Beer Garden in Hayes Valley

Great weather in SF? head to the Biergarten. It's a beer garden with a goldbrau, oktoberfest, and a weizen...something. $12/liter. They've recycled (3) of those shipping containers and they serve food and beer out of them. We lined up at 2:45pm, and I got my first beer at 3:30 ish. It's probably idea to go a little bit earlier. Nonetheless, 3-4 hours of great time out in the sun in the middle of the CITY!

Cinco De Mayo

We hosted a Cinco de Mayo tequila party. Here was the line-up:

Note that I'm not the best at describing hard alcohol. One thing most had in common was that they were sip-worthy, and salt and lime was optional.

• Tres Agaves Anejo - spicy and oaky, very flavorful
• Herradura Reposado Tequila - sharper spicyness, warm down the throat
• Sauza Blue - Don't remember much about this. 
• Kirkland Anejo - mild-spice
• Dos Manos Blanco - clean and smooth, this was my favorite
• 1800 Silver - also clean and smooth, this was my 2nd favorite
• Bandolero Silver - wasn't a fan... was pretty good in the margarita mix though
• Don Augustin Blanco - hint of persimmons 

Morningwood Cabernet Sauvignon

I had this Morningwood that was begging to be dealt with. Elisa was gone so I wasn't going to get any help from her this time around. So I decided to take matters into my own hand. 

sicko, I'm talking about my most recent bottle of wine I opened.

The nose was great, ripe plum, lots of pepper. The wine had high acid, and intense fruit... a little too intense. The tannins lingered with the ripe juice that made me scrape the back roof of my mouth with my tongue. 

You can find them on Treasure Island. Elisa and I actually had a pleasant experience wine tasting on Treasure Island a few months ago. We stopped by (4) tasting rooms, and one of them is a co-op type, where winemakers share equipment and all make their own wines. If you're in SF, and want to go on a quick wine-tasting trip without the 1-2hr drive up North, I suggest Treasure Island.

http://www.westgatewines.com/about.htm

http://www.tiwines.net/

http://winery-sf.com/

https://www.fatgrapewinery.com/

April 2012 - Brew Toys!

So I'm 5 batches in, and realized that there is too much StarSan in my Pale Ale. Once I noticed it in this, I can notice the same taste very subtly in all my other beers. This is a little upsetting to say the least. Anyway, I need to use this sanitizer less liberally. Therefore, I ordered the following new brew toys.

The bottle tree. It'll help me drain out the sanitizer a lot better.

The Sulfiter. This is for sanitizer use efficiency. And while I was using it, I managed to build a foam wall.

While we're on the bottling topic, I have another lesson learned. DO NOT use these bottles that have the thin second lip. The standard bottle capper won't grip the bottle low enough, and you end up with a loose cap.

 Don't use the one above. The ones below are ok. Notice the difference in the thickness of the 2nd lip.

Hop Rhizomes are here!

I got my hop rhizomes in the mail yesterday. (2) Willamette and (2) Glaciers. Here's a picture with one of each.

The only problem is that I live in SF. And while we have a small 'yard', it's on the North side of the house so no sunshine. Therefore, I'm sending the Willamette hops to Corning with Elisa. That's right, this ho-bunk-hill-billy-country town that is close to Chico (where Sierra Nevada grows their hops). Elisa's grandma has a green thumb, so I'm bribing her with some of my beer to take care of these bines. I will take the Glacier hops to my family's place in San Jose. I'll have my sister take care of them there.

They say not to expect much harvest out of your first year, but I'm looking to milking out anything I get.Some reference links if you're interested:

• Midwest Brewing
• Brew TV Episode 17
• Brew TV Episode 45

Pale Ale 002 - Bottling

I bottled the Pale Ale 002. I set up the bottling line on the dining room floor.

And here we are, bottling away.

Later, I was examining all my bottles in the light to triple check the bottles. While I was doing this, one of the tops just broke off.

1 bottle down.

Fix for non-matching bulkhead fitting to false bottom fitting

Update on the non-matching hose fittings for my mash tun bulkhead and false-bottom. Previously on my post from earlier this month, I talked about building my own bulkhead for a mash tun and ordering a false bottom. I realized that the bulk head fitting and the fitting on the false bottom were two different sizes. Instead of going out to buy a new fitting on the inside, I decided to get creative with tubing.

I created a fix for the nonmatching fittings. I got 2 types of tubes.

1/2" diameter silicone tube, and a 3/8" reinforced tubing.

