little less money and drive a Lincoln with all the features I want than refinance the house on a Caddy. After a few Red Ales and a nice Maduro I was struck with a thought: Why not go old school?
I am a wood chopoholic. I love to chop wood, it is a great workout and I actually have something to show for my efforts at the end of a sweaty workout unlike those five percenters at the gym. For those who don't know, five percenters mean the guys with five percent body fat, most of it in their head, working out each individual muscle on fantastic contraptions and treadmills while listening to death metal and sucking on an energy pooooop-sicle. Anyhow, back to the wood. It is nice to have a cord or two of it in the backyard in case it actually falls below forty degrees in central Florida (maybe a handful of times), and it is also nice to have the fireplace to set THE MOOD, if you knowwhutImean. A nice fire, a little homebrew, some Dean Martin on the phono, you get my drift.
With all of this wood in the backyard I thought of digging a pit and then thought twice as I really am not a redneck contrary to popular belief. Anyhow, too many deep roots in the ground to make it easy so it was on to a better design. How about a brick oven? I could double it's use as a kiln for claywork if I chose and it could also double as a hot plate instead of the typical gascrap contraption you find at the Depot. Maybe a simple coal oven with a lift of some kind like the old kettles in Medieval times.
After pondering my thoughts over several more pints I decided to design system that was easy and included a lot of components I already have. The design will begin with a half barrel keg sawn in half with four steel posts running waist high. A sturdy rack will be placed on top as such to make it easy to remove ash. I plan on a double pulley trailer winch attached to the side and running up and out on a limb of my great oak in the backyard. This line will carry two seperate kegs, one hot liquor tank, the other mash tun. The brew kettle will not be initially attached but will have a hook connect if I need to raise it off the heat in order to avoid a boilover.
The idea is simple. Start a small charcoal fire, build it with wood and heat my strike water, gravity feeding from the arm into the mash tun, turning to mash tun to the heat for decoction mashes if necessary or applicable. After starch to sugar conversion sparge directly in the same manner and drop the wort into the brew kettle laying on the heat rack. As sparge comes to an end, transfer the grain out of the mash tun and directly into a trash barrel using height and gravity to my advantage.
Attach the brew kettle hook to the winch arm and boil. If there is a chance of boilover lift the winch accordingly until you are in the safe zone. When boil is complete lift the winch and move the arm away from the heat, chilling with the wort chiller and transferring to primary into the cooler.
All of this sounds like a lot of work but if I could save ten bucks a batch I could cover my buildout costs in less than half a year, now that is some capital finance savings realized in a short time if I ever saw it, and I don't even know Rupert Murdoch personally. I do know what's in my bank account, though, and this sounds like a no-brainer to me.
The smoke might even make my brew more distinctive, you never know.