Every once in a while, I like to ferment things other than beer, mostly because I find it extremely fun and tasty. After flipping through my copy of The Noma Guide to Fermentation, I picked something new to me: fermented plums.

Lacto-fermentation is one of the most common ways of pickling and preserving foods, and occurs with the help of salt. Food placed into a super salty brine leads to an environment where bad bacteria cannot grow, but lactobacillus bacteria can thrive and convert sugars into lactic acid. This leads to an acidic and tangy ferment, which you may have experienced in a food such as sauerkraut. 

At my local farmer’s market, I picked up about two pounds of plums. With clean hands, I sliced the plums in half and removed the pits, but did not wash them to avoid washing any natural yeast or bacteria off their skins. Weighing the plums without pits, I then added 2% of their weight in a basic sea salt I had. I decided to ferment these plums in a vacuum sealed bag, though a jar would work as well. I’ve never fermented in a bag before and really wanted to see it expand as the bacteria create carbon dioxide during fermentation. 

After laying the salt-covered plums in a bag and vacuum sealing it, I placed it in my kitchen and waited. Since it was on the colder side in my home, perhaps in the mid-60 degrees Fahrenheit, nothing happened for the first few days. About a week in, the bag began to expand and even popped a small hole. At first taste, the plums were sour, but not as sour as I wanted. They were soft but still intact, and as I wanted to end up with a fermented plum juice, I ended up blending them and returning the pureed plums to a new vacuum sealed bag for continued fermentation. In total, I allowed the plums to ferment for about 10 days, and placed the ferment into the fridge until I was ready to use it. The final flavor was slightly sour and funky. 

Using another Noma recommendation, I put 75 grams of fermented plum juice into a custard base with five egg yolks, 100 grams of cream, 100 grams of whole milk, and 50 grams of sugar. I baked the custard filling in graham cracker crusts until they set, which ended up being close to 15 minutes in a 350 degrees Fahrenheit oven. While the custards were tasty, I was disappointed to find that I couldn’t taste much of the fermented plum at all. I ended up adding a dollop of pureed fermented plum to each individual tart to emphasize the funky flavor. 

The excess fermented plum has been in my fridge for close to a month and a half now. The flavor has gone past its initial sour to an almost vinegar harshness, which isn’t surprising, as the fridge can slow but not completely stop fermentation. I’ll probably use the remaining juice in a vinaigrette salad dressing at this point, and will look to ferment another batch and add more juice to a future custard recipe to bring out more of the flavor.

One of my goals for 2025 was to brew three styles that are new to me, so I started off the year with a Dunkelweizen, a style I have never actually tried. A Dunkelweizen is a moderately dark and malty wheat beer with some spicy and fruity flavors from the yeast. 

My grain bill was as follows:

• 3.5 lb Admiral Maltings Admiral’s Hearth (Dark Munich)

• 3.5 lb Admiral Maltings Yolo Gold Wheat

• 4.2 oz Crystal 120L

• 1.4 oz Victory Malt

• 5.6 oz Rice Hulls (for extra filtration)

To create a water profile for a brown malty beer, I added 1g of calcium chloride, 0.546g epsom salts, and 0.546g of gypsum to my 3.5 gallons of mash water. With a strike temperature of 167°F, the 75-minute mash started at 152°F and ended closer to 141°F. It’s been awhile since I’ve brewed, so of course, a few things had to go haywire. This was a bigger temperature loss than I was expecting, so I added about a gallon of almost boiling water to bring the mash up, and let it sit at 152°F for an additional 30 minutes. I’ll have to check my mash tun cooler to make sure it can still maintain mash temperatures. 

Once I transferred the wort to the kettle and brought it to a boil, I realized I was out of propane. Strike two! A quick trip to Ace Hardware was all it took to get back to the 60-minute boil. With 30 minutes remaining, I added 0.35 oz of Magnum hops, which will provide a very low level of bitterness. A whirlfloc tablet was added with 15 minutes remaining to precipitate out some proteins, as well as a gram of yeast nutrient. I had an original gravity of 1.056. 

Lalbrew German Wheat-Style Ale Yeast was pitched after the wort cooled. I mostly fermented at 63°F and saw a very rapid fermentation for the first week. Do you believe bad things come in threes? After six days of rapid bubbling, my Tilt hydrometer was reading a gravity of 1.040 for a few days. I was surprised because I didn’t expect my yeast to stall, even though my temperature was on the lower end of its preferred range. I used a heat wrap to bring up the temperature to 68°F and agitated the yeast to see if it would ferment more, but saw no additional bubbles. I decided to pull a sample to test with a manual hydrometer, and the ferment was done at a final gravity of 1.010 and an ABV of 6.0%. 

For now, I have transferred the wort to a clean fermenter and off the trub to prevent any off flavors before I bottle. The cost for ingredients for this beer was $34.27, with the following breakdown: 

• Water Additions: $0.17

• Malt: $25.19

• Hops: $0.92

• Yeast: $6.95

• Adjuncts: $1.03

Approximately 2.5 gallons of beer were produced, leading to a cost of about $1.28 per 12 oz bottle. 

Cheers to my first brew of 2025!

I always enjoy looking back on the year and reflecting on the ups and downs of brewing. In 2024, I brewed nine beers, which included a hazy IPA, an Irish Stout, a saison, a gose (from a very random kit), a rice lager, a bière de garde, a sour, and two brown ales. I spent a little over $250 on brewing supplies.

And what were the highlights? 

• I really started 2024 strong, brewing an Irish Stout that won awards at multiple competitions. In total, I won three awards for my Irish Stout.

• I entered five competitions and joined the Master Homebrewer Program to better track my brewing record. 

• I received $8 in cash and a $30 gift certificate in competition winnings! 

• I started a tracker to count how many breweries I’ve been to in the Bay Area (and found out it’s 50!). 

Areas of opportunity included:

• My hops. My year 2 hops never made it higher than about a foot and looked crisp in the sun. In 2025, I’ll ensure they get the proper amount of sun.

• Cooling wort before pitching the yeast. I accidentally melted a plastic container with wort that I thought had cooled when it was still way too hot, and cooling was the most time consuming and frustrating part of the brewing process for me this year.

• I entered beers in competitions that didn’t match the style guidelines they were submitted under. This is a good reminder to choose the style based on the characteristics of the finished product rather than the style I aimed to brew.

My goals for next year are to: 

• Become a BJCP Certified Judge! Take the entrance exam and tasting exam. Don’t be afraid of failure. 

• Brew an IPA I am proud of. This is a style I have generally avoided because every IPA I’ve made has had a flaw. I’d like to take the learnings I’ve had over the past few years to correct these issues and be less afraid of the style.

• Continue to enter competitions and brew at least three styles I haven’t before.

• Be more intentional about blog posts. I felt like I was forcing myself to post once a month this year and I wasn’t proud of everything I wrote. I didn’t even post in November because I didn’t think I had anything worthy to write about. In 2025, I’m going to try to write once a month, but if I don't have any ideas, I won’t force it. 

I’m looking forward to more tasty homebrews and brewery visits in 2025! 

Most of the mistakes I’ve made while homebrewing have been related to temperature. Whether the mash is too cool or a beer gets too hot during fermentation, temperature can have a huge impact on the finished beer. As I’ve gained experience, most of the additional equipment I’ve purchased for brewing has been related to temperature control. 

One of the most obvious places to explore temperature is the mash, where the beer’s grain bill is mixed with heated water, leading to enzymatic activity to convert starches into fermentable sugars. Different enzymes have different activity levels at certain temperatures, so even a temperature difference of a few degrees can change a beer’s fermentable sugars and body. The mash typically occurs between 148°F and 160°F, with 152°F being a temperature that allows for a balance between two of the key enzymes, beta- and alpha-amylase. A lower temperature leads to a lighter beer, while higher mash temperatures are good for more viscous beers. Something to keep in mind while mashing is that when the grains are added to hot liquid, the overall temperature will go down, potentially leading to a lower than desired body in the finished beer. This is solved by heating water to a strike temperature that is higher than the desired mash temperature, so when grains are added in, the correct mash temperature is reached. Many online calculators can help determine this strike temperature based on the total grain bill.  

The temperature should also be maintained during the mash, which can occur with an insulated cooler or electric system. In some cases, a brewer may complete a step mash, which involves raising the temperature of the mash over its course for a desired profile or efficiency. The best tools I’ve used during the mash include a grilling thermometer to precisely measure water temperature, an insulated cooler for my mash, and an online strike temperature calculator. A solid mash is essential before going into the boil step, and something I like to do after the mash is sample some of the grains. If they still taste sweet, I know I have not properly sparged or gotten all of my sugars to the brew kettle, so I may sparge again or expect the need for a longer boil.

After the mash is the boil, which requires bringing the wort to a rolling boil for a set period of time (usually 60 minutes). The purpose of the boil includes sterilizing the wort, concentrating the sugars, boiling off unwanted flavor compounds, clarifying the beer by forcing proteins out of solution, and dissolving the flavors from hops. In a previous post I discussed how to handle a boil that doesn’t end with the original gravity you need. To reduce starting gravity, sterilized water can be added to dilute it. Increasing gravity can occur by continuing a boil to further concentrate the sugars, but if you do not want to lose the volume, adding malt extract can help provide additional sugars. Boiling has many benefits, but cooling the beer for fermentation can be tricky for me. 

Once the boil is complete and an acceptable gravity has been reached, the beer must cool before yeast can be pitched so that the yeast has an acceptable environment. Most strains ferment around 68°F. Reducing the temperature from the boil to a much lower number requires some sort of cooling system, though some individuals may use a “no chill” method and allow the beer to cool overnight. For a faster cool, metal coils with cold water running through can be used, though this can be a waste of water if the outgoing water is not captured for use, and one must remember to put the coils in for the last 15 minutes of the boil to sterilize them. A more advanced system is a glycol chiller that circulates a mixture of water and propylene glycol through a closed loop of tubing. The liquid mixture can drop below the freezing point of water, leading to faster and more efficient chilling.

Yeast requires a certain temperature, which varies by style, to keep the fermentation healthy. Lagers need a low fermentation temperature, while some Belgian beers can handle up to 85°F. A fermentation that is too high may lead to fruity esters, harsh alcohol flavors, or other off-notes. During fermentation, I keep a sanitized thermowell in my beer with a temperature probe inside. This ensures I am accurately reading the beer’s temperature throughout the fermentation. Some ways to control temperature during the fermentation process include placing the fermentor in an insulated cooler with ice or adding a jacket or other heating element. As yeast consume sugars and produce alcohol, the beer’s temperature will rise, making it important to check the temperature over the course of the fermentation and adjust as needed. 

The last step of making beer before enjoying it is bottle conditioning, where priming sugar is added to beer after bottling to produce carbon dioxide. It typically takes about one to two weeks at 68-75°F for this to occur. Once this period is over, the beer can be chilled for consumption. The serving temperature is one of the most obvious, with beers needing to be served in the 40-50°F range. Darker beers tend to be served at slightly warmer temperatures than lighter beers to bring out their more complex flavors. 

Temperature control is essential for making a good beer, not just in initial mashing and boiling of the wort, but also throughout fermentation, bottle conditioning, and serving the beer. One of the easiest ways to level up my beers was through paying attention to temperature and making sure I had the right tools to control it, and going forward it will continue to be an area of focus for me.

