Brews Reporter

A guy I know recently tried one of the Rauchbiers I’d brewed a few months back, and said something I found both flattering and startling.

“I’ve tried a couple of your beers now,” he said, “and they’re very grown up.”

Grown up? What the hell does that mean, I thought, knowing full well his point. It means showing restraint, not overdoing the alcohol kick or hops or, in this case, the smoke. I’d agree with him on that beer — it had some alcohol kick at around 6-6.5 percent, but nothing “extreme,” and the smoke wasn’t close to the “bacon-in-a-glass” I’d warned him about. It’s a fine beer, complex, interesting and, yes, perhaps grown up.

Why obsess over this? Because I’m going to be a dad in a month. My father has never been much of a beer drinker, but my friends’ fathers were, and they all drank pilseners. American pilseners. Bud. Coors. You know… everything craft brewers have been fighting against.

But I’ve made peace with pilseners. It took me a long time, actually. It never occurred to me that I could possibly like a pilsener until another buddy of mine said, in 2006 or so, that he was tired of the extreme beer movement and sometimes just enjoyed a good pilsener. I sampled a few. Tried to like them, but always went back to my Imperial IPAs and barleywines. Then, maybe a month ago, I actually wanted one. So I began to plan for brewing it.

Bought a 55# bag of pilsener malt from the president of the my beer club and cracked it open this past weekend. It’s based on Victory’s Prima Pils, which I have just sampled and thoroughly enjoyed.

Daddy’s Summer Pils
9.5 # German Pilsener malt
1 oz. Hallertau hop pellets — 3.8% AA (60 min.)
1 oz. Czech Saaz hop pellets — 2.8% AA (30 min.)
1 oz. Hallertau (20 min.)
1/2 oz. Saaz (20 min.)
1.5 oz. Saaz (10 min.)
1 tsp. Irish moss (10 min.)
Saflager W-34/70 dry yeast (1 liter starter)

Mash with 12 quarts of water at 138F. Will stabilize at 120-122F. Rest for 20 min. Raise temp to 140F by adding 5 quarts of boiling water. Let rest at 145F for 40 min. Then raise to 155 by adding 3 quarts of boiling water and let rest for 20 min. Mash out by adding 4 quarts of boiling water to raise to 168F. Let stand 15 min. Sparge to collect 7.5 gallons. Boil down to 6.5 gal. before beginning 60 min. boil.

It won’t be finished until after my son is born, and probably around the time when the grass will need its first cut. It’ll be one of those Saturdays when I’ve got about 8 things on my to-do list, including repair the garage roof after a tree crashed down upon it this weekend. (Yes, the incident was man-made.)

I imagine I’ll be wearing a V-neck T-shirt sagging from my shoulders with the arm pits stained. Maybe some paint on my shredded jeans. I won’t be allowed to hold the baby until I shower, but that’s cool. I’ll joke with him when I take a break to have another sip of pilsener, and try to finish up as fast as I can.

Yep. Pretty grown up.

You just know it’s going to be a good day when you find something like this:

This lovely artifact was discovered in the garage of my brew buddy, Bob. Monday was a gorgeous day, roughly 40 degrees, sunny and we were ready to make some wicked-good Simcoe IPA. It was going to be his first all grain in a while, but the guy has equipment I envy.

Bob has done some really brilliant brews, including a jalepeno pilsner and a nice Barleywine, half of which he’s still conditioning 15 months after he brewed it.

But on this Monday, we were all about a nice balanced IPA, with some grapefruity hop goodness. Simcoe is a wonderful hop, one of those rare breeds that can be used for bittering, flavor and aroma all in one. Citrus and strong, we had a lot of fun sticking our noses way in the pack of pellets and inhaling, deep.

Unfortunately, I had to take off early, but got the recipe, which came in a kit from Midwest. The name is “Simcoe Select IPA:”

10# Golden promise malt
1 # Crystal 55
8 oz. carapils
8 oz. Munich 10L
1/2 oz. Simcoe pellets (60 min.)
1/2 oz. Simcoe pellets (40 min.)
1 oz. Simcoe pellets (20 min.)
1 oz. Simcoe pellets (2 min.)
White Labs California Ale yeast

Single infusion mash with 3.75 gallons of strike water at 168F. Mash for 60 minutes. Mash out with 6 quarts of boiling water. Sparge slowly with 170F water.

