So we decided that we want to try our hands at continuous sparging – or fly sparging – as opposed to the batch sparging we’ve been doing in the past. We’ve read that brewers can get better efficiency (the amount of sugar extracted given the amount of grains used) by using the fly sparge method. We don’t care to weigh in on this hot debate and will let you Home Brew Talkers debate in our place.

We began our fly sparging journey by opening the mash tun and slowly trickling water through via a hose. However, we decided this was not the best method and we built a sparge manifold on the cooler lid for the following reasons. See our post here on Building a Fly Sparge System.

1. We did not like keeping the cooler lid open. While all the sugar has probably already been converted to sugars 1 hour into mash, we felt we were losing too much temperature too fast in the mash tun. Why chance it if you don’t have to.
2. We had a stuck sparge when doing a Rye Pale Ale. By being able to slowly trickle water onto the grain bed, we could keep it set, while uniformly rinsing the liquid out of the mash tun. Without the manifold we were guessing (we still are, but with more education) at how much sparge water to put into the mash tun and take out.
3. We saw somebody else do it, and their process seemed much easier. Dumping buckets, holding a hose over a 155 degree mash just wasn’t fun. We want to explore better ways of doing things, so we built a sparge system in our mash tun for less than $15 – we had the cooler already. We wanted to let simple engineering and gravity do the work.

So far we have only used with one batch – we tried the Rye Pale Ale again – with good success. We beat the OG by about .0015 and had no issues with a stuck sparge. We did use a bit more Rye and Pale Malt which accounts for part of the OG, but even with using more of the sticky Rye, we did not collapse the grain bed. Cheers and sparge on!

According to the official website, attendees can join from all across the beer blogging spectrum, including “Citizen Bloggers” who discuss and review beer, “Industry Bloggers” who represent a brewery or beer industry business and also anyone in the beer industry interested in learning more about new media and how their brand is portrayed in the digital arena. Only 150 tickets are being made available, though I have to believe that high demand will push that up just a bit higher. The cost is $95 for a “Citizen Blogger”, $195 for “Industry Bloggers” and $295 for non-blogger participants from the industry or otherwise.

I only follow a few beer bloggers but here is a rundown of my favorites:

• The Beer Wench – The Wench speaks in the third-person, writes passionate reviews of her favorite brews and loves Ohio State football. Buckeye football alone is enough for kudos but she gets extra points for the other two facts.
• Here For The Beer -  I enjoy the layout of this site and they focus more on breweries, beer festivals and related beer topics. I also dig the focus on video content.
• Mike’s Brew Review – This dude from Minnesota runs a decent beer review site with video content (again, bonus points for video) focusing on his personal picks and, in one of my favorite posts, a guide to craft beers in Japan.
• Lost in the Beer Aisle – Aside from having a clever name, this guy gives a fun spin to beer reviews, even if he does use Blogger.
• 100 Beers 300 Days – This ambitious girl’s goal is to tackle 100 different Belgian-style ales in 30 days and blog about it. Looking at her detailed reviews, she certainly knows her beer. I’ve only tried a few on her list and am jealous at the sampling. Perhaps I’m not trying hard enough in this drinking hobby of mine.

While this site is more about home brewing than beer reviewing, I feel it worthwhile to promote this grass roots industry of ours in whatever form it takes. Check out the beer bloggers above and attend out the Beer Bloggers Conference in Colorado if you have the chance.

WHICH HOPS TO PLANT & WHEN TO PLANT

Hops can easily be grown from a root segment that buds into its own hops plant. Many farms have online distribution (here is a review of the popular sites from which to order hop rhizomes) though we used Thyme Garden Herb Company in Oregon based on home brewer reviews and recommendations.

The easiest hops to grow, judging by the general consensus of both growers and distributors, are Cascade, Magnum and Nugget. Early spring is the time to get the rhizomes in the ground, though its probably safest to wait until the threat of frost is gone. Here in Cincinnati the last frost is around mid-April, though we received the shipment in late March … what to do? It was recommended by the grower to seal the hops in a zip bag with a few drops of water and store in the refrigerator until ready to plant. While in cold storage, I started to see a bud growing on the root and got worried that this guy was ready to get in the ground and the cold treatment might stunt his growth. Most forums say the hops will be fine for up to 6 weeks in the fridge with light water moisture periodically added. In retrospect, the smarter approach would have been to plant them in a pot and kept indoors (though rewarded with outdoor sunlight for good behavior), transplanting once the threat of frost had passed.

