Ring By Spring

You there, come closer. Let me tell you about my beers.

The carbonation, LUC (for some reason, Gmail didn't tell me I got a comment), went swimmingly. I was a little spooked when it warmed up this past week and we had a bit of a temperature excursion (~78-80 degrees for a day). But it ended up not being an issue. As with most dangers in brewing, I'm finding that patience and understanding prove the greater. We took some pale ales and Trapdoors up north to my parents' house for my mom's birthday to taste. I pried off the American cap and poured what I hoped to be my biggest win yet.

Always use a coaster.

The Citra hops hit you right on the nose. Gator, my brother, could not keep his nose out of the glass. It's a little darker than I wanted-- take typical unfiltered pale ale a couple SRMs toward an amber-- but it leaves a persistent, frothy white head and a torrent of bubbles. The taste is clean: it's not sticky or sweet, nor is it overly bitter. And the hops add a lemony-shandylike scent without dominating the brew. It's not complex. It's not gourmet. It's not going to win any awards. But damn, it is good.

My family suggested "Stoop Beer" as a name. While an excellent name, it doesn't really fit the intended purpose (a wedding present). Carrie and I are going with Ring By Spring, and she will be designing f'real labels. She is just the best.


As for now, two problems now present themselves:

1) What am I going to brew next
2) How am I going to keep that beer from tasting like a flower patch in a house without A/C

Allow me to explain the second one, because this involves some minor microbiology. If you're not interested, but you should be, skip to the bottom.

(Specifically, if you're one of my Facebook friends who endured biochem with me, this has everything to do with enzyme kinetics. Remember that lab where we had to wait a couple hours to make sure the enzymes were working at the right temperature and producing a predictable dose-response graph, and even then we had to start all over a few times? Easy now, put that hammer down.)

The yeast used in brewing is Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Until very recently, recently being the last couple hundred years of brewing out of about 6,000, we did not know that yeast had anything to do at all with fermentation. We did, however, know that temperature has an effect on beer. Anyone who has ever taken a wincing gulp of skunked beer can attest to that. It turns out that yeast cells perform fermentation with predictable effects (alcohol and carbon dioxide) inside a certain temperature range. The range depends on the strain of yeast. Most ale yeasts can tolerate warmer temperatures, but only up to about 75 degrees F. Any higher than that, and fermentation speeds up, and the yeast produces chemicals that are incomplete products (mostly esters). If you remember organic chem, you remember how esters smell. Not like beer.

Maybe I'll talk about some of the technical stuff later. I know a lot of my friends who are considering brewing their own beer read this blog, and if I'm feeling spunky, I might try summarizing what I know about the process. When I was just starting out, it seemed very complicated. It was often surreal to think about what was happening in the fermenter-- beer was happening.

As Guy Montag says in Fahrenheit 451, "I'll hold onto the world tight someday. I've got one finger on it now; that's a beginning."

Elbow grease

This post is about hard work. It's more American than your post.

You wish you were this America.

I'm not as patient as I tend to let on. When I think a plate is clean, my wife shows me that it is not. When I think Magoo has had enough pureed cheesy vegetable soup, she shows me that I'm wrong. When I want to bottle this pale ale two days early, she kindly implores me to wait.

I tell myself that she does this because she loves me, and because she's got an awesome track record in the "being right" department (~100%).

I didn't clean the ten bottles I used last time, that was all her. I didn't have the exquisite pleasure of wrestling with label glue, tearing paper, and musty old beer stank from bottles I didn't rinse as well as I thought (see: not patient). But with this batch, which is almost five times bigger, I had to wash all of them. Which I would normally complain about-- except I took mental notes.

Following is a review of beers and breweries... by the experience of removing their labels from the bottle.

Victory Brewing Company

Beers used: Dirt Wolf IPA

Even after soaking in blazing hot water for fifteen minutes, it was rough coming off. And the paper didn't hold together very well. Hence, poking around said blazing hot water for scraps of paper. 

Rating: Wag of the finger

George Killian's

Beers used: Do they make more than one?

I noticed this one needed to soak a long time, too. The paper tended to hold together pretty well, but it left an assload of glue behind. Even in hot water for twenty minutes, it didn't scrub off easy. But no neck labels, and the bottles have that funny bubble in the neck, which I think is cool. But it's hard to justify all that scrubbin's.

Rating: I'm grumpy now.

