Craft Beers, Microbreweries and Homebrewing

nismaratwork

Well, in a wayward youth I bought a similar plant which operates under similar weight/volume principles... potency was the issue there. If you're not making something like an IPA, do you really need a ton of hops?

Insanity

If he gets half the seeds to germinate into mature plants, he'd probably have enough for him for sure, and maybe other brewing friends. Fairly sure each plant can produce 1-2# a year, even if only 10 mature, still 10-20# a year. 160-320 oz is a lot when you only use a few oz per batch. Not enough really to sell as a business to local breweries, but enough likely for homebrew.

nismaratwork

OK, excellent, thanks.

turbo

Certainly. I harvested enough off the side of my old neighbors' horse barn to hop a few batches of beer every year. I was flying blind, though. This was 30+ years back with no guidance, except from the old-timers that had made home-brew back in the bad old days.

Insanity

Montgomery Burns - "Excellent"

Insanity

Heck, if you just want to make beer, do whatever...add 4oz of mystery hops. Most of the styles came from people doing whatever they had to to make beer.

The dark color of the scottish ales comes from the tradition of skimming the floaties grain, that never malted, from the top of the mash, roasting them and adding them to the next mash vs. throwing them out.

Rule #1: Relax, have a hombrew...
Rule #2: Relax, have another homebrew...
Rule #3: Err...what?

nismaratwork

There should be a 'Brumeister 2011' award, and you should have it Insanity.

turbo

I think I recognize that plan.

Insanity

Nice...thanks. Brewing is a science.

After about 6 pints, you stop worrying about silly things.

turbo

I could never have drunk 6 pints of anything I brewed. Wow!

Good rule about rules, though.

nismaratwork

6 Pints of beer and I'm officially drunk, but I'm a big guy in every dimension, an half Russian-Polish, and the other Greek... so... yeah.

Still... 6 pints of liquid is a looooooooot of liquid!

Insanity

I was determine to drink 6 pints that night. I was successful, intoxicated, but successful.
Was home, so no major challenges getting to bed. Just the hallway, the bedroom door, the bed.

Insanity

Assuming weather stays how it is, 60-70's, I plan on brewing this weekend.
Additionally might participate in the National Homebrew Competition the following weekend, don't need to be present and the local shop is offering to drive entries to Indianapolis at a fee less then shipping.

dlgoff

Wow. Good luck on the competition.

nismaratwork

Hey, take some pictures of your brews; I know that I for one would love to see them. I'd add, kick butt at the competition with your suds.

Insanity

Pictures of the beers, or pictures of the brewing?
A glass of beer, while quite tasty and refreshing to drink, is not necessarily as refreshing to look at.

Here is a picture of the brewing gear, the larger pieces belong to my club, I've simply been using them.



The large kettle in the background on the left is a 32gal kettle, I've only used when making a 15gal batch. In front of it is a Rubbermaid 10gal cooler that has a ball valve and false bottom strainer inside, used as a mash tun. On top of the mash tun is a sparge arm, it spins slowly spraying hot water evenly to sparge (rinse) the grains slowly, to get as much of the converted sugars out of the grains.

In the back on the right is a Budweiser keg that has been made into a kettle, ball valve attached as well.

The smaller kettles are my own, good for partial mashes or extract, but not for all-grain really, cutting too close on the volume. The larger of the three is a aluminum turkey fryer pot (7.5gal I think), the others are a 4.5gal and 3gal?, both stainless steel. On the smaller pot is a copper coil immersion chiller, used to bring the hot wort down in temp so you can pitch the yeast quickly.

When I picked up the club equip this past spring, I've brewed about 40gals with it. Got to considering it my equip with how often I used it. Looking to get my own equip this year as I don't want to do anything but all-grain now.

Another note, got my German Kolsch yeast and spices today, hopefully brewing tomorrow.

nismaratwork

Very nice setup, and congrats on your yeast and spice aquisition! Did you end up going for grains of paradise?

By the way, shine some bright white light into a diffusing screen, and you can get some lively shots of actual beer. True, it's not refreshing, but the color and head can be judged at least.