| By Zane on Aug 10th 2006, 12:12 am | Permalink |
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Time for another entry.... Since I had previously experienced some overly banana flavored beer, I brewed two batches of Hefewiezen last week. I used WL Hefe IV in one and Wyeast 3068 in the other. I've kept them both at 67-65 degrees for six days. I moved them to the secondaries yesterday and the preliminary results are good. The WL has a little more vanilla type flavors. The Wyeast is slightly clovey. Both have hints of banana, but neither have the overpowering banana flavors I experienced when I used the 3068 at higher temps (75 deg. F). I now know to ferment my hefes in the mid 60s. Both yeasts made great hefes. The batches were identical. We are going to do a side-by-side comparison of the two once they mature. (I'm expecting the results to be fairly close.) I'll post the results at that time. There has been a lot of discussion on the forums about oak barrels and wood aging lately. I recently brewed an Imperial Stout and added 1/2# of American Oak to the secondary. I put 2 C. bourbon in the secondary about a week before I racked the brew onto it. The flavor is amazing. The bourbon melds wonderfully and the oak tannins add a nice additional bitterness. If I was doing this to a less 'flavorful' beer, I'd recommend 1/4# of oak and maybe vodka or no liquor at all. The bourbon was both for its own flavor and to pull the oak flavor out more rapidly. I think using too much oak could easily overpower a lighter brew. I'm glad that I tried it on the I.S. and not some other recipe. My bitter with cardomon is not so good.  I used 2G. of cardamon and in hindsight I probably should have used .5-1.0 G of it instead. It has an almost minty flavor. It should, hopefully, mellow with time. It is drinkable but not something I'd fancy too many of in one sitting.I finally got a freezer and a temp. controller this week. I'm going to brew my first lager this weekend. Wish me luck. Zane |
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| By Zane on Jul 28th 2006, 11:29 pm | Permalink |
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Ok, last journal entry for a while. Brewed the imperial stout today. I increased the boil time by 15 minutes and boiled with a little extra water than normal. This recipe has a lot of grain and needed the extra water to completely soak everything. It wound up at 1.094 initial gravity! W00t! I ran oxygen from a welding tank into the wort for two 30 second blasts. It foamed up really good. I pitched the yeast and put it on a blowoff tube in my bathroom. My less dramatic bitter is fermenting quite nicely. Lots of activity and a two inch thick larer of krausen on top. See ya'll in a week! Zane |
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| By Zane on Jul 28th 2006, 2:44 pm | Permalink |
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I brewed the English ESB mentioned below last night. It came in around 1.047 for it's initial gravity. No mishaps at all, even though I had tipped a few glasses of Dubel during the process. The starter for this (Wyeast 1968) kicked off really quickly and the beer is bubbling away merrily this morning. I've started making starters (redundant I know) for everything nowadays. It works well and isn't much of an added cost. My stater for the imperial stout didn't kick off so quickly. I harvested yeast from my previous batch and it had sit in the fridge for about 8 weeks. I guess that it needed to be awakened because it sat in the cold for so long. It is fine now and I'll probably brew this batch today. The ESB recipe is mine and I'll post it in the recipe section once it is finished and tasted.  The imperial stout recipe is from my LHBS (Austin Homebrew). They call it Cannonball. If you are looking for a good imperial stout, this one is good stuff. This is my second batch using this recipe. My first batch is almost completely gone. Everyone has loved it.Zane |
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| By Zane on Jul 27th 2006, 2:22 am | Permalink |
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I went to my LHBS today and bought goodies to brew two batches. I'm off of work this week so I figured I'd make good use of my time. I'm brewing an imperial stout and an English bitter. Both of these recipes have been used before, so I'm making some slightly experimental changes this time. In the imperial stout, I've added 1/2# of oak chips to the secondary along with 2 cups of Rebel Yell bourbon. I'm going to let this soak in the secondary while the beer is in the primary. I'm using 2 cups because it is just enough to wet out the wood chips. I'm hoping to get an oakey character and a slight bourbon taste. For the bitter, I'm adding some aromatic and victory malts this time around. I'm also adding 2 grams each of black pepper and cardamon. I don't think the spices will be noticable in that amount but if they are, the flavors seem like they would be complimentary to a bitter. Zane |
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