Fall is here, you say? Bring out the darker styles! For September, I had to brew one of my favorite recipes, a clone of Ellie’s Brown Ale from Avery Brewing. This beer is one I love for many reasons, with the main one being that I feel you can’t get a better basic brown ale these days. Coming in at 5.5% ABV, Ellie’s Brown Ale has a smooth, brown sugar maltiness, and it once was the base for a chai beer from Avery (if you’re reading this, bring back the chai beer please!). 

I actually got this recipe from Avery Brewing directly, who generously sent me a homebrew version via email. This is the second time I’ve brewed it, with the first time being when I made my Gingerbread Ale last year and added spices to it. With a few very minor tweaks to match the ingredients I have, I’m looking forward to tasting this one as “just a brown ale.”

You know the drill - we’re starting with the water profile. I brought 4.9 gallons to 160°F and added 1.17 grams of calcium chloride, 1.30 grams of epsom salt, 1.17 grams of gypsum, and one campden tablet. I mashed at 149°F for one hour. My grain bill contained:

• 9.0 lb Admiral Maltings Maiden Voyage (2-Row Malt)

• 14.8 oz Admiral Maltings Midway (Light Munich)

• 10.8 oz Chocolate Malt

• 7.4 oz Crystal 120L Malt

My 2.6 gallons of sparge water got 0.63 grams of calcium chloride, 0.70 grams of epsom salt, and 0.63 grams of gypsum. The mash was deep brown in color and absolutely beautiful, with a pH around 5.3 and a gravity of 1.049. For this brew day, I got to use my new pH probe. I’ve always been curious about the pH of my mash, and know it should be in the 5-5.5 pH range. I’m not sure if this information will have a large impact on my brews early on, but for now, I’m excited to collect data and see what I learn.

I boiled my wort for 60 minutes. At the beginning of the boil, I added 0.08oz of Galena hops for bitterness, which has flavors of blackcurrant, spiced wood, and sweet fruits. In general, the bitterness for this beer may be lower than a typical American Brown Ale, but I added additional hops for flavor and aroma. At the 30 minute mark, I added 0.21 oz of Sterling, and an additional 0.65 oz of Sterling at the end of the boil. This should add some herbal and perhaps spicy notes. In addition to hops, I also added a Whirlfloc tablet into the beer to help with its clarity. At the end of the boil, I finished with about 4.5 gallons of wort and a starting gravity of 1.056.

After cooling the beer overnight, I pitched in one packet of White Labs California Ale yeast. Within 48 hours, it began to bubble and happily ferment, and I anticipate a final gravity of 1.010, leading to an ABV of about 6.0%.

For a cost breakdown:

• Water Additions: $0.52

• Malt: $38.48

• Hops: $1.86

• Yeast: $15.95

• Total Cost: $56.82

After loss due to transfer, I’m expecting about 42 bottles, leading to a cost of $1.42 per bottle.

This should be the perfect beer to transition into fall. In general, I kept the recipe very similar, but swapped in Galena hops over the Bullion hops that the original recipe called for so I could use some hops I already owned. I’ll have to go buy some Ellie’s Brown Ale at the store to compare!

I knew I wanted to brew this month, but had absolutely no idea what to make. With a day off of work and no strong preferences, I decided to choose a random style that I’m not very familiar with: a Bière de Garde. First brewed in Northeastern France, this style was typically produced in the spring and left in cool cellars for many months before serving it in the summer. Its name essentially translates to “beer for keeping.”

Looking at the BJCP Style Guidelines, a Bière de Garde typically ranges from 6.0-8.5% ABV. There are three different variations: a blonde, a brown, and an amber (most traditional). Though strong, they tend to be smooth, malty, and have medium to low hop bitterness. Some haze is allowable, and it tends to have moderate to high carbonation and a silky smooth character. 

The plan was to make three gallons of this beer in the traditional amber variant. Though it’s a French style, the ingredients available to me were more representative of Belgium and Germany, so I can’t say I kept it very traditional. I started with 3.8 gallons of mash water, to which I added 0.93 grams of calcium chloride, 1.16 grams of epsom salt, 0.93 grams of gypsum, and one campden tablet to build a balanced water profile.

My grain bill was as follows:

• 5 lb 6.4 oz Belgian Pilsner Malt

• 1 lb 12.8 oz Admiral Maltings Admiral’s Hearth (Dark Munich Malt)

• 9.6 oz Admiral Maltings Pacific Victor (Vienna Malt)

• 4.8 oz Victory Malt

With a strike temperature of 163°F, the mash started at 153.3°F and went down to 151.7°F after the hour-long mash. I warmed up one gallon of strike water, to which I added 0.27 grams of calcium chloride, 0.34 grams of epsom salt, 0.27 grams of gypsum, and half a campden tablet. I ended the mash with about four gallons of wort.

After transferring the wort from the mash ton to my kettle, I dissolved 0.6 lb of clear Belgian Candi sugar to the batch to increase the sugars further while also lightening the body. The boil lasted 60 minutes in total. I added 0.61 oz of Hallertau Blanc 30 minutes into the boil, and 0.51 oz of Hallertau Mittelfrüh and 0.30 oz of Fuggles at the end. Hallertau Blanc and Hallertau Mittelfrüh are both German hops, with the Blanc variety providing green fruit and citrus flavors, while Mittelfrüh is more herby and woody. If I had done more research before my brew, I actually would have switched the addition order of the two Hallertau hops. Mittelfrüh would have been more appropriate during the boil to match BJCP style guidelines and add an herbal hop flavor to the beer.

Due to the higher expected ABV (~7.6%), I decided to make a yeast starter to propagate more yeast and ensure I had enough for a successful fermentation. About 24 hours before pitching the yeast, I made a “starter wort” of 100g of dry malt extract and ½ teaspoon of yeast nutrient dissolved in one liter of water. This was boiled for 20 minutes and cooled before I added a bag of Wyeast 1007 German Ale yeast. The solution was kept on a stir plate in a sterile flask covered with foil and stirred for 24 hours total before pitched into my Bière de Garde wort that had been cooled to 60°F. I am going to maintain the temperature at 60°F for at least three days before allowing it to naturally rise to 70°F and finish the fermentation. Since this beer has a higher ABV, I am expecting it to need a little more than a week to fully ferment. 

My cost breakdown for this beer was:

• Water Additions: $0.11

• Malt: $25.58

• Hops: $3.21

• Yeast: $12.95

• Adjuncts: $3.90

• Total Cost: $45.75

After loss due to transfer, I am expecting about 28 bottles of this beer, leading to a cost of $1.63 per beer. With an OG of 1.072, I predict the ABV will land around 7.6%. 

Will a Bière de Garde be my next favorite beer style? We’ll find out in a few weeks! If all goes well, the intent is to enter this one into at least one competition, with the hope that I don’t get points docked for the out of style hop choice. In the meantime, I’ll go try to find a Russian River Perdition to see what this beer is all about. 

A fermentation store was recently looking to get rid of some excess stock and sold me a homebrew kit for 80% off. Despite its approaching expiration date, I was intrigued, especially since the style was a gose, something I’ve never brewed before. 

Like many homebrewers, the first beer I ever made was from a kit. Since then, I always assumed that moving from kits to all grain brewing would show my advancement in the hobby. To me, kits were shortcuts for beginners, while “real homebrewers” turned to more advanced techniques. 

Over time I’ve come to see kits as approachable for those new to the hobby and for experienced brewers looking to try something new without spending too much money. For about $50, you can introduce yourself to brewing with a kit that will produce about a gallon of beer. Larger kits for five gallon brews might cost you closer to $150. Once you get the initial kit with equipment, you can buy ingredient-only kits to continue brewing that cost around $20 or less. Typically the kits are space efficient, which makes them great for small spaces. During a time when homebrewers are leaving the hobby, I think it’s awesome that many companies are providing kits to get people interested in brewing. 

Thinking about buying a kit? Here are a few Pros and Cons. 

Pros

• Convenience! The obvious pro. All of your ingredients are in one box and measured out for you. Allows for a super quick brew day.

• New Styles: Some kits are small (~1 gallon) and may feature a style you’ve never brewed before. It’s a good way for you to try something new with low effort as the recipe has already been crafted for you and ingredients are picked out.

• Beginner Friendly: Most kits come with easy-to-follow instructions that can make brewing accessible to everyone.

Cons 

• Supply Chain: You don’t always know how the kit was stored. Did they leave it in a warm warehouse for days? Will the hops or yeast be bad? Will the kit be damaged? 

• Imprecise Fermentation: While the kit can estimate the ABV you will get, they typically don’t provide or expect you to have equipment to measure the original and final gravity. Therefore, you don’t have a good way to measure the progress of your fermentation and the final ABV. Bubbling in your fermentor slowing down is not enough to gauge the end of a fermentation. This issue can be overcome with basic equipment, but is a watchout for beginning brewers.

• Ingredient Quality: Most kits come with ingredients with generic branding. You won’t get as much connection to your ingredients as you would from purchasing from a local shop, where you can get malt or hops from specific maltsters or farms. 

I’m fortunate that I only needed an ingredient kit since I already had the equipment I needed. Trying to brew a gose is something that was initially intimidating to me, but having the kit helped me overcome some decision paralysis around a recipe and ingredients. I’m hoping it will be a good beer! 

This year, I had a really cool opportunity to purchase hops from Garston Hops, the southernmost hop farm in the world. I got my hands on 100g each of Motueka, Nelson Sauvin, and Rakau, classic New Zealand hops that provide citrus and tropical fruit flavors to a beer. Instantly after getting my hops, I decided to make a pale ale with Rakau as a summer treat.

I decided to make a slightly smaller batch than normal to see how the hops would do and aimed for three gallons of wort. My grain bill was: 

• 4 lb Admiral Maltings Maiden Voyage

• 7.2 oz Admiral Maltings Pacific Victor

• 7.2 oz Admiral Maltings Yolo Gold Wheat

To 2.7 gallons of mash water, I added 0.56 grams of calcium chloride, 1.33 grams of epsom salt, and 1.38 grams of gypsum. After a strike temperature of 167.1°F, the 60-minute mash started at 151.2°F and ended at 142.0°F. I sparged with about 2 gallons of water with 0.54 grams of calcium chloride, 1.28 grams of epsom salt, and 1.33 grams of gypsum, and ended up with close to 4 gallons before my boil. 

I decided to boil for 75 minutes without much thought, and when my timer was up, I had evaporated more water than I wanted to, ending up with only two gallons of wort. My original gravity was measuring closer to 1.060, way higher than my goal of 1.045. Adjusting can take some time and calculations, so if my beer is off, I usually just roll with it and move forward. I could have fermented the two gallons of wort, but I would have ended up with a beer much higher in alcohol than my desired pale ale.

When adjusting wort, there are two ways you can go:

1. To reduce the gravity, you can add water to dilute it. This is a relatively easy adjustment as you only need water, but you’ll need to be prepared for an increase in the volume of your wort and you’ll need to boil the water addition to sterilize it. 

2. To increase the gravity, you can:

a) add additional fermentable sugars, which can be added in forms such as malt extract (solid or liquid). This takes a few more steps as you need warm water to dissolve the malt extract and mix it in. 

OR

b) boil your wort further to evaporate water and concentrate the fermentable sugars. Effective, but does reduce your total amount of wort. 

