Brew Day: Saaznook DIPA

19th Annual Midwest Reggae Festival 2010 review

Brew Day: Lapsang Souchong Black

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Brew Day: Saaznook DIPA - 2010-09-08 14:42:13

Housewarming brewday! This time I am messing with a high gravity IPA. My original idea was to make a single-hop all-Saaz DIPA, but after some mucking around with various home brewing calculators and checking the hop inventories at Local Home Brew Stores, I decided to add a 1/4 lbs of Chinook I had laying around in the freezer for bittering and 1 Oz of leaf Hallertau for flame out. Also in attempt to make it a bit drier and mess with an unfamiliar ingredient, I added a little bit of Raw Agave Nectar at the start of the boil.

Ingredients:

• 4oz Crystal 120L
• 8oz Crystal 60L
• 6lbs Muton's Xtra Light DME + 3lbs Muton's Light DME
• ~5-6oz of Raw Agave Nectar.
• 4 oz Chinook pellets
• 7 oz Saaz pellets
• 1 oz Hallertau leaf
• WLP007 Dry English Ale Yeast
• (dry hop) 1oz Saaz pellets + 1 or 2 oz Saaz leaf

This time the brew day coincided with our first weekend at the new pad, so we had a few friends over to play some tunes, puff down, brew beer and eat tandoori chicken. Good times! Started out by getting a little over 3 gal of water to about 160°, dropped the grain bag with the Crystal malts in for about 20 minutes while keeping the temp around the same, then blasted the heat and took grain bag out about 190°. Specialty grains smell so good, they make me hungry.

Next, the kettle was brought to a boil at which point Agave Nectar and 6lbs of DME were added along with a 1/4 lbs of Chinook pellets. I love piny hops and Chinook is becoming one of my favorites. I tried something a little different this time - which is adding the last 3lbs of DME about 15min before the end of the boil. I have heard a lot of folks and prepackaged kits suggest that for LME, and it makes sense to me as far as the extract already being cooked as much as it can be before it's sprayed and dried. So why cook it for another hour?

I did a 60 minute total boil and 6 oz of Saaz were added between 45 and 15 minutes in the boil. I tossed in another 1 oz of Saaz and 1 oz leaf Hallertau at flameout.

Pitched yeast at about 75-80deg ( I know its a little hot, but i get impatient at that point ), primary fermentation was highly active the next morning and is still continuing very vigorously. I am slightly concerned about krausen getting into the airlock, spilling out or blowing the top of the bucket while I'm at work, as that would not be good - my new primary spot is in the closet with all my winter clothes and camping gear. :) Fingers crossed.

Going to keep this in primary for at least 10 days this time, maybe 13-14, depending on my schedule, then secondary for a week or two - then corny keg. I reckon I'd like to toss a hopsock of Saaz in there as well. Might age in the keg for additional week or two, we shall see. I might be highly tempted to tap this around Halloween time. :) Certainly exited to taste this one as the aim is 9% abv and about 100 IBUs. Ay carramba!

Next in line: either a Pumpkin brew or single-hop Sorachi Ace IPA.

19th Annual Midwest Reggae Festival 2010 review - 2010-08-17 08:37:25

This past weekend we went out to check out the 19th annual Midwest Reggae Festival at Nelson Ledges Quarry Park. This is our 3rd Midwest Reggae Fest and first of all thanks to Packy Malley for putting on another great show this year! It seemed like attendance was a lot higher than in last couple of years - congrats! Hopefully y'all made some money which will translate in some bad ass performers next year (bring sizzla!). Of course it rained some this weekend, like it has for last few years, but weather stayed relatively nice and rain was no hindrance to good times.

Unfortunately Luciano - one of the top names on the bill - was unable to make it to the show because of unspecified Visa problems. (Motherfucking bourgeoisie babylon border bureaucracy - don't get me started :). Nevertheless, the weekend was full of great reggae music. I was impressed with Third World live show! First of all, good to see 3 original members back together. While I have never been a big fan of the Third World, mainly because of their radio friendly sound and big-time success in the 80s/90s, but I must admit - they are a great live show and world class entertainers.

