Bramwell Oktöberfest 2009

And as it turns out, I will be attending this year after all! My home brew Homeboy Bryan's wife canceled at the last possible moment and Bryan put the call out into the ether: does anyone wish to go with him? Sure, I said! And I'll take my 10B. v2.1.1 with me for entering into the homebrew contest. The OG is about 15 points higher than style indicates, but what the heck, I like it. And I'm sure that the judges will too! Bwa-haha! Maybe Bryan and I will clean up for the club this year, as we are the only two going. The rest of the brew crew will be attending Blacksburg's Brew Doo on the same day.(Did I just step in some Brew doo?) Maybe they will clean up at that festival.

I have my labels made & 'banded onto my bottles and I'll be ready to roll at the appointed hour. More on this after the fact.

Bottled Cream Ale v3.0 Batch 1 this AM...

This came out around 7.5% ABV, which is higher than I expected, even after adding water at secondary to lower the 'starting gravity'. Oh, well. I'll drink it.

Brewed the Batch 2 of Cream Ale, same recipe version on Sunday. Great day to brew. Added an additional gallon & change at mid boil and wound up with 5.5 g. in the primary. Adjusted my calcs accordingly.

And now, I have an issue: Looks like I'm running out of bottles! I have some with labels still on them, and I'll have to clean the labels off of them before I bottle the next batch of beer.

I'm also out of: Corn sugar; cap labels; and I broke the thingy that I use to clean the inside of the bottles before sanitizing. Got to get a new one of them. I'm also out of Pale Ale malt. 50 lbs sure doesn't seem to go that far.

Waiting for Godot...

Drinking a Biere de Garde after a couple American Amber Ales. Contemplating when to bottle the Cream Ale v3.0.... This weekend, or next? We'll see...

I was thinking the other day about my next batch of Cream Ale: Should I use a champagne yeast, and call it 'Sparkling Cream Ale', or use the final batch of yeast that I have in the fridge for fermenting as a standard Cream Ale? I was thinking of Champale, from my childhood. Is it a real style anymore? Who nose? Maybe I should make it and submit it to Sam Adams in their next Homebrewer's Competition. Would be a hoot if it made an impression. We'll see...

Drinking Beer...

Got home from work a while ago and was puttering around the computer and drinking beer, as is the way of my people. I am about out of the v2.1.1 of American Amber Ale, but I have v3.0 in bottle and under refrigeration, as well as almost half a case of Biere de Garde in a drinkable state as well. Will bottle the Cream Ale in a week or two, depending on the gravity reading that I get when I test it in a week and two. I am considering buying hops to brew another batch of Cream Ale on Sunday, even tho' I have to go to work from 9:00 AM til 1:00 PM to do inventory. (Inventory sucks the bigun!) I know that I won't have to do the truck on Monday, so I can brew beer into the late evening on Sunday without screwing up my sleepless pattern any more than is necessary. I have the last generation of the yeast that I used for the two American Amber Ale batches and the one Cream Ale batches left in the fridge and I guess I'll use it for another Cream Ale, as Trish likes that style. More as it happens...

Beer meeting good.

Went to the September meeting on Saturday. Took a crock full of BBQ, brought home half of it. (Yippee! Lunch for CyberDave!)

Took some BBQ and several beers to Cap'n Eddie after work today, he was pleased with it all. If you remember, it was Cap'n Eddie that gave me a lift back to the States on his tramp steamer after the ill-fated Katonga safari in Africa....

Sipping on an American Amber Ale v3.0 as I write this tome. Should cellar a month or two more, but is palatable, now.

Racked 06A to Secondary with additional water

Learned a few things about this adjustment soiree: 1) Don't try to estimate the water to boil after you know how much you need. Boil more than you need and cut it off when you reach the goal as are adding it to the carboy. 2) It might be a good idea to rack it from the kettle to the carboy rather than pouring it ever so slowly into the bottling bucket. The water might be getting more O in it when you pour.

I've completed the dilution and it is at 5.25 gallons rather than the desired 6. That made the 'OG' 1.066 rather than the desired 1.057.

Looking forward to sampling this experiment!

Cream Ale is a little lower in volume than planned...

..So... After getting input from fellow brewers and from brewing linx on the net I have decided to make an addition of 1/2 gallon of water before I rack to the secondary, placing the boiled and cooled water into the carboy first. To minimize aeration I'll put the water into the bottling bucket and attach a hose to the cock, lower the hose to the bottom of the carboy, and open the cock. THEN: I will rack to the secondary. What about the OG? That was 1.077 at 4.5 gallons. Recalculating it thusly:
SG=Starting Gravity = 1.077 = 77 Gravity Points
V1(ferm) = Volume in Fermenter = 4.5
OG = 1.055 (intended OG)= 55 Gravity Points

To determine the volume to add to achieve the intended gravity of your wort in the secondary fermenter, divide the SG points by the OG points and mulitply by the V1 volume.
SG/OG x V1 = 77/55 x 4.5 gallons = 6.3 gallons 6.3-4.5= 1.8 gallons of water to get 1.055 gravity.

I want 5 gallons rather than 6.3 gallons which is more volume than I have carboy space for.

To determine a gravity for a specific volume:
V2=5 gallons.
OG = (((V2 / V1) x SG)*1000) + 1 = 69.3 = 1.069 OG.

I think that I'll use a 6 gallon carboy to secondary in and will have a 1.057 OG.