Brew Day - Apricot Pale Ale

Things never go according to plan on brew days. I think a skilled brewer already knows this fact, and utilize their experience to take quick corrective action to save the brew. Sh#t happens as they say. So, since I made every mistake under the sun brewing my Apricot Pale Ale, I figured I'd elaborate on my corrective actions to see if anyone had any ideas they'd like to share, or maybe help some brewer noobs out there hone in their own skills.

First problem: Forgetting things until the last minute. I almost forgot the 5.2 (a powder that gets the acidity of your water to the ideal levels for your mash). I did forget about the whirlfloc tablet, but was able to add it later on. I didn't have any yeast nutrients, not that, that mattered with how well the starter performed. The point is, add your additives to your brew day planner (I use beersmith), and set the additives out right next to your brewing setup so you have to walk past them 20 times.

Second problem: Know your system. I just installed the 5500 watt elements in my brew kettle and hot liquor(water) tank from the electric brewery. It's incredible how fast it can heat 8g+ of water. Which leads us to our problem. Know your boil off figures (how fast your system boils off wort/water). When it came time to cool the wort, I should have had 5g left, and instead, had only 3.5g! The garage had clouds of steam hovering around the ceiling. The simple corrective action - just add more water (which is when I remembered to add the whirlfloc tablet. I boiled just long enough to sterilize the wort, and give the hops a little more time. Which leads us to problem #3.

Third problem: Timing. Since I didn't know how fast my system boiled off water, I was guessing at the hop timing. I hit my volume levels after only a 20 minute boil with the hops - which is part of the reason I ended up with 3.5g. The element in the boil kettle comes on slow, but once it's hot, it tears through your water volume. I estimated I was losing about 1g every 30min - which is 2x as fast as the propane fired system I used to use. That was one of many problems with the hops, but by simply adding more water, I was able to extend the boil time, and get my volumes back in line. The good news is, at that boil rate, their should be a hint of any DMS!http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

Fourth problem: Know your hydrometer. Your brew day planning sheet (in beersmith) gives you estimates of where your original gravity (the sugar content of your wort) should be before you boil off some of the water. I thought the efficiency of my system was off because I'd get 45% efficiency when everyone else would get 65-70% on average. The light bulb finally went off (hey...better late than never!). HYDROMETERS ARE CALIBRATED TO 60 DEGREES! Not the 140 degree plus wort I was pulling. There are calculators online that can give you an accurate adjustment based on the temp/og reading you get. As soon as I plugged my numbers in the calculator, it came out to an OG of 1.040. Beersmith estimated I'd get about 1.039!

Fifth Problem: Hop leaves don't act like hop pellets. The pellets practically dissolve during the boil. Hop leaves however, just sink to the bottom. They're extremely adept at clogging your plumbing in the most annoying locations. When I tried to start cooling the wort, the hop leaves almost immediately clogged the pump housing. Not a big problem, simply removed the pump housing and cleaned it, but it took probably 20-30 minutes. During that time, I added water straight to the wort, and brought it back up to a boil, while re-adding the hops to give them some more time to soak - this time using a HOP BAG, so they wouldn't clog my plumbing. The hops that were in the wort, I strained out into a bucket, and trust me, holding a 20g steel kettle while pouring out the wort is a man's job. That thing isn't lite!

Sixth problem: Avoid stupid mistakes. Once I finally got to cooling the wort, the process began to flow smoothly. The wort had already been strained, so I just pumped it straight into a 6.5g carboy that had been sterilized. It's busy fermenting at about 65 degrees. The last problem was that I forgot to put a bit of gin in the air lock, so it was open to air all night. Hopefully, that won't create any sour tones in the brew!

