Yankee Weissbier American Wheat

Grain Bill:
3/4 lb 6-row Malted Barley
3/4 lb Malted Wheat
1/4 lb Victory Malt
1/4 lb Munich Malt
1/4 lb Vienna Malt

Malt Extracts:
2 lb Extra Light DME
4 lb Wheat DME

Hops:
1 oz Tettnang (45 minutes)
1 oz Czech Saaz (Knockout)

Grain steep at 160 F for 20 minutes in 2 gallons filtered water (with Brew Saltz) 2 cups of hot water for grain rinse. 60 minute boil. Ferment for 7 days at 68 F. Striaght to bottles without secondary. I currently plan to rack half of this over 1.5 lbs of Raspberry puree for an additional 2 weeks. I will use priming sugar at a touch more than 1/4 per half batch.

American Wheat

My big plans to brew for the family this past Sunday was a bust. There was no time to entertain and brew, even though I had thoughts that the brewing would be the entertainment. Instead I jumped into the pool for 10 minutes before jumping back out to cook. I picked up the Sam Adams Summer mix pack from Costco for the party. I had the mix pack this past late winter and it was quite good, so I was willing to try the summer mix. This has their Hefe, Cherry Wheat, Pale and Summer Ale along with their Lager and Light. I agree with reviews I have read that their Hefe is actually an American Wheat, but other than the misnaming, it is a great drink. Their Pale was quite interesting, and even more so after taking a whiff of hops on my Memorial Brew Day.

So onto the brew. Things went pretty good this time with just a few difficulties. The mini-mash was successful, although I did spill some grains into the pot while trying to fill the muslin bag. I used the small size bag and even though this was not a huge grain bill, it barely fit. The next issue I had was with adding the DME. It clumped up and formed a candy like substance. I was quite worried that it wouldn't incorporate, but after stirring for 10-15 minutes it smoothed out. I added the hops and waited my 45 minutes. Kind of a boring recipe compared to the IIPA. Since this time I had a cooler full of ice water, I used this to cool off my wort before tossing it in the primary with water. I also used a 4 gallon bottle of water from Wal-Mart, rather than exhausting my RO supply. I hadn't noticed any signs of fermentation as of last night some 12 hours after pitching, but I understand that these plastic buckets are something less than perfectly sealed, so this isn't unusual. No pictures or even the video that I had planned as I was watching Mary through a par of this brew and I am a father first, brewer second. I'll post the recipe separately as Brewers Connection didn't have this one on their website.

Next up, a Kolsch for Sharon.

Next Brew

I have been really enjoying the Stout and it just seems to keep getting better. I had one last night that I had cold conditioned for a few weeks and it was great. By the end the brew had warmed a bit and you could really taste the dark stout flavors. My biggest concern is that I am not brewing real crowd pleasers. So this Sunday, I am going for a hefeweizen. Actually I am going to make an American Wheat, with the major difference being the yeast used. This should make a real easy drink, plus I am going to split the batch and make half of it a raspberry wheat by racking it over a can of Oregon raspberry puree. This means I'll only have around 20 beers for 7/4, but this should be plenty. I am going to follow it up immediately with a Kölsch. I bought a sixer of Shiner's Kölsch for Sharon this weekend and she enjoyed it quite a bit, so I think it will be a popular one.

The Whitest Kids U'Know

Mary Loves ASU

We finally got Mary to make the pitchfork with her hand without our help. This video is abort the 15th time she did her routine and she was definitely more interested in playing with the camera than showing off for the world, but it still isn't bad.

Pittsburgh Photos

Here is a slide show of pictures from my trip. Includes a number of shots from PNC.

Beer in Pittsburgh

While I was back in Pittsburgh earlier this week , I took the opportunity to try out a number of east cost beers that I have heard a lot about on BeerAdvocate, but hadn't been afforded the opportunity. Here they are:

Brooklyn Brown

Nice hoppy brown, more like Bridgeport than anything


Harpoon IPA

Strong IPA, less hops than the Victory

Magic Hat #9

Weak crap I wouldn't give to my dog.

Stoudts American Pale Ale

OK pale, a bit too bitter, prefer the 07 Widmier style. I guess they were shooting for the American style of pale, but they could have been more subtle.

Victory Hop Devil IPA

Hop levels remind me of Ruination, but without the higher ABV and no pine flavor, not for someone who doesn't love hops.


IC Light

If I lived in Pitt this would replace Coor's Light as my major session beer. Drank about 6 while there making it my session beer for this trip.

Troegs Hop Back Amber

The name is perfect, an amber with a hop backer. Basically reminds me of an amber colored brown. A bit sweeter finish than your average brown. It seems like this could be like a cheap, low ABV DIPA.


Yuengling Lager

I understand why they call this a gateway to micros, but for someone who has made the transition it is too much like MGD fir me, in other words too macro.