05 April 2006

Beer and CHiPs

That's right California Highway Patrol. Frikkin Ponch pulled me over today as I was crawling back from Berkeley where I had bags fo beer supplies, a take & bake CostCo pizza and some fresh bread from Acme. Why, oh why, doing oh-five in the slow lane would the man with no eyes pull over my poor dented truck? No seatbelt, of course, because I am a lazy shit.

Interesting thing was my first thoughts. I had to give myself the once over, checklisting my potential illegal behavior...had I been drinking? Speeding? I knew the seatbelt was off, but oh well, right? I even considered reaching over to pull it on. Good thing, would have been a dumb move.

Anyway, officer BoBrady takes my license and reg, comes back with my ticket, looks in the passenger seat. "What is THAT?" He asks, and I assume he's looking at the copper tubing making up my wort chiller. "Is it COKE?"

I think I laughed, and blurted a "mmghyeah, right! It's beer-making stuff." I reach over and grab the brown bag and only then do I realize he's looking at this huge clear bag of off-white powder. I show him.

"That would have been some drug bust," he exclaims and stands to leave.

"I would have to be a pretty stupid drug dealer," I reply.

"I don't have to lecture you on your seatbelt, do I? You just didn't put it on?"

I shake my head, frowning. I thought we had passed this point in our relationship. C'mon, beer buddy, how's about tearing up that stupid $20 tichie so's I can make more beer?

Monday, Tuesday, Brewsday, Thursday...

Today it is another adapted recipe from Beer Captured: Victory Hop Devil India Pale Ale. I also bought a wort chiller today, hopefully I will get it to fit on my faucet. Key-Z is coming over to pitch in, we will drink Stella, eat Cost-Co take and bake, and have a brewtastic time.

We kept excellent company with our one and only bar connection from Japan, who advised us that we should number our beers consumed from 1 to a dozen and keep in mind baka is a reasonable substitute for hammerhead. Now if only we can get that translation from Portuguese.
It's hard to tell what one gallon is. I found filling up 3 nalgenes about does the trick. Yes, for the first time I am using Oakland's finest instead Safeway approved. I have my grains speeting for a half hour, suspended in a grain bag from a rolling pin in 160 degree water.

The specialty grains are:

8 oz. German Munich Malt
8 oz. German Cara-Munich Malt (wtf is this?)
8 oz. German 40L Crystal (adapted from 65L Dark Crystal)

After a half hour steep, I did the 'ol minisparge with a gallon of H20. Brought that to a bizzle, added all the sugary stuff:

4.6 lb. Light Dry Malt Extract (adapted from 4.5 extra light)
4.5 lb. British Light syrup (adapted from 3.5 lb. Bierkeller light syrup)
6 oz. Malto Dextrin
2 oz. Centennial pellets

Brought the level to 2.5 gallons, boiled for 45 minutes. Added:

1 oz. Goldings (adapted from 1/2 oz. G, 1/2 oz. Cascade, since I had less cascade than i thought)
tsp. Irish Moss (gonna need it, this beotch is murky)

12 minutes later,

1 oz. cascade

Killed the heat in 1.5 minutes.

After an hour of stovetop cooling (lid on), I strained the wort into the carboy half-filled with Essence of Lake Merritt. I made up this funwrist swirl to get the muck off the surface of the strainer: if I rotate in a circular fasion, the spent hops simply pull away from the sides, forming a nice neat green ball in the bottom of the strainer, letting the liquid slip by. I am learning!

A week later, dry hopped with one oz of Saaz pellets. (adapted from recipe)

Kegged two days later. A quick brew that I want to make again.









OSG:1.054
FSG: 1.019

1.054-1.019 x 105=3.7%