Trip to San Diego

Last weekend I took a few days off work to head down to San Diego to go camping with my Dad and QUAFF (Quality Ales Fermentation Fraternity). QUAFF is the big home brew club in San Diego with lots of members. I mentioned in another post that I've been camping with this club before to Aqua Caliente, but since I had so much fun last time I figured it would be another great opportunity to meet more people with similar interests. The timing was perfect because of Mother's Day and it happened to be my dad's birthday that Saturday.
So anyway, that next morning before we headed out to the campsite, my dad and I wanted to check out Intergalactic Brewing Company, which was just recently opened by a guy I went to high school with, Alex Van Horne. After touring the brewery and bombarding Alex with a billion questions my dad and I headed down to Balboa Park for a San Diego Brewery Exhibit that was in town. I'll include a picture or two of the exhibit but it was pretty fascinating to see the evolution of what San Diego has ultimately become.

Finally, hit the road with several growlers from Intergalactic and Beachwood. Because I google mapped the the route to get to Lake Morena, I saw that we had to drive through Alpine. It didn't take much convincing to have my dad stop off there for a few samples and what's another growler?
So eventually, we got to the campsite and set up our tent. We met up with the rest of the QUAFF club members and immediately started sharing beers. I met lot's of great people while I was down there, homebrewers seem to just be so easy going and down to earth.
Later in the night, everyone seemed to be bouncing around from site, drinking beer from each others Jockey set-ups. I eventually got to try this guy's beer which is a strong ale aged for 2 years... It was a Strong Ale known as "Creeping Death" nicknamed because its so easy drinking and so high in alcohol. It was brewed with a bunch of different dark fruits and had 5 different yeast strains to finish it off at 17% abv. Needless to say... "Creeping Death" got the best of me and I my head was hurting pretty bad for most of the next day. The 95 degree weather wasn't helping my situation either.

At one point, some of the members from the club began roasting a pig on a manual spit for a potluck scheduled for dinner. The pig was roasted for 8 hours, totally worth every minute too... That night was more mellow than the night before. I went to bed kind of early and felt great the next day. Had my steak and eggs and we hit the windy roads back to Rancho Penasquitos. Because it was Mothers Day, we relaxed at home and spend some quality family time together. We had an unfortunate incident that afternoon that later resulted in having to put down my childhood pet Abbey. She brought nothing but happiness to our family so it was very difficult to see her go. She was 13 years old and not getting any younger. We all miss her very much and will never forget her as she was a true member of our family. Here's a picture of her as a puppy with Beau our other faithful companion probably sometime circa 1999.
Anyway, it was a quick trip but I was very glad to be down in San Diego with the family this last weekend. I'm sure I'll be down there relatively soon with the San Diego County Fair beer entries due next month. Until then, Cheers!

Cascade Pale Ale

I feel like I've been doing a bunch of obscure beers lately so I wanted to switch it up a bit and brew a crowd-pleaser for when the non-beer geeks come over. I often find myself in a situation where I'm offering beer to friends who like beer but who maybe are not super deep into the craft scene. I then realize, shit... I don't have any beer styles on tap that many people know of... For example, I have 4 beers on tap right now... A whiskey barrel aged Russian Imperial Stout, a very hoppy session IPA, a peat smoked Scotch Ale, and a Czech Pilsner... So, you don't like smokey things... okay...so you don't like whiskey.... okay.... so you don't like very hoppy beers... okay wellllll now you have one option. A pilsner.

So anyway, I want to probably work on a few beers to have on tap this summer in order to give our guests a few more options just in case they are too skeptic to try new things. With that being said, I mentioned in another post that Summer is really when the session beers come out anyway. I haven't brewed an American Brown ale lately, those are always fun. Maybe a basic IPA or Imperial IPA, an American Stout, a Saison perhaps? This is just myself brain storming but I think it's time to hold off on the cryptic styles for bit. Although I do have some fun things fermenting away in the closet, they can be released at strategic times... I just mean, one strange beer at a time.

It's been 10 weeks in the barrel as of yesterday and I finally kegged the Russian Imperial Stout that was sitting in my whiskey barrel. Bad news... it tastes oxidated as all hell. I kinda figured it would be because I've been trying it periodically. I think that, there, in lies my problem... I've always been impatient for beers which is why brewing the big ones are so difficult for me. I think if I would have just left it alone for the two and some months it would have been much less oxidated. The worst part is it's not even the sherry oxidation notes.. it's the wet cardboard notes that make it almost undrinkable. Anyway, I'm carbonating it right now to see if a little gas in suspension does anything for the flavor profile... who knows..? Going back to the other beers I have in my closet, I have the 100% Brett IPA which I think is coming along VERY nicely... I'm a little hesitant to take a gravity reading because I just don't want to risk contaminating my other beers until I have a second thief... It smells incredible and looks great. The only other beer I have in the closet is the Habanero Black IPA. Here's the deal, Black IPA...Vermont Ale....Cascadian Dark Ale... Black Ale... what ever you want to call it... I took a gravity reading this morning and it tastes great... I used the San Diego super yeast which is kind of weird to me... I always get a bunch of off flavors in the first week then they drop out or get reabsorbed by the second and third week so I think it's on the right track. Either way, it's nice and hoppy, very dark without the roasty aromas, thanks to Sinamar. I plan on dry hopping it but I don't want it to butt heads the habaneros. I haven't put them in yet, still deciding on a dry hop variety.

