20080216 - Musings

Thursday night, Dave came over and we racked his "Wilson's Winter Warmer" into a keg. That was tasting very nice even warm and flat. It's been in the kegerator a couple days and now its cold. I did one force carbonation shake session, but with a small air space, I know I'm going to have to do it one or two more times. If I take some off for tasting a sample, I'll have that much more air space for the CO2 to go in. :) I told Dave he has to give me 6 bottles worth. I'll take three and enter them in the Bluebonnet Brew-Off. The other three I'll share with the ZEALOTS at the March meeting.

I also got my Ahtanum Pale Ale into a keg that night. Great aroma, great taste. I love this recipe. Thanks JB at Austin Homebrew. I'm resting up a bit before I give this one a shake session today.

Last night, I had enough time to rack my British Pale that I dry-hopped with Summit into another carboy. I stole a taste of this one. I'm hoping for that taste of tangerine or orange that the Summits are supposed to have. It was dry-hopped with ony 1/2 ounce. The flavor reminds me more of Cascades right now. Perhaps it is just that I can make out the citrus flavors but not distinguish them as yet. I may have to wait until it's cold and carbonated before the flavor really comes out.

I also took my Vanguard Red and racked it into a keg. It is a little quicker than my normal process of one week in primary, one month in secondary, and then into keg. The FG is a bit higher than I expected. Many times I come in lower than what the recipe expects. I'm going to leave this out of the fridge for another week or two. Perhaps the yeasties can finish it out a bit more.

I've got even one more keg open because I got impatient. My last version of White Oak Porter was overpoweringly wood flavored. I know that I could blend it or wait on it until that flavor smoothed out or diminished, but I'd rather not wait or work on it. Chalk it up to experience. Dumping a 5 gal batch sears in the lesson: Don't leave a beer on oak for too long (without really planning on it). A Porter doesn't have strong enough flavors to compete with strong oak flavors.

My Psychedelic Monk surprised me when it didn't blow the top off the primary. It didn't even foam up into the blow-off tube that I had set up. I was thinking this might be a stuck fermentation, but I can peek inside through the airlock's hole and see that foam still covers the entire top of the beer. This one I may have to let sit up three to four weeks before transferring to carboy. Even there, I expect to wait 3-4 months before kegging. This has the potential to get to 13%.

I'm rested now, off to shake up my Ahtanum Pale Ale.