Fit one right into the other, and shove it in good.

and voila! Pure creative brilliance.

Saison 001

With my recent tasting of the Barrel Aged Stateside Saison, I decided to go for making my own saison. I was also curious to see what the recipe kits at Northern Brewer were about, so I decided to order the Petite Saison d'Ete recipe kit. They sent me the Safbrew T-58 yeast with it. According to Kyle, this is a Belgian Ale yeast, and advised me to order a saison yeast. I ordered the Wyeast 3711 French Saison yeast.

Since I'm still figuring out how to get the efficiency up on my mashing, I assumed 60% efficiency, and added 4 lbs of pilsen malt to compensate. Here's the command station.

My new toy includes the Better Bottle Carboy that you see on the left.

I mashed for an hour, and here's the wort coming out of the mash-tun.

Nothing different here. I started the boil....

and the water level seemed a little low to start the boil with. I was wondering why because I started with 8.5 gallons of water. The rest of the brew day went smoothly until I was cooling down the wort. I think I turned on the water too high, and the tubing on the wort chiller came loose again and sprayed water into my beer. NOOOOOO. I got pretty pissed off, but got over it pretty quickly.

Lessons Learned:

• Start with more water. I lost a good amount of water because the grains soaked up a good chunk. 
• I need to shove that tubing further onto the wort chiller, and tighten the shit out of it.
• Mash for longer, maybe it'll improve my efficiency.

There's my saison, in front of the Pale Ale 002. 

Yes, that's foil on the top of the carboy. Northern Brewer messed up my order and sent me a bung that didn't fit. The foil didn't really work so that the airlock would bubble, but oh well.
Next morning, fermentation was going strong. I couldn't tell by the airlock, but could tell by the wort itself.

St. Patty's Dinner

I had myself a St. Patty's dinner. Instead of the Guinness; however, I had wine. Guinness is to beer as ______ is to wine. I filled that in with a Petite Sirah from J. Rickards.

This wine is dark in color, has a intense blueberry and chocolate nose, and a smooth mouthfeel with some  luscious fruit (luscious is Jim's word) - a perfect wine substitute for a Guinness. It paired really nicely with the corned beef too. I think it's because it has a solid acid backbone that makes the fatty meat melt. This bottle is Elisa's favorite, and also one of my (3) favorite wines from Jim Rickards. I also love his Cab and Malbec.

The winery's passion clearly shows up in the wine. Once you try their wines, you also have to love their price-point. At $20-$35/bottle, there's no better bargain for great wine.

Elisa and I try to help out during event weekends with the winery. If you're able to visit J Rickards during an event weekend, we might be there. If we're not there, no worries, say 'hi' to Sue, Eliza, and Jim!

A Fix for Corked Wine (Allegedly)

I got a copy of imbibe magazine complimentary with one of my online orders. I tried to look for an online version of this article with no success. Here's the picture of the article though.

 Courtesy of imbibe magazine March/April 2012

I did, however, find the link to the NY Times article: For a Tastier Wine, the Next Trick Involves.... The reference for the pictured article above is on the middle of page 2.

2009 Sera~Sera - David Coffaro

First wine post. I opened a bottle of the 2009 Sera~Sera from David Coffaro Vineyard & Winery. Sera~Sera is a 50/50 blend of Syrah and Petite Sirah.

Prologue
Descriptions of wines ultimately don't matter. They should be used only as A) taster/drinker's opinion, B) confirming winemaker's intent C) marketing tool. There are a lot of common descriptors that are accepted by the wine industry, as you'll see on a wine wheel below. Other descriptors can be very personal. An aroma that you remember from a distinct experience, e.g. stinky shoes. If you throw out a descriptor that you smell (not making up) and someone reacts in a disagreeing way, give that person a finger and walk away.

source: http://www.santarosafinewine.com/images/winetastingwheel.jpg

The wine itself - straight description
The wine is very dark, which makes sense, and the wine is still very purple, which also makes sense because it's a young wine (more on this below). It's very dark berry-ish on the nose, with a hint of spice. Mouthfeel is solid, very bright fruit, good acid, and plenty of tannins that prolong the finish.

Analysis breakdown
Ok, so you read my description above, and you're thinking "ok, mister wine snob"... Sort of true, but let me explain to you that the description I gave is very typical, and I'm only confirming the varietals in the wine, regional style, and the Winemaker's style.

