Straight Dope brewers & winemakers - How's it going?

Cafe Society
41

[QUOTE=Demo]
Are you saying you can get 5 gallons of hard cider for under $40 bucks? Dude, show me where you buy your booze! :slight_smile: Also, I thought you couldn’t use store-bought apple juice for cider because it has preservatives in it. I’ve never brewed cider before though, so I have no idea.

[/QUOTE]

Hmmm… I may have to redo my math.
I know people that have used store bought apple juice with good end results, so I’m not to worried about it. I’m under the impression that your average preservatives knuckle under to a fierce onslaught from specialized yeast.

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You can buy pasteurized apple juice, sans preservatives, and it will ferment nicely.

Juice that has had preservatives added can still be fermented, but you need to add a VERY large yeast starter, because the preservatives will inhibit budding. So you basically need to add enough yeast cells to ferment without relying on any reproduction. That is a lot of yeast but it can be done.

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[QUOTE=Whammo]
OH… Eleusis… that JPA was GREAT!! I only wish I had dry hopped it with cascade! Rave reviews!

I plan on doing it again soon and dry hopping it.

I’m still brewing obviously and have recently moved on to All Grain brewing… hit 85% efficiency with my 2nd batch!

:smiley:

BTW I HAVE to thank you for the JPA recommendation… not only did I find a great brew from CJ but the GreenBoard brewboard.com has become my home away from home.. lol

I’m Whammo on there too.
[/QUOTE]

[exhale]

You have no idea how happy this post made me… I figured you had a taste for real beer, and asked if you like hops, but still… some people can’t handle our level. :smiley:

[QUOTE=psycat90]
We did attempt a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale clone, and my husband did attempt to dry hop it. It’s, well, kind of drinkable. I think a couple too many attempts at filtering might have oxidized it.
[/QUOTE]

First of all, why attempt a SNPA clone?

After all you can buy it, and it’s not going be much cheaper or better. If you want SNPA then just buy it (right? is it available there?) Secondly, the filtering thing is WAY unnecessary. The alcohol content will kill the germs all by itself. I’ve never produced a cloudy beer anyway.

On the other hand, if you LIKE SNPA, then surely you have a taste for “real Beer” and should strive to make one better.

SNPA is (too) often the first taste people have of real dry hopped pale ale, especially in the US.

So screw the clone, and try the JPA. I, however, recommend a minimum of 4 weeks of maturing total. 1 week primary, 3 secondary.

[QUOTE=InvisibleWombat]
Of all the beers I’ve brewed, my pumpkin beer is the most-requested. I use the spices sparingly, so you can smell them but not really taste them. I cube and roast about 3 pounds of pumpkin (1" cubes, roasted at 325F) and add it to the boil. I remove the pumpkin when it goes to primary fermentation and add another 2-3 pounds of cubed & roasted pumpkin for the secondary. Great body, great flavor.
.
.
.
I’ve taken to putting vodka in the airlock instead of water. If any impurity gets in there, the vodka sterilizes it.
[/QUOTE]

Yummy. Just in time for Halloween/harvest season, too.

Perfect.

44

[QUOTE=Eleusis]
First of all, why attempt a SNPA clone?
[/QUOTE]
For the most part, I agree with you. The only time I’ve tried cloning is when I tasted a beer I really liked and thought, “Boy that would be great if I late-hopped it,” or “This would be a lot better without the raspberries,” or “I wonder how this would taste with a half-pound of crystal malt added”… I make a clone to reproduce the original beer, and then tweak the recipe to my personal liking.

45

[QUOTE=Eleusis]
[exhale]

First of all, why attempt a SNPA clone?