I use a Brewer’s Friend calculator found here to plan adjustments. Since my gravity was too high, I needed to add water to reduce it. I had already boiled and sterilized my wort, so it was essential for me to boil any water additions to ensure I was not introducing any bad bacteria. I ended up needing to add a full gallon of water to reduce to my goal original gravity of 1.047. 

After all the boiling and adjusting, I left about 0.3oz of Rakau in the hot wort for 20 minutes, stirring it to impart a small amount of hop flavors and aromas. I cooled the wort to 68°F before pitching the yeast. 

The beer fermented with one package of dry White Labs California Ale yeast. I kept it in a cooler bag at a rather constant 68°F and it dropped to my final gravity of 1.009 in about five days, giving it an ABV of 5.0%. After a few more days of letting the yeast clean up, I added 3 oz of Citra hops as a dry hop for three days to add some additional citrus aromas to the beer.

My New Zealand pale ale is now cold crashing before I will bottle it in a few days. I am happy I adjusted it so it would stay in the ABV range of a pale ale, and I am excited to try it out and see how the Rakau hops taste!

Every year I make at least one beer that is an absolute flop - the recipe didn’t turn out the way I wanted, the fermentation led to some off flavors, or the carbonation was all wrong. This month I went to brew an “Altbier Light,” a lighter version of the full-bodied and malty beer, and it went…incredibly terrible. I incorrectly substituted a grain in a panic near closing time at my local homebrew store, I didn’t boil the wort for as long as I should have, and I didn’t notice that my OG was much lower than my target until way after I had cooled the wort and was too close to bedtime to fix it.

Whenever I make a terrible beer, I feel frustrated for a few days. I wish my initial attitude was more forgiving, reminding myself that every bad brew is a lesson learned, but that’s just not the reality. You could argue that this post is really just a vent session for me. 

However grumpy I am, mistakes happen. I’m sure I’ll continue to make them even when I have 10+ years of experience. Fortunately my mistakes tend to be under $50, but that doesn’t always make them less annoying. For the sake of reflection, here are some mistakes I’ve made over my three years of brewing (some of these happened when I was starting out, but some are more recent…I won’t tell you when each one happened):

• Didn’t allow enough time for a beer to finish fermenting. Bottled it, added sugar for carbonation, and submitted it to a competition anyway. Turns out the yeast were still incredibly hungry, they ate all of the remaining sugar and produced way too much carbon dioxide, and the beer exploded as a big gusher at a large local competition. I received some polite feedback to avoid that in the future. To those judges who experienced that and had to clean up my mess….I’m sorry and I’m glad there were no eye injuries. Next time I will give a beer the time it needs, and if it’s not ready, I won’t submit it. I rebrewed that beer a few months later to make myself feel better, and it won a small competition. Win?

• I forgot to mill my grains. This mistake feels particularly stupid, because you can tell when grains have been processed, but I really thought I had paid the extra fee to have them crushed when I purchased them and assumed it had been done. I didn’t notice until my OG was way too low. I tried to troubleshoot with additional boiling, but couldn’t boil off enough water to concentrate the sugars and make the beer worthwhile, and eventually had to toss out the five gallons. Because the grains weren’t milled, I couldn’t get the sugars out, and it taught me that one way to check how the mash went is to taste some of the spent grain and see if it tastes sweet. A sugary taste means the grain still contains the sugars that I want in my wort. And yes, those grains tasted very sweet. I also now keep dry malt extract on hand when I need to make small increases to my OG without more boiling. 

• Made a wrong ingredient substitution or forgot to buy something. This covers running out of propane in the middle of a brew day and having to drive to the local Ace Hardware for more, as well as trying to substitute hop varieties without accounting for alpha acids. Bad hop substitutions is how I’ve made some terrible IPAs - incredibly bitter in a bad way. Always do the calculations and reduce the hop addition amount when substituted a hop with higher alpha acids. Also don’t dry hop for too long - you can get grassy flavors.  

• Pitched too much yeast into a beer only for it to overflow the fermentation airlock and spill all over the floor. I now keep all of my fermentors in a secondary container to avoid having to clean up a mess. I lovingly refer to this as beers “throwing up,” and I can promise the aftermath is very gross. 

• Overcarbonated some beer in bottles (yes, again, a different beer) and needed to dispose of them. After one bottle gave a large pop over the kitchen sink, I decided to open the remaining bottles in my bathtub instead. Don’t ask me for the logic there. With a beer in my left hand and the opener in my right hand, I opened the beer, only for it to ricochet backwards out of my hand, hit the side of the bathtub, and shatter the brown glass into what felt like hundreds of pieces all over a bathroom I shared with two other roommates. One of the worst clean ups I’ve ever had and I was startled for hours, but somehow one of my roommates at the time got it on camera and it is a hilarious video. I now wear safety goggles when I am scared of opening a beer. Safety first!

• After cleaning my kegerator components, I incorrectly reassembled the faucet, couldn’t stop the flow or turn off the gas, and proceeded to dump about a gallon of cleaning solution all over the floor and behind a couch while trying to find a container to put it in. This one doesn’t seem too bad, right? Cleaning solution on the floor should essentially be like preparing to mop? Wrong. That liquid leaked behind almost every piece of furniture in my old living room, and I spent the entire evening rearranging furniture to dry it all. 

Mistakes happen, I’ll learn from them, I’ll continue to make more, and I’ll keep laughing at myself. As for my bad beer this month - I still pitched some dry yeast in as I was curious as to what will happen. Who knows, perhaps it’ll be a 2% ABV masterpiece! For now, I’m reminiscing on the good beers, laughing at the bad ones, and preparing for something new next month. Cheers!

While my main method of brewing is all-grain over an outdoor propane burner, my setup is best for batch sizes above 3 gallons, which can lead to large amounts of home brew. Producing a small batch of a recipe (usually around a gallon) on my indoor stove top is a fun way to try something new without making a large quantity of it, reducing my equipment cleaning requirements and time needed for a brew day. 

I’ve always been intrigued by rice lagers, and recently with the warmer weather, they’ve sounded delicious. My current setup doesn’t allow for lager fermentations, which require a fermentation temperature below approximately 55℉, but with a smaller batch size, I’m able to have better control of my fermentation temperature and logger in a small cooler. 

In a homebrew competition, rice lagers fall under category 2A (International Pale Lagers). They tend to be pale yellow in color, between 4.5-6% ABV with a dry finish, and use a large proportion of rice in the grain bill. A common commercial example of this beer is an Asahi Super Dry, which promises a crisp finish that can be paired with any type of cuisine. 

For this brew, I decided to use malt extract instead of grains. Malt extract has already gone through the mashing process and is dehydrated into two forms: liquid (partially hydrated, ~20% water) and dry (completely dehydrated). A benefit of using extract is a reduction in your total brew time as you do not need to mash your grains. Instead of a grain steeping time, which can typically last an hour or longer, you can add your malt extract when you water has heated to around 180℉ and immediately continue heating into your boil. The extract dissolves readily in warm water. Though it is convenient, there are not as many varieties of malt extract as compared to available grains which limits its uses, but using extract was perfect for this rice lager. 

The brewing process for this beer felt very simple compared to other beers I’ve made. To make my rice lager, I started with two gallons of water on my stove top. I didn’t add any water additions to this brew since it was a smaller batch. My extract bill included 1lb and 0.9 oz of Extra Light Dry Malt Extract and 8.5 oz of rice extract. I added the extract slowly and stirred it in immediately as I brought my solution to a boil. During the 60-minute boil, I added 0.14oz of Sorachi Ace hops with 60 minutes remaining in the boil, and 0.13oz of Sorachi Ace hops with 5 minutes left in the boil. I cooled the beer in an ice bath in the sink before moving to my one-gallon fermenter and cooling in the fridge. I pitched half a packet of dry Fermentis S-23 yeast (one packet of yeast can be used for 5 gallons, so I only needed less than a quarter of the packet, but I added closer to half because the yeast had expired). 

The OG of this beer was at 1.046, and I expect it to drop closer to 1.008 when its fermentation is done, leading to an expected ABV of 5.0%. It will spend at least 7 days at 55℉ for the initial fermentation, and then I will increase the temperature closer to 65℉ for at least 3 days to remove off-flavors.

From a cost perspective, I didn’t spend much money on this beer as I was gifted the necessary hops and yeast. The dry malt extract cost me $9.48, which is relatively high compared to a grain equivalent. I’m expecting this beer to yield eight 12oz bottles after transfer, leading to a cost of $1.19 per bottle. 

Fingers crossed this experiment goes well for me!

Spring is here in Northern California! Flowers are blooming, the rain has slowed, and the weather is gorgeous. The beginning of spring always has me craving a saison, so I decided to brew one in March. I was inspired by the recipe for Mannenliefde, a saison from the brewery Oedipus in Amsterdam that has won three medals in the World Beer Cup.

Saison is a rather broad style, with many different variations of color and strength. These beers are usually unfiltered and have high carbonation. Hop flavors are low to moderate. The real star of the show is the yeast, which lends fruity flavors and spicy notes such as black pepper. 

My grain bill was as follows:

• 5 lb, 4.8 oz of Admiral Pils

• 3 lb, 1.6 oz of White Wheat Malt

• 7 oz of Biscuit Malt

To the mash water, I added 0.99 grams of calcium chloride, 2.39 grams of epsom salts, and 4.31 grams of gypsum. After a strike temperature of 156.8°F, the 60-minute mash started at 146°F and ended at 143.4°F, a few degrees above my desired mash of 148°F. The strike water had 0.71 grams of calcium chloride, 1.71 grams of epsom salt, and 3.09 grams of gypsum. 

I boiled the wort for 60 minutes, adding 1.1 oz of East Kent Golding hops (4.7% alpha acids) at the beginning of the boil to contribute to bitterness. With ten minutes left in the boil, I added 0.7 oz of Sorachi Ace hops (11.6% alpha acids) for flavor. Once the boil was finished, I had a lot of additions: 1 oz of Citra hops (14.5% alpha acids), 1oz Sorachi Ace hops, 0.2 oz of lemongrass, and 0.2 oz of Szechuan pepper. This beer will have a lot of fun flavors! Sorachi Ace hops are herbal, lemony, and spicy, which will pair well with the lemongrass and pepper.

The wort was cooled to 70°F and the packet of Lallemand Belle Saison dry yeast was pitched. I had a starting gravity of 1.048. This was my first time using dry yeast and it was incredibly convenient - no rehydration or starter needed! The beer is actively bubbling away in its carboy and I expect its final gravity to land around 1.004. 

Here’s a cost breakdown:

• Water Adjustments: $0.27

• Malt: $19.04

• Hops: $2.15 (especially cheap as I was gifted the Sorachi Ace!)

• Yeast: $6.95

• Adjuncts: $4.75

• Total Cost: $33.16

After loss during transfer, I am expecting 4 gallons of beer, leading to a cost of $0.78 per 12oz bottle. 

I can’t wait to bottle this beer and enjoy the spicy saison flavor!

In honor of St. Patrick’s Day next month, I decided to brew a new to me style - an Irish Stout! There’s something about a classic Guinness that really appeals to me - despite its dark appearance, it isn’t a very heavy beer, and the classic foam and slight creaminess makes the drinking experience fun. 