Full Pint Brewing Company

Beers used: Rye Rebellion Stout

The paper was pretty plasticky, so there was no way it was going to tear.  It took a lot of effort to finally get the label off, but the amount of glue left behind: sweet Fanny Adams.

Rating: Nice! Also, I'm a strong dude.

Brooklyn Brewery

Beers used: Brooklyn Lager
I am now convinced. There is a chemist who works at this brewery, whose only job is to develop new and stronger adhesives. Probably using genetically modified oysters. The paper was in shreds, the glue had to be soaked all by itself for twice as long... even then, it left a slimy film before I got it all off. Great, now I need a shower.

Rating: THUMBS DOWN WOULD NOT WASH AGAIN

Labatt Brewing Company

Beers used: Light Lager with Lime
I didn't know if a clear bottle would be work the work, especially given my disposition to Labatt out of hockey season. The label was 100% plastic, so all it took was a little time and tough fingers. I will give this bottle to someone who is not sure what color pale ale should be.

Rating: I win this time, Canada

Bell's Brewing Company

Beers used: Oberon
I was warned about this one, from Keegan. I gathered these bottles with slight hesitation, wondering how much more difficult it would be to get the labels off. The other option was Killian's, the devil I knew. I took them both. The moment of truth... they came right off. Neck label, front, back labels came clean off after only 15 minutes. Minimal glue. Huzzah for Michigan!

Rating: I want to swim in a lake and pick an apple and plant a pine tree because of my state

Atwater Brewery

Beers used: Vanilla Java Porter
Man, my state sucks. Michigan can bite me.

Rating: You Midtown hipsters trying to ruin my night?

Anheuser-Busch GlobalCorp Soul Devouring Inc. Unlmtd.

Beers used: O'Douls
It's official. I'm an O'Douls man now.

Rating: I feel like that should have been harder and also that's what she said


Enjoy your night! I know I will enjoy mine: waiting, biting my nails, reminding myself that waiting one more day to bottle the beer isn't going to cause any death or serious injury.

Provisions

You guys, I'm just so excited for tomorrow.

Swell

First of all. Bought a five gallon bucket today. Look at it.

LOOK AT IT. Five gallons of beer at one time. I can't even handle it. That's 48 12-oz bottles, which coincidentally, I am now accepting donations for. Seriously, if anyone reading this wants some of this beer, please donate your bottle deposit and bottle to me.

In addition, I have all the ingredients I need for the next batch of beer, right down to the irish moss (which just sounds like a load of fun!). I'm not going directly according to the recipe, but I'm close. Here's a link.

Finally, a friend of mine tried some Trapdoor, and took notes on it. You'll know the part that inspired me to get a hydrometer today with the bucket!

Adam's notes: Trapdoor

Alright, so I'm going to write my tasting notes to you as I drink. This way, you'll get every point of view that I have, plus it will help me drink slower and savor it!

The Pour:

Pours nicely, good aroma came off of it, and it looks nice and carbonated. No flatness here! After a good sniff, I'm getting lost of caramely scent, maybe a little toasted marshamallow? Anyway, it smells great and has the same coloring/look of a glass of Coca-Cola. Cheers.

The Sip:

Not a ton of carbonation, but I like my dark beers a little less bubbly, so it's perfect for me. I get a lot of kick from the beer, which is definitely nice. I feel like this would go great with Mom's Sunday dinner. I'm not getting any fruity tastes yet, but enough talking and more drinking!

The Gulp:

Wow, that was really nice. Still no sign of the fruitiness, but I got a lot of caramel on that bit. The aftertaste is a little smoky, sort of like the burnt bits of a steak. It's a really nice matchup with the sweetness. No complaints here so far.

The Gulp, Act II:

Same thoughts as above, although this time I got more of an alcohol kick going down, almost like someone tossed in a little vodka. I might be having a stroke, hard to tell.

The Burp:

Yep, definitely getting more of a vodka-esque taste on the burp. With the sweetness of the caramel flavor, it really is reminding me more of rum and Coke. I'd kill to be drinking this alongside some steak and mashed potatoes. Whoops, another burp. That was more smoky. Not sure what's going on down in digestion-ville.

The Gulp, Act III:

I'm really starting to like the combo of smoky and sweet caramel. It's not overpowering (the beer still tastes like beer), but it definitely is a nice kick in addition to the beeriness.

