Beers of the week

DMX Update & Pico-brewing

Bubbling has calmed way down, but it's still going about 3-4 bubbles a minute. Ya, me and my bubbles. Took a gravity reading, and it's about 045. Nose is like bread and alcohol. Kinda like a stronger, warm MGD. Warm it tasted like an alcohol soaked yeast cake :D ...it's about 12.7%. It's in the keizer chill & settle before I take a for real sip.




This is the first of many pico-brewing experiments I plan to do... was also just sent a link to this inspired (or bored) picobrewer

DMX Update

Yowzer! Krausen right up the air lock all day :D Fermentation was very active this morning, it's tapered off somewhat this evening. The alcohol is probably killing off the yeast. I'm sure they'll all be long dead well before it reaches it's theoretical potential of 20%. I'm interested to see what the current gravity is, since it started out crazy high.

Kokanee!

Right from the tap at Toronto airport (YYZ)

Kombucha!

On the 3rd batch of Kombucha. For this one I did two 1g runnings on Stash Mambo loose tea. Let it sit in the oven for 2.5 weeks with a paper towel and rubber band (as opposed to the loose metal lid as before). I also split the scoby between the two jars. Quickly bottled while I made dinner (Cassoulet) and made DME... syrup. I bottle with an auto-siphon, tube, clamp, old bottles, nothing fancy. Although I make sure to wash, rinse, and starsan my tube and siphon before it gets put away. This batch was slightly sweet and a touch of vinegar; mambo makes great kombucha!

DIY Breathalyzer

Sparkfun MQ-3 and a few resisters dividing it to the netduino. I think it needs a bank of LEDs...

Smoked ham, then more smoke, and after that even more smoke. Really a bit too somkey for me, but good in very small amounts.

Beer Advocate Link

DMX (DME Experiment)

So I decided to do a small experiment of DME and California Ale Yeast. A short boil just to get the water fresh; DME was adder after the heat was off. Unfortunately, I was doing 8 things at once and I doubled the DME, so I've got a 1.140 wort that may or may not start fermenting. We'll see. It's in a growler with an airlock, so if it doesn't start in two days the I'll likely divide the wort, top-off and re-pitch.

W'11 & Pitch Black IPA

W'10 was better. Still have 1 bottle in the keizer. Pitch Black was so-so, but 10%. So hey! For some strange reason I'm drawn to mis-colored beers.

Beer Advocate: W'11

Fat Tire Clone - March 2011

Made a kinda-clone of fat tire, but I changed the bill quite a bit. Did some online research and doctored up a recipe from about a dozen different takes on fat tire. I downplayed the chocolate malt and amped the biscuit and base 2 row pale ale. Funny, I also got the wrong amount of grain at the store. I asked for 8oz of two of my grains and got 0.8lbs. All the grain was mixed in so oh well :) This was the first journey of the rubber-made mash tun and 10g boilermaker! 14lbs of grain; Eff was about 60-some. first running was 1.080 and second was 1.040 which meshed together for 1.055 which I decided to amp up to 1.066 with DME @ 10 minutes to go. Bittered with Willamette and flavored with Fuggles. Fermenting 2w @ 66. With a 1/2g starter of WLP001, it took off like a rocket and finished active fermentation in 2d. Took a sample the other day and it was at 1.017 on target and the taste put fat tire to shame. I'll be crashing in 1w, racking 2 days later, and force carbonating for 2d, then off to NABX!