After all you can buy it, and it’s not going be much cheaper or better. If you want SNPA then just buy it (right? is it available there?) Secondly, the filtering thing is WAY unnecessary. The alcohol content will kill the germs all by itself. I’ve never produced a cloudy beer anyway.
[/QUOTE]

The reason we were making a SNPA clone is because we’re relatively new to brewing and, IMO, trying to imitate something you know you like is one of the best ways to learn anything. When you start learning to play guitar, you don’t try to write an original composition right away, you play Stairway to Heaven a million times until you know you are doing everything correctly, and THEN you go on from there. (And actually we did tweak it just a tiny bit by dry hopping just a tad more :slight_smile: ).

We filtered the beer not to get rid of any germs(lol) but because there was free floating crap everywhere in the beer that would NOT settle out for some reason. I could have tried a fining agent I suppose, but I figured I would try to filter it. The reason it failed was because I had already kegged and carbonated the beer so I basically ended up with a keg of foam. Anyway, after all that manipulation, you can see why it didn’t turn out so well.

Ah well, it’s all a part of learning. Luckily I have that 15 gallon keg of Sierra in the kegerator to keep me happy until my next batch, a double IPA, is ready. We’ve also got a zinfandel happily bubbling away in its secondary right now. :wink:

46

Just thought I would annoyingly jump in here and say that my whole basement smells like fermenting. I think I like it.

My store bought apple juice is bubbling away, with nary a worry at this point. I registered on Brewboard, and am trying to glean information, but their Wine, Mead, and Cider section seems a bit… dry. Heheh…

I’m going to do primary fermentation for about 10 days, then rack into a clean bottle for secondary. I think 2 months of secondary will work out well, then priming and bottling.

47

[QUOTE=InvisibleWombat]
For the most part, I agree with you. The only time I’ve tried cloning is when I tasted a beer I really liked and thought, “Boy that would be great if I late-hopped it,” or “This would be a lot better without the raspberries,” or “I wonder how this would taste with a half-pound of crystal malt added”… I make a clone to reproduce the original beer, and then tweak the recipe to my personal liking.
[/QUOTE]

While I’ve never done a straight-up clone, I think cloning is a great idea for learning how the ingredients go together to create a certain flavor profile. If you’re new to the game (I only started two years ago), it’s nice to look at a recipe and figure out what grain bill or hops or yeast contribute to a particular flavor you like. Every beer you make, whether a clone or not, is a lesson to be learned from. I think if there’s a beer you already know you like, there’s nothing wrong with trying to brew it home. Some people like experimenting, some don’t. However somebody wants to get into the homebrewing hobby is good by me.

I just finally got five gallons brewing after a hiatus over the summer. I’m thinking of upgrading to a keg soon rather than bottling all this damn beer time after time. I decided to improvise an amber ale and, since I have no time right now for full grain mashes, just went with 3.3 lb Coopers Amber, 3.3 lb Alexander’s Amber, 1 lb brown sugar, 2 oz Kent Goldings (1 oz bittering, 1 oz flavoring), 1 oz Fuggles (finishing), White Labs Dry English Ale yeast. I usually brew IPAs or IIPAs, but I’m kind of burning out on extreme beers. Decided to make something my girlfriend and family might actually drink. :slight_smile:

48

Oh, I forgot, there was also a pound of crystal malt in there. More experienced brewers -> Question: I’ve always done my fermentations with a primary and secondary, since I pretty much dry hop everything. If I decide not to dry hop this, should I even bother with the secondary? Second, would dry hopping this with like an ounce of Fuggles be worth it? Or would it not be appropriate for a milder ale like this one?

49

[QUOTE=Demo]
The reason we were making a SNPA clone is because we’re relatively new to brewing
[/quote]

Ahhh!

I should have known!

Of course no one can fault for you for that!
Once you get into it and have a few successes, SNPA will be a pleasant memory though :smiley:

As a guitar player who hadn’t picked it up in over a year, until last week, Stairway was was pretty much all I remembered :frowning:

My five month old daughter sure enjoyed it though :wink:

Yeah, I can see.

Finings were what you wanted. They work much better when the beer is cold, already, and trying to do it with carbed beer, well… at least that’s one mistake you won’t repeat.

Fuckin’ A.

