Brew Dudes Homebrewing Blog

Liberty Hops

On September 29, 2008

I am interested in brewing with Liberty hops. They are an American hop variety that are noble in their aroma and flavor profile…and there is good reason for that. They do have the famous Hallertauer Mittlefrüh hop variety in their heritage. Liberty hops were bred to be more mildew resistant. Here is some more information about Liberty hops.

Origin: America – Developed in 1983 and released in 1991.

Aroma: Of a noble variety. Mild, Pleasant, some spiciness.

Alpha Acid: Between 3.0 – 5.0%

Typical Usage: I think all your typical noble hop styles apply: Lagers, Pilsner, Bock. I saw one source saying it works well in Cream Ales and when brewing with rye malt.

When I get my hands on some, I think I will use them for some Cream ale. I think I am focused on some American style/hops/grains these days.

Indigenous Brewing Ingredients

By John Krochune

On September 25, 2008

In Ingredients

It’s Fermentation Friday for September 2008 and Marcus from Final Gravity is hosting. The topic this time around is:

What indigenous brewing ingredient have you used or would you like to brew with and what style would that beer be?

John here. Not sure if this is a cop out, but I did use some Vermont Maple Syrup for my Maple Porter last year.

Maple syrup has been made in these parts before the Europeans showed up. Someday, it would be nice to collect my own sap and boil it down (we do have some sugar maple trees around here). Until then, I think it’s best to buy from a small farm that made it on the premises.

I think brewing with ingredients that are indigenous to your area is the way to go. If they are from your area, the ingredients are fresh.
Fresh ingredients make good beer.

Plus, beer styles came from brewing using ingredients that were nearby and from environmental conditions. I think as homebrewers, we should continue this tradition…and make our own styles.

What indigenous brewing ingredient have you used or would you like to brew with and what style would that beer be?

For me, Mike, I think the best indigenous ingredient I have used has to be the cranberry. Here in Massachusetts out on the cape cranberry production has been a quiet staple of the agricultural industry. I once made a fantastic wheat based cranberry beer for the thanksgiving holiday. What a great beer. I used fresh local cranberries, fresh local apples and some oranges (non-native) to make a thick relish. I racked the beer after primary onto the relish and and let it sit for another two weeks. The beer was great. Tart and vibrant, it was a surprising treat for those cool fall evenings here in New England.

The best part of using cranberries as a fruit addition is their acidity. Cranberries are so acidic, that once you make then into a relish in a food processor any wild yeast contaminants are killed or greatly attenuated so they don’t infect the beer. So you don’t have to mess around with boiling fruit (which leads to horrible haze) or trying to pasturize the fruit like you would for other types of fruit beers.

Just thinking of that tart beer is making me thirsty….where is that damn recipe????

Who Needs A Blow Off Tube?

By Mike

On September 25, 2008

In Equipment

Yesterday, I went to the basement to get a clean shirt out of the laundry.

Just as I was about to turn off the light I thought: “Hmmm, smells like beer in here…CRAP!”

I went around the corner and sure enough, one of my Cream Ale fermentors had gotten a little aggressive during the night. and was oozing out of the airlock.

I usually don’t have that problem in my bucket fermentors, mainly due to adequate headspace. I also used dry yeast and don’t usually expect such a vigorous fermentation from on packet of yeast. Anyway, I set to cleaning up the mess. Luckily it wasn’t dripping over the edge of the bucket yet, so I caught it just in time.

I noticed one thing that was quite a surprise too. The blow off was all yeast, no hop trub whatsoever. Why is that significant????

Well because this time, rather than just transfer my wort from kettle to fermentor, I made a special effort to remove the break material from the flow. I have a large salad bowl sized stainless steel mesh strainer that I used to use years ago for letting grain bags drip back into the kettle for extract brewing. This session I cleaned and sanitized the strainer and I diverted the outflow from my siphon tube from the fermentor to the strainer. (Essentially, using the strainer as a grant.)

I caught almost all of the hop debris and break material in that strainer and passed clean wort into the fermentor. The clean wort is evidenced by the total lack of stuff in the blowoff. So, I am pretty excited to get a look at these beers when I transfer them to secondary in glass. (Yes, Mr. Skip The Secondary is planning a secondary with these brews.) Needless, to say I am excited about tasting these brews when they are done.

I’ll be sure to reflect back on that when I post about tasting these beers in the near future. For now, I can only dream about Mild and Cream Ale wondrousness.

BREW ON!

Seasonal Changes Are Good For Brewing

By Mike

On September 23, 2008

In General

So after brewing up two batches of Cream Ale and one batch of Mild Ale this weekend, I am reminded how much I appreciate this time of year. I really enjoy the hiss of the kettles and steam rising up from the boil as the temp slowly dips down into the low 50s at night while I brew.

The next big advantage is the temperature stability of the basement right now. My basement fermentation area is a solid and consistent 65F. So my beer has been perking away at a nice 68-70F. It’s just nice to get natural temp stability due to the seasons and not have to use energy with a dedicated fridge.

Of course it will be all short lived and we’ll be writing posts about how to keep the fermentor warm in the cold winter months.

Enjoy it while it lasts…
BREW ON!

Plastic or Glass Homebrew Fermentor

By Mike

On September 22, 2008

In Equipment

I have long been a fan of using plastic buckets for my primary fermentation. They are easy to clean and they make it easy to get the beer in and out. I generally ferment in primary for ten days before either racking to a keg or extended conditioning in secondary. My beers are good and I have never had any issues with the quality of my beers that I can relate directly to the choice of my fermentor.

However, I was recently reviewing the recipes for each of the individual award winners from the latest NHC (National Homebrew Competition). The recipes and their techniques are printed each year in the AHA magazine, Zymurgy.

After reviewing all the winners, I discovered something that I thought was interesting; none of those brewers had fermented in plastic. Almost all the recipes list what they fermented in and it was always glass or steel (glass was used ~95% of the time). I found this quite interesting. If all these award winners were not using plastic, should I switch over to make better beer???

There are a couple other possibilities to explain this. Plastic gets such a bad rap sometimes, that it’s possible people say they used glass to avoid the taboo. But I doubt they would lie about something like that intentionally. No one even mentioned using a “Better Bottle“.

It could be possible that glass is just a “step up” type of choice that many homebrewers serious about better beer brewing make. The choice of glass may have little relevance to the quality of the brew and fermentation; but it could be an indicator of a brewers that are being extra careful about ALL parts of their process.
Surely, it would be interesting to know what would happen if all the same brewers with all the same recipes and ingredient just used buckets, would they have all come out on top still????

Perhaps a few side by side comparisons are necessary to figure it out. I have no delusions that glass doesn’t have some better qualities than plastic, but I still really like the price and the easy cleaning of plastic buckets.

So I was wondering how many readers here use glass exclusively (or stainless) for fermentation? Maybe its time to make the switch BACK to glass.
Thoughts?