Several weeks back, I brewed up a German Wheat beer.  Well done wheats are one of my favorite sipping beers, and I felt this style would be perfect for summertime. Because I brew 10 gallons (a lot of one style of beer), I decided to split the batch by making two different beers off of one base.  Down the road, this will provide many options in terms of extra ingredients, varying dry hops, or even yeast options.  For this batch and for the next few I have planned out, I am going to keep one carboy true to the Reinheitsgebot, the German purity law , while the other I will "Americanize" by adding extra something to it. For the German Wheat, I kept one strict to the Reinheitsgebot with only water, grain, hops, and yeast.  The other, which I cleverly named German Wheat X, I dry hopped with one ounce each of orange and lemon zest as well as about 2/3s an ounce of Hallertau hops. Process As far as process, I simply used a single infusion mash at 152F.  Ther...

So, I purchased the IPA book.  I was in a mental bind about whether to get this book or the new Hops book, which is part of the Brewing Elements series.  I posted about my delima on various social networks: "which one should I get?"  To which the reply was mixed.  Get this one if you want this, get that one if you want that.  So, to make a short story boring, I bought both of them - but read the IPA book first.  (Have not yet gotten to the Hops book.  Can you say, "future post"?) I chose the IPA book because it is more in line with what I want to brew and learn.  I want to brew a good IPA, and to a lesser extent, a good pale ale.  I figured the Hops book would talk about hops in each style, growing, selecting varieties, etc.  Not what I am wanting now.  So, on with the IPA! The book goes in depth in to the history of the India Pale Ale style, going way back in history to its roots.  It tracks the evolution through the ...

Life has a way of filling up pretty quickly.  But, no excuses.  I haven't been as diligent as I want with this blog.  Now that Thanksgiving is over, maybe I can get back in the swing of things. For this post, I am going to review our pumpkin beer, Fairytale Debacle . Appearance The beer looks great.  It is one of the clearest beers I have brewed with an amber color, almost with an orange tint.  The head is nice and fluffy.  Very respectable pint of beer, if I do say so myself. Aroma I get some spice flavors coming through the nose, though, not a whole lot.  Has a good malt presence, too.  Nothing to overpowering, but pleasant. Flavor Good beer, easy drinking.  I get a bit of pumpkin flavor with some spice, but not a whole lot going on.  The spice flavors are more subtle and in the background.  Also, I think there is too much nutmeg or ginger which gives it a bit of a sharp aftertaste, but that is not unpleasant and mellow...

So, in a couple of weeks, I will be heading down to Hilton Head, SC for a yearly vacation with my wife's family.  It is always a good time.  We usually keep a nice stash of beer on hand, but this year I want to do something extra.  I want to take a corny keg of homebrew down to share.  Since we will be at the beach, the beer should be easy to drink and yet flavorful.  This led me to a pale ale - hence why I have brewed so much pale ale recently. The second pale ale recipe I am trying comes from the same book as the first: Brewing Classic Styles .  It takes out the biscuit malt and adds some caramel malts and a higher mash temperature to give it a fuller mouthfeel.  Recently, the batch was ready.  Here's what I think. Mine's the one on the left... if you couldn't tell. Aroma:  No hop aroma, which is ok since this is a pale ale.  I get sweetness up front with a little bit of malt finish.  There is not a stand-out aroma. ...

Sorry for the lack of posting lately.  With vacation and family visiting, writing wasn't one of my top priorities. Summer will do that to you.  But for now, I am back and I'm talkin' pale ale.  You can check out the recipe and some notes here .   Also, I do occasionally post some stuff over at Facebook if you want to "Like" that page.  I'll also update you when I have a new post up here. (Sorry for the shameless plug.) So, the first brew on the new equipment went well.  It wasn't perfect, but it was pretty good, all things considering.  I think I did some miscalculations with my mash water amount (too little water), but the mash still went ok.  I was pleased with how the day overall went.  Fermentation was ok, too, except I couldn't get the stinkin' temperature controller probe to stick to the carboy.  I had to submerge it in the blow-off hose bucket.  So, the temperatures were a little less controlled than I wanted. Curren...

For those who may be behind in blog reading, a while ago I decided to do a little yeast experiment.  I brewed one batch of beer, divided it into three fermenters, and added different yeast to each.  You can read more about the exploits in my previous post - Yeast Experiment: Episode I. I decided to brew a pale ale, since that is a recipe I would like to have as a staple.  Everyone should be able to brew a nice pale ale, right?  This project would give me a good head start on what yeast to use in that staple recipe.  I played around with malts and hops for a while, settling on a recipe heavy in late hop additions.  But I wanted a little more flair in my beer so I added a pound of orange blossom honey at knockout.  For the three yeasts, I used Wyeast 1968, Wyeast 1450, and White Labs 051. I fermented and bottled, and this past week I took three bottles of my yeast experiment over to some friend's house (shout out to Kate and Dave!) to get their...

One of the best things about making your own beer is drinking your own beer.  And, if you are like me, when you drink your own beer, it will either be horrible or the best beer you have ever had in your life.  Ever.  You put your own effort into this beer which you are now drinking.  You want it to be good, and if it is good, in your mind, that is great!  But classifying your beers into one of two categories ("horrible" or "great") is not very helpful.  So, today I want to talk about objectively rating your own beer. There are many ways to rate beers, but a good way I have found is to just use the Beer Judge Certification Program 's method.   They provide a nice score sheet (which the judges use in competition).  I'm not a BJCP judge, but why reinvent the wheel?  The sheet is helpful and can help you be a little more critical of your own beers.  And as an example, I am going to use my IPA which finished up a couple of weeks ...