One Hop Forward, Two Hops Back

When hanging out with other craft beer lovers or brewers, you often get asked this question: what is your favorite style of beer (to brew)?

I have always had a hard time answering this question. As I said last post, I have mainly tried to focus on experimenting with the different styles, both in brewing and consuming. I slowed down my brewing, so that left me with just the consumption part, and while I preached experimentation, I found I kept going back to the same style: IPAs. I absolutely buy more IPAs than anything else. I started to question why, and began to realize the real reason.

When you go into a bar, brewery, beer shop, home brew house, you will always find an IPA. Everyone makes one. They are wildly popular, and brewers know this. If you want to make money, you have to brew an IPA . The BJCP is even adjusting the guidelines to fit this rapidly growing trend, by greatly expanding the category to encompass many different IPAs (i.e., black, session, red, Belgian). And of course they should! New IPAs variants come out once a week!

Even many of the experimental and interesting beers are IPA variants. Look at Sierra Nevada's recent beer camp with 12 different beers from 12 different collaborations (which I loved). I found it funny that many of the beers were classic styles packed with American hop goodness (i.e. Hoppy lager, Maibock, pale ale). 

Our hop obsession even extends to the low alcohol beers. If you want a low alcohol, or session beer, what will be the easiest style to find it in? IPA. Session IPAs are all over the place. It's even becoming a staple with breweries now. Good luck going to Total Wine and finding much of anything that is 1) under 6%, and 2) is not loaded with American hops. This is arguably worse in restaurants, where you'll be lucky to find more than two selections under 6% (a topic I may expand on in another post).

Now I don't bring this up to bemoan the future of craft beer with IPAs. I love IPAs and high gravity beers, and I completely understand the trend of brewers and bars to sell them. I bring it up because it's relevant to the path I want to take as a brewer.

It's very hard to find low gravity, malt forward beers, so we, at the Toffee Brew House, are dedicating our brewing efforts to creating these beers. If I want to get an IPA, I have 100s if not 1000s of options to choose from. But I could probably count the number malty low gravity beers on my fingers, so I'm going to make them myself.

If anyone is interested in joining me in these efforts, then post a comment on this post. I would love to discuss possible ideas, commercial examples, and recipes. Furthermore, please check out and join Alistair Reece's American Mild Month page! Hes asking that everyone pledge to brew a mild ale in May this year (https://www.facebook.com/AmericanMildMonth)

- Toffee Brew House

And it Shall be Henceforth Known As

It's been awhile since I've posted. Honestly, blogging got put on hold with my work schedule, the holidays, new found soccer obsessions, and newly obsessive online gaming hobbies. While I have many ideas for my first post back, I wanted to start with something light, specifically about my brewing.

When I first started brewing on my own, I had much angst about a "name" for my "brewery." I had never thought too heavily about it. Having no intention to open a brewery, ever (a topic I might cover in another post), I didn't dedicate any time into a name. However, around Christmas time, my dad kept asking about a name. Little did I know, it was for a very nice chalk board for my kegerator. He wanted a name so he could have it on the board (silly me...). I, of course, did not think of a name before Christmas, but my dad decided to just put our last name on it, which works great.

While I didn't think of a name before Christmas, my dads questioning got me thinking about it more. I did need a name. It really gives a basis as a brewer. I couldn't really think of anything solid. Then, this little guy happened (spoiler alert: it's not a baby.)

My wife and I finally got our first dog. We thought a lot about what to name him. We went back and forth on different names, read name lists, and even researched ancient Celtic names (he's a terrier so it seemed fitting). We couldn't really find much. My wife rejected Maximus, but she hasn't seen Gladiator so I understand. 

The other thing that happened in my absence was the World Cup, and my new found love for watching football (soccer). While I could write a whole paragraph on picking an English Premier League team, I'll just cut to the chase and say I picked Everton, AKA the Toffees. 

We finally decided that Toffee would be a perfect name for our dog. He seemed to love it so we are solid. You can probably see where I am going, but that led me to the name of our brewery. First off, I did not want to use the term "brewery." I thought Brew House was more fitting; I brew in my house...