THE ECONOMICS OF GROWING HOPS

Cost savings is also a driving factor in deciding to grow your own hops. A typical rhizome will cost you $8 – $10 with shipping and the expected annual yield will be 1.0 – 2.5 pounds of dried hops. For comparison, a pound of dried Cascade hop leaves will cost you about $20. Keeping in mind that your hops plant will provide this yield year after year, the economics of growing your own hops can really cut down on the cost of brewing materials.

HOW TO PLANT YOUR HOPS

Though the neighbors gave me strange looks for photographing a hole in the ground, I have included a step-by-step guide to planting hop rhizomes. Caring for the hops and dealing with a trellis support system will have to be covered in a future post, assuming these initial experiments survive. For now we’re just concerned with properly getting the hop rhizomes in the the ground and on their way to maturity.

BENEFITS OF MALT EXTRACT BREWING

• The most commonly cited reason for extract brewing is the time advantage. Total brewing time is typically around 90 minutes to boil, chill the wort and pitch the yeast. Compare this with up to 4 hours for lautering and mashing, in addition to the boiling, chilling and pitching. Busy brewers with busy lives might opt for this time efficiency.
• The flavor of the eventual home brew has been noted to be more consistent, brew after brew. I think this is due to less factors at play, and thus less room for error, with malt extract. There are quite a few steps involved to mash grain and even an experienced brewer might inadvertently mess up the process along the way.
• Cost is a factor that both sides claim to their own benefit. The Malt Extractors out there claim the core equipment does not get more complicated than your brew pot and trusty stirring spoon, while All Grainers must invest around $75 to create the mashing equipment. It is also worth noting the energy costs that are saved by not boiling as much liquid.

BENEFITS OF ALL GRAIN BREWING

• Again the issue of cost comes into play. While the initial cost of buying equipment for the lauter mash tun can be steep (between $40 and $100 depending on your setup), the raw ingredients are more affordable after that. Buying grain in bulk is typically cheaper than a can of malt extract because the cost of preparing the extract has to be added to the bill in some fashion. There is a good article here that compares the relative cost of ingredients.
• Brewing with raw ingredients from the beginning allows you to experiment with new recipes and affect the final product in a variety of ways not possible with a can of extract. So maybe you want to add an extra 1/2 lb of chocolate malt to the grain bill and see what happens … by all means, throw it in the mash and lets see what happens! With more control over the process from start to finish, you have more room for experimentation (though also more room for error).
• Some brewers report better flavor with all grain, a fact harshly contested by loyal Malt Extractors. The mythical “extract twang“, or subtle sweetness, is reported by many as the reason they switched to mashing. The All Grainers claim to have better control over the “malt backbone” of the beer, though for the life of me I can’t understand what exactly that means.
• Home brewing is a labor of love. The time involved and attention to detail makes it hobby for a loyalist. All grain brewing affords the average Joe Homebrewer the chance to convert starch into sugar (magic!) and, with the help of the yeast, convert that sugar into alcohol. Really pretty cool if you think about it. As well, all grain brewing allows you to be involved with more of that awesome process and understand what is happening with your brew.

CONCLUSION: ALL GRAIN FOR ME, BABY!

That final bottle of home brew you hold in your hands represents the brewer as much as the ingredients that went into it. We all know too well the room for error during the brewing process and important role the brewer plays each step of the way. I see all grain brewing as a way of better understanding what is happening during this magic sugar-starch conversion and how those grains you brought home in a bag will magically transform (!) into an alcoholic and tasty beverage. Also important here is the ability to experiment with new flavors and ingredients. What if that Bell’s Oberon clone had just a bit more Munich Light malt, how would that taste? A bit more work but certainly worth the effort.

“This isn’t one of those fake holidays…No, this is officially sanctioned by congress, as of 2006. Which in my book makes it the equal to the separation of church and state.”
–Steven Colbert, May 18, 2008

May 17-23 2010 marks the 5th annual American Craft Brewers week. Organized by the Brewers Association, the week long event celebrates small and independent craft brewers with charity events, homebrew events, beer tastings, festivals, tours, dinners, and Declaration of Beer Independence signings among other things. Support for the week long celebration is very strong, evident by House Resolution 1297 – which supports the goals and ideals of American Craft Beer Week. To find out what is going in your area, click here. So take this opportunity to celebrate all the greatness that is good beer. Cheers.