• "wine is dark" - Syrahs tend to have solid color to them. Petite Sirahs are so dark it will stain your teeth with your first glass. Of course it's going to be dark.
• "wine is still very purple" - Wine color goes through a progression of colors based on age. Young wines are purple. A few more years and they turn reddish. 10 years and you'll see light brown or orange.
• "dark berry" - common descriptors for syrah and petite syrah includes: inky, tannins, jammy, spice, clove, black fruit, pepper... I'm only calling out two typical descriptors
• "Mouthfeel..." - again, typical descriptors on this

So why do I bother describing the wine if it fits the typical description of the varietals in the wine?

1. Confirmation that the grower and the winemaker are not messing with the varietal. It's a compliment when I say the grower and winemaker captured and highlighted the expected characteristics of the varietal and region.
2. Confirmation that the winemaker achieved his/her stylistic intent. 
3. If I see, smell, taste something I don't expect from the wine, that will also be documented.

There's much more to write on this wine and wine in general, but I'll post again later.

Stateside Saison ~barrel aged series~ - Stillwater Artisanal

I saw that Healthy Spirits had this beer, and I had to try it. I'm all about saisons. Oak-aged is even cooler. Here's the label.

This beer was smooth, soft, with a good amount of acid. I tried to get this again, but they apparently only received 1 case, so no luck. I tried the non-oak version, and while it was good, it was off. Nothing like an oak-aged saison - if you don't mind dropping $17 for a small bottle.

When I was done with the bottle, I swirled the dregs, transferred it to a jar, and put it in the fridge. A week later, while brewing the pale ale, I recycled my pale ale mash with 2 gallons of water, and brewed about a gallon of this, and added the dregs from the stateside saison in there. Jury is still out on whether it worked.

One-Legged Blonde

I opened the blonde I brewed early February (Super Bowl Sunday to be exact). It's turned out clear, dry, clean, and hoppy. There's also this twang (vocabulary from Kyle) that's in there though, and it's from the extract. To get rid of this 'twang', I need to do an all grain version of this. Anyway, here's the superclear beer.

And the label that Elisa created for it.

And a flashback to bottling day.

Pale Ale 002 - Fermentation

A day after brewing, the fermentor is blowing up like a volcano!

Crazy...
It's the first time I used a liquid yeast (WLP001), so that could be it. Or that I didn't need a yeast starter. Or I airrated the wort too much (unlikely).
It's weird because the fermometer reads 68 F, which is the temperature my other brews have fermented at.

Let me know if you have any other ideas on why my yeasts are eating sugar like Kobayashi and producing gas like Terrance and Phillip (from South Park).

Pale Ale 002

My first ever brew was a pale ale recipe from my local store, so this batch is Pale Ale 002. Time to do an all grain batch with new brew toys.

First, I set up my command station.

And the working area.

I now have my mash tun, false bottom, and my bulkhead fitting so I can properly mash a full grain batch!.... or so I thought, until I realized that the inside barb of my bulkhead is for a 1/2" tube, and the barb on the false bottom is for a 3/8" tube. oops. I need to make another trip to home depot, but in the mean time, I was determined to make my brew day work. So what do I do?

Put that bag I used on my last brew into the cooler.

And then fill it with grains, and then wait for an hour. And then it's time to get the juice out of the mash.

First wort hopping

And then it's business as usual, except now with my awesome new spoon.

After this, I forgot to take more pictures. =( My OG came out to 1.052 when I was shooting for 1.060+. My efficiency was 60%. Also, while transferring to the fermentor, I noticed that the wort was hazier than a YMC_ pool. another =(. oh well, as long as it tastes good.

Lessons Learned:

• Whirlfloc goes in 10 min before end of boil, not after I end the boil. No wonder it didn't clear up.
• brewing in a bag in a cooler is still brewing in a bag. Hurry up and get a lautering system that works, or calculate the projected efficiency accordingly.

March 2012 - Brew Toys!

Ok, so I just started brewing, therefore, I'm still collecting brewing toys. Here's what I collected over the last month:

My Brew Spoon

This thing is HUGE! I was looking on overstock.com for a spoon using a groupon, thinking "40 in spoon? cool!". And then it arrived, and not only is it tall, that spoon bowl thing is as big as my head. Oh well, I'm going to use it - action shots to come.

Mash Tun

While working on my Corning Redhead 001, doing a 'brew in a bag' mash, keeping the mash temperature at around 150F was very difficult. I decided to invest in a 10 gallon cooler and convert it into a mash tun.