Naturally, Toffee Brew House became the name. I even had my dad work up a fun logo with the dog and the Everton crest. Like I said, I don't plan on opening a brewery, so copyright is of no concern to me.

Up next, I'll be expanding on the basis and purpose of my brew house. Up until now, I've really wanted to experiment with each style. But I've learned that my ultimate goal is to brew things you rarely find in the store anymore: low alcohol malt forward beers.

Commemoration and Emergency Preparedness

So my wife has often encouraged me to brew something that she will enjoy. She has a very particular taste preferences for beers; she only likes a) light fruity beers or b) bourbon barrel stouts over 10%. Being that its Spring (kinda), I thought a light fruity beer would be best. She loves Blue Moon, so I found a couple of recipes that I merged in order to craft this SWMBO witbier (I recently that/s internet slang for "She Who Must Be Obeyed").

We are renting right now, so we have lived in two different places so far. We thought it would be fun to make a beer for each place we have lived in Richmond. Our first was a Brown Porter named after our road, "Old Nuckols" Taddy Porter. Our street now is Quarter Mill, so we decided to call this next one Quarter Milled Wit, which actually fits because most of the grains were not milled. Recipe is as follows:

Vital Stats:
Size: 5.04 gal                            Efficiency: 79.67%                        Attenuation: 78.0%
Original Gravity: 1.060              Terminal Gravity: 1.013                Alcohol: 6.15%
Bitterness: 20.4                         SRM 4.29
Ingredients
5 lb (41.2%) German 2-row Pils - added during mash
4.5 lb (37.1%) Wheat Flaked - added during mash
.25 lb (2.1%) Munich Malt - added during mash
1.0 lb (8.2%) Oats Flaked - added during mash
1.0 lb (8.2%) Rice Hulls - added during mash
6 oz (3.1%) Acidulated Malt - added during mash
1 oz (100.0%) East Kent Goldings (5.5%) - added during boil, boiled 60 m
.75 oz Corriander seeds - added during boil, boiled 5 m
.75 oz Orange Peel - added during boil, boiled 5 m
1 L White Labs WLP400 Belgian Wit Ale
Schedule:
Mash In - Liquor: 4.5 gal; Strike: 164.52 °F; Target: 154.0 °F
Rest - Rest: 60.0 m; Final: 154.0 °F
01:48:17 Batch Sparge - First Runnings: 0 gal sparge @ 168.0 °F, 15.0 m; Second Runnings: 3.71 gal sparge @ 185.0 °F, 15.0 m; Total Runoff: 7.0 gal

Brew Day
Everything went relatively good, with a few minor issues. My mash tun has been leaking since I got it. Luckily I discovered this problem before doughed in the grains. I messed with plastic spigot a few time and maybe said a few curse words. Finally, a quick trip to Original Gravity, my local homebrew shop, solved that problem for the most part.

The trip set my time back quite a bit (few hours)... the sun was pretty much gone when I was done. But eventually, I was mashing in with the grains. I had trouble getting a consistent mash temp, which is an issue I will have to solve for next time. The rice hull addition really helped prevent a stuck mash with all the unmalted wheat and oats, but the draining was still very sloooooow. Took a lot longer than expected. This was also my first beer with real water additions to maintain mash pH and correct for water flavor, so I did some acid malt, calcium chloride, and gypsum additions. I do not have a pH meter, so I will have to see how it turns out. Took my gravity reading at was close to target (little did I know...).



Finally I reached the long awaited boil; a time a relaxation and calmness. Probably one of my favorite parts of brewing, because I actually get to sit down and chill out. This boil was great, and I was able to chill down very quickly with my chiller (despite hotter than average ground water). Hit my volume numbers right on the money.

Then I took the hydrometer reading and got a whopping 1.060! Much higher than my targeted 1.054. Probably due to impatiently checking my refractometer too quickly (it has to cool down when you put hot wort on it). All in all, it just means more alcohol, so WOO! Just have to adjust for the next time.