50

I have to agree with the others posting about “why they clone.”

My current batch in the fermenter is a Magic Hat #9, but I’m going to use cherry extract to flavor, rather than the apricot flavor that they use. I also upped the malt content quite a bit to increase the alcohol content (and increased bittering hops a bit to compensate).

I have an Ipswich ale clone (recipe in my last post to this thread) that I’m brewing for my Father for Christmas, and I’m sure I’ll be doing some tweaks to it once I get to taste it. It’s been in the bottle for nearly a week, and spent 3 weeks between primary & secondary.

Anyone have a good FAQ/newbie guide for cider making? The wife wants me to make a batch, and I’m happy to do so, but have no experience with it.

51

I’ve brewed 3 or 4 batches now (all extract and steeping the grains), but I can’t seem to get rid of a somewhat bitter after taste in the beer. Has anyone else experienced this? My beers just don’t have a clean finish to them.

Does anyone have a good recipe for someone who likes the following beers:
Mirror Pond
Red Hook
Fat Tire

In other words, I like a darker Amber but I’m not a big fan of Porters and IPAs.

My level of interest would grow tremendously if I could just get rid of that aftertaste!

52

[QUOTE=cmosdes]
I’ve brewed 3 or 4 batches now (all extract and steeping the grains), but I can’t seem to get rid of a somewhat bitter after taste in the beer. Has anyone else experienced this? My beers just don’t have a clean finish to them.

Does anyone have a good recipe for someone who likes the following beers:
Mirror Pond
Red Hook
Fat Tire

In other words, I like a darker Amber but I’m not a big fan of Porters and IPAs.

My level of interest would grow tremendously if I could just get rid of that aftertaste!
[/QUOTE]

Well, there’s two types of bitter (at least two types that I’m aware of): there’s the hoppy bitter, and there the astringent, grainy bitter. Since you like Mirror Pond, I assume you must like hoppy bitterness, so my guess is grain is your culprit. How are you steeping your grain? If you get the grains to hot, they will release their astringent bitterness into your brew. Generally, if you’re steeping, you want to pull your grain bag at 170F.

53

[QUOTE=pulykamell]
Well, there’s two types of bitter (at least two types that I’m aware of): there’s the hoppy bitter, and there the astringent, grainy bitter. Since you like Mirror Pond, I assume you must like hoppy bitterness, so my guess is grain is your culprit. How are you steeping your grain? If you get the grains to hot, they will release their astringent bitterness into your brew. Generally, if you’re steeping, you want to pull your grain bag at 170F.
[/QUOTE]

The bitterness I was tasting definitely had an astringent flavor to it. I had read that it could be due to the steeping of the grains, so the last batch I kept the temp at ~155 for 20 minutes. Previously I would heat the water to 170 and let it steep for 20 minutes after that. The latest batch is in the primary right now (brewed on Sunday) so I won’t really know if that did anything for another 3 or 4 weeks.

54

[QUOTE=butler1850]
Anyone have a good FAQ/newbie guide for cider making? The wife wants me to make a batch, and I’m happy to do so, but have no experience with it.
[/QUOTE]

Cider is easy. Are you planning on using commercial juice, or do a custom-crush? What strength would you like it to finish at? I’ve won awards for my ciders, so ask away. Or email me - address is in the profile.

cmosdes - Try a mini-mash next time, rather than just steeping your grains. It gives you more temperature control and the extra body from the 2-row seems to mellow the astringency quite a bit.

55

On Saturday we racked the zin. I got to taste it, and I was pleasantly surprised. It’s not vinegar. Yet. :wink: It should be ready to bottle in a couple of weeks. Actually, I think it will end up quite nice. Not bad for our first try. On Sunday we brewed a double IPA. When we went to the supply shop my husband decided he just neeeeded a wort chiller, and he couldn’t have been happier with his purchase. He posted a few pictures of Sunday’s brewing in his livejournal. (Lots of pictures.)

