Oatmeal Stout brewed, racked the IPA

This weekend was a busy one for the DRB. I started by racking the IPA. It's looking really good and tastes pretty awesome. I used my own unfiltered tap water for this batch. I've heard the argument go both ways on this issue, I may be taking a gamble doing it - but so far it tastes as it should, so I guess we'll see how things go.
I cleaned up after that, and then cleaned out both of the empty kegs, sanitizing and purged with co2. Next I started getting everything together for the evenings brew. Both Kevin and I were brewing stouts. Kevin is making a bourbon oaked stout (mmm!) and I made a pretty common oatmeal stout. There were so many grains I had to use two muslin bags to put them all in. Getting them out was a pain - I think I need to get some beer brewing tongs! I went with the liquid extract and had to add 8 oz of malto dextrin. This beer has an ounce of Willamette hops and an ounce of Cascade.. both smelled soooo good as i put them in.
I haven't decided yet if I'm going to bottle or keg this. I had planned on bottling an Imperial Stout I was going to get from the local homebrew shop, but they ran out before filling my bucket!.. so, I may just bottle a small amount of these, and keg the rest. I'll have to see how my keg situation is then.
I decided to try keeping this fermenter out in a room, that is relatively warmer than the closet. The IPA took a couple days to start fermenting, then did for two weeks! This one started the very next day and has been crazy active since. Keeping a steady temperature around 70 degrees. It's kind of cool having it sit in the kitchen (covered), I can hear the bubbling action from here.
One last thing - I've been reading about "cold clearing" a beer. I'm going to try putting my carboy of IPA out in the garage this week for it to clear through the weekend. It's going to be above freezing all week, into the 40's, so It should be just fine covered up out there. I'll keep a close eye on it. Not sure if it'll work any faster, but it's worth the experimentation I suppose.

IPA - Two Hearted Clone

Monday, January 7th I brewed a Bells Two Hearted clone (in honor of the great hop shortage of 2008). One thing I've always heard about clones, is that they usually don't match up as good as one would think. This really wasn't my goal here, I just like Two Hearted, and the recipe was pretty basic, so I picked up the goods at Adventures in Homebrewing. The brew went pretty well, I used my new 25ft. wort chiller. Fermentation started probably Tuesday evening, maybe sooner. I'm going to rack this into a 5 gallon carboy and dry hop with 2 oz. of hop pellets (I think centennial). Maybe by next weekend or a bit later, it should be ready to keg.
IPA's are one of my favorite beers ever. I have a feeling I'll be doing more, so I thought I'd start off with something pretty basic.
I got my name on the list at Dundee Brewing for their Imperial Stout. Dundee brews some fantastic beers, so I'm really looking forward to this. I think I'm going to bottle the entire batch - I have a couple dozen or so Grolsch bottles I'll be filling them with, and letting them sit for St. Patricks day.
My neighbor has a light pilsner extract he'll be bottling up soon, and I think he's on the list for the Dundee Red. Right now, I'm not really sure what's on the horizon for my next batch - I'll probably wait and see how things go, and come up with an idea later on. The Porter in the DRB right now is fantastic - and my cherry wheat has been getting some rave reviews - I think the longer it sits, the better it is. Yay Beer! :)

More than beer in the DRB!

Whenever I go to Adventures in Homebrewing, I like to look at the soda syrup aisle. There's several flavors and instructions on how to make your own soda. Because I don't have the keg capacity right now to hold a root beer or other kind of soda, I decided to try a small batch. I googled around, and sure enough found a really easy recipe, that anyone can do from things around the house.
Here's the recipe:

Take an empty 2 liter bottle (they say to avoid glass) and a funnel. Fill the bottle with 1 cup of sugar, and a 1/4 tsp of baking yeast. Shake this around.
Add your extract. You'll see the right kind of root beer extract to use on the link at the end of this post. I used orange extract - 1 tbs. of it.

Next, you half fill up the 2 liter with water, and shake it around to mix up all of the sugar/yeast/extract.

I filled up the rest of the 2 liter with water, then added some food coloring to make it orange, and a small cap full of vanilla extract to add (hopefully) a creamy flavor to the orange.

Next, they suggest letting the soda sit for a few days, until the bottle feels hard. Refrigerate and serve after chilling one night. I'll post back how this turns out. The only drawback, from what I've read, is the chance of an explosion from possibly adding too much yeast/sugar. I'm going to move this to my brew box (a plastic tub I keep in my den with beer bottles in it - just in case of a mishap - less mess!).
How to brew your own root beer - link here (very detailed instructions with pictures).

End of the year updates

I kegged up the Cherry Wheat. I think the cherry flavor somehow disappeared after I moved it to the second then keg. Great tasting red wheat! I think if I do it again, I'm going to look up the recipe or add some additional cherry flavoring. Beautiful looking beer though.
I also kegged my neighbors porter that he picked up from Dundee Brewing. This turned out amazing. A jet black beer, nice head with a nutty caramel flavor. A perfect porter.
I have the makings for a Bells Two Hearted clone. Roger from the brew club said he made it and it turned out great. I wanted to brew an IPA, and figured this would be a good one to start with. I'll probably bottle some of them and keg the rest. Waiting on my new wort chiller to arrive in the mail to make this batch.

Christmas Ales - labeled!

I didn't feel the need to get crazy with the labels. I'm not sure I ever will. It's really what's inside that counts. I tested the bottled beer last night, and it carbonated perfect. I noticed the flavor came out more as it sat in the glass some - temperature is definitely a factor in this beer. Less cold = better. When it was very cold, I tasted a huge alcohol front.. as it warmed, the spices really came out.

The list

So if I were a real brew pub, I'd have a chalk board with the beers available listed. I picked this Guiness sign up at the Steins and Stuff barn in Fowlerville, MI. Works great!

Wheat!

I just finished bringing my wheat over into secondaries. I racked half of it to a bucket and added 4 cans of black pitted cherries in syrup (not pie filling). The other half I brought to a carboy. I'm curious to see what the cherry does, I am imagining the sugars in the cherries are going to reactivate the yeast, and I'll see some more activity. I'm going to let that bucket sit for a while, maybe another couple of weeks, before I do anything with it. The wheat, I may put on tap once my MBC IPA is gone.
I tasted the wheat and it is going to taste pretty good. Right now it's still yeasty tasting, but it's going to have a very light, slightly sweet taste to it.. right now I'll call it a light wheat. Can't wait for both of them! The good thing is, this batch I purchased from Things Beer in Webberville, it cost a whopping $21.00. So, if I botch up the cherry, I'm not out all that much. Pretty cool - 5 gallons of beer for just over twenty bucks! I'll post the results later.