After this is when things got a bit hairy, because some guy selling special promotional offers with the Dish Network rolled up and offered Bob about 100 additional channels for no extra cost (for now), so while Bob was handling the paperwork, I was busy not paying attention to exact measurements and stuff. His kettle didn’t have convenient markers on the side for quarts or gallons, like mine — it had some sort of lines that looked like measurements, but we couldn’t figure it out. It was made in friggin’ Italy! Too fancy for a dumb Yank-neck like me.

It was a learning experience in more ways than one. Most importantly, I discovered the importance of routine. Brewing is a process that demands precision, and one thing that helps is knowing your process. Bob has way better equipment than I do, but I couldn’t help feeling like I could have done better at my house. Not because my way is any more effective, but simply because I know my way. I know what tools I need, I know what I need to have ready and when, and I could probably brew a basic IPA blindfolded, with one hand tied behind my back and riding on a unicycle. (Not really, but I enjoy the image.)

I’m sure it’s fine, though. Bob will take care of it. Besides, when brewing an IPA, it’s really just stand back and let the hop magic happen, right?

I played like a champion today. Actually, I played like a champion for the past two weeks.

I’m referring to home improvement/maintenance, which is not inconsequential to homebrewing, because it involved my bathroom.

OK, fine, it’s pink. Heather Pink, to be precise. But I now have a new floor, sink and more room to spread out while cleaning equipment. Also, today, I learned how to prime a water pump that had been running dry… which as I’ve learned, is absolutely central to brewing. Take the “It’s a Boy IPA,” for example. Brewed that one with no running water, and not only was it extremely difficult, but now the beer tastes like cheap cider. I blame sanitation problems… due to not having WATER.

But that is in the past. I have learned the errors of my ways. I have grown as a homeowner and homebrewer. Which is why I’m fairly confident that my latest IPA is going to be, at the very least, quite good.

This is the second IPA recipe I’ve created using a few helpful tricks from Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River. He wrote a great article for the July/August issue of Zymurgy outlining the basics of building a double IPA. My takeaways have been:

1. Simple malt body
2. Mash at low temperatures
3. Use crystal malt sparingly
4. Use a little dextrose (corn sugar) to boost gravity and dry it out a little

The corn sugar thing was a bit tough for me to accept, but last time I tried it, it worked out pretty well. That time, however, I used way more crystal, which gave it a kind of nutty and sweet character.

I also made a big-arse starter for this one, which I hope will leave no sugars behind.

Here’s what I did:

7.5 # Marris Otter malt
4 # U.S. 2-row
1# Munich 10L
1# Biscuit
.75# crystal 40L
.75 corn sugar (final 15 min. of boil)
1 oz. Nugget pellets (90 min.)
1 oz. Centennial (90 min.)
.5 oz. Centennial (45 min.)
1 oz. Nugget (15 min.)
.5 oz. Centennial (5 min.)
1 oz. Nugget (dry hop for 14 days.)
US-05 (1 quart starter)

Mash for 90 min. with 17.5 quarts of 168-degree water. Mash out with 7 quarts of boiling water. Sparge with 6 gallons of 170-degree water for 30-45 min. Collect 7.5 gallons. Boil down to 7 gallons and begin 90 min. boil.

O.G. = 1.082

This beer now maxes out my capacity. I’ve got all three fermenters going — the IPA, Milk Stout and Barleywine. Proud? Absolutely. Done? Not even close.

I know, the name sort of grosses me out, too. Something about the image of a grown man drinking a beverage named “Mother’s Milk” from a pint glass seems wrong. Especially if that pint glass has a nipple on the end. (Oh, I’ve seen them.) But there’s just no other way to describe this one.