WHAT”S TO CELEBRATE?

Beyond good beer, this is a time to celebrate the diversity and entrepreneurial spirit that makes this country great and makes our beer great. It’s that same spirit that that pushes us homebrewers to spend a bunch of money on equipment, drive our wives crazy (love you Cara / Amie), concoct new recipes, make up stupid names for those recipes, and share our homebrews with our friends. It’s also time to celebrate the momentum craft beer has seen over the last few years. It’s great to have the ability to purchase and brew such variety and declare our independence from commercial breweries who seem to brew solely for profit without regard for art and craft. The rise of craft brewing is evident in a few statistics from the American Craft Brewers Association website.

• Growth of the craft brewing industry in 2009 was 7.2% by volume and 10.3% by dollars compared to growth in 2008 of 5.9% by volume and 10.1% by dollars.
• Overall, US beer sales were down 2.2% in 2009.
• Craft brewer retail dollar value in 2009 was an estimated $6.98 billion, up from $6.32 billion in 2008.
• 1,595 breweries operated for some or all of 2009, the highest total since before Prohibition.

So take pride in what you create and drink. Celebrate your diverse palate. Have a homebrew – or a craft brew.

TO CLEAN, SANITIZE OR STERILIZE?

The constant mantra of home brewers is that clean, sanitized bottles and equipment are important factors in avoiding infection and brewing a successful beer. Oddly enough, we use yeast in the most important part of the brewing process, which itself is a controlled infection of sorts. Cleaning a bottle involves a surface-level removal of debris and noticeable items in the bottle. Sanitizing a bottle starts to remove the microbes hiding below the surface, which is the goal here. Taking this one step further, to sterilize a bottle is to remove 100% of the microbes, a task rather difficult and probably not absolutely vital to home brewing.

TO BLEACH, CHEMICAL RINSE OR USE THE DISHWASHER?

We have tried a few methods of cleaning home brew bottles over the past few years. We started with “Easy Clean” no-rinse solution from LD Carlson and didn’t have any problems. When that ran out, we neglected to buy more and started using bleach to sanitize. This may have sanitized properly but we always worried the bottles were not rinsing completely clean of the bleach and may be affecting the taste of the home brew and lack of carbonation on a few batches. Through all this we have used the dishwasher (on regular wash cycle with no detergent) after cleaning the bottles and using bleach. The theory here was that all the bottles fit nicely into the dishwasher and this was much easier than another rinse (yes, we call that laziness). Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear possible for water to be sprayed accurately into each and every bottle, given the limited range of the dishwasher arm. Smelling a few bottles after the wash cycle still gave off a smell of bleach, which had use worried.

DISHWASHER ON SANITIZE CYCLE

What is home brewing about if not learning from your mistakes? We have since moved away from the bleach in favor of Star San chemical rinse and no longer use the dishwasher for our final rinse. Instead, I think we will utilize the “Sanitize Cycle” option, which blasts hot steam at 160 degrees for over an hour.  Other brewers on HomeBrewTalk agree that the sanitize feature can only help if proper sanitation has already been achieved in advance. I also found a rather in-depth scientific study of bottle sanitation and the amount of bacteria removed through different methods. His findings show that immediate rinsing and proper chemical sanitation are the best method to remove the majority of bacteria. He also recommends covering the bottle tops with tin foil after sanitizing and before bottling, which is a method I had not heard before. But he’s a scientist and I’m not, so it’s definitely worth a try.

According to the American Homebrewers Association, last year was the most successful yet with “more than 5,000 people celebrated National Homebrew Day brewing over 13,000 gallons at 342 sites on six continents worldwide. Sites were registered in 47 states and Puerto Rico, as well as Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, England, Israel, Kenya, The Netherlands, Russia, and Switzerland.” This is up from 10,500 gallons and 4,000 participants in 2008, so we hope the trend continues.

