Cool website

I came across a website through an email sent to me called http://www.beermenus.com/chicago. It could be a handy little site. It has multiple features such as beer events, bar listings and beer lists. What seems to make this website a gem though is the function where you can look up a specific brand of beer. From there it will list all the places in Chicago that carry it as well as a google map to their location. Plus the list has the prices at each bar. So you can find that less expensive place that will then allow you to have one more of you favorite brews without breaking your budget.

The results are in on Batch #3

About a week ago I opened my favorite (only because it's my latest) batch of brew. It was a robust porter. The results were good. Very tasty. Multiple tasters agree. I'm trying to convert friends from just drinking their standard mass produced lagers. They even said they liked the taste, which I take as a good sign.

The only problem I seemed to note was with carbonation. It was of course a bottle conditioned beer. The bottles were fine when opened yet I packaged some into gallon jugs. The first beers poured from that were fine but the refills seemed a little low on carbonation. I'll have to investigate why and what could be done about it.

I give myself a B on this beer.

Batch #3

Well many months and many miles later I have started brewing again. This time my home brew has a new home. I am now living in the Chicago land area, South Elgin to be exact. I met up with the owner and introduced myself to the local home brew shop in St Charles. They seem like good guys over there and hopefully the can lend me a hand in the upcoming months as I progress.

Now for batch three. I felt I have a firm grasp of knowledge of how to brew properly and I probably could have started making my own recipes but since it had been a while I decided to go with a kit again, just to get back in the flow. So I picked out a Robust Porter.

Here's the recipe and target numbers according to the Home Brew Shop which I brewed on September 9th.

6 lbs Dark Dry Malt Extract
1 lb American 2-row
2 oz Wheat Malt
1 lb Chocolate Malt
2 oz Black Patent
4 oz 10L Crystal Malt
4 oz 20L Crystal Malt
4 oz 60L Crystal Malt
1 oz Bitter Hops (3/4 at 60 minutes, 1/4 at 5 minutes)
1 vile White Labs California Ale Yeast

Starting Gravity 1.055 - 1.058
Final Gravity 1.012 - 1.016
Alcohol by Volume 5 - 6%
Hop IBU 25

After following the recipe I ended with a Starting Gravity of 1.052 and at bottling time, which I did on September 16, I ended with a final gravity of 1.018. It's a little higher than it should be. Hopefully there will be no exploding bottles! Two weeks and we'll see how it turned out.

Cracked open Batch #2

Well I went to Phoenix this past weekend for my annual Spring Training trip to see the Chicago Cubs play. I got to see two games and two Cubs losses. Damn them. Bought regular season tix for when they're out there and I better not see the same results.

Anyway, I digress. My friend, Jen, also trough a party that weekend. So brought two and a half gallons of this latest batch. I cracked it open just before the party and it was fantastic! First off, this recipe is great. I had tasted it previously at a Maltose Falcons Home Brew 101 class. It tasted just the same and the carbonation was beautiful. It was a very good beer and everyone at the party that tasted it, loved it. In fact, one person there said he wanted to buy a gallon of it the next time I came into town. That is good praise and only solidifies my desire to continue with this.

I plan on later this week adding a post about my endeavors into business brewing and where I'm going with that. I've realized that till now this hasn't been quite the blog I wanted when I started it.

Batch #1 Update

So, I think I may have mentioned that my first batch turned out good except that it seemed a little low on carbonation. Well I recently went to give a family member a couple bottles, and when I was handing them to him I saw some hardened white residue. Sediment is normal in home brew but this seemed off. It turned out to be undissolved sugar. The sugar is added in the bottling process so that the yeast in the bottles has something to eat which then in turn creates the carbonation that we're used to. So since the sugars weren't dissolved, the yeast couldn't eat and hence a low carbonated beer. So at least I know why I was low on bubbles. I just need to make sure that doesn't happen again.

Brief note on Batch #2. I'll be bottling this weekend, so I'll make sure all sugars are dissolved.

Batch #2 update

Nothing exciting for this update. This weekend I moved Batch #2 from its primary fermenter to a secondary fermenter. I thought about moving it straight to the bottles, but something in me wants me to still do it. So I did. I'll let it sit there for two weeks before bottling. The beer's looking good though.

Cracked open Batch #1

Well this weekend I opened up my first batch, a red ale similar to Smithwicks. My early morning sample glass did not seem to taste right, I thought it was a little flat. But when I opened the bottles a little later with some friends, everything tasted great. A success!! I think I just wasn't in the proper state of mind when I took the first sample.

So good, it looks like I'll be able to keep going. This next weekend, my fermentation on Batch #2 should be complete so I'll decide then if I'll ferment a second time or put it straight to bottles. Maybe I'll experiment and try both with this batch to see if it really makes a difference.