To kick off my brew, I prepared about 4.5 gallons of water for the mash, adding 0.69 grams of epsom salts and 0.87 grams of gypsum to bump up magnesium and calcium. My mash goal was around 150-152℉, but after hitting a strike temperature of 164.5℉, my mash started at 154.2℉. The temperature dwindled down to 149.5℉ by the time the 60-minute mash ended.

My mash was beautifully dark black in color after a lovely grain bill consisting of:

• 7 lb British Pale

• 1.25 lb Flaked Barley

• 0.75 lb Roasted Barley

• 0.25 lb British Pale Chocolate Malt

• 0.25 lb British Crystal 120L 

I sparged with about three gallons of water at 157.7℉ containing 0.87 grams of epsom salts and 1.1 grams of gypsum. The wort smelled wonderful, like a roasted hot chocolate. My boil was 90 minutes. In hindsight, this was too long, as I boiled off over 2.5 gallons, leading to only 4.5 gallons of wort. 

I added hops during two portions of the boil - 1 oz of Perle with 60 minutes remaining in the boil, and 0.25 oz of Northern Brewer with 10 minutes remaining. Guinness itself uses an isomerized hop extract instead of actual hops, and most clone recipes use Fuggles or East Kent Goldings. I used Perle and Northern Brewer because they were already in my freezer, and although they are hops typically found in German styles, they have been used in some Irish styles. Perle hops can have an herbal or menthol flavor, while Northern Brewer hops are known for a woody aromatic and menthol flavor. The Perle will contribute most to the bitterness of the beer, while the Northern Brewer will add a little bit of hop flavor. 

My OG was around 1.060, way higher than my target of 1.048. After cooling and transferring to my fermenter, I added in a packet of Wyeast 1098, a classic British Ale strain that allows for malt flavors to dominate. Within eight days, my beer dropped to a final gravity of 1.010 and was ready to bottle. 

In total, I ended up with about 4 gallons of liquid after transfer. Unfortunately, due to a bottle shortage…I only ended up with 28 bottles and had to dump a little over a gallon. Embarrassing! I don’t normally like to dump good beer, but I had no other way to store it. A reminder that I need to start looking at kegerators again so I can bottle some for competitions and keg the rest. 

Here was the cost breakdown for this beer:

• Water Adjustments: $0.07

• Malt: $22.75 (higher than usual but expected for a malty beer)

• Hops: $2.67

• Yeast: $8.95

This leads to a total of $34.44, leading to a cost of $1.23 per bottle over the 28 bottled finished goods. I know, I know…if I had bottled the full four gallons worth, the cost per bottle would have been closer to $0.60, which would have been one of my cheapest beers yet.

Here’s where the real fun comes in - when I went to sample this beer during bottling, I realized that my ABV was higher than a typical Irish Stout (~4-4.5%), coming in around 6.5%. The roasty malt flavor was also a bit more intense than your average Guinness. I was entering this beer into a competition, and for strategy reasons, it’s critical to enter your beer into the correct category based on BJCP Style Guidelines. In terms of ABV, my beer should be referred to as an Irish Extra Stout, so to boost my chances at success, I entered it as both an Irish Stout and an Irish Extra Stout. I am very curious to see if the scores differ! Guinness is technically a commercial example of a Dry Stout as well, so if I was entering it again, I’d consider that category as well. 

The samples are still carbonating, but once they’re complete, I can’t wait to see if they have a thick, persistent foam head similar to a typical Irish Stout and Irish Extra Stout. Hoping both of my entries have the luck of the Irish!

Cheers to 2024! I moved into a new apartment back in December, and it took awhile to get settled in. Throughout January, I was trying to figure out how and where I’d brew in my new place, and with the fatigue of moving and many days of rain, I found it hard to restart my normal routine of brewing outside. 

Enter…the one gallon jug. Brewing a small amount is a great way to test recipes, but it also means I can make the beer on my stovetop rather than pulling out all of my gear. 

For my first brew of 2024, I decided to make a Hazy IPA! I started with tap water and wanted to increase the chloride content in order to highlight the hop flavors and aromas. I added 1.88 grams of calcium chloride, 0.65 grams of epsom salt, and 0.66 grams of gypsum.

Since I was brewing on the stove top, I decided to use a brew in a bag instead of my cooler mash tun to only use one pot. This means I filled a fabric filter bag with my grains to steep in my pot of water for the mash.

For my grain bill, I used:

• 1 lb 2 oz Maiden Voyage from Admiral Maltings

• 1 lb 0.4 oz Gallagher’s Best from Admiral Maltings

• 3 oz Flaked Oats

• 1.6 oz Carapils

• 1.5 oz Clipper Oats

I was aiming for a mash temperature of 150°F, but in reality, I started the 60 minute mash at 164.3°F and ended at 158.7°F, quite a bit higher than my goal. Mash temperatures over 155°F favor alpha amylase, leading to a less fermentable wort than can have a fuller body. Though this was a mistake in my mash, I think having a fuller body will be in style for my hazy IPA, but I was worried the fermentation would have issues. 

IPAs need hops, and for this brew, I actually didn’t add hops until the end of the boil, which is when hops are added to impact the beer’s aroma. To get to my OG of 1.060, I had to boil for 60 minutes, then added 0.25 oz of Citra and 0.25 oz of Galaxy hops. After turning off the stove, I used a sanitized spoon to stir the liquid, creating a whirlpool to add the hops into and allowing them to steep for 20 minutes. As you can probably tell from their name, Citra hops have citrus flavors, but can also impart floral and sweet fruit flavors. Galaxy hops also give citrus and sweet fruit flavors. 

After bringing the beer temperature down to 64°F, I pitched a packet of Wyeast Labs 1318, a strain that finishes slightly sweet with a fruity flavor. This is a very common yeast for hazy IPAs and great for balancing fruit flavors with dry hop additions. Since I added way more yeast than the one gallon of beer needed, it was fast to ferment and very active. 

Adding hops during fermentation is referred to as dry hopping, and it can add hop flavor and aromas to the beer without adding bitterness. For my one gallon jug, I poured hop pellets directly into the beer for my dry hop. I allowed the beer to ferment for a full week down to a gravity of 1.018 before adding 0.5 oz of Citra hops. After an additional 4 days, I added an additional 1 oz of Citra and 0.5 oz of Galaxy. Within two days, my final gravity was at 1.010, leading to an ABV of 6.5%. 

My cost breakdown for this beer was:

• Water Additions: $0.10

• Malt: $7.20

• Hops: $8.67

• Yeast: $8.95

• Total Cost: $24.92

I only got 7 bottles out of this beer due to the hop “sludge” at the bottom of the jug, a very small yield, leading to a breakdown of $3.56 per bottle. This is a much higher cost than usual for me, which is due to the amount of hops as well using a full packet of yeast for a fifth of the wort it could support. Part of it will be shared with an IPA-loving family friend, while the other bottles I will most likely enter into a competition to get feedback on the recipe before a future rebrew. 

I was able to sample this beer before carbonation, and it was juicy with a heavy dank flavor. The appearance is close to orange juice. I’m hoping that carbonation will help calm down the hoppiness a bit. I can’t wait to try it!

Cheers to a new year of brews!

Ahhhh, the end of another year! It’s always nice to reflect on the past year and look to the future. 

Quite frankly, I felt a lot of frustration with homebrewing this year. I faced many struggles with yeast and incomplete fermentations. I tried some newer styles that I was initially excited about, but I found them to be more challenging than I was expecting, and felt like my skills were regressing at times. 

Despite the initial challenges, not all was bad this year! I learned new ways to manage my fermentation temperatures without spending a lot of money. I planted hops for the first time and was able to harvest a small but adorable amount of Cascade hops at the end of the summer. In the nonalcoholic space, I fermented some Bloody Mary mix and kombucha for the first time in a long time. I visited San Diego for the first time and got to check out some breweries I’d been dying to try. And, I ended the year on a positive note with an award-winning Gingerbread Ale! 

In total, I brewed 6 beers and spent $308.00 on brewing ingredients. The styles I made were:

• Helles Lager

• Blonde Ale

• Gingerbread Ale Version 1 (Brown Ale base) 

• Golden Sour Ale

• Pale Ale

• Gingerbread Ale Version 2 (Brown Ale base)

I entered four beers into judging over three competitions. I ended up winning first place with my re-brewed Gingerbread Ale in a competition through my homebrew club! The other competitions provided some great feedback. 

While I’m good at keeping track of my brews, I’m not the best at recording all of the breweries I went to, but here are a few stats from 2023:

• Approximate Number of Breweries Visited: At least 32 (but I’m looking for a better way to track for a more official count next year!)

• Favorite Brewery Visit: Ballast Point in San Diego’s Little Italy neighborhood - great beer and cool views of planes about to land!

• Favorite Beer: Green New Zeal from Armistice Brewing (Hazy IPA)

• Favorite Brewery Tour: The tour at Anheuser-Busch in St. Louis - I thought this was a very well done tour with good history and incredible views of brewing equipment. 

• Favorite Brewery City: San Diego! 

• Trends I Noticed in the Beer World: Craft lagers, brewing classic styles, beers with high ABVs, a continued passion for Cold IPAs

My goal for 2024 is to become a Certified Judge via the Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) and serve as a judge in a local homebrew competition. The hardest part for me will be dedicating time to study, but I am excited to explore different beer styles in preparation!

Cheers to a wonderful 2023 and more beer memories in 2024!

Back in July, I decided to brew a Gingerbread Ale, thinking I could age it for a few months before Christmas for something special. The beer featured spices including ginger, cinnamon, allspice, and cloves, as well as some brown sugar and molasses. The smell was incredible! Everything seemed like it was going well, until one day my fermentation completely stalled. I tried more yeast, more time, agitating the yeast, and even increasing the temperature a bit, but nothing. The beer was done for, and not close to the final gravity I needed.

This experience left me frustrated for a bit. I’ve been brewing some higher gravity beers this year than in previous years, and as I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I’ve had some yeast issues. I was initially hesitant to brew again, but still wanted to make a good Gingerbread Ale for the holidays. 

I did a few things the second time around to make sure my experience went well:

1. I did an extra thorough sanitization routine, looking more closely at crevices in my brewing equipment, especially my spigots, to ensure no contamination. 

2. I changed my recipe to bring down the OG (and thus reduce the final ABV). 

3. I created a yeast starter 48 hours in advance of my brew day to propagate my packet of yeast so that I would pitch more.

4. I put a larger focus on getting enough oxygen into the wort for the yeast by using a sanitized immersion blender to generate a thick layer of foam before fermentation. 

5. I set my temperature controls during fermentation to a more narrow temperature range for happier yeast conditions. 

Sure, changing many different things at once won’t help me get to the root cause of my yeast issues. But…it worked!

48 hours before my brew day, I created a yeast starter. The goal of a starter is to make a mini batch of wort, add your yeast to it, and provide some constant agitation for the yeast to propagate. Sanitization is incredibly important in this process as you don’t want to propagate a bad organism that will then be added to your beer and cause contamination. In a pot on the stove, I added 100g of dried malt extract and ½ teaspoon of yeast nutrient to one liter of water. After mixing, I brought this solution to a boil and let it boil for 20 minutes. I cooled the wort to 70℉ and poured it into a sanitized 2000 mL Erlenmeyer flask. After sanitizing my yeast packet as well, I poured the yeast into the flask, added a stir bar, and placed a sanitized piece of foil on as a lid. The mixture sat on my stir plate and mixed constantly for about 36 hours. I then placed the flask into my fridge to allow the yeast to settle to the bottom in preparation for fermentation.