Bulkhead Fitting

I could have bought a bulkhead fitting from a store, but decided to assemble one myself using instructions from "How To Brew" by John Palmer. From left to right.... 3/8" barb to 3/8" MIP, 3/8" ball valve stuck to a 3/8" MIP nipple, 3/8" FIP to 1/2" FIP, 1/2" MIP to 3/4" F hose w/ rubber O-ring, and a 3/4" M hose fitting to 1/2" nylon barb. This will replace the built in spigot that comes with the cooler.

False Bottom

This will fit into the mash tun. It filters out the wort from the grains after mashing. Only problem is that I didn't get any tubing to connect everything. I ordered the false bottom online, so I didn't know what size tube fits onto this thing. Yes, I bought the 3/4" M hose fitting to 1/2" nylon barb assuming I would use a 1/2" tube, and I may have to buy a new barb fitting when I open this package. 

Scale 

I bought a scale. 11lbs capacity. I'm at least 150lbs too heavy to weigh myself on this thing. I bought this because I purchased grains in 5 and 10 lbs increments, and hops in an 8oz bag since it's cheaper to purchase in bulk. While brewing, I need to make sure I stick to a recipe and separate the grains and hops into increments of weight.  

Tomorrow, I'll be bottling the Corning Redhead 001 that I brewed 2 weeks ago.

Cheers!

Taka

Atlas Double IPA - Palo Alto Brewing

This Atlas Double IPA is my current favorite IPA.

Has a pronounced floral and citrusy nose. Solid mouthfeel, plenty of flavoring hops, and the bittering hops are not overdone like many other IPAs. I strongly encourage people to try this beer. I got it for $6.99 at my local beer store.

Hoppy Ending Pale Ale - Palo Alto Brewing

I bought a 6-pack of the Hoppy Ending Pale Ale from Palo Alto Brewing today. I did this because I've had their Atlas IPA and I really liked the intense hoppy aroma it had.

Overall, this is an ok beer. Light in color and slightly grassy hop aroma. It's very light on the mouthfeel, and has a solid (not strong) bitterness at the finish. I think the finish is the strongest part. Would I buy it again? No. At least from Palo Alto Brewing, I'll stick with the Atlas Double IPA (more on this later).

Hoppy Blonde? Light (color) Pale Ale?

I got fascinated in super-hoppy light beer when I had the My Antonia, a collaboration brew between Birra Del Borgo and Dogfish. 

The first bottle I had was so good that I bought two more. The taste was different between all three bottles and I was disappointed afterwards, but I was hooked on this idea of a hoppy pilsner (imperial pilsner). Since I don't have an open fridge to use for lager-ing, I dove into the idea of a light hoppy ale. Naturally leading to this idea of a hoppy blonde ale and maybe even calling it an imperial blonde. I brewed one using malt extract, and the next batch (all grain) will be brewed in the next couple of weeks

Looking closer, there's a fine line between this beer becoming a pale ale instead. Here's a comparison of a typical blonde and a typical pale ale below:

	Blonde Ale	Pale Ale
SRM	3 - 6	5 - 14
ABV	4.2 - 5.6	4.5 - 6.0
IBU	15 - 28	30 - 45+

Basically, to make an 'Imperial IPA', I need to keep my color below 5, or the beer can easily be called a pale ale. Good to know.

SF Beer Week - Stop at Magnolia

I stopped by Magnolia with Allison and Kelly last Friday for Magnolia's "Beer From the Vault" Day. We tried everything on the list below, and I personally liked the "Out with the Old Ale" which was a barrel-aged English Strong Ale. "The Other One" was pretty good too. It was brewed with Blue Bottle Coffee. Great decision on my part to leave work early enough to make it here.

I also tried a cask conditioned red ale from Birra Del Borgo (Try this link, you might want to have Google translate for you), which is quickly turning into one of my favorite breweries. I especially love their Duchessic. 

Also, we met Magnolia's Brewmaster (Ben) who was actually sitting right next to us at the bar. I exchanged e-mails with him, and he offered to engage in a conversation about my home brewing if I e-mailed him. 

Brew Equipment and Ingredients Stores

Before I go into this post that has multiple links built into outside websites, I want to make I let you know that the links within my posts are not ads. I don't get paid for posting links (I wish I did), and they're there only to make it easier for the reader to relate to my opinions.

