Second Batch: Bob's Begian Witbier

I'm a little behind with getting this posted, as there are only like 3 of these brews left!  This turned out great, but at first I was a little taken back from the clove notes I found.  After further research, I found out that true authentic Belgian beers (as well as German) have clovieness notes in the brew.  Who knew?!?!?  Well, again it was really good, but took some getting used to.

I don't really want to post the same angle of pics from the other batch, so I tried to find a few different things to show.  This first picture is from the very beginning.  Before my water comes to a boil, I must add my grains and steep them at 155 degrees for about 30 min.

Next, I remove from heat and add 6 lbs of wheat malt extract and stir until it dissolves.  Then I add 1 oz of pellet hops and boil for 60 min.  Here is a pic of that stage.

After the boil is complete I need to chill the wort down below 80 degrees as quickly as possible in order to pitch my yeast.  I sanitize a few containers the night before and freeze some blocks of ice to help with the chilling process.  That is what you see floating on top of the wort.

Here are two pictures of the yeast packets that I buy from Wyeast.  The packet on the left is an "unactivated" packet.  There is a nutrient pack inside the larger packet.  The day before you're ready to brew you have to break the smaller pack full of nutrients.  If the packet swells, then the yeast are viable and ready to be pitched.  If not, then ABORT!   As you can tell, my packet swelled nicely.

And finally my favorite part... drinking the brew.  Here is a picture of the brew and a picture of how happy this brew made Bob...

First Batch: Lazy Monkey Brown Ale

I decided to post some of the pics that I took while brewing my first batch of beer. I went with a brown ale for a couple of different reasons. First, it's sooooo good! Second, a brown ale is "brewer friendly". Meaning that I didn't have to have everything perfect in order for the brew to turn out good.

Here I am boiling the Wort (pronounced wert).  This is where I add all my ingredients, such as the malt and hops. 

Now the hard part.  In order to pitch the yeast (final step on brew day) the wort must be below 80 degrees.  Sounds simple enough, right?  Wrong.  Taking 4 gallons of boiling liguid (212 degrees) down under 80 is tougher than it looks.  I actually got it under 85 degrees fairly quickly, but it was those last 5 degrees that would keep me up til 1:30 am.

Only 4 days later (really I should have waited a week, but patience is a virtue that I have yet to receive) I transferred the brew (now that it is fermented it is no longer called wort) to the 2nd stage fermentation in a plastic carboy. 

One week later I start checking the gravity level with a hydrometer.  This tells me the amount of alcohol that has been left behind after the fermentation.  If the readings are the same for 3 days then it is safe to bottle.  If you bottle too soon and fermentation is not complete, then you could have about 50 little yummy grenades going off in your basement.  I chose not to blow up my brew, so I checked. 

Clarity looks pretty good, too.

Now I just have to get 50+ bottles ready for bottling.  I filled this tote up with water, added 8 or 9 "gullups" of bleach and let sit overnight.  The next day the labels came off pretty easy...

... but it still took me about 1 1/2 hours to get the bottles cleaned.  After that I placed them in the dishwasher (no soap) for a final rinse and sanitize.

Finally, it's time to bottle.  This was quite awkward at first.  I had to move the bucket around a few times, plus rearrange my assembly line, but I finally got it right.  The whole thing from start to last bottle filled and capped only took about an hour.  Now, I just need to wait about 2 weeks for the bottles to prime. 

Now that the waiting is over (I could only wait 1 week) the only thing left to do at this point is to pop, pour, and enjoy!  Cheers!