The base recipe for this beer is a brown ale, and this time I based my recipe off the home brew recipe for Avery Brewing’s Ellie Brown Ale, a classic brown ale style that comes in around 5.5% ABV. I thought this would be a good base for my Gingerbread Ale that wouldn’t over power the spices with alcohol. 

My grain bill for a desired batch size of 5 gallons featured:

• 9 lb Two-Row Malt

• 14.5 oz Munich Malt

• 10.8 oz Chocolate Malt

• 7.4 oz Crystal Malt 120L

Brew day was a typical brewing experience for me. I started with tap water and added one campden tablet to reduce chlorine flavors in the water. My mash required 4.9 gallons of water, which I raised to a strike temperature of 158.5℉. To adjust to a neutral water profile, I added 1.17 grams of calcium chloride, 1.3 grams of epsom salt, and 1.17 grams of gypsum. My mash started at 148.9℉ and after 60 minutes cooled to 144.0℉. I needed 2.6 gallons of sparge water at 161℉, to which I added half of a campden tablet, 0.63 grams of calcium chloride, 0.7 grams of epsom salt, and 0.63 grams of gypsum. 

Brown ales aren’t known for being hoppy. This brew used Galena and Sterling hops. Galena hops are a US hop that can give some citrus, grapefruit, and grassy notes, while the profile of Sterling hops is herbal and spicy. Given the small addition of hops, I would expect that they provide a small amount of spice but no major hop aromas or flavors. 

In the 60 minute boil, I made additions at the following time points:

• 0.08 oz Galena hops (11.7% AA) with 60 minutes remaining in boil

• 0.26 oz Sterling hops (6.4% AA) with 30 minutes remaining in boil

• 1 Whirlfloc tablet and 1 gram of yeast nutrient with 15 minutes remaining in the boil 

• 0.3 oz Galena hops (11.7% AA) and 0.12 oz Sterling hops (6.4% AA) at the end of the boil

• 1 tsp of Royal Cinnamon, 0.5 tsp of ground ginger, 0.25 tsp allspice, and 0.25 tsp cloves at the end of the boil 

The wort was cooled and had an OG of 1.060. After 6 days of fermentation, my gravity dropped to 1.008, a little more dry than my target of 1.011, but the fermented beer tastes delicious. I allowed the yeast to stay in the vessel for an additional 48 hours to clean up any off flavors before moving the beer to a sanitized secondary container and putting it in a fridge to cold crash. I will bottle the beer in a few days to allow it to bottle condition. 

 The cost breakdown was as follows:

• Water Additions: $0.56

• Malt: $21.48

• Hops: $3.78

• Yeast: $15.95

• Other: I am considering the cost of the spices and supplies for the yeast starter to be negligible. 

• Total Cost: $41.77

After loss when transferring between vessels, I think I will be able to fill approximately 42 bottles, leading to a cost of $0.99 per bottle.

I’m very excited about this beer! It feels good to have a solid ferment again after a few struggles this year. Moving forward, I will continue to ensure I am providing the best environment for my yeast to thrive, especially by providing them with enough oxygen in the wort and a healthy starting culture. This beer will be entered into a mini holiday competition within my homebrew club in December which features the 12 Beers of Christmas from Randy Mosher’s Radical Brewing. I can’t wait to taste all of the holiday brews!

Sour beers are known for their “funky” or “tart” flavor profile, which comes from the wild yeast or bacteria they are fermented with. They can be a bit of an acquired taste, but once you get used to them, you'll likely find that they're quite enjoyable. In homebrewing world, brewing sours can be incredibly tricky - they can take a longer time to fully ferment and develop their flavor profile, and if the wild bacteria or yeast gets into other brews fermented with your typical ale or lager yeast, it can lead to an “infection” or off flavors in your beers. It is best to keep them completely separated from other ferments and to thoroughly sanitize equipment that has come into contact with the sour beer yeast/bacteria to prevent issues. 

Despite the challenges, I thought it would be fun to try and brew a sour. I was inspired by a Golden Ale recipe from The Rare Barrel in Berkeley, CA, which was acquired by the brewery Cellarmaker in late 2022. Cellarmaker continues to produce and sell Rare Barrel brews. 

I was aiming to make three gallons of beer so I could ferment in a separate carboy away from my typical fermentation spot. My grain bill was as follows:

• 3 lb 15.6 oz Admiral Pils (Pilsner Malt) from Admiral Maltings

• 10.8 oz Yolo Gold Wheat from Admiral Maltings

• 5.4 oz Melanoidin

• 5.4 oz Oats

I started off with approximately three gallons of mash water and held the mash at 145℉ for 90 minutes. The mash was sparged with approximately two gallons of water before the 90-minute boil. This beer had a very, very small amount of hops. I used just 0.2 oz of Strisslepalt hops, which are a French hop with citrus, herbal and floral notes. The hops were added with 60 minutes left in the 90 minute boil, contributing a bit of bitterness to the brew. 

The really important part was the yeast, which is Wyeast Labs 3763 Roeselare Blend, a lambic blend with Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Brettanomyces, Lactobacillus, and Pediococcus cultures. It is said to produce a very dry ale with some earthy flavors and a “distinctive pie cherry sourness.” More and more yeast companies are coming out with wild strains these days. 

One thing that is funky about sour beers is that they can grow pellicles on the top of the fermenting surface. Pellicles are a biofilm made of cells, proteins, and polymers, and despite their funky appearance, they are not a mold and they are not dangerous! They often appear as a waxy or bubbly white layer. Not all sour beers form them, so it isn’t an indication of whether a sour beer is “good” or “ready.” It is thought that they are formed when the beer is exposed to oxygen, but they do not necessarily provide the beer any protection from oxygen. 

The cost for this beer was a lot cheaper than I was expecting! 

• Water Additions: $0.19

• Malt: $15.39

• Hops: $0.35

• Yeast: $8.95

• Total Cost: $24.88

With an expectation of about three gallons, this beer costs approximately $0.78 per serving.

According to Wyeast, this beer could need up to 18 months of aging to develop its full flavor profile. I’ve been letting it sit for about three months now, and during that time, its gravity has dropped from 1.050 to 1.020. I’m expecting a full drop in gravity to 1.009, leading to an ABV of 5.1%. I’ve been pulling a few samples every now and then to bottle so I can have a taste from different stages of the fermentation (and thus explains the most likely cause of exposure to oxygen/pellicle formation). I’m excited to see how this one turns out!

Certain beers are so iconic that brewing a clone of them feels like a homebrewing rite of passage. That is how I’ve felt about Sierra Nevada’s Pale Ale - a nationwide staple that has been brewed for over four decades. The beer is known for its light, malty body but also features piney and grapefruit notes from the use of Cascade hops. Sierra Nevada is kind enough to put their recipe on their website for those of us who want to try. 

In terms of specifications, Sierra Nevada’s Pale Ale falls at 5.6% ABV and 38 IBU. I used Brewfather software to build my recipe to try to match these specifications as close as possible. To make 5 gallons of beer using the ratios on their website, my grain bill looked like:

• 10 lb Two-Row Pale Malt

• 14 oz. Caramel Malt (60 °L)

They don’t provide any information on their website about water quality, so I used Brewfather to calculate what my water profile should look like for this style. I started with 4.8 gallons of mash water and used a campden tablet to get rid of chlorine flavors from my tap water. From there, I added 1.2 grams of calcium chloride, 2.7 grams of epsom salt, and 2.8 grams of gypsum. I recently got a scale with more precision for these smaller additions - it was very exciting to use it for the first time and have more accuracy! I raised my mash water to a strike temperature of 165.1°F so that, when mixed with the grains, my mash would hit 155°F, which I would hold for 60 minutes. I was pretty close - my mash started and ended at 154°F. 

After the mash, I used 2.8 gallons of sparge water with another campden tablet, 0.7 grams of calcium chloride, 1.6 grams of epsom salt, and 1.6 grams of gypsum. I brought the wort to a boil for 90 minutes. Instead of hop pellets like I usually use, I went with whole cones for the recipe to follow the Sierra Nevada website. The boil additions were as follows:

• 0.25 oz Cascade hops at 90 minutes left in the boil

• 0.50 oz Cascade hops at 60 minutes left in the boil

• 0.65 oz Cascade hops at 30 minutes left in the boil

• 1 whirlfloc tablet to help with clarity and 1 gram of yeast nutrient with 15 minutes left in the boil

• 2.00 oz Cascade hops at the end of the boil 

After cooling the wort down to 68°F, I used a brand of yeast that was new to me: Imperial Yeast A07 Flagship Ale. This yeast has a clean flavor and is versatile for use in pale ales, IPAs, and stouts. My OG was sitting at 1.055. I was going out of town for two weeks, so in total, this beer fermented for three weeks around 66°F. 

Unlike most blog posts, I actually fully fermented this beer before posting this month’s blog post! My beer finished at a gravity of 1.015, leading to an ABV of 5.3%, close to the typical 5.6% of the Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. The beer has a nice malt base with clear hop bitterness. It’s a bit hazier than I would like, most likely due to the yeast strain. I had placed the beer in a fridge for 48 hours in hopes that the yeast would crash out and its clarity would improve, but it is still a little cloudy. Besides its appearance, I am really happy with how it turned out compared to Sierra Nevada!

This beer was very reasonably priced. The cost breakdown was as follows:

• Water Additions: $0.79

• Malt: $19.51

• Hops: $8.08

• Yeast: $12.95

• Total Cost: $41.32

I filled 20 bottles and put the remaining two gallons into a keg, leading to a cost of $0.97 per 12oz serving of beer.

As I am posting, the beer has been split into bottles and a keg and will need up to two weeks to carbonate. I hope to take the bottles to a homebrew club meeting or maybe even enter into a competition for feedback, while the keg I will enjoy at home.. Wish me luck!

In the summer, I tend to take a break from homebrewing. I brew outside, and between the sun and the lack of shade on my balcony, it’s usually too hot for me. Instead, I look to take on other projects.

For the month of August, I decided to try something I’d never seen before: a fermented Bloody Mary base. I pulled the recipe from page 136 of Brad Leone’s cookbook, Field Notes for Food Adventure. I bought this cookbook a few years ago after watching a lot of “It’s Alive with Brad” YouTube videos, but quite frankly, after taking a look at some of the recipes, I wasn’t sure I’d ever use it. There are plenty of recipes for grilled and smoked fish that I never thought I’d be brave enough to try, but the fermented Bloody Mary mix seemed easy enough.

The recipe called for:

• 2 lb cherry tomatoes

• 40 grams grated fresh horseradish root

• Garlic cloves, crushed and peeled

• Za’atar 

• Sea Salt

My first step? Figuring out where I’d even grab horseradish root. Fortunately a great grocery store near me had it in their produce section, but I did have to buy organic. For the tomatoes, I decided to splurge and get those from the local farmer’s market, thinking they’d be extra delicious and fresh. The rest of the ingredients were already in my pantry. I used four garlic cloves, 15 grams of salt, and ½ teaspoon of Za’atar. 

