Archive for category Hobbies
Snowshoeing is fun
Posted by bradinator in Hiking, Hobbies on February 16, 2010
I am glad I got outside this weekend, even if it was only for a few hours. Snowshoeing is a great excuse to go outside, trudge through snow over a foot deep and trail blaze deep into the forest.
For $11CDN we get these for the day from Sports Rent
It looks a lot colder then it was. At this point we stripped down to our t-shirts
Instead of marked trails we wandered through the woods.
Trudging through snow is slow, tiring work.
Bragg Creek may not be in the mountains, but it beautiful none the less.
Home Brew Time – Bradinator’s Mistake
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Hobbies, Home Brewing on February 16, 2010
What was I thinking? If this turns out to be even mildly drinkable it will be a miracle.
So I dub this brew “Bradinator’s Mistake”
Ingredients -
- 4.0lbs Light DME (approx)
- 0.25lbs Corn Syrup
- 1 oz of Tettnang Hops @ 45 min
- 0.5lbs 120L Crystal Malt
- 0.25lbs Roasted Barely
- 0.125lbs Brown Malt
- 1 tsp of Irish Moss @ 10 min
- 1 tsp of Yeast Nutrient @ cold break
- SafeAle S-04 (English Ale Dry Yeast)
Basic steps were steeping the grain tea at 80c for about 30 minutes, boiling 2.5g of water and mixing in the DME and Corn Syrup adding the hops and boiling for 45 minutes. Cold break went poorly and I did not reach 28c for nearly 45 minutes.
I have a great idea. Lets throw a bunch of ingredients together and hope for beer.
OG reading was between 1.034-1.036 which is what I was shooting for. I have never tried making a beer before out of primarily dry malt extract and I do not think I will ever do it again. It is far to much hassle mixing it and it does not give very good consistency either. It foams up like mad too.
Somehow I managed to avoid a boil-over.
I have no idea if this will actually turn out, but I plan to rack it to a secondary in 2 weeks and have it in bottles with 4 weeks.
Update on Apfelwein – Gravity reading taken (finally)
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Hobbies, Home Brewing on February 12, 2010
So over three weeks later I finally got around to taking a gravity reading on the Edwort’s Apfelwein. I wanted to wait until the fermentation had visibly calmed down and until a few days ago it was still very active. I grabbed the gravity reading last night and was happy to see its come down a long way, giving an SG reading of 0.996-0.998, or around 10% ABV. I the carboy a good swirl to stir up the yeast and plan to do once a day for the next couple to see if I can get the yeast to continue working.
The goal is still 0.990 final gravity, but that is a long way off at this point. The plan is still keeping the wine in the carboy for at least another 5 weeks, then an additional 8 weeks in bottles. I may even wait until after my trip before I rack it.
An Experiment in Brewology – Beer Yeast
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Experiments, Hobbies, Home Brewing on February 6, 2010
It’s been a long while since I have last done an experiment in home brewing and this is one I have been planning on doing for a long time. The lack of small 1 gallon fermentation units and the terrible state of the local home brew suppliers in my city have prevented me from attempting this.
Last week I found a decent online store which supplied several strains of dry beer yeast, plus a variety of well priced hops and managed to convert several 1 gallon apple juice containers into fermenters. The yeast arrived at my house last night and the rest will be history. Until now I have exculsively used Coopers beer yeast which has served me very well in producing beer. Still from my reading and research many state that the strain of yeast plays a very large role in the overall final product. I have to find out for myself…
The Question – How much does the strain of yeast affect the final flavours of a home brewed beer?
The Experiment -4 Different strains of yeast will be used for a single beer recipe which will be divided into four seperate 1 gallon fermenters.
The Recipe -Bradinator’s Red Ale
All the ingredients collected and ready to go
- 3.3 lbs Pilsner LME
- 1.0 lbs Light DME
- 1 and 1/2 cups (approx 0.5 lbs) Crystal Malt 60L (steeped for 30 minutes at 70-80c)
- 1 oz Amarillo Gold @ 60 minutes
- 0.5 oz Amarillo Gold @ 30 minutes
- 0.5 oz Amarillo Gold @ 5 minutes
- 1/2 tsp Irish Moss @ 10 minutes
- 1/2 tsp Yeast Nutrient @ Cold Break
- SafeAle-04, SafeAle-05, SafeLager S-23, SafeBrew S-33
Original Gravity: 1.038 – 1.040
The Plan – 4-6 weeks in the fermenters, then an additional 2 weeks in bottles. The final products will be refridgerated for 24 hours prior to drinking and will be sampled on an individual basis (possibly 1 a night). A final gravity reading will be taken from each individual batch as I highly expect them all ferment out differently, especially the S-33.
