Three Carbouys in Less then Thirty Days

It happened again last night. Another carbouy bit the dust. B was racking the Hefeweizen to final packaging and was preparing a five gallon carbouy as a precaution to deal with any excess volume issues. Well there were no volume issues, but while he was cleaning the carbouy it slipped and broke. Funny how glass and water always win. I'm now down to four
He cut himself pretty good. Luckily no stitches required.

The Saison fell slightly short of the target gravity, but landed well within range for the style. It came in at 1.063. We are going to ferment it on the high side with hopes to produce some nice esters from the WLP 565 yeast that we used. Due to it's relatively moderate rate of attenuation It will likely sit in primary fermentation for around three weeks and then get finished off with a dose of WLP 550 to dry it out.
Due to warm temps and capacity issues this will likely be the last brew for a few weeks.

Summer Sasion

B and I are brewing a summer Saison today. I got all the malt measured up last night, along with the orange peels, ginger, and whirlfoc. I completed the final calculation for this beer today, and he going to mash in around 2:00 pm. I'll be blasting out of the office around 3:45pm on my bicycle for the ride home. At this rate I may fit in another hundred miles this week.
Brilliant!

The Hosfeld Rebound

Mattie stopped by on his way back to PA today. We had originally planned on getting out for a road ride, but due to the copious amounts of thunder and lightning we decided to rack to beer and hit the Top of the Hill Grill for lunch.

A Hundred Mile Week and a Beerfest

I managed to get in ~115 miles on my bike this week. It feels good to be getting mileage like this in. Today I'm hooking my friend Ray up by serving his beer at the Green River Brewfest. It is likely the first time that I will ever go to a beerfest and return home sober.

Gile Mountain Loop- Blue Ribbon Trail

Friday morning Mattie and I had plans to meet the weasel in Norwich to ride the blue ribbon trail. Iz arranged a play date for Grace with some friends in Norwich.
We rolled out at 10:30 for Norwich. I dropped Grace off, and we met up with the crusty weasel and his friend Jim. We commenced the ride, and some very nice suffering, and singletrack. Matt was looking somewhat green and ended up booting on the climb. It must have been that "How about a nice greasy pork sandwich served in a dirty ashtray" comment that sent him over the edge.
We enjoyed two hours of singltrack bliss, with a nice easy spin back to the car.
Maybe you had too much to fast?

Long Weekend but no Brewing scheduled

I have Friday off this week. All my primary fermentation vessels are full, so I'm pretty much at capacity right now. I had considered making some more chocolate stout this weekend, but for now have opted to simply take the weekend off from brewing.
Friday I'll be mountain biking with Matty and the Weasel.
Saturday I'll be doing a little bit of work for my friend Ray, by serving up his beer at the Greenfield Brewers Festival.
Sunday is up in the air. So, maybe I will end up making some beer this weekend after all.

More brewhouse damage

I was inspecting the second five gallons of APA in Secondary fermentation on Monday night and noticed a hairline crack in the carbouy. This makes the second casualty in less then two weeks. WTF?

Fathers Day Fifty

I had a slight change of plans on Sunday morning. Instead of the original plan of going for a mountain bike ride, Murph and I ended up cruising down Greenfield to drop off my Brother in laws cellphone before he headed back to Boston. It turned into my first 50 mile ride of the year. I had some close calls in May, but no Fifty milers. It was a brilliant ride.
We enjoyed dinner with the Eagle family. I even broke down and enjoyed about 12-16 oz beer yesterday. At around 9:30 last night I was finally able to reach my dad to wish him a Happy Fathers day. He's a good guy, I just wish he wasn't so opinionated.

Double Decoction at Dawn

I brewed up the Super Pilz this morning. Winty and I woke up around 5:45. I rolled out of bed, made some coffee and doughed in at 6:40 am. I wrapped things up by 2:30pm today. It was a big day in the brew house for a big beer.
My original plans were to brew up the Bohemian Pilz, however after performing a double decoction I determined that I was going to be overshooting my gravity in a major way. As a result I adjusted the Hop profile to meet my new target gravity, and voila The Super Pilz was created. It's fermenting away happily in the lager chamber.

I have a brewing problem

It certainly doesn't look like a drinking problem. Seems to me I have more of a brewing problem. I am compelled to brew to maximum capacity. With that said, I have had to make some minor adjustments to the styles I will be brewing in the next few weeks. The temps have jumped to around 73-77 in the basement. This is well beyond the acceptable fermentation range for almost any beer.
As a result I will be making use of my lager chamber. Saturday morning I plan on making some Bohemian Pilsener. Fortunately I can still make lager beers in this heat. The downside is it takes almost three months to complete the process.

There is one style that seems to fair well in with higher fermentation temperatures. This anomaly is the Saison , which is sometimes more commonly know as a farmhouse ale. So with that said as long as the temps in my basement stay above 70f, I'm going to brew some Saison. I'm in the process of growing up some yeast to an acceptable pitching rate, and expect to have my first Saison in primary fermentation sometime next week.

Spontaneous HefeWeizen

Winter was home sick for the third day in a row today. Iz was also home for the third day and desperately needed to get into the office to get some work done. I seized the opportunity and left work early to be at home with Winty. I also seized the opportunity to make some beer. Nice Summer beer. So Lickity split, I was mashing in, and brewed up a nice super light wheat beer. With an OG of 1.043 this easy drinker will chime in around 4%. The perfect summer session beer.

I also had a chance to rack the Beach Blonde to final packaging. This is slated to beer I'm taking on vacation for the whole family to enjoy. I moved ~5 gallons of APA to cold conditioning, and ran out of room in the conditioning chamber. Inventory is looking up.

The cow parade

The strolling of the Heifers took place on Saturday. Astrid and Buddy joined us for the event. It turned into a full on dairy feast complete with cheese, milk, yogurt, and of course ice cream.

Casualities in the Brewhouse

While racking the APA to secondary last might I managed to break one of my carbouys. This is the second carbouy that I have managed to break in the past eighteen months. While I did escape injury, I did not emerge unscathed. While cleaning out my conical I managed to slice my middle finger. This is the second time in less then ten days that I have managed to cut myself while working down in the brewery. I guess it's time to get a basic first aid kit down there so I can stop bloodying up the towels.

On a postive not I did order two additional five gallon cornies this week. They should be in by Friday. This will bring the cornelius keg inventory up to nine, thus enabling me to have up to forty-five gallons of packaged beer. It's not a hobby, it's an obsession.

Temperance

Starting today I'm embarking on a three week cleanse. Iz is doing a three week cleanse and abstaining from Alcohol, caffeine, sugar, and wheat. I'm sure I probably forgot something in there, but you get the point.
I'm going to give up alcohol for the next three weeks. Yes, you heard it right, no beer for Glib. As for those other things... I aside from alcohol my consumption of those others is rather limited. With that said wish me luck sailing the SOBER seas for the next three weeks.