
The thing about living in the country is this: you can buy a case of Bud Light or you can buy a case of Busch Light or you can spend $27.98 and buy a six-pack of a microbrew that really isn't a microbrew anymore because corporate greed took over. The beverage choices around these parts are less than glamorous. Now don't start thinking evil things about me: I'm not exactly prone to drinking on a daily basis. I just enjoy the unique flavors that only a specialty beverage can provide. So I decided, with some Danish Cowboy gift certificate assistance, to start brewing my own malt beverages.

There are entire stores devoted to the hobby. Under a law passed in the 1970s by President Jimmy Carter, home brewing of up to 100 gallons of wine or beer per year per adult was made legal. I tried the wine thing. Look up past posts for how that little ongoing debacle turned out. This time, I'm turning to home brewing with a beer kit formulated to create a blonde ale with perhaps a hint of peach flavoring. We're starting out light this time around: the face of Danish Cowboy when he sips a dark beer ("motor oil") is priceless and I want to introduce him to the delights of a quality beverage ever so slowly.

The various proprietors of homebrewing equipment also offer oodles of different kits intended to make hundreds of different kinds of beer. You can make a generic version of a beer type or they even make "clone" kits which attempt to mimic the flavors of commercially produced brews
(Hello Yuengling Porter!)
. For the more advanced, the possibilities are endless as you create your own recipes. In this case, I started off with steeping some crushed specialty grains in about 3 gallons of water.

As the water came to a boil on the stove, I remove the grains and added the hops and the liquid malt extract. A 60 minute boil was then required.

Since my kitchen is prone to boilovers and I am prone to whining when I have to clean up sticky messes, I had to stand by the stove for the entire hour. Thankfully I had purchased some interesting reading to get me started on this new little adventure that I am embarking on.

Post-boil, the "wort" (as the unfermented liquid is called) needed to be brought down to a temperature sufficiently low enough to allow for pitching my yeast without killing them. Note for the future: snow, no matter how cold it is, is an
insulator. I would have been much better off just sitting the pot outside in negative 10 degree temperatures. Much. Better. Off. Also, much less sleepy the next morning.

I finally was able to add the last two gallons of water to it and bring it down to a reasonable yeastie temperature. The whole thing went into the fermenter, a lid with airlock was attached and I put it into my specially-equipped brewing room (i.e. basement) to ferment happily for three weeks. This all happened a week ago and I can bottle it in two more. Name suggestions for this blonde brew, please?
Beauty Creek Blonde and I'll be arriving on the afternoon of May 28! Love you!
ReplyDelete