56

[QUOTE=cmosdes]
The bitterness I was tasting definitely had an astringent flavor to it. I had read that it could be due to the steeping of the grains, so the last batch I kept the temp at ~155 for 20 minutes. Previously I would heat the water to 170 and let it steep for 20 minutes after that. The latest batch is in the primary right now (brewed on Sunday) so I won’t really know if that did anything for another 3 or 4 weeks.
[/QUOTE]

What are you steeping? Crystal malt? Anyway, when I steep, I just drop the grain bag in about 2-3 gallons of cold water, and heat it until it hits 170. Once it hits 170, I just pull the bag out and don’t steep any more. With crystal malt, I find that’s enough extra sweetness and body for me. I’ve never noticed any bitter grainy aftertaste. The only time I got that astringent bitterness was an all-grain mash I did that went completely awry temperature-wise. I suspect you won’t have the problem with this latest brew.

57

[QUOTE=silenus]
Cider is easy. Are you planning on using commercial juice, or do a custom-crush? What strength would you like it to finish at? I’ve won awards for my ciders, so ask away. Or email me - address is in the profile.

[/QUOTE]

I’d say I’d be starting with commercial juice. I’ve no problem with a “strong” strength cider, and I’m open for suggestions. I understand beer, but really don’t know where to start for cider.

My initial questions…

How much juice do I need for a 5Gal batch?
What kind of yeast?
Boil for how long?
Any other ingredients needed?
How long in primary/secondary/bottle? (Need to know if I need another carboy, don’t want to hold up any beer production! :smiley: )

58

Get 5 gallons of juice for a 5 gallon batch. You will lose a little, but you can make it up at the end. Try to get a variety of apples in your juice. A lot of commercial juice is rather flabby, and doesn’t give you a good base for cider. If there are orchards in your area, look for different juices. Mix and match to your taste. A little tartness in the mix is a good thing. I don’t boil at all. Heat the juice to 180 or so and hold for a few minutes. You don’t want to drive off all of your aromatics. Cool and pitch your yeast. Use either a beer or wine yeast…your choice. I tend to use a Montrachet yeast. Rack once after primary fermentation is complete. Just before bottling, add one small can of apple juice concentrate to the cider, This will give you a wonderful nose. If you want to boost the alcohol a bit, add honey at the start. A cinnamon stick in the cider during warming is also a nice touch. The higher the alcohol, the longer it will last in the bottle. I’ve got some that are going on 9 years now, and still great. Of course, they are 17%, too. :smiley:

59

[QUOTE=pulykamell]
What are you steeping? Crystal malt? Anyway, when I steep, I just drop the grain bag in about 2-3 gallons of cold water, and heat it until it hits 170. Once it hits 170, I just pull the bag out and don’t steep any more. With crystal malt, I find that’s enough extra sweetness and body for me. I’ve never noticed any bitter grainy aftertaste. The only time I got that astringent bitterness was an all-grain mash I did that went completely awry temperature-wise. I suspect you won’t have the problem with this latest brew.
[/QUOTE]

I was stepping crystal malt. The instructions I was following were from a local home brewing supply store.

Anyone have any good websites for information on what I’d need to go to full grain brewing?

How much have home brewers invested in their equipment? How much time do you need to brew up a new batch if you are doing all grain?

60

[QUOTE=cmosdes]
The bitterness I was tasting definitely had an astringent flavor to it. I had read that it could be due to the steeping of the grains, so the last batch I kept the temp at ~155 for 20 minutes. Previously I would heat the water to 170 and let it steep for 20 minutes after that. The latest batch is in the primary right now (brewed on Sunday) so I won’t really know if that did anything for another 3 or 4 weeks.
[/QUOTE]

I’m sure I missed something… but steeping at 170 is crazy will always give you bitter astrignency.

Keep it down below 155… less than 20 minutes…

For extract brewing, just dunk your grain bag, then build up to 155 and leave it for maybe five minutes TOPS…

Then start the boil.

Serioulsly…

What am I missing here?