All in all, brew day was an adventure to say the least. I think it means I'm out of practice, so I'll have to brew a whole lot more! :)

Happy Brewing,

Jeff

Updates, Happenings, and Occurrences

Hi Friends! So I know it's been a while since my last post. A lot of things have been happening with the family business between travel and real estate deals. So far I've been to Las Vegas and Orlando, and Boston is right around the corner. We're also looking at a significant investment property for the family call center here in Statesville. In my opinion, one of the nicest buildings in Statesville may soon be home to Answerphone of America and the telephone answering service. Here's a picture:



The good news is it looks like the deal is becoming more and more likely, and it will get us out of our current location that we've been shoe horned into for so long (not to mention the area isn't the greatest). The real estate deal looks like a lock tight commercial deal that should generate a decent cash flow for years to come. The bad news is it looks like it will be a significant investment personally on me and my wife's part, so the brewery is going to be delayed fairly substantially. While not my ideal choice, the safety and security this deal represents compared to opening a brewery is a no-brainer, and I'm very excited about it.

The brewery looks like it will stay in the garage for now, where I'll be working to perfect my different recipes and experiment with different ideas to create unique and tasty beers! Right now on tap, we've got a hefe, a blonde, and a brown ale. All almost crystal clear, crisp (with the exception of the brown) and delicious! My pumpkin ale is still a bit of a disappointment, and I'm still hoping it will mellow out, but so far, no dice.

Anyone's welcome to come on by for a good brew anytime! Hope to see you soon!
~Jeff

Updates: 8-15-11 - The Knob Hits The Beach!

Hey everyone! After a great week and a half at the beach, it's back to the daily bump and grind (got a few shots below). Have a lot of travel coming up for work, and I'm looking forward to hitting up quite a few craft breweries. I'll be in Vegas, Orlando, and Boston in the coming weeks.
On The Beach

Bar Knopping (Get it? wocka! wocka! wocka!)

More Foolishness




Had a great day over at Chuck & Chad's place yesterday where the beer never stopped flowing, and the pizza was hot and spicy! Got to make a few new friends and even ran into an old friend I played ball with back in the day (ahhh the good ole days)! We, and by we - I mean Chad, brewed 20g of NoDa-rized. Got to try some award winning baltic porter, along with some other great porters and ipas. Their place could definitely be considered hop heaven when it comes to brews!

As for the brewery, I continue to piece together our pilot system for the main brewery. The 1/2bbl system will be fully electric, which will hopefully save some cash on propane. I'm thinking about adding a HERMS system to the pilot. The plans for the system can be seen at theelectricbrewery.com - a very well put together piece of machinery!

Our expected launch date has been pushed back due to repairs that we're undertaking on the house. Originally, we were looking at October, but with all of the planning, testing, gov't red tape, etc, we're now looking to (hopefully) open on St. Patty's day next year with a big party. We're looking to rent a location in January of next year, and build out the brewery.

The other option we're considering is a much slower roll out - which is a definite possibility. Instead of diving into the game with a 3bbl system, we might hold out until we can afford a 10-15bbl system. Let's face it, it's rare for a brewer to become a millionaire in this business, but brewing on such a small system would be very difficult to make any profits off of. Profits from a 3bbl system aren't projecting that high, and I've heard to make any money, you have to operate at least a 7bbl system. It'll be a difficult choice to make as I'm one of the least patient people on the planet, and waiting until St. Patty's day of next year is killing me. We'll continue running the numbers and stick with that plan until we see that it can't work. Either way, we'll continue perfecting the brews and loving life!

Cheers!

Jeff

Hob Knob's Official Logo & Latest Happenings!

Well, here it is! Hob Knob's official logo. Personally, I think it turned out great! It's got a few elements of symbolism in there. The most obvious is the oak tree. My favorite areas of Charlotte and Cornelius have towering oaks around them. Absolutely beautiful. Oak is a symbol of strength. From what I've learned, you've got to be a very strong company to break into the retail markets like grocery stores. It'll take persistence and brewing great beers that people demand in the stores. It'll also take long nights of brewing to keep up with the demand on such a small system. All are tasks that I think we'll be up for.

