Saturday Brew-a-thon

I’m still waiting on some pictures before I write up pig-roast part 2. In the mean time, we brewed a stout on Thursday and two beers today. We made our third round of headless horseman first then followed it up with an IPA. Both brews were all grain so we knew it would be a good long brew day.

The RIMS tube is now fully functional so our all grain efficiency is peak. Pirate Mike really came through with the adjustments that needed to be made. Our stout recipe is a milk stout, or sweet stout. We went with some seriously roasted grains and added milk sugar (lactose) during the boil which is un-fermentable by yeast.

This beautiful picture is the PID controller on the RIMS tube showing a target temperature and actual temperature on 154. That’s usually the temperature we mash our grains at in order to dissolve off sugars.

Mike got a new tri-clamp fitting so that the RIMS tube can be easily disassembled and cleaned.

Our grains have been crushed and they’re ready to mash.

Now the wort can recirculate through the grains and maintain specific temperatures.

We had to weigh some of our hops because we were adding less than an ounce (the size of the packet)

After the boil we chill the wort down to a temperature suitable for fermentation and transfer it to a sanitized carboy. Time for some yeast and an airlock and it’s off to the closet.

The stout came out with a really high specific gravity which usually means a really high ABV. But, since we used lactose, one pound of the dissolved sugars will not ferment, so the alcohol percentage will be high, but not crazy high. I do believe our friend Tyler who requested the stout will be pleased.

After a night off for rest (read: party-time), it was back to the grind for our marathon brew day. With our newfound confidence in the RIMS tube, we figured we were ready for our first ever 2 all-grain brew day. All grain brews may take longer but it’s a labor of love, and we couldn’t have had a better fall day for it today. So, first we worked on Headless Horseman round three. We got 6 gallons of water up to our strike temperature of 170.

You’ll never make it through a marathon without fuel. Luckily, we still have a little Tres Equis in the kegerator.

Time to measure and crush our grains.

Once the water is at strike temperature we start our mash. The grains get stirred up to absorb the water then steep for one hour.

The RIMS tube hard at work recirculating wort.

This is an inside peak of what’s happening in the Mash tun (cooler). There’s a device on the end that sprays the water out like that so that the wort coming in doesn’t upset the grain bed. If a grain bed gets stirred up, liquid will not run through it smoothly and our RIMS tube will not be able to circulate the wort.

As I mentioned, it was an incredible fall day today so we did our boils outside on the propane burner. Here’s the horseman coming to a boil.

After an hour it’s time to cool it to room temp and pitch the yeast.

Now that the headless horseman is done, it’s time for our second brew of the day. In exchange for some yard work, my grandparents gave me an oak barrel with a tap. So naturally, we’ve been working on a recipe for a cask conditioned ale. We brewed an IPA today for just that purpose. After a quick trip to the hardware store, we made some fixes to our full size keg kettle so we could brew in that. Here’s pirate Mike transferring from the mash tun to the keg kettle.

Once we finished up the IPA, we transferred it to a carboy as well for primary fermentation. After a couple of weeks, we will move the IPA in to the oak barrel. It will go through secondary fermentation and cask condition there. Eventually we will chill it in the barrel and serve it straight from there. The brew closet is so happy right now.