The Finish:

I think I had an Usain Bolt experience here. Strong most of the way through, but it seemed to celebrate just a little too early, and the finish wasn't as strong as I hoped. At the bottom of the glass, I lost most of the sweet flavor and was left with sort of that smoky, vodka/rum sensation that I noted above. I might have let a little bit of the sediment fall into the glass, so it might just be my bad pouring skills.

The Summary:

A nice beer with a good combo of sweet and smoky, but still holding on to that classic, dark beer twang. I'd drink this with a nice piece of meat slathered in gravy and some potatoes. All in all, a pleasant glass of joy. Nice work! 9/10


All in all, quite encouraging! And let it be known, also, that he was not having a stroke. I'm very glad about that.

So, I'll probably be brewing on Saturday after Magoo's swim class. I will have video, fingers crossed.

Like spaghetti

Some things are just better the second time.

I put all my hazelnut brown ale in the fridge the other day, hoping that the cold would cut the taste a little bit, or it might help dissolve the CO2 a little better (longshot). I cracked one open last night, and I have to tell you:

It was delicious.

Why? Were the flavors too green when I tried it first, even after a week and a half? Did it just take more time to prime with honey? Who can say? But it's dark as a nightmare and rich as a turtle cake. Carrie tried it, and she said it felt like "it hits your tongue, then drops right down, you know? Like it's heavy, but not in a bad way, and definitely not sticky."

We're going to call it Trapdoor. Because every beer needs a name, right?

I wanted to enter this beer into Untappd as a homebrew, but it tells me I should have a brewery name if I want to log my homebrews. I have no idea what to call my brewery. Any suggestions?

Diagnosis Beer, and other plots

I think I know what went wrong with the last batch.

I used honey as a priming sugar. For anyone who's tried to mix honey into anything, much less a not-hot thing, you know what I mean when I say that it probably all sunk to the bottom. Where all the trub is. So it probably didn't all get poured into the bottles, explaining the flatness. Womp womp. Lesson learned.

Lesson so learned, in fact. I'm trying to use my spanking new installation of Ubuntu to its full potential, and got an app called Symphytum. Seriously simplified my recipe-keeping and note-taking. As Palmer says in How To Brew:

The difference between a good brewer and a lucky brewer is documentation.

In the mean time, I have the green light to upgrade to a five-gallon bucket. Looking into a citrusy, back-porchy pale ale for the coming Spring. I can taste it already.

If you're reading this, you're probably thinking about similar thoughts (I hope, because fear not, Spring will be here soon enough). What kind of beer do you think of when the flowers bloom? What does it taste like? Yardwork? Lemonade? The first bonfire since October? I'm honestly curious: leave a comment.

The Cappening

At long last, the beer meets my lips. And since I'm drinking it while I type this, it has not caused me to die. So, by any tolerable measures of success in a first-batch, I think we passed.

It has been a very long time since my last post-- I am well aware. Work has been nuts, Magoo has been needier than usual (we're sure he's growing teeth... somewhere), and in the pauses, I am just not up for posting. So, to catch y'all up:

We bottled last Tuesday, on Feb 26. We got seven bottles out of a gallon fermenter, short of the 10 bottles I was counting on. We ended up having to pour the beer into the bottles through a funnel, which is absolutely not what you're supposed to do. The beer got crazy aerated, but we bottled it without much problem. And none of the bottles exploded, which is an acceptable bonus.

You should have seen the look on my wife's face when I mentioned that possibility.

Now, the beer has been happily conditioning in its new dark homes in a cabinet in the kitchen for over a week. Tonight, we decided it was appropriate to celebrate my first big SAS program at work running without a hitch by opening up one of these babies and pouring it out. Oh, I was nervous. And excited. I would usually argue that these are the same thing, but I was too excited and nervous to think.

I poured it correctly, leaving the yeast in the bottom... where it belongs. I don't want gas tonight.

I smelled it, and it was passing, but I thought it smelled a little funny. Like fruit and marshmallows. I mean, beer, too. But it took me by surprise. Then I took a sip.


Flat. Damn it.

And it was really sweet! Very dark, very fruity, and I registered almost zero hops.  I was very disappointed. However, it's still better than most of the beer at the store. And it does finish clean with hazelnut, which is pretty baller.

Maybe I'll go a little simpler with the next one. And maybe scale up to a bucket.