The ratio of salt to tomatoes led to a brine that was approximately 4% salt, higher than the typical recommendation of 2% needed for lacto-fermentation. In lacto-fermentation,  Lactobacillus convert sugars into lactic acid, which gives pickled items (think sauerkraut) their tangy flavor; this type of fermentation is different than the fermentation used to produce alcoholic beverages. The salty environment also kills off bad bacteria, and it’s important to use “pure” salt, such as sea salt, for this purpose; avoid table salt or anything with additives. 

The recipe calls for vacuum sealing the ingredients or using a jar. I had to go the jar route, so I threw everything in, gave it a quick stir, screwed the lid on, and put it away in a dark cabinet to sit at room temperature. The recipe makes it seem like the fermentation will only take a few days and I should wait until the tomatoes burst. 

After a full week, I took a look at my jar and…nothing. No bubbles, just tomatoes sitting in the grated horseradish root. I felt a bit defeated, but read online about individuals letting this ferment for a full two weeks without issue. I placed it back in the cabinet and went out of town on a work trip. 

Upon my return and nearing two weeks of tomatoes sitting in my jar, not much had happened. There was some liquid forming at the bottom of the jar, but the tomatoes were still intact. I wanted to see juices! Lacking patience (and scared I was going to make myself sick if I let this concoction falter for much longer), I decided to take matters into my own hands and blended the tomatoes with my immersion blender. Other recipes seem to rely on the blending technique before fermenting, so I decided it was fine. 

Two days after the blending, I could see bubbles in the blended tomato mixture and decided it was done. I strained out the liquid from my ferment, and for fun, I put a pH strip in the mixture. I got a pH of ~4, which was expected and lessened my concerns about the potential for bad bacteria to grow.  Served up in a glass with ice, it definitely had a big kick; while the Za’atar provides an earthy flavor, the horseradish is the main star of the show. 

Overall, the recipe made enough for four Bloody Mary’s with a total ferment time of 18 days. To break down the cost:

• 2 lb of cherry tomatoes from the Farmer’s Market: $8.00 

• Horseradish root: $1.07

• Garlic: $0.20 (estimated cost for 4 cloves)

• Spices (Za’atar and Salt): $0.05 (overestimate, pretty negligible expense for me given these spices are always available in my pantry) 

This brought my cost to about $2.33 per Bloody Mary. Add a shot or two of vodka (Tito’s, of course) and a few accoutrements (pickled things galore!), you’re looking at around $4 per drink.

I can’t say I’d do this again. While I did enjoy the horseradish kick, the longer than expected fermentation time was concerning to me. It potentially took longer to ferment due to the use of a 4% brine; less salt would have led to a faster ferment. I’d consider reducing the amount of horseradish, though I believe wild yeast on the horseradish root was a main driver of the ferment. Perhaps if I stumbled upon a vacuum sealer (I could vacuum seal hops as well for freezer storage, so don’t tell me it’d be a one-time use appliance!) I'd consider trying this experiment one more time. 

Cheers to a new recipe! Back to beer next month. 

My first brew day back in a while and I…decided to make a beer I won’t drink until December! This year I am participating in a winter homebrew swap known as the “12 Days of Brewmas.” Twelve people will each brew a beer and share at least three bottles with others in the group, with all recipes coming from Randy Mosher’s Radical Brewing. I’ll end up with 33 bottles of homebrew from others!

I decided to make this beer a few months early as a trial run. I’ll bottle it and age it for a bit, but I may make an additional batch closer to the due date if I feel it needs improvements. The base of the beer is a brown ale, with the gingerbread flavor coming from spices added at the end of the boil. I can’t quite remember where I got the base recipe, but I made a few tweaks to the adjuncts to fit what I had in my pantry. 

I started with tap water and added one campden tablet to reduce chlorine flavors from the water. My mash required 5.4 gallons of water, which I raised to a strike temperature of 168.8℉. To adjust to a neutral water profile, I added 1.74 grams of calcium chloride, 2.25 grams of epsom salt, and 1.82 grams of gypsum. When combined with the water, my mash started at 158℉, a bit higher than the goal of 154℉, but by the end of the 60 minute mash my temperature had cooled to 153.5℉.

My grain bill featured:

• 10 lb Maris Otter

• 12.5 oz Crystal 60L

• 12.5 oz Crystal 90L

• 7.5 oz Belgian malt

• 3.75 oz Carapils

• 2.5 oz chocolate malt

• 1.25 oz black patent malt

In addition to the malt, I added 7.5 oz of brown sugar and 6.5 oz of molasses as adjuncts. Adjuncts are ingredients that provide additional sugars, and usually add flavor or color to the beer. In my case, the brown sugar and molasses will add some caramel notes. 

After the mash, I emptied the wort into my kettle and used 2 gallons of heated water as a sparge. To the sparge water, I added 0.66 grams of calcium chloride, 0.85 grams of epsom salts, and 0.69 grams of gypsum to match the water profile of my mash water.

My boil lasted 60 minutes.  I used 0.76oz of Fuggle hops (6.6% AA) at the beginning of the boil, which will contribute to overall bitterness. Fuggle hops are a British hop variety with floral, woody, and menthol flavors. With 20 minutes left in the boil, I added Willamette hops (3.7% AA), which will add to the flavor of the beer. Willamette hops have a slightly spicy, woody, and green grassy flavor. In the last 15 minutes of the boil, I added my cooling coils to sanitize them, as well as a Whirlfloc tablet to clear up the wort and 2.2 grams of yeast nutrient. 

The end of the boil was also where the fun spices came in! I decided to get some fresh spices from Oaktown Spice Shop and Burlap and Barrel to give the beer its gingerbread flavor. I needed 1 tsp of Royal Cinnamon (slightly sweeter than regular cinnamon), 0.5 tsp of ground ginger, 0.25 tsp allspice, and 0.25 tsp cloves. 

After the boil was finished, I cooled the beer to below 65℉ and pitched a packet of WLP005, a British Ale Yeast. My original gravity (OG) was sitting at a whopping 1.075! This is the perfect strain to accentuate malt flavors. Despite being an ale yeast, the yeast tends to flocculate at the bottom of the fermentation vessel, and may need to be agitated every once in a while. I am looking to ferment until I get to a final gravity (FG) of 1.022. 

This is one of the cheaper beers I’ve made in a while. The cost breakdown was as follows:

• Water Additions: $0.71

• Malt: $27.94

• Adjuncts: $3.87

• Hops: $5.07

• Yeast: $15.95

• Total Cost: $53.53

After loss when transferring between vessels, I think I will be able to fill approximately 40 bottles, leading to a cost of $1.34 per bottle.

At the time of publishing this post, my beer is sitting at a gravity of 1.027, a bit above my target final gravity (FG) of 1.022. While this is finishing up, I also have a sour golden ale fermenting! I am letting the wild yeast go for a few months longer before I prep for bottling. I am very excited to provide an update on it soon!

If you couldn’t tell, I haven’t been brewing much recently. Between work and personal travel, I have spent many weeks out of town and haven’t been able to keep up with this hobby. I’m sure this is disappointing to all two of you that read this blog - but have no fear! I picked up some brewing supplies this afternoon so I can brew over the 4th of July long weekend. My July post should be a lot more exciting. 

Despite not brewing anything new in June, it was a rather successful month for my hops. In April 2023, I posted a hop rootlet in a container on my balcony, and it is now a thriving plant that I need to figure out how to maintain. 

Hops are the flower of the hop plant, known as Humulus lupulus. They grow on long bines (similar to a vine, but yes, with a ‘b’) that can grow as much as a foot a day during their peak growth spurt. The whole hop cones that come off a bine contain lupulin glands, where you can find the essential oils and resins that provide beers with bitterness and aroma. Most hop farms dry the hop cones and form them into pellets for preservation, storage, and easier transportation to breweries. You can also buy hop extracts, which are super concentrated resins extracted from the whole cones. 

Hops are grown all over the world, and in the US you will mostly see production in Washington and Idaho. Different regions provide different hop flavors - for example, the hops of Germany can be earthy and spicy, while hops from the Southern hemisphere (most commonly New Zealand) tend to be fruit-forward. In the US, there are three hops known as the “Three C’s” that were foundational to the craft beer industry here: Cascade, Centennial, and Columbus. Nowadays, you’ll find many more hop options in the US, with flavors ranging from citrus and stone fruits to piney and woodsy. 

Cascade hops are one of the most recognizable in the US beer industry, mostly because they are one of the most prominent hops in Sierra Nevada’s Pale Ale. The Cascade hop was developed by the USDA at Oregon State University and released in 1972. Because of its tie to one of the original craft beers, when the option to purchase a Cascade rootlet at my local home brew shop arose, I decided to go for it.

I knew next to nothing when I decided to buy a hop rhizome. At a cost of $6.75, I figured it would be a fun experiment that didn’t cost me much. Hops are an invasive species and I also live in an apartment, so I knew planting in a container was going to be the best option for me. I opted for a very large container and a huge bag of moisture control dirt, which cost me $45.91. For around $50, I was ready to get growing!

Once you buy your hop rootlet, it’s best to keep it in the fridge until it’s time to plant. A south facing site is recommended for the best light, which worked perfectly with the balcony of my apartment. Good drainage is needed to prevent rot and the hops prefer a slightly acidic soil if possible. I felt like my moisture control soil covered both of those needs, so I didn’t feel the need to add any compost. 

Next came the actual planting. The rhizome needed to be planted a few inches deep with the brown rootlets pointing down. I gave it some water and waited. Within days, shoots started to pop up. Once the shoots were a foot tall, I was instructed to cut all of them but two. For the rest of them, I wrapped them clockwise around a trellis. 

The internet wasn’t lying - once the hops started growing, they took off! At this point in time, I have multiple different shoots that are all over 6 feet long. They are continuing to grow vertically on my trellis, and I’m not quite sure where I’ll prop them up just yet. I can tell they reach for objects to grow on and I’ve unwinded them from a few items on my balcony. If I don’t continue to give them vertical space to grow, they should form a wild bush. 

I expect to see a few hop cones in the next month, though I know I won’t get a full harvest until my third year. The hop cones will be ready to harvest when they lighten in color and feel papery. They can be used within 24 hours or can be dried to last longer. After that, I will keep the bines attached to the plant until the first frost, when I will cut them down to about a foot above the soil. I am looking forward to seeing how this plant grows! I will post updates on the homepage of my blog as I see more progress. 

I was in St. Louis in mid-May with some extra time on my hands and decided to treat myself to a trip to the St. Louis Budweiser Brewery. Built in 1852 and serving as the flagship and headquarters of Anheuser-Busch (AB), I knew it would be an interesting experience. 

I get it - Budweiser isn’t exactly craft beer. There are a lot of individuals in the craft beer scene who would scoff at even spending time or money there. But whether you’re a fan or not, Budweiser is the most valued beer brand worldwide with a value of over $16 billion USD. For $44 including tax, I found myself on the Beermaster Tour, a two-hour excursion all across the property that includes a hat, a pint glass, and a few beers along the way. There are other tour options that are cheaper and shorter, but I was interested in seeing the entire property and history. 

You’re asked to arrive 15 minutes early to check in. After checking in for the tour, you have a few minutes to peruse the gift shop, which contains a multitude of gear across all of the AB brands. I was close to buying a Bud Light Christmas sweater, but I stopped myself. Additionally, there is a bar on the main level where you can grab a quick drink before the tour starts. They have all of the staples on tap, like Bud Light, but also a test label or two. I tried a sample of a hoppy lager under a test label, and it was pretty refreshing!