My wife is 11 weeks away from delivering our first child — a son — and a milk stout was her post-pregnancy menu request. Cool. I can do that. Even have a recipe, based on Left Hand’s Milk Stout. It’s smooth, creamy and oh so delicious, and I’d been wanting to try out a clone recipe I’d seen in Zymurgy a couple issues ago. Problem is that I’ve retooled my method and begun using a sparge arm. I say “problem” because my wife wanted something modest on the alcohol front — a nice 5 percentish ease-me-back-into the drinking class kind of libation.

What she’s going to get is a little more like … 8 percent .

Sorry, Momma-to-be, but I couldn’t be more pleased with myself. If my calculations are correct (and I’m reasonably sure they aren’t) my efficiency was somewhere close to 90 percent.

I said “DAY-UM.”

Whut?

“DAY-UM.”

No idea what happened, but my theory is that I’ve finally figured out how to use the sparge arm. Go slow, is what I’ve discovered. Sparging took about 45 minutes, which is what I hear you want to aim for. I had a pretty fine grind going on the grains and I also mashed for longer — 90 min. Plus, this recipe used 1 lb. of milk sugar, so that helped boost the gravity. I hope this turns out OK. I’m sure it will. And I cross my fingers that Val likes it. I tried, momma. I tried.

7# pale malt
1# roasted malt
1# lactose (15 min. from end of boil)
.75# Crystal 60L
.75# Munich malt
.75# Chocolate malt
1# flaked barley
.5# flaked oats
1 oz. German Hallertau pellets (60 min.) — 3.9AA
1 oz. UK Golding (15 min.) — 4.9AA
US-05 ale yeast

Mash in with 14.75 quarts of 168F water. Stabilize at 151F for 90 min. Mash out with 6 quarts of boiling water. Sparge with 6 gallons of 170F water using sparge arm. Boil down to 6.5 gallons before beginning 60 min. boil.

O.G. = 1.080.

Reason No. 101 why gas stoves are better than electric: When the power goes out in the middle of a brew session, you don’t have to wait four hours before you can kick things up again.

New Year’s Day, a buddy of mine and I were brewing up a barleywine when, just as I started the boil….DOINK. Complete darkness. At first, we thought it was just us. (There was, after all, four burners, a crockpot and a Wii going.) But nope, just rural New England on a winter’s evening. Kind of par for the course, really. So, we waited… and waited… and waited. Played a round of Tripoley with the wives. Finished off some bottom-shelf bourbon. Twiddled thumbs.

Finally, around 11 p.m., lights came back on and we kicked things into high gear. Didn’t get to bed until 3 a.m., mind you, but I believe we salvaged what should be a nice potent brew that’ll clock in around 9.5 percent.

Pay no attention to the recipe in the image above. I had 1 oz. fewer hops than I’d thought. Here’s the actual recipe:

15 lbs. Marris Otter pale malt
2 lb. Belgian Aromatic malt
1.5 lb. crystal 60L malt
.5 lb. chocolate malt
.5 lb. rye malt
.5 lb. Dark Candi Sugar
.25 lb. Special B malt
1 oz. Northern Brewer hop pellets (90 min.)
1 oz. Kent Golding (90 min.)
1.5 oz. Kent Golding (40 min.)
.5 oz. Kent Golding (20 min.)
Safbrew S-33 yeast (made 1 pint starter)

Mash in with 25 quarts of 150-degree water. Hold at 130-135-degrees for 30 minutes. Add 10 quarts of boiling water to bring up to 153-degrees. Mash for 60 minutes. Add hops according to schedule.

O.G. = 1.095

One final shout out to all my fellow Stillers fans. It was a disappointing season, certainly. But at least we went out with a win. Besides, sometimes it’s nice to enjoy a care-free playoffs. May the best team win, as long as that team is not the Bungles or the Ravens. (I’m quite certain it’s not.)

Holiday travel is all about the detours.

Val and I make the 13-hour trip from New Hampshire to Long Island to Virginia exactly once per year, and when a snowstorm sweeps through the day before you leave, it is no fun. Particularly, when you’re on your way back — exhausted from family, the car packed with gifts and dirty laundry and the workweek grind ahead. Which is why Harrisburg, PA has become a favorite stop of mine.

