Brews you can Use

I tried to get an early start to the cider making this fall. Cub Foods sells Wescott Orchards cider for a reasonable per-gallon price, which was what I made my first batch of cider out of a couple years ago. That batch turned out pretty good, so I was pleased to see the same stuff in my local Cub on Saturday. I bought 6 gallons of it (5 for fermenting, 1 for drinking/mulling), and pitched yesterday afternoon.

Just a bit ago, I checked on it again. Not fermenting. Uh-oh. I took a closer look at one of the empty jugs. "Ingredients: Apple Juice with up to 1% potassium sorbate added to preserve freshness." And, apparently, to frustrate my cidermaking plans. Crap. It's not even good for vinegar, and since I added yeast and left it unrefrigerated for over a day, it's neither tasty nor safe to drink.

And all because I couldn't wait 2-3 weeks for some bulk unpasteurized, preservative-free juice from a homebrew club pressing and/or bulk buy. Damned impatience.

See that last post? I think that's the first beer-free post I've done in quite a while. The cosmic balance of Pfft! and glugluglug must be restored. To wit:

Saturday, I went to Autumn Brew Review. It was a great day for it, about 60-65, sunny and calm. A lot of good beers, and a few surprises. The biggest surprise to me was Town Hall's booth. It was all experimental beers! Usually, Town Hall doesn't do very many of these, usually one off-the-wall tap at the pub. That's understandable, since their standards are world-class, with their IPA and Scotch ale garnering well-deserved national awards.

Other worthwhile repeats from previous years include White Winter Winery's booth, serving one of only two braggots/bracketts at the festival. Viking Brewing brought the other, a lighter more mead-like interpretation, as well as a number of other interesting beers, for instance the festival's only smoked beer. Lastly, Summit brought a cask version of their flagship extra pale ale, a real treat.

Saturday ended with an impromptu party at my house, with a few college friends and their husbands I ran into at the beer festival, complete with pleasant conversation, homebrew, and barbecue from Ted Cook's (my current favorite hole-in-the-wall place, near the house we all met up at). Alas, the party was called around 9:00 on account of cat allergies. That's why it works better for me to bring beer elsewhere.

On Sunday, I brewed. Five gallons of Historical IPA and 10 gallons of a lightly-hopped American Wheat, five gallons of which will be racked onto cranberry relish, and five gallons of which may get doctored at some point. Yes, this means my recipe finalization record is currently being shattered. Previous: 15 minutes before end of boil, current: 33 hours past end of boil and counting :-)

The undetermined batch is fermenting with a somewhat spicy, fruity, earthy Belgian strain, so that limits me to something Belgian in style. Which is to say, sarcastically, "that narrows it down." The simplest option is doing a Gin or Vodka extract of the traditional Wit spices (coriander, orange peel) and doping the beer to make it another Wit. I'm also entertaining adding more fermentables and perhaps some dark malts to make something completely different out of it.

The weekend's gone (more later), and I'm watching Monday Night Football. I usually tune out the intro, but this time I paid attention for some reason ("some reason" = "half-asleep baby strapped to my chest, nothing better to do"). It started with a live shot of helicopters flying toward the stadium accompanied by the obligatory-since-apocalypse-now "Ride of the Valkyries". They fly over the stadium, where a bunch of Marines are standing in formation. A drill seargent calls them to attention, then barks "Are you ready for some football!", and the crowd goes wild.

And my jaw drops. What the hell is the U.S. military doing in a football game? I can see having a small guard escorting the flag displayed during the National Anthem, but the large group, flyover, and barking a commercial slogan is qualitatively different. The former is respectful, tasteful. I can't decide whether the latter is merely cheesy, or scary. It was definitely unsettling....

Of course, I've noticed the concentration of Army recruiting commercials during football games, and have even heard that NFL films has produced recruiting films for the armed forces. Perhaps the Marines were just loaned out to return the favor. I doubt they do this for other private gatherings:

	The few, the proud, the Marines.
	We do amphibious assaults, close air support,
	weddings, birthdays, and bar mitzvahs.
	Thank you, we're here all week!

Quite the beery weekend planned here...

Saturday's the Autumn Brew Review in downtown Minneapolis (Peavey Plaza, 1-7 p.m. -- be there or be vertical :-). I've been to a few of these, and they're a blast.

On Sunday, I'm planning to brew. I'm not 100% sure what I'm planning to brew just yet. At least 5 gallons will be a lightly-hopped American wheat beer, to make the Cranberry Relish ale from October's BYO magazine, which is (as far as I can remember) the first beer Jess has requested I brew!

Of course, I don't feel like brewing a mere 5 gallons when with just a little more work and juggling, I can get a good 15 gallons out of the brewday. So, I'm considering:

• 5 gallons Cranberry Relish wheat, 10 gallons American IPA (use up some American hops from my stash).
• 10 gallons wheat (split batch, cranberry relish and something else, most likely Jamaica), 5 gallons Historical IPA.
• 5 gallons Cranberry Relish wheat, 10 gallons Historical IPA (spiked with some high-alpha hops so I don't blow my beer budget on this by spending a mint on hops (mint... hops... get it? feh...)).
• 5 gallons Historical IPA, 5 gallons cranberry relish wheat, 5 gallons of something Belgian (via some serious post-boil doctoring of half of the wheat).

Decisions, decisions... I've pretty much stocked up on ingredients, etc. to do any of these, and will most likely decide sometime before I start brewing. Maybe. I think my record at this sort of procrastination is having the recipe finalized at 15 minutes before the end of the boil.

The bad (well, odd anyway): I watched almost no football... Just as well, since all "my" teams lost this weekend (the Gophers positively cratered against Penn State; I'm glad I avoided watching that).

The good: Football was pre-empted by three parties. It's almost like I had a social life for once :-)

The usual: Of course, beer was involved. On Friday night/Saturday morning, I finally bottled the Rochefort 8 clone I had been sitting on for a couple months. I did something slightly different, mixing the priming sugar and beer in a keg, so I could push the beer with light CO2 pressure instead of gravity. It was mostly an experiment to see if I could make bottling a little more ergonomic by manipulating the bottles at a better height, but it didn't quite work out that way. I reverted to moving bottles around on the floor, just like old times... As an added bonus, I'm less than confident that the priming sugar was well mixed, and the beer stopped fermenting at a higher final gravity than I expected, so I'm on a dual "bottle bomb" and "persistently flat beer" watch for the next couple weeks.

That's why I keg most of my batches. I only bottle if I'm planning to keep the beer around for a year or so.

After bottling, I took a sample of my Mustard/Pepper ale, which I still haven't transferred out of the primary fermenter. It's really coming along. It has a crisp, spritzy mustard bite followed by a mild black-pepper burn. All of this is backed by a light malt flavor and some yeast fruitiness. It's looking like it will be better for something other than torturing beer judges :-)

On Saturday, I got a chance to show off my last Oatmeal Stout at one of the parties. I think my favorite comment was something like:

	"Beer usually makes me break out in hives, but..."
	(sips)
	"...I don't mind, this one's worth it"

The funny thing is that this was the half of the batch I almost dumped. I had fermented it with somewhat suspect yeast (my favorite strain stepped up from a petri dish via multiple "sterile" transfers performed in my definitely non-sterile kitchen). Worse, I left it in the primary fermenter for too long, and it was invaded by fruit flies. They seemed to stay out of the beer itself, but were way to close for my comfort. Luckily alcohol and hops are preservatives :-)