BEER dad

Two Brews: Sparkling Beer & Red Lager

Chad — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 04:22:25 +0000

Shortly after brewing my sparkling ale, I read through the recipe for the lager I planned on making next, and suddenly remembered a major difference between lagers and ales:

Lagers take about 3 months to condition while ales only take a week or two.

This time requirement is the main reason everything I have made so far has been an ale, along with the fact that it would require another 3 or 4 cases of bottles.

We bottled the sparkling ale Sunday and I went ahead and brewed the lager last night. This way I have something to drink while I wait.

The ale, or sparkling beer, as I decided to call it, will be ready around the 27th. The lager should be ready for bottling this weekend, so I will probably buy bottles from my local homebrew store tomorrow.

In case you are keeping track, the sparkling beer was BEER dad brew #14 and red lager is #15.

The BEER dad Countdown

Chad — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 03:09:00 +0000

Tonight I will embark on a journey I call the BEER dad countdown.

Like a modern day Noah, but crafty, I have been saving two of every beer I’ve made.

Not including the coffee beer I just made, there have been 12 in all, and my intent is to drink them before my coffee beer is gone and my sparkling ale (which I am making later) is ready to bottle.

The brews I’ve made so far are:

Nut Brown Ale
Espresso Stout
Amber Ale
Wheat Beer
Coffee Beer
Amber Bitter
Amber Bock
Porter
Espresso Stout (w/ Wichita Coffee)
American Ale
Amber Wheat
English Bitter
Coffee Beer (w/ Wichita Coffee)

Girly Beer

Chad — Tue, 19 May 2009 03:10:37 +0000

Something I once thought was impossible has happened. The wife suddenly decided she likes beer too and wants to brew 2 batches next time so we can make something lighter for her.

(Disclaimer: That was BEER mom 18 months ago when she was still pregnant.)

I am looking at kegs and additional brew pots to make the process a little smoother. If you have suggestions or homebrew recipes your spouse likes, let me know.

On a side note, I recently picked up a few additional homebrew related domain names I hope to do something with soon. These include:

OpenSourceBeer.com
HandcraftedBeer.com
Homebrews.org
CiderBeer.com
EspressoStout.com
DraftCider.com
EnglishBitter.com

and the others we already owned:

BeerCompany.org
WichitaBrewing.com

The homebrew store closest to us appears to be going out of business, or at least shrinking their stock each time I visit, so I might make one of them into a local homebrew store/website since there isn’t one anywhere nearby. If you have ideas for them, those will be appreciated as well.

Sumatra Stout

Chad — Sun, 17 May 2009 05:17:56 +0000

I brewed homebrew #13 a couple weeks ago, and it just got to the point where it is ready to drink. This time we made another coffee beer using 1/2lb of the Sumatra Mandheling I have been roasting and selling on Twitter as @WichitaCoffee.

I haven’t been able to take pictures yet, but believe me, it is dark, and very tasty.

We used drip brewed coffee this time rather than espresso, so I am calling it a “coffee beer” instead of another “espresso stout.” The Sumatra also has a bolder, almost smokey flavor that makes the beer taste more like a lager than a stout or ale. We ended up with 68 bottles this time and are leaning towards another amber bock for June.

First Easter

Chad — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 04:58:10 +0000

My English Bitter is ready and so is Laura’s Easter basket. She hasn’t seen it yet, so no telling her what she got.

Kaden missed last Easter by mere minutes, so tomorrow he will be crawling around the living room in search of eggs containing his favorite snack. We also got his one year old pictures back, which I know everyone is dieing to see.

More can be found in his photo album.

That’s really all the excitement that’s been going on here.

Laura has been looking at cars and I have been enjoying the new job. Kaden is finally starting to stand up and manages to get himself “stuck” several times a day because he forgets how to sit back down. He usually does that in his crib, but let’s us know after a few minutes.

Kaden’s First Birthday

Chad — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 02:09:30 +0000

Kaden turned 1 the other day so we did what any awesome parent would do and took him to Hooters to celebrate. He had a blast and will have plenty to remember in 20 years or so.

He also ate cake for the first time when we got home.

Kaden loves cake.

We got 1 year pictures taken last weekend which we expect to get back soon, and brewed more bitter which we are bottling tomorrow.

351 days of parenting

Chad — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 02:54:12 +0000

Kaden is 351 days old today, which means in exactly 2 weeks we will be celebrating his 1st birthday with beer and hot girls at Hooter’s.

If you haven’t heard already, my wheat beer has been done for a couple weeks (I’m drinking one now actually), and turned out well. I shared some over the weekend and so far the response has been good. I also ordered another 10lbs of coffee that I’m selling on Wichita Coffee, so my next brew will be either porter or another coffee beer.

This past weekend we took Kaden to visit his grandparents and cousins in Overland Park, and brought home a few gifts since they won’t be able to make it to Wichita for his birthday celebration. He got a SpongeBob chair from my parents and almost came home with a puppy. We’re getting him a wagon for the big 01.

Amber Wheat Beer

Chad — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 22:52:37 +0000

Laura and I brewed Amber Wheat beer last weekend and bottled it Thursday. It will be ready to drink early next week.

