Brewblog, Entry Nine

Good News, Everyone!

212, which will probably be bottled this weekend, is NOT SOUR. Hallelujah. I don't have to quit brewing (yet).

October 2, 2010 - Brewed Brewniversity #8 (126)

The plan for this brewday wasn't really to do a Brewniversity beer. Simon had awesomely taken it upon himself to build us a bigger mash cooler (66L vs 45L) to match our big 15 gallon pot, so I let Simon create a 38L recipe for the day based around the malts and hops we had in stock. After seeing that his recipe relied on staggered additions of only Amarillo hops for bittering, flavour, and aroma, I decided to slap on the Brewniversity brand.

Malt-wise, it was more complex than the average Brewniversity, having Victory, Crystal, and Munich malts. But 124 (and 224) had been similar, minus the Victory malt, and had also featured staggered hop additions, so 126 made sense for a label for this brew. To me.

The new cooler wasn't nearly pushed to its limits by this batch. That is excellent because it appears that we should be able to do a big batch of big beer in the future. (Right now I'd argue that we have too much big beer in stock.)

After brewday, we attended the Brewer's Dinner at Beer Bros, featuring Half Pints from Winnipeg. It was fucking awesome! I am relieved that my memory blackout for the day only covered a short period between finishing brewing and arriving at Beer Bros. I now believe in teleportation.

October 9, 2010 - Brewed Vanilla Porter 2 (VP2)

The first plan for this brewday was to attempt a Milk Stout. I failed at Friday afternoon shopping (where the fuck do you buy lactose?) and proposed a second attempt at making a delicious Vanilla Porter as plan B. We decided again to do a big 38L batch, which will give us the fun experimental opportunity to split the batch and do different things with the Robust Porter base. This recipe had only a slightly larger grain bill than the 126, so the new mash tun was again nowhere near capacity.

The original Vanilla Porter had been pretty good. The pure vanilla extract added to secondary had lent a very subtle vanilla-ness. For this batch, I purchased both vanilla extract and vanilla beans. I am not yet sure what quantities of vanilla I am going to add to my half of the batch, but I want it to be much more noticeable this time, without being extreme.

The recipe was slightly modified from the original Vanilla Porter. I adjusted the Black, Chocolate, and Crystal 80 malt quantities, and added Munich Malt, based on what I have learned from the various Scott's Stouts and Imperial Stouts and Honey Nut Brown in the meantime. For hops, I went with only Fuggles this time instead of the Fuggles and Goldings blend from the original.

We did make one interesting process change with this batch. Although my house has a water softener installed, it is not operational, so there theoretically shouldn't be a difference between the drinking water tap and the hot water tap. I am assuming that the water heater doesn't fuck up the water somehow. So, rather than heating cool drinking water on our propane burner, we started each step with 145F hot water from my house, letting the high efficiency natural gas water heater handle the brunt of the work. The savings on time is definitely significant. The savings on propane probably is as well. But it remains to be seen if there is an affect on taste.

Next time on Brewblog?

The tenth Brewblog will likely include the next edition of Tasting Notes, discussing the merits of 224, Honey Nut Brown, Matrimonial Ale 6, and the Wee Heavy at a minimum.

Not sure what we are brewing on Saturday. Or if. I'm a lot distracted right now by life. Not complaining. It's fantastic!