My next highlight of the weekend was the Skatelites - legendary name in Jamaican ska music. Not sure how many original members are still in the band - 2 or 3? Regardless, Can't beat spending the afternoon on the beach and listening to ska. :)

I must include a healthy helping of props to all the local bands that also appeared over the weekend - main stays of Ohio reggae scene - Carlos Jones, Ark Band, Flex Crew and Roots High Power. Flex Crew and Roots High Power kept the energy going and kept the crowd engaged during what would have been Luciano's time slot.

Main highlight of the weekend for me was the Michael Rose set on Saturday night. There was the most people by the stage I have seen at this festival to date! Michael Rose put on a great show, covering many Black Uhuru classics as well as his extensive solo material. One thing that surprised me was that he was backed by the Flex Crew! Lots of respect to the local reggae ambassadors - great solid job as a back up band for one of the top reggae vocalists.

See u next year Midwest Reggae Fest!

Brew Day: Lapsang Souchong Black - 2010-08-03 09:26:10

Brew day! Yay! Finally purchased my 5gal kettle for extract brewing on the stove at home, and the inaugural brewing experiment is one I've been meaning to try for a few years now, but didn't want to waste one of the rare brewing opportunities I've had so far (in case it turns out nasty :).

Ingredients:

• 1lb Black Patent malt
• 1lb Chocolate Wheat malt
• 3lbs light DME
• 4lbs amber DME
• 2-3oz organic lapsang souchong from a local co-op
• 4oz chinook pellet hops
• 1oz nugget pellet hops
• WLP028 Edinburgh Ale Yeast
• (dry hop) 1oz of willamette hops

First, brew day morning (bout 5-6 hrs before wort) I brewed about 2 gal of lapsang souchong with 2-3oz of organic loose leaf in a grain bag. Cooled it down w/ an ice bath and stuck it in the freezer.

Steeped the specialty grains in 3gal of water while it got up to about 175* (bout 15-20min?). Got extremely dark body color. Sharp dark grains smell - reminded me of coffee and fresh farmers bread. Also very rich dark brown foam from all the chocolate wheat - pretty!

Brought to a boil, took of flame and added the DME. Then back to a boil. Not sure if I blasted my burner too high right off the bat or just not used to smaller volume and head space in the new kettle - but about 3-4 min into the boil I had my first sticky boil over! Had to drop my PS3 controller and dive in the kitchen to kill the flame and perform quick disaster clean up. Damn! Had to watch it for a few minutes and prevented several more boil overs by stirring and riding the gas.

After a few minutes the wort chilled out and I tossed in 1 oz of chinook and started the timer at 60 min. Another 1 oz of chinook + 0.5 oz of nugget at 45 min, then 1 oz of chinook at 5min and another 1 oz of chinook and 0.5 nugget at flame out. At this point the kettle went into a massive ice bath.

In the meantime, I dumped the freezing 2gal of tea in my primary bucket and after a short puff break, the wort was down to about 90 or so. Had to add about a gal of spring water to get the total volume back up to 5gal... At this point I poured the wort on top of the tea, another few min - temps were down about 80 and I proceeded with pitching the yeast straight from the tube, aeration and airlock. Done!

Active fermentation started about noon on Monday, I suspect it would have started earlier, but I put the bucket in my laundry room that has a raging A/C vent and stays about 10 degrees cooler then the rest of my house. It's Tuesday, and this morning the yeasties were partying like it's 1999!

I'm estimating about 7-10 days in primary, then re-rack into secondary and add that 1 oz of willamette on top. Then at least 2wks in secondary - maybe up to a cpl months, depends on my schedule and how it's looking in the carboy. :) But certainly looking forward to tasting this - whenever it's finished. I think it is going to make I real nice fall/winter day brew, dark and rich, decently hopped, with some hints of pine forest and campfire. Or at least that's what I'm hoping for at this point. I do like how it smelled before I put the lid and airlock on - noticeable smoky, piny aroma, also some tea aroma. And the beastie burps are smelling nice and hoppy.