Brewing seems to never be without minor crises and issues, but as my wife reminded me... its supposed to be fun. At least I got to have one of these after.

                                                      Old Ironsides California Common

AHA Best Beers of 2013... for me.

I recently received an email from the AHA regarding the Zymurgy's best beers of 2013. The email provided a link to pick your favorite 20 beers of the year. I have never done anything like this before, and have only really kept a mental list of my favorite beers. I decided to give it a try, and with much help from Untappd (https://untappd.com/), I was able to come up with a list a 20 of my favorites for the year.

Honestly, I found this pretty challenging. At time, my rank order is somewhat irrelevant. If anything, my list of more of an honorable mention of 20 different beers that I really enjoyed throughout the year. That being said. the top 5 is probably the closet to an actual rank ordered listing. I have put them in bold. Let me know what you think, I am curious to hear other's opinions and I encourage everyone to, first, join the AHA, and, second, do their top 20 list.

1. Ballast Point Sculpin IPA
2. Stone Espresso Imperial Russian Stout
3. Sierra Nevada Celebration
4. Sierra Nevada Narwhal
5. Selin's Grove Brewery Saint Fillian's Wee Heavy
6. Devils Backbone Schwarzbier
7. Lagunitas Little Sumpin' Sumpin'
8. Hardywood Park Gingerbread Stout
9. Midnight Brewery Purdy Mechanic IPA
10. Anchor Steam
11. Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout
12. Foothills Peoples Porter
13. Lagunitas Pils
14. Legend Oktoberfest
15. Center of the Universe Slingshot Kolsch
16. Dogfish Head Craft Brewery 90 Minute IPA
17. Strangeways Brewing Blitzkrieg Bock
18. Troegs Troegenator Dopplebock
19. Victory Prima Pils
20. Midnight Brewery Rockville Red

As you can see, its been a great year for Virginia, and especially Richmond beer. Its good time for the city. I should include some honorable mentions such as:

Legend Golden IPA
Midnight Granite Oatmeal Stout
Lickinghole Creek Tripel
Apocalypse Ale Works Wet Hopped Hoppocalypse

Did I leave any out? Hit me up on Untappd! Username:Boitnottmk

Yeast Comparison: The Competition

As mentioned before, my local home brew shop (Weekend Brewer http://www.weekendbrewer.com/) held a competition for the different beers brewed for the ClusterBrew. My dad and I brewed a Smoked Oatmeal Porter for the competition. He used English Yeast and I used California Common Yeast. I listed the details of the beer and the tasting results in different posts. The next step was the competition and here are the results! (For a more detailed listing go here https://www.facebook.com/weekend.brewer.3)

1st Place: The smoked porter with the Cal Common yeast actually won first place! The judges scored the beers in typical BJCP fashion with a 44/50. All judges agreed on a pleasant smoky character that was well-balanced with the other malts. They also mentioned a creamy texture from the oatmeal. The first place prize was a Blichmann floor burner and a $50 gift card to the Weekend Brewer.

The actual burner shown here has unistrut attached to the side of it. This add-on was not included.

3rd Place: The other smoked porter (with English yeast) actually tied with four other beers for third place. All judges a agreed the beer was well-balanced with a light smoke character and specialty malt. 3rd place prize was a $25 gift card to the Weekend Brewer.


After weighing all the results from the taste tests, and most notably, the Competition. I would say this yeast comparison experiment went pretty well. I would also say the base recipe for the smoked porter is a great one. If you wanted to have a really interesting yeast, then go with the WLP810 (Cal Common), but typical English yeast will work as well.

Special thanks to the Weekend Brewer for hosting the Cluster Brew event!!

Yeast Comparison Results

Its been awhile but the results are in. Some of the results we found were quite interesting.

1. Fermentation: a big difference was the lag time for the yeasts. 002 started right away, after a few hours. 810 took a full day to really start, and then, built up slowly to high krausen.