Both the brewing and bottling took place in the middle of a busy schedule so we did not have time to take pictures of either process. It wasn’t any different than any of the other 10 times we brewed beer. I am leaning towards another Porter for our March brew.

Kaden will be 11 months old in a couple weeks and recently caught his first cold. He’s added cheerios and other small crunchy items to the list of food he likes to eat. BEER mom has more on that and what he’s been up to on his site. Here is a video of him munching on multi-grain Cheerios.

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Post tags: Ale, Amber Wheat, Baby Eating Cheerios, baby smith, BEER dad, Bottling, homebrewing, Kaden, video, Wheat Beer

Inauguration Beer

Chad — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 03:07:38 +0000

My American ale is finally done and happens to taste excellent. Not only am I glad it’s ready, I’m slightly amazed by what day it finished on. Because of that, I will call it my special inauguration beer. BEER mom and I had tickets for today’s events, but ended up staying home since airfare is expensive.

In about a week I am going to brew an amber wheat beer for BEER dad brew #11.

For those of you wondering about Kaden, he’s fine. He has 4 teeth now, is crawling everywhere and will be 10 months old on Saturday.

Tips on Bottling Beer

Chad — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 03:33:32 +0000

The corn sugar and caps I ordered ended up shipping late, so we were forced to wait an extra day before bottling our American Ale. While an extra day may not seem like much, the effect it has on homebrew can be disastrous depending on your recipe.

Our ale seems to be unaffected, but it is always good to bottle your beer at the precise time it’s ready. We ended up with 72 bottles this round, which will be ready for tasting in about 10 days.

Many visitors to BEER dad ask me “how do you know when your beer is ready to bottle?” and some even ask how exactly you bottle it, so here are a few tips on when and how to bottle beer.

How to tell when the beer is ready to bottle

Most recipes I use take about 6 days in the fermenter followed by another 8-10 in bottles before the beer is ready to drink. You can measure the gravity of your beer using a hydrometer to tell when it’s ready to bottle, or simply wait until the yeast no longer appears to be active.

If you bottle your beer while the yeast is still actively converting the sugars into gas and alcohol, they will continue to do so once your beer is bottled, which will lead to extremely carbonated beer, or worse, exploding bottles. The yeast should still be active when you bottle your beer, but not necessarily constantly blowing gas through your airlock when it’s time to bottle.

I typically wait 6 days after brewing the beer, or one day after the yeast dies down, before bottling my beer. In the case of our American Ale, this would have been Thursday evening, but we did not have enough corn sugar for priming, so we had to wait an extra 14 or so hours.

If you bottle your beer too soon the bottles will either explode or be overly carbonated and will fizz everywhere once opened. Neither are very fun since they waste beer. If you wait too long to bottle the beer, the yeast will die out and will leave your beer flat and overly sweet. Pay close attention to the sounds of your fermenter, or measure the gravity to know the correct time.

How to bottle beer

If it’s your first time bottling beer, here’s what you need to do:

Sanitize all your bottles and caps

Use a sanitizer or directions provided by your local homebrew store. I have heard of people using small amounts of chlorine bleach mixed with warm water. I use the one-step sanitizer from my local homebrew store to save time.

Prime the bottles with corn sugar

Priming the bottles gives the remaining yeast something to feed on to pressurize and carbonate the bottles. It also adds a little bit more alcohol once the brew is complete. You typically add 1tsp of corn sugar to every 12oz bottle. You should do this before adding the beer to keep your area clean. You will need a funnel, teaspoon, and about 1.5 cups of brewers corn sugar to bottle 72 bottles of beer.

Open the fermenter

Do not open the fermenter until the bottles are sanitized and primed. Otherwise you risk letting too much oxgen come into contact with the beer.

Fill the bottles

Bottling beer really is that simple, but is time consuming, especially when sanitizing the bottles. To bottle your beer you will either need a second fermenter (which I do not use so I can tell you nothing about) or a bottling kit from your homebrew store. The bottling equipment consists of a plastic tube, a rubber tube, and another plastic tube.

The first plastic tube is called a racking cane. It has a tip on one end, to keep sediment out, and connects to the rubber hose on the other end. The end with the tip goes in the fermenter. The rubber hose - or siphon hose - is usually sold by the foot and should be long enough to carry the beer from the fermenter to where you are filling the bottles.

The last plastic tube is the bottling wand. It has a stopper on the end that will begin filling once it touches the bottom of the bottle.

Fill the bottles but leave about an inch at the top for carbonation. Once you start to see the sediment in the bottom of the fermenter you can probably stop.

Cap the bottles

Finally it’s time to cap the bottles. This part is really boring so it’s best to make a friend or your wife do it. You will need a capper and crown caps for this step. Caps are cheaper if you purchase “overrun” caps in bulk.

Store the beer

Once your beer is bottled, store it in a dark location where the temperature is fairly constant. The temperature needed can vary by recipe, but is usually 65-75°F.

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Post tags: Ale, american ale, Bottling, homebrew, how to bottle beer, when to bottle beer