Once the tour starts, you’re taken upstairs to a room with a private bar and leather couches, where you receive a hat, safety glasses, and a headphone set for the tour. You are asked to keep all of these items on throughout the tour, which feels a little dorky, but no shame as your entire group of about 12 people will also be wearing all of it! The tour guide begins with a 15-minute overview of the beer brewing process and ingredients before you head to your first stop - the Clydesdales. Clydesdales used to pull beer wagons back in the 19th century. A few are kept on site, and on this visit, I got to see Llyod and Bruce, who were huge! There are also two stalls for dalmatians, but they weren’t on site when I visited. The carriage house they live in features some old beer wagons and the regalia that the Clydesdales wear for parades or other events. 

After seeing the Clydesdales, you make a quick stop in the cellars to see where Budweiser is aged on beechwood during its lagering phase. This is where you receive one of the first samples along the tour. Then, the group heads towards the brewhouse to see all of the process tanks! This was one of my favorite parts of the tour. The warm air in the building hits you as soon as you walk in, but when you take an elevator up to see the tanks, you’re immediately mesmerized by the beautiful architecture. We spent time by the mash tanks and brew kettles. The building is also said to feature some quality labs that we didn’t get to see. 

In the middle of the tour, you walk into the Lyon Schoolhouse Museum. Once a school, the building was purchased by Budweiser in 1907 and originally used as offices for the company until about 1982. It now stores Budweiser memorabilia, including old packaging designs and an old time punch clock for employees. This is also the part of the tour where you can take a bathroom break if needed.

The next stop of the tour is the packaging line. This was one of the most interesting spots for me given I work in consumer goods. I’m familiar with some packaging lines that fill bottles at a speed of around 70 bottles per minute. These lines were filling beer bottles at a rate of 1350 bottles per minute and beer cans at 1950 cans per minute! The bottles are filled to the top before being capped, which prevents oxygen from entering and damaging the beer.

From the bottling line, we took a trolley up the hill to the carbonation tanks in a building that is kept rather cold for storage purposes. This is where we received our free pint glass. The tour guide placed a pigtail sampling tool on the tank which allows beer to flow, and we each had the opportunity to go up and pour our own sample of Budweiser straight out of the tank! My pour was pretty foamy, but it was still a refreshing beverage, and probably the freshest Budweiser I’ll ever have.

The tour finishes back in the private upstairs bar where you’re allowed to enjoy a full-sized pour of a variety of AB brands, from Budweiser to Mango Cart to Bud Light Seltzers. I went with a Goose Island Neon Beer Hug, a 7.0% IPA. I finished my day by swinging by the Biergarten to enjoy some soft pretzel sticks with beer cheese before hitting the road.

If you find yourself in St. Louis and enjoy beer, I’d recommend swinging by the Budweiser Brewery! It was an enjoyable experience, and they have a variety of tours to match any visit length or budget, plus a ton of fun merchandise. Swing by the biergarten for a snack and to check out a classic beer or one of the many craft brands owned by AB. I’d definitely do it again!

Do I imagine Taylor Swift drinking beer? No, I’m pretty sure she’d prefer an Old Fashioned. But since I was going to attend the Eras Tour in April, I thought it’d be a great idea to brew a Blonde Ale in her honor. 

Blonde ales are supposed to be a lighter style that are malt-oriented, but may have fun hop or fruit additions. They are light yellow (blonde) in color, typically have a slightly sweet malt aroma and flavor, and have a smooth, medium body. ABV tends to fall in the range of 3.8%-5.5%. It is a good light style for breweries that are unable to brew lagers, which require different yeast strains and can take up precious tank space during their longer fermentations. There are plenty of commercial examples of blonde ales, and the most recent one I’ve had was a Kona Big Wave Golden Ale.

When planning my brew, I wanted to find a recipe that felt like spring. I was inspired by typical “lawnmower” beers - ones that are light and refreshing enough to drink while doing yard work. I knew I would want a beer that featured dry hopping to get some grassy aromas in the finish. After browsing Craft Beer & Brewing, my favorite website for recipes, I settled on the Loving Summer Blonde Ale recipe. The goal for this beer was to hit an original gravity (OG) of 1.051 and a final gravity (FG) of 1.013 to reach an ABV of 5.0%. 

Although I was planning to bottle some of these beers for friends and family, the majority of the batch will go in my kegerator. I’m not planning to submit this to a competition, so there was no need for me to be extra serious and start with DI water. Using water from the tap is usually acceptable for brewing where I live because of its low mineral content. I typically check the annual water report from my water utility as a baseline before using the calculator in Brewfather to determine water additions. Brewfather has water profile suggestions for different styles, and for the Blonde Ale it recommended 50 ppm calcium, 7 ppm magnesium, 6 ppm sodium, 41 ppm chloride, 71 ppm sulfate, and 43 ppm bicarbonate. 

I started with 4.3 gallons of water for my mash. When using tap water, I usually like to add in one campden tablet, which removes any chloramine resulting from water treatment procedures. I don’t feel like this step is super necessary with my water as I’ve never experienced a high chlorine taste, but campden tablets are incredibly cheap and work in under 20 minutes, so I don’t mind putting them in my brewing routine. To the mash water, I added 1 gram of calcium chloride, 1.2 grams of epsom salt, and 1 gram of gypsum. 

My mash water was heated to a strike temperature of approximately 164°F which was added to 9.5 pounds of malt in my makeshift mash tun. I was aiming to hold my mash at 152°F for 60 minutes. In reality, the mash temperature was 153.1°F at the beginning and 147°F at the end of the 60 minutes. Enzymes required for converting simple sugars into alcohol are activated between 145°F to 158°F, so this temperature range felt appropriate. 

I decided to have some fun with the malt and buy most of it from my local malthouse, Admiral Maltings in Alameda, CA. My grain bill was as follows:

• 4 lb Admiral Pils (Pilsner malt) - notes of honeysuckle, vanilla, and dry grass 

• 4 lb Gallagher’s Best (similar to Maris Otter malt) - flavor of toast with honey

• 1 lb Pacific Victor (Vienna malt) - flavors of sweet tea, breakfast cereal, honey 

• 8 oz Victory malt (supplied by Briess) - nutty, toasty, biscuit flavors

After the mash, I heated 2.8 gallons of water to 163°F to pour over my grains as a “sparge.” This water got 0.7 grams of calcium chloride, 0.6 grams of epsom salt, and 0.7 grams of gypsum to meet water specifications. I ended up with approximately 6 gallons of water in my kettle. 

Compared to my last brew day, getting to a rolling boil was an absolute breeze using my propane burner outside. My plan was to boil for 60 minutes, following the schedule below:

• 60 minutes left in boil: add 0.74 oz Tettnang hops [5.4% AA]

• 15 minutes left in boil: add 1 tablet of Irish moss (coagulates protein to improve clarity) 

• 10 minutes left in boil: add 0.6 oz of Cascade hops [8.4% AA] and 0.5 oz Simcoe hops [11.7% AA] 

Blonde ales aren’t usually very hoppy, but some hops in the aroma and flavor are acceptable for the style. The Tettnang hops will provide the bitterness to the brew as they were added near the beginning of the boil. Cascade and Simcoe hops will provide more to the flavor of the brew as they were added near the end. Cascade hops have citrus and floral flavors while Simcoe tends to be on the woody aromatic and sweet fruit side. 

I was so excited about my rolling boil that I didn’t even consider that I might lose too much volume to evaporation. The beer was cooled to approximately 60°F, and after transferring to my fermenter, I realized I had just a little under 4 gallons, short of my goal of 5 gallons. The OG of the beer was measured at 1.060, higher than my initial goal of 1.051 as well. I probably could have diluted it with water to bring down the OG closer to my goal, but I decided to stick with it.

For the fermentation, I pitched one packet of Wyeast 1318 (London Ale III) yeast, a rather common strain for brewing ales that has a fruity, light, and balanced profile and finishes slightly sweet. Fermentation was expected to take about 1 week, and after that, 0.4 oz of Citra hops [14.5% AA] would be added for a 3-day dry hopping stage to add citrus aromas to the beer. My yeast has an attenuation of approximately 71-75%, meaning the FG I am expecting is around 1.017 and an ABV of 5.6%. 

The cost breakdown was as follows: 

• Water Additions: $0.51 

• Malt: $24.00

• Hops: $5.34 

• Yeast: $8.95 

• Total Cost: $38.81

After evaporation and loss after transfer between vessels, I am assuming I could fill approximately thirty eight 12 oz bottles, leading to a cost per beer of $1.02. 

At the time of this posting, my beer gravity is sitting around 1.025 after a week of fermenting. I’ve decided to add the dry hops and give it a few more days to ferment, but with such little activity, I think it may be close to done. This will lead to a slightly sweeter finish on my beer than expected as all of the sugars have not been converted to alcohol. Once I feel it is closer to done, I will crash cool it at 32°F for 24 hours to improve the clarity before moving to a keg and carbonating it. 

This is the second brew in a row where my fermentation has been slower than expected. I believe this could be caused by two things:

1. The yeast don’t have enough oxygen or other nutrients to convert sugars to alcohol. The yeast packets have nutrients in them, so I believe a lack of oxygen is more likely. Although oxygen is typically bad for beer in other stages of its life and can lead to off flavors, the yeast need it in the wort to do their job. A potential solution here would be to agitate my wort more before adding the packet of yeast to ensure it has the right amount. 

2. The yeast aren’t very healthy to begin with. I’m purchasing unexpired yeast packets from a local store and following proper storage techniques, so they should theoretically be fine for use. However, some solutions here would be to add more yeast nutrient or try making a yeast starter a few days before my brew day to ensure the yeast are healthy and multiplying. 

May is my birthday month and I’m sure I’ll treat myself to a stir plate that will help me make a yeast starter. Maybe come back to the blog next month to see if that comes true! 

And thank you to everyone who voted in the beer style poll. I’ll be keeping the style a secret until I make it, so stay tuned!

I’ve never brewed a lager before, mostly because I’ve been intimidated by the need for temperature control and the time it would take. Since my last keg was kicked and my kegerator was open, I decided to use the time to brew a Helles Lager for my homebrew club’s Style of the Quarter (SOQ). As a follow-up to my last post about my Helles Brew Day, I wanted to provide an update on the fermentation process. 

Lager yeast work at a much lower fermentation temperature than ale yeast (around 50°F vs. 68°F), and typically take longer to ferment. They are bottom fermenters, meaning that they flocculate and fall to the bottom of the brew, and it can often look like nothing is happening due to their low fermenting speed. The process requires multiple temperature steps: after the fermentation, raising the temperature allows the yeast to clean up diacetyl, and then the beer is brought down to around freezing to “lager” for weeks or even months. This lagering process further reduces unwanted flavors such as lactic acid so that the beer gets its crisp lager profile. 

As a reminder, I pitched three pouches of White Labs WLP835 German X Lager yeast so that I would pitch approximately 22-24 million cells per milliliter of wort. Three pouches is more than I usually pitch, but due to the slow nature of lager yeast, I was hoping this would allow for a reasonable fermentation time. This yeast has an attenuation of 70%-76%, meaning I was expecting an FG of 1.013-1.017 after having an OG of 1.056.