The Scotsman's Wee Heavy turned out wonderful, despite the hectic brewing day. However, the Kurbis Oktoberfest and Northern English Brown Ale have some tweaking to be done on their recipes. The Scotman tastes darn near perfect. It's so well balanced, you'd never guess it was tipping the scales at 10.2% ABV. It's very malt, with some slight bitterness, but very very smooth. The flagship for the brewery is just about set! The Kurbis pumpkin ale may be over spiced. Though spices tend to mellow with age, so since we're waiting until oktober to drink it, hopefully it will be good to go. I tasted the N. English Brown - though it was just off the trub after transfer to keg this morning - and it tasted like crap. Hopefully, it was just the trub I was tasting moreso than the beer. We'll give it some time to settle out and clear, and then give it another shot. I must say though that the aroma is very, very sweet, so the balance isn't really there from the hops. Maybe some older hops from my local provider killed some of the alpha acids. Time will tell. In the meantime, I'm gonna go try some more of that Scotsman's Wee Heavy!

Big Box Store Brand Beer? Say it ain't so!

I don't really like the idea of big box companies jumping into the craft brew market, but that's just what Harris Teeter is planning to do. Besides the obvious reason I don't like the idea (less shelf space), it could also slow the craft brewery movement currently underway. When a company is primarily concerned with profits, they look for short cuts. Cutting corners almost always produces lower quality beer loaded with adjuncts (like corn & rice) instead of natural, high-quality ingredients. If I put my brown ale next to a harris teeter (or a michelob/budweiser/miller/coors etc) brown ale, and if their beer is $7.99 and mine is $9.99, the consumer is going to go with the cheaper one. If the cheaper one sucks...do you think they're going to come back to the $9.99 brown ale from Hob Knob? Of course not.

I think it is also a bit deceptive to put a different label on it other than Harris Teeter (instead calling it 'barrel trolley'). It's obvious why you would change the brand name. No one's going to buy a harris teeter beer, or sam's choice beer, or kroger brand beer.

Craft breweries do one thing. They focus on producing unique, high quality, fresh beers (makes my mouth water just thinking about it!). The margins are ok, but not huge by any means - unless - you skip on the quality, slap a label on it with a 'crafty' name, and an interesting label, and market it as craft beer. That's what I'm afraid we'll run into if big organizations try to take over the market from the little guy. At Hob Knob, we have one goal for our first year. We're looking to try to break even during our first year of business! Profits are important, but if I wouldn't drink what I'm producing, I certainly wouldn't create some pretty marketing label and catchy slogan and try to market it. I'd rather see us place in the top 3 of a few beer competitions.

With that being said, I don't plan on boycotting HT or anything silly like that (they're actually the best grocery store chain in my opinion). Of course, I could be totally wrong, and HT might produce some high quality brews. I plan on trying their Belgian white because I'm a fan of blue moon, and it sounds similar in characteristics. I'm skeptical of the quality of their product because every store brand I've ever tried, while being cheaper, has also been a lower quality and value than the original brand. Think cereals, vegetables, etc. I guess we'll see. One things for certain, that's one less area on the beer shelves for a smaller guy to come into the market, because they certainly aren't going to take shelf space away from the big box brew companies like inBev (formerly Annheiser-Busch - now owned by a foreign company) even though they have singles, 4 packs, 6 packs, 12 packs (in bottles AND cans), 18 packs, 24 packs, and more. One of the harsh realities of the fierceness of competition in the beer marketplace.

Scotsman Wee Heavy Brew Session was a brewing nightmare

So last night was pretty much a brewing disaster by all accounts, save one - at the end of the night (well morning to be exact), we had a wee heavy that was fermenting and should be ready to go by August. Really looking forward to trying it, because it'll be our first beer with an ABV closer to wine (around 10.2-10.5%) than beer! It's a tough balancing act to keep the malty characteristics of the beer in line without it creating a burning sensation from the high ABV.

The biggest area I've been struggling with in all grain is my final volumes. I use a computer program called beersmith to help me estimate final volumes (like boil volumes) etc.

Things started off bad. I go to crack my grain with my corona mill, and get the bright idea to put a bolt in the crank (instead of the crank), and use that to turn the mill. It worked perfectly until I cracked the steel housing on the mill! Some JB Weld and about 2 hours of waiting and permanently installing the hand crank solved that problem, much to the chagrin of my shoulder.