It's unfortunate that my local home brewing store is more nosy than friendly, and more pushy than helpful. For those reasons, I've decided to take my business elsewhere using the internet. For the last 2 batches and my next batch, I used Midwest Supplies. The following are some pros and cons.
Pros:

• Not nosy, not pushy
• grains and hops are pretty cheap
• easy to navigate

Cons:

• Ships from Minneapolis - takes up to a week to deliver
• Shipping is expensive - $20 for my last order 

Based on the cons, I've tried to check out some other sites too. Like Northern Brewer, and Brewmasters Warehouse. These two are equally as far, and shipping seems to be flat rate, $7.99 and $6.99 respectively; however, the grains and hops are a little bit more expensive. Brewmasters Warehouse is great in that I can make my recipe on their "Brew Builder" and transfer my recipe into my cart easily.

I've also looked at some closer brew stores near my area, but they're websites weren't as appealing and/or wasn't user friendly.

I'll take any suggestions for stores that I can look into. With no membership/incentive programs for any of these sites, I'm in no way attached to them. Until I find a source better than the 3 I've mentioned above, I'll have to populate my batch orders on all 3 sites before actually making an order.

Corning Redhead Batch 001 Recipe

Corning Redhead Batch 001

Brew-At-A-Glance
Batch Size (gallons)			=	5.5
Original Gravity			=	1.050
Projected Final Gravity			=	1.012
Req'd Attenuation			=	76%
Bitterness (IBUs)			=	35.4
Color (SRM)			=	17.0
BU:GU			=	0.71
Est. Alcohol By Volume			=	4.96%
Est. Calories per 12 oz.			=	160

Grain Bill
Grain			Weight	% of Bill	PPG	Total	°L	Total °L
American Crystal Malt 10			1.00 lbs	7.4%	34	34	10	10
American Crystal Malt 40			0.50 lbs	3.7%	34	17	40	20
American Crystal Malt 120			0.50 lbs	3.7%	34	17	120	60
Roasted Barley			0.25 lbs	1.4%	25	6.25	300	75
Maris Otter Pale Malt			5.00 lbs	41.6%	38	190	3	15

Other Fermentables (Assumed 100% Extract Eff.)
Grain			Weight	% of Bill	PPG	Total	°L	Total °L
Syrup Malt Extract			3.30 lbs	42.1%	58	193	3.5	11.55

HOP ADDITIONS
Variety		Weight	Typ AA	AA	AAU	Boil Time	Utilization	IBU's
Goldings (US)		1.50 oz.	4-6%	6.3%	9.45	60 min.	0.266	34.2
Goldings (US)		0.25 oz.	4-6%	6.3%	1.575	5 min.	0.053	1.1

Yeast: Safale US-05

Corning Redhead Batch 001

Brew Day #3. Shooting for an Irish Red. I titled it Corning Redhead because I'm hoping to take a big chunk of it with me to Elisa's brother's wedding (She's from Corning, and the brother is allegedly a redhead).

I decided to try a partial mash brew, using a bag to mash. Before trying it, I watched this clip from NorthernBrewer. I'll upload the recipe sheet soon, but here are some pictures from the brew day.

I used Kent Goldings in a nylon bag during the boil.

It was so windy, I had to bring my setup inside to get the wort to boil.

12 hours after brewing, it's already fermenting like crazy!

Lessons learned: 

• 1 tank of propane only lasts me 2 brew days. Luckily, I was already smart enough to have a back-up tank.
• "It takes a log of beer to make good wine"... It takes some wine to make good (the jury is still out on this adjective) beer?
• Fermenting in a carboy is WAY cooler.
• The 2 'extra' clamps that came with my wort chiller aren't actually extra, they're used to clamp the plastic tubing to the copper. When I first turned the water on, the plastic tubing shot off the coil, luckily, the water didn't make it into the wort.

Homebrew Starter Kit Purchase

Last November, I bought my first homebrew starter kit. I went into a store thinking I would get the all glass kit, which was priced at $150. The store convinced me that the half glass kit was the way to go. He was so adamant about it, that I decided to just get the half glass kit for $130 so that I can just make my purchase and leave. I got a recipe made out by this guy for a pale ale for my first batch.

After looking into it a little bit more, I saw a groupon for an all plastic starter kit for $64, which also included a $25 coupon towards an extra recipe kit. With a glass carboy being around $40, this would've been a great deal for me, but 1) I already had a kit, and 2) I didn't feel the need to hoard brewing kits.

Blog Introduction

First post... probably a good idea to have an introduction.

• I love wine
• I want to make wine
• Making wine seems expensive
• I love beer
• Making beer is cheaper, and has a quicker turnaround
• I'll make beer as practice

The blog posts will mainly be on the points above. I'll try to keep posts short and sweet. That said, Cheers!

Taka