With the carboy in my kegerator, I am able to control the temperature and pull samples of liquid with a clean siphon to measure gravity over time. I’ve tried a Tilt Hydrometer in my carboy over time but unfortunately with little success…but I hope to have better luck with that option in the future.  For now, I pull a sample and measure gravity with a handheld refractometer to record the progress. 

The initial fermentation plan for my Helles Lager had multiple steps:

1. Ferment at 50°F.

2. When the gravity has dropped to about 1.018, increase the temperature to 54°F. 

3. When beer has fermented completely, decrease the temperature by about 4°F per day until you reach 39°F.

4. Hold there for 4 days, then decrease the temperature to 32°F and lager for at least 3 weeks—preferably longer.

With my beer needing to be bottled and delivered by the deadline of March 8th, 2023, I only had approximately seven weeks to get this beer ready. With three weeks dedicated to lagering and about one week dedicated to slowly adjusting the temperature to avoid shocking the yeast, this really only left three weeks for the yeast to convert sugar to alcohol. 

The fermentation started at 50°F. As expected, not much could be seen during the first few days of fermentation. It took multiple days to see a krausen, the foamy buildup on top of the brew that indicates fermentation is active. I took my first gravity measurement around 2.5 weeks in and measured a 1.029, meaning I still had a ways to go before hitting my goal closer to 1.017. 

I started to take measurements slightly more frequently, mostly measuring 1.026 without much budging. To fall in style guidelines for the Helles Lager (4A), I needed the final ABV to land between 4.7%-5.4%, meaning I needed to get to at least 1.020. I was only able to get to 1.024 before raising the temperature to 54°F to get rid of any diacetyl. This means my ABV sits at 4.2%. The lack of drop in gravity may be due to my yeast not having enough time to ferment, or the yeast were not healthy enough. In the future, I’d like to ensure my wort has enough oxygen, give more time for fermentation, and consider adding more yeast or checking the health of my initial pitch.

At this point, I was already behind schedule to allow for enough time to lager. I decided to prioritize the lagering process over fermentation to give the yeast time to get rid of off flavors. Was that the right priority? Only time will tell! On February 13th, I began lowering the fermentation temperature by 4°F to reach 39°F. The beer sat for four days at 39°F before lowering it to 32°F.

At the time of posting this, my beer has been lagering for one week. It will lager for one more week before I need to bottle it and add priming sugar to carbonate in time for competition. In the future, I plan to make a lager without the time pressure so that I can give the yeast all of the time they need. While I’m disappointed I didn’t hit the full lagering schedule or expected FG, initial tastes of the beer have been delicious, and I’m excited to try the final product!

New year, new brew!

This first post (ever!) will follow my most recent brew day making a Helles Lager. To get an update on how the fermentation went, you’ll have to look out for part 2 at the end of February!

I should start this post by saying I never thought I would brew a lager - lagers require much lower temperatures than other beers (typically below 51F, while an ale ferments around 68F) and a longer fermentation time. It truly is wild to me that the first ever beer I’m posting about on this blog is a lager. But when I saw that a Helles Lager was the Style of the Quarter (SOQ) in my homebrew club, I figured I might as well try it. The kegs in my kegerator have been near empty for a few months, so it felt like the perfect excuse for using that fridge to temperature control the beer. Normally I don’t focus too much of my energy on fermentation temperature as my apartment tends to hold my brews steady around 68-70°F. Although I would love to have better control over my fermentation temperature for the sake of quality control, it’s never been a major focus for me as a newer homebrewer. 

I decided to go big for this beer and brew 5 gallons - some to (hopefully) enter in a competition in March, and some to refill the empty homebrew keg in my kegerator. The recipe I followed was inspired by the Helles Lager at KC Bier which I found through Craft Beer and Brewing. 

Helles comes from the German word for light, bright, and clear, which is very fitting for this lager style. First brewed in Munich in 1894, the beer has a smooth, malt focus with subtle bitterness to balance the sweetness, making it very drinkable. The aroma tends to be malty, and traditional hops in this beer may add floral or herbal hop aromas. It is a pale yellow to pale gold in color (approximately 3-5 SRM) with low hop flavor (16-22 IBUs) and should feature a persistent, creamy head of foam. Typical Helles examples fall in the ABV range of 4.7-5.4%. 

The most recent Helles Lager I had was Pistol Proof, a 5.2% ABV beer from Edward Teach Beer Co. (Wilmington, NC, - to my parents, if you’re reading this, not sure why we didn’t make it out to this brewery when we were recently in Wilmington!). I enjoyed it on an unusually warm January afternoon in the outside gardens at Namu Beer Hall in Durham, NC, while doing some work. I found it to be the perfect drink since it felt light and smooth. 

I was aiming to make a beer with an original gravity (OG) of 1.053 and a final gravity (FG) of 1.014 to hit an ABV of 5.1%. The beer needed German malts and German hops to get the right flavors. Water in Munich tends to be high in temporary hardness, but high residual alkalinity is not ideal for a Munich Helles. Although I knew it would be more expensive, I decided to purchase DI (deionized) water and add brewing salts to build my own profile. With help from the internet, I decided to add 0.3 g/gal of epsom (MgSO4) and 0.3 g/gal of calcium chloride (CaCl2) to my brewing water to create a very soft water profile (about 22ppm Ca, 8ppm Mg, 31ppm SO4, and 39ppm Cl). 

My grain bill was as follows:

• 8.8 lb Weyermann Pilsner Malt (crushed)

• 8 oz Weyermann Vienna Malt (crushed) 

• 11 oz Weyermann Acidulated Malt “Sauermalz” (crushed) 

For my mash, I followed a step mash with a decoction and started with 3.3 gallons of water. A step mash is used to maximize the fermentability of wort by hitting the optimal temperature for certain enzymes in the malt, making sugar extraction easier (and thus improving your efficiency). I completed my mash in a large orange cooler with a false bottom and heated water in my kettle to the estimated strike temperature. My mash was as follows:

• Step 1: 20 minutes at 144.0℉ (favors beta amylase)

  • Strike Temperature: 155.0℉ 

  • Actual Mash: 142.0℉ 

• Step 2: 20 minutes at 149℉ 

  • Strike Temperature: 155.0℉ 

  • Actual Mash: 150.3℉ 

• Step 3: 20 minutes at 162℉ (favors alpha amylase)

  • Strike Temperature: 167.0℉ 

  • Actual Mash: 162.5℉ 

After the three mash steps, I removed a third of my mash liquid and boiled it for 15 minutes in what is known as a decoction step. It is thought that a decoction mash develops malt character and depth, and is a step typically seen in German beers (though it has been debated if it is really that useful). After the boil, returning the decoction to the main mash also increases the mash temperature; in my case, it was raised to 171℉. 

Once the mash was complete, I poured my initial wort from the bottom of my cooler into my kettle. I heated an additional 5.9 gallons of water on the side for my “sparge,” pouring hot water in the top of my cooler to ensure I get all of the sugars from my malt and to get my wort total to 6.8 gallons. This is around the time that I like to taste my grains out of curiosity. If they’re still sweet, I know that I haven’t gotten enough sugar out of them and that I probably won’t hit my target original gravity. I now get my grains milled at my local homebrew shop, but I have accidentally added grains to my batch that weren’t crushed (embarrassing) and they remained sweet after brewing - that beer wasn’t my best. Fortunately for this beer, my grains didn’t seem to have too much residual sweetness, so I felt like I was doing well! I didn’t get a mash pH (I don’t have a very accurate way to measure it), but I wish I had reserved a sample to check.

This was, however, around the time that my brew day went downhill. We had been facing some heavy rains in the Bay Area and I thought I had picked a day that would be dry, but right before my boil, the rain started to come down. I typically brew outdoors over an open flame propane burner, which is my preferred method due to its speed. With the rain, I knew I’d have to switch to my electric stove top, which takes much longer to get to the rolling boil I need. After 30 minutes of trying to wait it out with no success, I moved my beer indoors and started heating the stove top. 

Getting to a rolling boil was painful, and in all honesty, I didn’t record the amount of time it took. Even once I hit a rolling boil, I was concerned it wouldn’t be steady for the full 90 minute boil I was going for. If my beer has flaws, this is probably the step that will be at the top of my root-cause analysis. Once it was boiling, I followed the below schedule:

• 60 minutes left in the boil: 0.7oz Perle hops (8% alpha acids or AA)

  • Since they were added towards the beginning of my boil, these hops should contribute the most to bittering the beer.

  • The flavor profile of Perle hops tends to be herbal, citrus, menthol, and green fruit. 

• 15 minutes left in the boil: 1 tablet of Whirlfloc to help clarify the beer (perhaps not necessary since lagering should clear the beer, but added anyway) 

• 5 minutes left in the boil: 0.85oz Hallertau Mittelfrueh hops (5.9% AA)

  • Since they were added towards the end of my boil, these hops should contribute most to the aroma of my beer. 

  • The flavor profile of Hallertau Mittelfrueh tends to be woody aromatic, herbal, and floral.

At the end of my 90 minute boil, my wort was reduced to 5 gallons, which was my target volume. A temperature-corrected gravity measurement showed an OG of 1.056, which was slightly above my target, but since I hit my volume target and it was close, I considered it to be acceptable. 

At this time, the rain outside had stopped, but it was pitch black. Since it was cold outside, I decided to place my brew kettle outside for about 45 minutes to start cooling it. Once it came down to about 100℉, I placed the beer in a glass 5-gallon fermentation vessel, and then let it cool overnight at room temperature. The next day, I placed it in my kegerator to cool the wort even lower to 46℉. I don’t usually like to do a “no chill” like this (I prefer using my cooling coils with cold water running through them outside), but I had to be flexible given the conditions. 

After the beer had cooled to 46℉, I pitched 3 pouches of White Labs WLP835 German X Lager yeast so that I would pitch approximately 22-24 million cells per milliliter of wort. This yeast strain is special because it comes from a famous Bavarian monastery. It is supposed to develop a creamy, malty beer profile with low sulfur production and low esters. For my needs, I had to buy this directly from White Labs as it is not a strain that is produced year round and it wasn’t available at my local home brew shop. This yeast has an attenuation of 70%-76%, meaning I am expecting an FG of 1.013-1.017. 

Something new I am trying this year is recording the price of my brews. I knew this beer was going to be particularly expensive given I didn’t use tap water and I bought three packets of yeast straight from the supplier (meaning I had to pay for shipping instead of picking it up from my local homebrew store). Here’s my cost overview:

• Water: $20.45 (ouch…)

• Water Salts: $0.05

• Malt (close to 10 lb): $22.31

• Hops: $3.77

• Yeast: $60.80 (this includes $15 cooled shipping, which really is the kicker)

• Other Additives (Whirlfloc): $0.30

This brings my grand total to $107.68 for my Helles Lager. I definitely could have spent less if I didn’t buy DI water or yeast, but I am happy with the choices I made to make this beer. Assuming some loss from transfer, I am estimating I will have approximately forty eight 12oz bottles, bringing the cost to $2.24 per beer.

The fermentation of this beer is going to take a few weeks, so I’m planning to post at the end of February with an update on all of the steps. Here’s to hoping things go well!

Cheers to you for reading my first blog post and cheers to more adventures for Pool Party Pints in 2023!