The state capital of Pennsylvania is pretty much as you might expect — grimy, gray and in desperate need of a good power-washing. But it is beautiful in its own way, and even better, has a cluster of breweries located just off I-81. There is every reason to pull over for a respite and hour-long sample session.

Last year, we visited Troegs, which I adore. No such luck, this year. We were running too late for the 4 p.m. closing. But armed with a Mid-Atlantic Brewing News, I was not deterred. I called around to a couple other places and hit upon Appalachian Brewery. I called — C’mon by, they said. Open late that night.

I dug the look. A downtown brewery (sort of) that made the most of its space, I could definitely see hanging here on a regular basis if I were a Harrisburg resident.

The beer menu was expansive, if not all that impressive. I did an eight-beer sampler, which had your standard pale ale, wheat, IPA, stout and porter. Of the regular line-up, their organic Brown ale was the best. Nutty with just the right amount of body and sweetness, it also finished clean. The worst of the bunch was their IPA. Not sure what happened here, because I love IPAs and am usually pretty forgiving. But this tasted soapy and slightly sweet. Almost like they didn’t let it finish fermenting. It’s one of the few IPAs I’ve left on the table, unfinished.

However, our barkeep more than made up for some of the drawbacks. She had the raspy voice of someone who’s experimented with her beverage choices and aimed for the higher decibel levels at a football game. She also came right out with her plans for the weekend. “So guys, I’m going to jump in the river,” she said, explaining that it was some swim event for charity, while giving the impression that she would have done it anyway.

But that’s not why I liked her. She knew her stuff. All too often, I’ll walk into a brewery and want to geek out with staff, only to discover that they know little or nothing about the beer they are serving. This person was definitely game, telling me why they had to boost the hops in the brown (because the organic malted barley is smaller and more concentrated, therefore sweeter) and also giving me the actual ABV on this year’s Weizenbock (8 percent) instead of the stated (7.2). She also hooked up my pregnant wife with a free ginger ale and me up with a NICE pour on the barleywine, which was my favorite overall.

If you’re looking for an objective opinion, taste beer at home or in some neutral setting. External experience too often interferes with your pallet, I think. That said, Appalachian was exactly the road trip experience I was looking for.

So, lagers. They scare me. And I ain’t afraid of much — except maybe, Funions, and when my neighbor’s cousin comes over with his chainsaw to do a little tree trimming.

Lagers scare me because they are slow, and tempermental and require so much more caressing than an ale. Which brings me to the Rauchbier I brewed last week.

Five days after I pitched the yeast, there was nothing going on. The airlock was flat dead and I had no idea what was going to happen with this beer. I panicked, sent out an appeal to the AHA listserv, and got a number of responses. They ranged from optimistic (”All I can say is Relex and have a Homebrew! Give life a chance – you will be pleasantly surprised.”) to borderline scolding: (”Always use a starter with that yeast. Sounds like you didn’t, so after four days with no activity, there is a very good chance that your wort will have an infection going.”)

There were a lot of common threads, however. And if I take away anything from this experience, it will be to make a starter. ALWAYS. The president of my brew club, Upper Valley Beer Society, told me he has a 5 liter flask that he uses to prepare his lager yeast starters. Also, a lot of people said to pitch warm — around 70 degrees — to get things started, and then cool it down to 50 for fermentation.

Everybody had some helpful hints, but perhaps the best advice came from Dave Houseman, a regular contributor to Zymurgy and one of four beer reviewers for its “Commercial Calibration” section. Here’s what he said:

Assuming the vial of yeast was viable, and no reason to think it wasn’t, the yeast you pitched is multiplying and growing. It should end up doing the job. Perhaps by the time you find other yeast you’ll see fermentation activity. If you pitch a 11g package of dry lager yeast that will be sufficient, but rehydrate it per the package instructions. The only urgency is that you may have given a head start to whatever wild yeast or bacteria is in the wort and it’s multiplying like the yeast and may give you some off flavors. So I’d get the dry yeast. Before you pitch, just check to be sure that in fact fermentation hasn’t started. Besides a starter having more yeast cells, you know it’s good because it was actively fermenting. If they had been a problem with the vial of yeast you’d kow it when you pitched this into the starter.