We have never tried our hands at a Scottish Export 80 Shilling (I’m thinking Belhaven’s Scottish Ale or Sam Adams Scotch Ale) and I’ve never honestly heard of a Rocktoberfest (similar to an Oktoberfest, I’m guessing) but currently have a wheat ale ready to bottle in the basement. The guys at DrinkHomeBrew.com were unable to participate in this most holy of holy days but raise our glasses to the growing movement of home brewers and craft beer drinkers. Cheers!

DRY YEAST
Fermentation took off like a race horse and the bucket started bubbling almost immediately — and with more intensity than we usually see. Our experience with yeast has been predominantly dry packets. We never learned about “re-hydrating” your yeast until later in our brewing maturity (we just recently emerged from the awkward home brewing puberty stage). The packet never explicitly mentioned re-hydrating and we were afraid to deviate from the instructions. We have since become much bolder brewers. The brands of yeast were never much of a concern and we usually went with whatever the guys at Listermann’s suggested (Safele and White Lab brands).
LIQUID YEAST
We have only brewed with liquid yeast on the Chocolate Irish Stout, and with mixed results at that. We have hypothesized the reasons for low ABV, but liquid yeast is a potential reason since this is the only time we have used it. The local home brew shop prefers dry yeast and agreed they have not had the best results with liquid. Of course, most of this evidence is anecdotal and many folks out there prefer liquid yeast.

WYEAST ACTIVATOR

The package contains enough live yeast for your typical 5 gallons of wort (100 billion yeast cells) and when you smack the package, as the directions instruct, a “nutrient vial” is ruptured and begins activating the yeast. The package starts to swell in room temperature and is ready to pitch within a few hours. I was a little anxious about smacking the package to break open the nutrient vial, though you can feel the vial inside and can tell once it has been ruptured. Some brewers on the Northern Brewer forum have inadvertently broken the package open when smacking too hard, though most post positive remarks on the yeast activity once pitched into the wort. When brewing up our Bell’s Oberon clone, we noticed vigorous yeast activity a few hours after pitching, much faster and stronger than is typically seen. We have not taken a final gravity reading yet but are optimistic given our active yeast in the bucket.

Overall, the Wyeast Activator performs as described and, pending a final gravity reading, seems like a handy method to activate your yeast prior to pitching. We have never had bad results with dry yeast (though we never “re-hydrated” it, either) and the one brew with liquid yeast has me skeptical. We will report back with an updated gravity reading to ensure the yeast performed as intended before passing final judgment, though the yeast activator seems useful upon first impression.

1. Fizzy yellow beer is for wussies – Stone Brewing

2. Cost of beer

3. Satisfaction of drinking your own creation

FIZZY YELLOW BEER IS FOR WUSSIES

Why is fizzy yellow beer for wussies? The reason is because the popular American Pilsners/Lagars all taste the same. There is very little flavor / recipe distinction between the different beers. Don’t believe me, check this out. Recently, 8 friends (including myself) tested this theory. We poured Miller Light, Coors, Beast Light, Bud Light, and Natural Light into clear cups – so not even a blind taste test. One of us was able to get 3 out of 5. Beyond that, no one got more than one right. A few of us could tell Miller Light as it is a little less sweet. The Strand Brewers Club in LA Country found similar results. Check out the Beer Hacker’s Results – PBR is the winner. The reason all these beers taste the same is because the hop flavor is very muted, the malt flavor is extremely light, and they use corn and rice adjuncts in place of malt to provide the alcohol to the beer. Triple hopped my ass. The folks over at Home Brew Talk have pretty good discussion going on here.

So 2 questions for you?

1. Why drink beer that mutes the flavor of the core ingredients that make up beer?

2. Why “spend up” and buy Miller Light, Coors, and Bud Light over Beast Light, Natural Light, and PBR if the taste is indistinguishable.

COST OF BEER

Considering equipment a sunk cost, it is just as cheap to brew a quality home brew as it is to buy Beast Light or Natural Light. We just spent $26 to make 48 bottles of Rye Pale Ale. Two cases of Natural Light will run you the same.

SATISFACTION OF DRINKING YOUR OWN CREATION

There is nothing more satisfying than sharing your latest home brew creation with friends. While we have not been able to create a beer as good as a Stone (our IPA and Imperial Stout were good, but still not Stone), I still enjoy drinking and sharing my own beer more than any beer I purchase – with exception to the Oktoberfest we commonly refer to as “Pear Bear“.

Bottom line, you spend a lot of time with your beer. You should know it.