Big racking night

In the face of a crazy work schedule, I have found some sanity in beer. Work can sometimes be SO consuming that even when you're at home, your mind is racing with thoughts of what you would or should have done. Some nights I can't even sleep because there are work issues eating away at me.

Beer is a true escape from all that. When I'm planning (drinking), racking (drinking), cleaning (drinking)or brewing (drinking), my mind is totally focused on beer. It's a great feeling. It's like a little vacation. I think that's why I love the hobby. When you're brewing, you can totally focus on the task at hand and lose yourself in the act. Even when you have people over, all you talk about is beer. It's great.

Anyway, earlier this weekend I took one of my "brewcations" (trademark pending) after work by racking over three of my brews to the keg. I bottled up 8 12oz bottles and 2 bombers (maibock). For the carbonation, I used a little over 1/3 cup priming sugar for the Maibock and just shy of 1/2 cup for the Californication. Using Beer Smith for all of this has been spot on with my carbonation.

I tasted both brews. The Maibock was good, but had a little harsh burn to it from the high alcohol. I think some time mellowing will do that some good. The Californication was REALLY good. The mild malt profile really lets the cascade hops jump out at you. The grapefruit flavor is really distinct and compliments the whole experience. I am pretty pleased with both brews. Should be good brews.

Finally, I picked up four more kegs from my "source" for Bryan. He is really ramping up his brewing operation fast. Good for him!

And the winner is...

Brewing this weekend wound up getting canceled because it was Nick's brew-girlfriend's birthday. Keeping the brew-significant others appeased is ALWAYS a worthy reason to delay a brew weekend. God knows they put up with enough craziness.

With my new found extra time, I decided to take care of a few odds and ends.

$20 Gift Certificate

With the $20 gift certificate that I got for valentines day, there were a lot of opinions on how the money should be spent. It seemed that the funnel was prone to clogging so that was a "no-go", but the stainless steel spoon and the carboy carrier were both winners. So as you can see in the picture below, I got one of each and used the leftover money to get 1lb of extra light DME for my starters.

Racking Samuel Jackson

Even though Nick couldn't dedicate the necessary 5hrs to a brew day on Sunday, he was able to come over and give me a hand racking over my Samuel Jackson. I need a hand lifting things for the next few weeks since my surgery so Nick came over and did a little (much appreciated) heavy lifting for me. He also came baring the gift of home-made pasta that ended up being our delicious dinner.

The Samuel Jackson is going to be a heck of a beer. We dry hopped it in the secondary with a 1/2 oz of Amarillo leaf hops which really gave this a great finish. It tastes a lot like Samuel Adams, but I will wait to give a verdict after I do a little head-to-head. Nonetheless, it's going to be a great beer.

CO2 Stuff

So finally I had to make a run to Lowes to do some "home-owner" duties and on my way, I go right past Harbor Freight so I figured two birds with one stone. Since I made a trade with my brother in law (1 case of cream ale for his 5lb CO2 tank) I needed a regulator for my new tank in order to start using it with the jockey box. I had been eyeing up a dual gage gas regulator that they have there for $34 (such a good price), but wasn't sure if it was too good to be true. Well Saturday I broke down and got it.

As you can see from the picture below, once I figured out that it would work, I decided to put the new regulator on my 25lb CO2 tank instead of the new 5lb one because I use the 25lb tank all the time.

Now with the 5lb tank, since I use the air compressor release fittings, I picked up the necessary parts to have my small tank work with the other parts of my system. With my normal system I used these fittings and had an extra gas ball lock with a hose connected to a air compressor release fitting (male) and my large tank connects to the 4way manifold via a release fitting (female). The manifold has gas shutoffs so I can disconnect the CO2 and reconnect it to the single line.

With my new setup, there are 3 quick releases that will go to 3 gas ball locks and I will be able to power the two tap jockey box plus one other keg. I am officially king of the tailgate.

Even though we didn't brew, I still got a lot done. No complaints here.

Cheers!

Super Brew Racking Weekend

Yea it's a pretty lame title, but I'm sick and not in the mood to be overly creative.

This weekend I did some of the necessary upkeep to my brews to keep things moving along. In order to do this, I had to stop off get two more 5 gallon carboys for secondary because everything I have now needs to sit for at least a month in a secondary container.

Here are the updates:

Samuel Jackson (pictured on the right)

This was brewed on 1/20/08 and was racked over last weekend so that we could use the yeast cake for the kaffir lime imperial lager (KLIL). This brew would up with quite a bit of traub and I had to top it off in the secondary with some water. It has been sitting in the fridge at 41f for the last week. This weekend I gave it a second racking because of all the traub that was built up and I dry hopped with with a half oz of Amarillo hops (8% AAU). I also added some of my gelatin to hopefully give it a nice clear finish.

Kaffir Lime Imperial Lager (pictured above on the left)

The KLIL was brewed last weekend and in spite of the high gravity, made quick business of the 1.072 OG. When I racked it over it was reading 1.009 for a FG making this a 8.2% ABV lager that is dangerously smooth.

For the kaffir lime part of this brew, per Nick's instructions, I took 10 fresh kaffir lime leaves that had been in the freezer for the past week and diced them into thin slices. The freezing was to allow the glands that hold the lime smell and flavor to burst and cutting them was to get off of the stuff in the glands exposed. From here, I boiled the thin slices in 4qts of water for an hour. I added a little gelatin into the mix at the end for clarity as well.

I added the liquid into the secondary with the pieces of kaffir lime leaf in the mix. This will sit in 41f for secondary for at least one month.

Tripel Nipple

Finally I have the tripel that I brewed. It's been sitting patiently for the past two weeks in secondary on my bench (a nice even 61f) and I am not going to move it until I bottle it. I am looking at waiting a month on that one as well, but I might consider bottling in another 2 weeks depending on what my brewing storage vessel needs are.

Finally, next weekend I am headed to Colorado for some snowboarding and sampling of great brews. I am a fan of New Belgium's Fat Tire which I had for the first time while I was at A-Basin last time I was out there a few years back.