Batch #2

Yesterday I decided to brew Batch #2 before I even was able to taste my first batch. Taking a risk but I need to keep plowing through so I can become a pro at this thing. So I went to brew shop and decided on a British Pub Porter. I had gone to a Home Brew 101 class in December and they gave us samples of that and I liked it a lot. On a little tangent, I told the clerk that the jugs I had bought last week didn't come with lids. He was being a douche bag and saying that since he wasn't there last week he doesn't know that I didn't get them. Are you fucking serious? I'm going to go in there and try to rip off the shop of four 25 cent lids? Whatever man. So I broke the bank and bought one dollar worth of lids.


Things went much better this brew than they did for Batch #1. I steeped the grains in three quarts of 160 degree water, then sparged the grains with another three quarts. From there I added enough water to the boil pot to bring it to about 3.5 gallons and set it to boil. Once it reached the boil I added the salts. The salts are added to give the water in the beer similar makeup of the water from where the recipe was conceived. In this instance, it was the Thames River that we are trying to duplicate. I also added the first addition of hops.

After 40 minutes I added the second and last set of hops. Many beers have another hops addition. However, Porter style beer is known for its malt flavor. So only adding two additions of hops helps keep that maltiness that you're looking for in a Porter.

At 60 minutes on boil, I cut the gas and set about cooling the wort down. Luckily I did it much faster than my first batch. The first time I think it took around an hour and it wasn't even fully cooled. This time I had the sink set up properly with an ice bath and I even added ice to the wort to cool it down even faster. I've been told by home brewers that adding ice to the wort may not be a good idea because you can't guarantee pure ice and any bacteria in it may ruin your beer. I believe the ice maker who says it's filtered ice, so I'm taking a gamble. It only took me 10 minutes this time.


I added the wort to the Ale Pale, which is a plastic bucket. I added enough water to bring it to the 5 gallon mark. Then I added the yeast, closed the lid and put on the air lock. Now it's just sit and wait time.

Phrase of the Day (times two)

Well you may have asked, "James, you say you're brewing an ale, but what exactly is an ale?" That's a good question, thank you. So today's phrase of the day will define ALE and its common counterpart, LAGER.

ALE - Beers distinguished by use of top fermenting yeast strains, Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The top fermenting yeast perform at warmer temperatures than do yeast's used to brew lager beer, and their byproducts are more evident in taste and aroma. Fruitiness and esters are often part of an ale's character

LAGER - Beers produced with bottom fermenting yeast strains, Saccharomyces uvarum (or carlsbergensis) at colder fermentation temperatures than ales. This cooler environment inhibits the natural production of esters and other byproducts, creating a crisper tasting product

Most beers you will drink probably fall into one of these categories.

Finally to the bottle

Well, Batch #1 made it to bottle this weekend. That was a fun experience. I went and bought a dozen 22oz bottles and 4 one-gallon jugs. It seemed the most economical and made the most sense as far as consumption.

I boiled one cup of water and added the priming sugar to that and stirred till it dissolved. Then I added that to a bucket and siphoned the beer into that bucket to mix up with the sugar. For those that may not know, the priming sugar is added so that the yeast left in the beer will have something to eat in the bottle. The end result when you open it up is carbonation, something every good beer should have.

I then filled up the 22oz bottles and as I was about to start to fill up the jugs I noticed they didn't come with lids. Shit. I didn't have the time then to go back and get lids, so I improvised. I had some two liter bottles lying around, so I cleaned and sanitized them. Then I finished my bottling. They need to sit for two weeks and then it drinky, drinky.

Phrase of the Day (Occasionally)

It has been brought to my attention that many people are probably not familiar with some of the terms I may have used in previous posts. So to make this blog more informative I have decided to add a Phrase of the Day to most posts and maybe the occasional extra one if there's really nothing else going on.

So today's term is "sparge". According to merriam-webster.com, sparge means "Sprinkle, Bespatter; especially: Spray". What does that mean in the world of brewing? After you steep your grains in water, you pour that water into your kettle. Then you take some more hot water and pour that over the top of the grains. This gets the maximum amount of flavor from the grains.

For Batch #1, I steeped the grains in three quarts of 140 degree water for 45 minutes. I then poured that pot through a cheesecloth, allowing the liquid to enter the kettle and leaving the grains behind. Then I took three more quarts of 140 degree water and sparged the grains.

I hope this is useful information and expect more in the future.

To condition or not condition, that is the question

Well Batch #1 has passed its two week of fermentation. Now I have to decide whether I condition the beer or not. Conditioning is (from what I understand) where you move the beer from the fermentation container to another container and just let it sit there. The other option is to just bottle the beers. I've been told conditioning isn't necessary, and if I had my druthers I'd skip it as well, but being off for two weeks means there isn't room in the budget to buy bottles yet. So it looks like I'll condition my beer. I'm not totally sure what this will accomplish but it buys me time.