Hibiscus anyone?

Man, I'm so behind. I'd love to update this blog often but just don't get the time I wish I had. So here I am.... rambling.
Firing up the kettle once again this week, this time attempting to use dried Hibiscus to give a basic Pale Ale an extra shot of something different and interesting. The inspiration came from the wonderful Rosée d'hibiscus from Dieu de Ciel brewery located in St. Jermoe, Quebec.
I really like fudging with recipes and homebrewers are at a great advantage when gambling on a 5 gallon batch of beer. My thinking is to brew a tea using dried Hibiscus ahead of time and add it to the primary rather than pitch the dried hibiscus directly into the brew kettle.Providing all goes well this will be a re-do soon.

As for the brewery, I'm finally getting into the garage and beginning the spring cleaning and making room for a semi-permanent set up for all my brew gear. Lugging my mash tun and brew pots up from the basement to the garage each brew day is a pain the ass but the only solution at this time. Fortunately my wonderful better half puts up with a lot of my crap and is all for giving me a designated area to do my brewing.

Mindless Ramblings

First batch of the year is kegged, on tap, and going down fine. I brewed an English bitter, leaning towards ESB. I hit about 4.5% which makes for a great session beer and this is going down easy.
The magic ingredient in this batch was 1.5 cups of Golden Grahams cereal. Not sure how much it may or may not have added but after listing to Basic Brewing Podcast on using cereal grains I wanted to try something different for myself.

Next up, my go-to Weizen recipe. Not sure where I first started with this recipe but I've tweaked it slightly over the last 3 or 4 batches and I'm very satisfied with where the recipe now sits.

Did I mention how much I'm diggin' my kegerator? I was a little worried about blowing the house up when I started but now it seems so simple. I highly recommend kegging when you're ready for the next level. Cleaning and sanitizing one container is a helluva lot easier than cleaning and sanitizing 4 dozen containers.

2011

6 months since I've last posted with only 2 brews since then. Nothing I'm proud of but c'est la vie. We don't always get what we want. Yes, I finally got my hands on a new kegerator and tapped my first batch of delicious Dry Stout, but a spiffy double-tap kegerator is nothing but an expensive beer fridge if you ain't pouring a dam thing.

I have no plans to set a New Year's resolution to diet, lose weight, or exercise more. Why bother? Ok, maybe I'll cycle more to keep my prettier, better half happy.

What I really want to do in 2011 is brew more of my own beer, drink more of my own beer, and improve on my own beer. There's a certain pride that comes from serving your own ale. Seeing someone smile and give you an honest, "this is really good" response to a sample of something you dedicated your time, energy, and patience to is quite a feeling.

It's not always easy for me to make time and give my undivided attention to a day of brewing, as easy as that may sound. Everyone wants a piece of the Broke Brewer. My brew day usually consists of 4 to 5 hours, preparing, heating, pouring, boiling, cooling. But I also take that time to really think about I want the beer to taste, look, smell. How can I make a better beer? How can I improve my skills? What can I do in my brew day to be consistent from batch to batch.

I know there's always room for improvement. Hey, that's why I'm the Broke Brewer.


So, no gym memberships to buy. No smoking to quit. It's time to just put that recipe together and fire up the brew kettle.

TBW Hombebrew Contest

In case you haven't heard, some great minds have been hard at work putting together the first Toronto Beer Week.

Celebrating all things great about craft beer in Toronto, the week of events will kick off September 20th and run till September 26th.

One of the great events just announced is the TBW Homebrew Competition. To read more about this exciting event, click here...

Old School homebrew

On the plus side we are working through are to-do list as we work around the house and prepare to sell and move to a new house. Of course, that means no brewtime for this brewer.

I was boxing up a number of brew gear, magazines, and books, when I found a classic Homebrew book purchased at a charity sale a couple of years ago. More for a laugh, I paid about 50 cents for "HomeBrewing Without Failures", published originally in 1965. Man, have times changed.

I certainly don't mean to discredit anything that author H.E. Bravery offers in this paperback classic from it's time, but it really makes you see how far we've come in terms of knowledge and ingredients over the years.

Some of the more entertaining tidbits from the book;

- recipes listing"2 oz hops". Not really sure which hop I should go with but it's a start.

- 1/2 Oz of citric acid to any Pale, Brown, or Stout. Further research on this subject leads me to believe the benefit of this is for avoiding chill haze but I'd still be hesitant today.

- Sugar... and a good 2 to 3#'s of the stuff. Whether brewing with extract or as a grain brewer, it appears to be a staple for any and all recipes

- Rolling Pin solution for a grain mill. Never tried it, but I imagine at the time of publication this was really the only option for a Homebrewer wanting to All-grain.

While there's no recipes for Tripels, Saisons, or even a basic wheat the author sticks to what must be the most common ales for it's era that being Pales, Browns, and Stouts with a gentle nudge to the act of lagering.

To the credit of this ancient text, Bravery does educate on some of the basic rules of homebrewing that will never go out of style, that being Quality of ingredients, the need for sanitation and choosing the best yeast available (though I imagine the best of '65 wouldn't rank in the top 50 over the last several years).

And when speaking of the developing brewer who goes through the stages of extract brewing to all-grain, Bravery offers words of encouragement and inspiration as he states "...Such a man will make some extra super beers the like of which will not be obtainable elsewhere".

I only hope that Mr. Bravery is still alive and brewing... and saying I told you so.

Hops, man

I'm entering season 2 of Hop growing and waiting for my first harvest. I purchased 2 Cascade and 1 Willamette and they were only plants, not rhizomes, at the time of purchase so they've come along way since last spring.

Using 20" pots (lack of yardage at the moment), they have sprung back to life after the winter and continue to climb and climb. While I'm hoping to migrate them to a bigger, better garden space very soon, I've been using an 8' piece of doweling in each pot to allow the bines to claw their way up. Using twine, I tied one end of a very, very long piece to the bottom of the dowel and run it up the length of the stick. On top, a small hook to hold the twine in place. Every couple of days, I let some of the twine out to the lower the bines and keep them from going over the top. As my length of bines grow longer and longer, I loop them around the base of the plant pot. The hard part is keeping them from becoming to entangled in themselves and causing a dog's breakfast of the whole thing. A few wild roamers have actually reached out the neighboring plant and tried to climb on board.

It's quite amazing how much growth I notice from when I leave for work in the morning to when I get home at night. These guys can really get away on you fast.

Cascade and Willamette are two of the hardy hop varieties and seem to withstand most of the elements. From my yard they get about 6-7 solid hours of sunshine. Some of the leaves appear to be falling prey to something that's enjoying a little snack but overall, big, green leaves are growing and I'm hopeful that my first few cones should appear soon.

Now if I can only convince the wife to plant some barley.

OCB Week

Yeah, I know I know. I'm suppose to be ramblin' about Homebrew but I think we can all agree that the great Craft Beer of this Province is inspirational to many, pushing us to make great beer ourselves and maybe even reach for the brass ring of becoming a Pro. Cheers to Ontario Beer! Now get out and enjoy some. I'll be heading out to the Session this Saturday in Toronto and looking forward to it.