All the beer was divided evenly and each individual yeast packet pitched.
SafeAle S-04: Described as an English Ale yeast
SafeAle S-05 - An American ale yeast, low diacetyl production
SafeLager S-23 - A german lager yeast, supposed to impart fruit like flavours
SafeBrew S-33: A robust ale yeast with high alcohol tolerance. Used in strong ales.
I am going to need to monitor this brews over the next couple days as I pitched the entire 11.5g packet of yeast into these small fermenters. To prevent the inevitable blow out that will occur in the next day or so I have all the beers pointing into a blow-off jar filled with sanitizer.
I already know this beer will explode... It's just a matter of time.
Another experiment in Brewology is about to begin
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Experiments, Hobbies, Home Brewing on February 6, 2010
I am excited about it 
Several yeast strains, several possible beer outcomes
Homebrew Session- Summer Berry Ale
Posted by bradinator in Beer, Hobbies, Home Brewing on January 31, 2010
Today I created my first “fruit” infused ale. Though to be completely honest I did not use any fruit at all. Taking the idea from another recipe I found online I decided to use a fruit tea instead. This minimized the overall difficulty of the brew, lowered the cost and saved me some time.
Ingredients –
- 3.3 lbs of Coppers Canadian Ale LME
- 3.3 lbs of Beer Makers Draught LME
- 1 cup of Light Brown Sugar
- 2 cups of Crystal Malt 60L
- 3 bags of 2 oz Tetly’s Summer Berry Ale Herbal Tea
- 0.5 oz Styrian Goldings Hops @ 60 Minutes
- 0.5 oz Styrian Goldings Hops @ 20 Minutes
- 1/2 tsp Irish Moss @ 10 Minutes
- 1/2 tsp Yeast Nutrient@ Cold Break
- Coopers Dry Ale Yeast (rehydrated)
- 2 Gallons of cooled, store bought water (added directly to wort to aid in cooling)
All the ingredients ready to be turned into beer!
Procedure –
1) Clean everything. Sanitize everything.
2) In your brew pot bring to boil 2.5 Gallons of Water. In a separate pot bring 0.5 Gallons of water to 70-80c.
3) Steep your grains in the smaller pot for approx. 30 minutes at a constant 70-80c.
4) Once the brew pot is boiling remove the heat and place the tea bags directly into the water. Allow to steep for 5-7 minutes.
These are the secret ingredients that will hopefully impart a nice, sweet, berry-like flavour
5) Add grain steeped water to brew pot, add extracts and sugars. Return water to boil and pitch the bittering hops.
6) Pitch the flavouring hops, irish moss, etc at appropriate times. Prepare an ice bath.
A lid can help keep your temperatures stable and achieve a boil quickly
7) At 60 minutes remove from and add to ice bath. Cool to about 40c and move to the fermentor. Add the cooled store bought water to bring the temperature down to room (~25c).
Rehydrate yeast and pitch.
You do not want to pitch the yeast at too high or too low of a temperature.
The OG reading was around 1.055 and I am hoping to achieve a 1.015-1.020 for the FG. I am a little worried about the yeast I used, simply because I may have rehydrated it at a bad temperature. If I do not see any air bung action by tomorrow night I will repitch another package of yeast Monday.
Apfelwein update – Fermentius, Maximus
Posted by bradinator in Hobbies, Home Brewing on January 28, 2010
I do not think I have ever seen something ferment with such vigor for so long before. Normally I see a day of intense fermentation, maybe two at most, then it levels off and the air bung shows minimal activity. This creation is going on five days and the air bung is still flying.
The fermentation is so strong that you can easily see the yeast creating CO2, causing it to rise to the top making a constant large ring of bubbling fizz around the carboy.
The Apfelwein has yet to clear, but that will take at least another several weeks. Originally I was going to move this into bottles at around 4-5 weeks, but I may give it up to 2 months considering the fermentation that is still going on. Hopefully the fermentation settles out by next week so I can grab a gravity reading, but until it does I am not touching it!