Okay, so that was mostly about other shit... I know. So, this beer I brewed today was basic compared to my current beers but I think it's for good measure. As I normally do, I'll put the recipe down below. It's an American Pale Ale. Yes, another very broad category, but it's classic in the hop choice (cascade) and the other flavor and aroma profiles from the grain follow suit. Although, I did used Chinook for bittering, I wanted to keep the amount of hops somewhat under control in this recipe. Going into the fermentor it looked nice an clean, I really like the color. I always have success with the White Labs 001 as a house strain... but I'm interested in trying maybe the Chico strain or possible looking into see what Dogfish Head's house strain is... It's what ever is in the 60 and 90 minute and you can tell recently in their 'Rising Bines' collaboration with Sierra Nevada Brewing. Cheers.

Cascade Pale Ale - 5.4% (Brewed on 5/6/13) 6 gallons

10.5# American 2 Row
1.5# Crystal 60L

1 oz Chinook @ 60 min
1 oz Cascade @ 10 min
2 oz Cascade @ 0 min

WLP001 (California Ale)

(5/9/13) Here's a sequence of the first 3 days of fermentation starting with the yeast pitch.

Czech Pilsner

Pilsner... Czech Pilsner... Don't I mean lager? Yeah, well it's a lager. In fact, All pilsners are lagers, but not all lagers are pilsners. A lager, in short, is a beer fermented with lager yeast (Saccharomyces Pastorianus). Oh... okay now it all makes sense. Well, not really. In the vast world of beer styles, there are really only two types, ales and lagers. The main difference between the two is the type of yeast you added for fermentation. That's it? Yeah, pretty much. However, there are plenty of other factors that you might want to look into while building or brewing a recipe in order to make it drinkable. The main idea to keep in mind is that LAGERS, unlike ALES, need to be brewed at a much cooler temperature, we're talking around 45-55 degrees. So, unless you have a basement that stays around those temps year round, you're going to need to have some sort of refrigeration unit to keep things chilly, especially in the Summer months. Additionally, because temps are colder, fermentation happens much, much slower. At least double the time a traditional ale would take. On top of that, the pitching rate needs to be much higher of a cell count compared to an ale. Just keep that in mind...

So, let's go back to lager types. If all pilsners are lagers but not all lagers are pilsners, what other types of lagers are out there? A LOT. American Lagers, Bocks, Dopple Bocks, Baltic Porters, Festbiers, Helles, Vienna Lagers, the list goes on. In fact there's more lager beer brewed and consumed in the world than ales. Seems unlikely since there are so many more ale styles out there, but you need to think about who's drinking the beer. Which brings me to American or European lagers. Coors Original is a lager. It's not a pilsner. Budweiser brews lager beer, not pilsners. These particular beers being brewed are stylized as American Lagers due to the amount of corn and/or rice being added. They are essentially watered down, low ABV, "sessionable," adjunct beers with the sole purpose of easy, one dimensional drinking. I'm not one to knock anyone for making or drinking such product and I feel it definitely has a place in today's beer drinking community, and always will. However, I'm not really into the whole one dimension flavor thing, so I searched elsewhere for lager inspiration for my homebrew.

Ok, back to Czech Pilsner. This lager style is a simple, yet extremely flavorful beer that comes with quite the flavor profile. These beers are basic in ingredients but quite complex in hop aroma as well. The Czech, or Bohemian Pilsner -- I think is what BJCP refers to it as -- is brewed with traditional European ingredients. Monrovian Pilsner malt is recommended but it's harder to find in the United States. The next closest is probably German Pilsner, full bodied grain with a nice malt flavor. The Czech Pilsner is also know for its spicy/earthy hop flavor and aroma, so keep that in mind too...

So, what's left? The YEAST, a lager yeast of course. When building my recipe I was looking into what White Labs has produced and stumbled on WLP800 (Pilsner Lager). From the White Labs website, "Classic pilsner strain from the premier pilsner producer in the Czech Republic. Somewhat dry with a malty finish, this yeast is best suited for European pilsner production." Ok, that was easy. Anything else I should be looking at...? I've got the recommended malt, yeast, hops... Is water important?.... Hell yes it is... SOFT water is a must! Avoid hard water at all costs... It wont ruin the beer but it will certainly leave you with a minerally aftertaste and not give that quintessential smooth, refreshing mouthfeel that lagers are know for. Long Beach has moderately hard tap water, so I decided to blend distilled water with arrowhead spring water. I did about three parts distilled to one part spring water. I wanted to get a little bit of minerals in there because the yeast love it and it's all about making them happy.

Lastly, before I include my recipe I want to mention a protein rest and diacetyl rest. Protein rests are used in the mash for certain beers in order to break up the longer chained proteins at a lower temperature. This contributes to a clearer beer by reducing the chill haze as well as helping to lend a crisper finish. I want to make a note that I did NOT end up doing a protein rest, but a single infusion mash for a light body (148 degrees) for 75 minutes. Some people will tell you that the protein rest makes all the difference but I took a risk on this one and left it alone. Now, a diacetyl rest is used in order to clean up the beer a bit from the diacetyl let over from cold fermentation. This is achieved by slowly ramping up the temperature in the fermentation process as it comes to an end. This will leave the beer cleaner in taste and free of any off-flavors still lingering. I feel a diacetyl rest is always necessary when brewing lagers. After the lagering phase (week 4-8) in fermentation, bring the temperature up to about 60 degrees and hold for a day or so... I usually keep it at 60 deg for 48 hours then crash the temp one last time before kegging.

Czech Pilsner 5.4% Brewed 1/28/13 (6 gallon recipe)

10# German Pilsner

2 oz Saaz @ 60 min

2.5 oz Saaz @ 30 min

1.5 oz Saaz @ 5 min

1.5 L Yeast Starter WLP800 (Pilsner Lager)

Also, I wanted to mention that I aimed to accentuate the Saaz aroma with late addition hops. I wanted to promote the spicy aroma without having to dry hop the beer. I would say it definitely worked. This Czech Pilsner is herbal, spicy, floral, very refreshing for summertime. Cheers!