I took his advice. I got the Fermentis Lager Yeast, Saflager S-23, rehydrated it 2 cups of wort and pitched at 55-degrees F. A day and a half later, and my brew is a bubbling.

So, lesson learned. If I make another lager, I’ll be sure to make at least a 2 liter starter and give the wort plenty of music to aerate. Also, I’ll remember to pour myself a sipping beer and have a little patience.

Smoke is among the more dichotomous aromas. I love it in barbecued brisket and ribs. Hate it on my sweater. Love the smell of a woodstove on a chilly evening. Hate it on someone’s breath.

In beer, it’s more complex. (But isn’t everything?) I love smoked beers, but it can be overdone. I’m pushing that threshold with my latest creation, an honest attempt to replicate the smokiest beer I’ve ever met — Schlenkerla’s Marzen Rauchbier.

While making this, I got to break in my new sparge arm.

It took me about 45 min. longer than normal, and while I soooooo want to believe it was worth the extra time, I can’t go there just yet. I got around 73% efficiency. Meh. Good, especially considering the amount of malt I used, and given the gravity, it should be a 6% alcohol beer. But if pressed for time, I’ve got no problem batch sparging. I’ll keep at it, though. I’m a first-timer, after all.

If you’re interesting in trying it yourself, I’d recommend checking out the following video, first:

I’m also lagering the beer — another first. It’s a risk considering I’ve got no basement. But my log home is leaky and cold, so if I’m going to try this, now is the time. We’ll see with this monkey. We will see.

7 lbs. pilsner malt
5 lbs. Weyermann smoked malt
1 lb. Munich 10L
8 oz. black patent malt
1.25 oz. Hallertau hops (8%) — 60 min.
.75 oz. Hallertau hops (8%) — 15 min.
White Labs Oktoberfest/Marzen yeast WLP 820

Single-infusion mash with 17 quarts of 172-degree water for 60 min. Sparge with 6 gallons of 170-degree water. (With sparge arm, should take 60-90 min.) Collect 7 gallons. Boil down to 6.5 gallons before beginning 60-min boil. Cool down and pitch yeast at 60-degrees. Ferment in primary for 21 days.

O.G. = 1.066

So brewing on Mondays is becoming a regular habit. So is crock pot recipes. Today, it’s a pot roast, which would be lovely with my Rauchbier.

Just for shigs and tiggles, here’s the recipe for that, taken from allrecipes.com:

4 pounds chuck roast
salt and pepper to taste
1 packet dry onion soup mix
1 cup water
3 carrots, chopped
1 onion, chopped
3 potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 stalk celery, chopped
Directions

1. Take the chuck roast and season with salt and pepper to taste. Brown on all sides in a large skillet over high heat.
2. Place in the slow cooker and add the soup mix, water, carrots, onion, potatoes and celery.
3. Cover and cook on low setting for 8 to 10 hours.

The fresh hop “It’s a boy IPA” is bottled and, an immediate lesson — don’t be so quick to pull the trigger when dry hopping. Especially not with homegrown hops, given that you don’t know how much lupulin you’ve got.

Nevertheless, it came out good. Really good, actually, but is not the hop monster that my co-brewer Bob and I were hoping for. I crammed 2 oz. of the mystery hops in the secondary and let it sit for a week. And while it is nice and citrusy, I was kind of holding out for something with a bit more aroma. Carbonation should help, but with an alcohol presence of 5 percent and the lower-than-expected IBUs, this is a pale ale, plain and simple.

Whatever. I’ll take it. At least it is fresh and delicious. Unlike this unholy concoction I tried at a buddy’s house on Friday night. I’m all about being brave with cuisine, but Jungle Joose shouldn’t be part of anyone’s evening menu. (Shouldn’t be part of their morning or afternoon menu, either.) It’s one of those unfortunate combinations of an energy drink and alcohol, something NEVER to be tried at home, kids. This bright green, 9.9 percent ABV dreck looks like antifreeze and tastes like sour green apple Jolly Ranchers, mixed with death.