Once we have the grains cracked, it's time to mash. Beersmith says to add the water at 164 targeting a mash temp of 150. Well, it drops to 161 instead of 150, so I'm losing precious enzymes. Not that big of a deal, but not that happy that beersmith was off by 11 degrees. A few ice cubes brought the temperature down to 151, and I let it sit for an hour.

Attempting to keep my HLT water temps up for a fly sparge after my first batch sparge. I failed to realize that thanks to the 2 hour delay, I'd lost a ton of water to evaporation.

About this time, my march 809 pump blew it's housing. I don't know what the problem was, but it sounded like a screw had dropped. Of course when I reached down to fix it, the pump fell all of 4 inches and the weight of all the brass attachments cracked the damn plastic housing!

So while I was waiting for my 2nd sparge water to heat up, I replaced the housing on the pump - another hour gone. I let the second sparge sit for about 45 minutes in the mash tun, and drew it off to the kettle via gravity since the pump was out of commission. Of course, I didn't keep track of how much water I put into the second sparge because I was pissed about not having enough water and having to wait for that and about the problems with the pump (which has been nothing but problems and a huge hassle - now I know why there are so many gravity fed systems - gravity never fails...pumps always fail). When I pull the 2nd sparge into the kettle, I overshot my pre boil volume of 7.7gallons, and end up with close to 9! Crap! My boil time then get's extended from 90 minutes to 120 minutes in order to burn off the excess water, and get my abysmal starting gravity (1.055!) higher in sugar concentration.

After boiling all the way down to 60 minutes, things went rather smoothly from there. The pump was fixed. The cooling went like a charm. The only problem was I ended up with 5.5g instead of the 6g I was hoping for. Final starting gravity after the boil was 1.097. Right in line with where I wanted to be!

So at 6am, I decided to clean up. Since I've gone to all grain, I've picked up some mice in the garage who enjoy taunting me throughout the brewing process. Apparently, they're also the smartest mice in the world, because they avoid the traps and poison. I keep my grain stored properly, but that doesn't mean they don't get the benefit of the few kernals that fall to the garage floor every so often. I've declared war on the rat bastards, and they'll soon meet their maker.

After all is said and done, the brewery's clean, and I've got a fine wee heavy fermenting. I'm really looking forward to giving this brew a try in the near future! The one good things about night's like last night is that after everything, you're still left with a ton of great beer!



Cheers!

Jeff

Hob Knob announces it's flagship brews!

Over the past few weeks we've been debating what styles of beers we should brew. I'm happy to say we've reached a decision. The 3 styles we'll be brewing (according to BJCP guidelines) are English Brown Ales (which include a Strong American Brown, English Mild, and English Northern); Irish & Scottish Ales (including a Strong Scotch Ale or "Wee Heavy" as some call it); and finally, a few seasonal/specialty brews (like our Oktoberfest Kürbis (pumpkin) ale). Not giving too much away, our beers plan on having something that is (at least to our knowledge) unique to the craft brewing industry on the East Coast of the United States. Keep an eye on our blog as we get closer to our official launch, we'll fill you in on just what that is.

As for our official launch, we got some bad news yesterday. We're dealing with the government right now, trying to get all of our paperwork/licensing/permitting/etc out of the way. After speaking with the folks at the NC ABC (who were very friendly), we found out that the employees at the ttb (the feds) have a bunch of workers on furlow. So it has dramatically lengthened their time for processing our Brewer's Notice form, which we plan on sending in this week. Typically, it takes them less than 95 days (according to their site), but with the furlows, I've found this can take up to 6-9 months. As Arnold Schwarzenegger would say, "DAHALAHGLHALALHLHGLAHLAHA!" So it looks like best case scenario for production to start would be early 2012. Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky and get our paperwork back by mid-late fall. I guess the good news is it let's us perfect our brews, and we can shop around for the best price on our equipment for a bit longer. Delays on shipping equipment are usually around 3 months anyways.