- This may have been due to the hybrid/ale differences in the yeast. One vial is just about enough for a 2.5 gal batch with an ale, but is a bit short for a hybrid, so underpitching may be a culprit for 810.
- Both beers took about the same time to ferment completely, despite differing lag times, maybe a day difference. 810 = slow but steady 002 = fast and quick
- Both beers started at 1.071 and ended up at 1.020 (6.6%). I thought that was pretty crazy, but they are listed as having very similar attenuation rates.

2. Taste Test
- Both beers had a nice dark brown color, with a nicely formed head that persists. Carbonation was right on the money. I don’t have pictures yet, but I will. No real difference in the color, we will have to inspect it more.
- For our mini taste test, we had a few friends come by and try the beers. They don’t really know much about the difference yeasts, so their bias was limited. My dad and I also tried them as well. Initials reactions were that everyone generally preferred the 810. Both beers had tastes of mocha and roast, but to different degrees. The 002 did not express the malt as well, and even left a touch of esters, that do not really balance that well. The biggest difference was the smokiness, 002 having almost no smokiness and 810 having a bunch. The smokiness a nice rounded bitterness, and did not taste like bacon (which I prefer).

3. Results from others
- People have expressed many differing opinions on this beer. There has been about a 50/50 split for people who prefer one over the other. Only a handful of people have claimed that they do not taste the difference between the two.
- An interesting point when talking to others has been their description of the of the smokiness. Oftentimes, people claimed that the 002 beer had more of smoky character. From this, I would basically conclude that the expression of the smoked malt is neither more or less in either beer, but rather, different in both.

Yeast Comparison Experiment: Robust Porter

My local LHBS does an event called a Cluster Brew. Homebrewers around the area all bring their equipment to brew at the shop. Everyone brews a beer on their own system, and months later they do a mini-competition. Whoever wins gets the honorary trophy and bragging rights. The rules for this year’s competition were that you had to use a flaked adjunct.

Aaaaaaanyway, my dad and I thought this was a great opportunity to do some experimental brewing with two (count 'em TWO!) yeast strains. We also kept our recipe experimental as well. We used a 10 gal igloo single-infusion mash, mashed at 154 for 60 minutes, batch sparged. Had a bit of trouble hitting our mash temp, but a second infusion put us right on target at 154.

Here is the recipe

Fermentables
7.0 lb (48.4%) American 2-row - added during mash
2.7 lb (18.7%) Smoked Malt; Weyermann - added during mash
14.0 oz (6.1%) Munich Malt - added during mash
14.0 oz (6.1%) Crystal 40; Great Western - added during mash
14.0 oz (6.1%) Crystal 75; Great Western - added during mash
11 oz (4.8%) Chocolate Malt; Breiss - added during mash
7.0 oz (3.0%) British Black Patent - added during mash
1.0 lb (6.9%) Oats (Pregelatinized Flakes); Briess - added during mash

Hops
1.0 oz (40.0%) East Kent Goldings (5.0%) - added during boil, boiled 60 m
.5 oz (20.0%) Styrian Goldings (6.0%) - added during boil, boiled 30 m
.5 oz (20.0%) Styrian Goldings (6.0%) - added during boil, boiled 15 m
.25 oz (10.0%) East Kent Goldings (5.0%) - added during boil
.25 oz (10.0%) Styrian Goldings (6.0%) - added during boil

We used our immersion chiller to get down to 68F. We decided then to do a split batch (2.5 gallons each) with different yeasts. WLP810 - San Francisco Lager and WLP002 - English Ale Yeast

What we both did
-We each took home 2.5 gallons.
-Both pitched one vial of respective yeast.
-No starter (we entered at the last minute, didnt have time)
-Both held our beers at 62F for 5-7 days
-Both bottle conditioned with appropriate priming sugar rates, based on style

What we did differently
- Dad had WLP002, I had WLP810
- Dad cold crashed after fermentation ended. I did not
- I did a diacetyl rest at 70F, dad did not (i dont think this really had an effect at all)
The results will be a second post... this one got really long.