My body was so confused after trying this. I wanted to go to sleep and run through a load-bearing wall — at the same time. I’ve since heard similar reports from the other guys who tried it, and my wife informed me that the FDA is currently trying to ban this stuff. Jungle Joose is sooooo wrong. I honestly have no idea what is in this can? That color of green doesn’t exist in nature. It probably glows in the dark, like airport runway paint.

Hey, some people may like this “Joose.” But if you need a second opinion, take it from this guy:

Don’t watch the whole thing. It’s not worth it. But his reaction — and he doesn’t strike me as a person of particularly high taste — should tell you everything you want to know.

Take away? Put into your mouth only those foods and beverages with ingredients you know. At least, ingredients you can pronounce. Even better, ingredients that you’ve grown yourself. My fresh hop beer is tasting better already.

Anytime I travel, a visit to the local brewery or brewpub is on the agenda. These days, every major city and certainly most tourist destinations have their own offering of oat sodas, which I think gives a window into local culture. Like a lot of businesses, breweries survive by appealing to the local population and regular visitors.

And so, if that theory holds, what could you possibly expect of a place like Vegas?

After I visited last week, I can tell you this — “local taste” is something of an oxymoron.

Being out West, sandwiched between great beer states like California and Colorado, I was expecting to find some good stuff. But Vegas is a city populated by tourists, the majority of which are NOT looking for a tasteful experience. It was easier to score coke (not that I accepted any offers) than a decent beer. Nobody goes to Vegas to drink beer. And no one should. Which means that you get, at best, a lot of middle-of-the-road offerings, the culinary equivalent of eating chicken in a steakhouse.

Take The Pub at Monte Carlo. This place boasts 50 taps, which if you were in southern California or New England, means you could reasonably expect to find 30-40 decent beers and several of which you’d never heard of. Not so much in this overpriced watering hole. These swill merchants dedicated roughly half of their taps to InBev-Anheuser Busch products, and the rest to safe choices such as Blue Moon and other craft versions from corporate breweries. They serve it up in 20 oz. “pints” (gee, thanks) and charge you $8 for the convenience. I left heavy in my belly, light in my wallet and wondering how these jagoffs stayed in business.

I wasn’t going to judge the city’s beer taste on one mediocre bar, however. Vegas also has a couple local brewpubs, including Sin City Brewing Co.

Certainly, this was a lot better. It is not trying for brilliance, however. When I showed up, they had four beers on tap — a stout, amber, German weisse beer, and a Czech-style pilsner. I tried three of them — amber, Weisse and Czech pilsner — and can confidently say “Meh.” All were solid examples of the style, but nothing special. These guys are playing it safe. They don’t want to offend anyone, which is odd, given its name. But consider its location. Vegas may be over the top in every way, but the people who flock to the city have probably already burned their taste buds with cigarettes and tequila, and will not appreciate the subtle biscuit-y malt in an Oktoberfest or hop profile of an English IPA. Toss it back and head to the craps table. Maybe that is why our bartender kept trying to talk us into doing liquor shots. (Note the Jagermeister dispenser beneath the bar sign.)

Perhaps the best pound-for-pound selection we found was, randomly enough, at the bowling alley in The Orleans.

It didn’t have a lot, but there was New Belgium’s Fat Tire and the Tenaya Creek Brown Ale (another local brewery). Fat Tire is always a good standby and I found the brown to be pretty damn good. Given Tenaya’s lineup, I probably should have visited there. It seems more willing to test the limits, with a barleywine and several Belgian styles. Ah well, it was our last day in Vegas. I was tired, poor and just wanted to get the hell out of there.

This is not to say I didn’t have a good time. I did, but it was in spite of, rather than because of, the beer. At least I got to see this fabulous lady mullet.

This, in case you were wondering, is the taste of Vegas.