Sure - just pm me or something. Morebeer in Los Altos is great and the people there are SUPER helpful. I have even called them in the middle of some stuff happening and they helped me out over the phone. I need to head down there this week some time for more sanitizer and some priming sugar.

Yep - they had those at Whole Foods too. Looked very tempting but I have to conserve $$ these days.

 

Jacob, did you get the postcard for More Beer's sale this Saturday?

Walter, may be worthwhile checking it out since they're going to have a brewing demonstration.

I'll probably be there around noon since I want to get one of those cheap sample taker/wine thief thingies and I was told they'd be in stock later this week. May also pick up another ingredient kit, but I don't know how long I want to leave it sitting around before I can brew again.

 

cereally? may need to make a drive.

 

No I didn't but I stopped by and they told me about it. Gonna be there in the AM to get some more star-san, hopefully a bottle tree and if I feel saucy, two more kits (yep that means 25 gallons total YIKES). I need bottles! Just bottled the ale tonight and the wheat is bottle-conditioning for another week.

Get the 3-piece thief - it's way easier to clean. Also - what beer did you make? You use a kit or a recipe? Just curious. I plan on making another hef (for the lady) and an IPA. Can't wait to try the Kolsch. I think you can store a kit in the fridge and if it has no flavoring grains, it can keep for a good while but I wouldn't keep a kit w/ grains for more than a week. They are air-tight sealed when rolled, but I have heard you do not want to keep your grains too long after rolling.

Yep, cannot WAIT to hit up the brewpub again. Last time, two days, pretty much there most of the time. Good food, great beer and really nice people.

 

I did the light ale kit that came with the deluxe bottling setup.

I have recipes for a Scottish Ale 60 Shillings, a "Kiltlifter" Wee Heavy Scottish Ale, and Dry Irish Stout. I think next I'm going with the 60 Shillings. The recipe is pretty basic, so I might throw in some peated barley for a little more flavor (although the smartest thing would be to brew it without the peated first so I can see what exactly is adds).

 

Oh, and I ran across these bottle caps the other day, but when caps run $0.025 at the most from More Beer, 50 cents per cap seems rather pricey. Still cool as hell though.

http://craftycaps.com/shop/index.php...oducts_id=2199

 

I didn't think that beer o'clock started at $0.49, rather after work

 

Ok it's been 8months since I've been home so my friends took me to Marin Brew Co. and I love it there! The IP's were hoppy as all hell...like I could literally taste the hop plant in my mouth lol. I had their stout and loved it since I do prefer Stouts/Ales. Also they have "9th Annual Microbreweries Battling Breast Cancer Brewfest!" on the 18th this month I'm hoping to go to!

http://www.marinbrewing.com/calendar...lendarID=10921

 

Ingredients for a Scottish Heavy Ale are in the fridge

Jacob, I'm now joining your "I need more bottles" club.

 

Jacob,

I was doing this 50 mile Bike for Breath charity ride, and guess what I saw?

A lady wearing a light purple 'Lilikoi Wheat' Kona Brewery bike jersey. Had to compliment her on it.

 

That place is great, and the battle for boobies brewfest is SO much fun. Ride the ferry up, get boozled (show up earlier, or bring a 40 for the line) and then ferry back to SF and hit up Thirsty Bear to finish drinking. I am so bummed that I have to miss it this year.

Sounds interesting. I recommend tossing in .25lb of flaked barley in your steeping grains for your ales - really makes the head nice and lacy. MoreBeer sells it only in 1lb bags so I use a little and keep it in the freezer in an air-tight bag. I tried a pale with and then without it, and it made a nice difference. Also - let me know how the light ale comes out. I swapped mine out for a "Frank Ellis kit" when I got started so I never tried it.

Not sure what you are planning to do about bottles, but I guess buying more is always an option, thought it's nice when they are already full of beer.. I have been getting the "Big Kahuna" pack of Kona brews at Costco since it's 24 beers for $20.99, half Fire Rock Pale and half Longboard Lager. These are my favorite bottles for bottling. For some reason Kona's 22s and 12s are perfect. A local store here has the Longboard 22oz bottles and I have scrambled over there to get a couple when I needed bottles before! Alternatively they also have Sierra cases at Costco for similar prices, but the bottles are a weird size, different from everything else and I don't use them since nothing else fits in the boxes. If Costco starts carrying Kellerweis then I will have to change up. Sadly Racer5 bottles have the worst glue on the labels and it turns to a snot ball that is hard to clean up. It's better on tap anyway...

I use Deschutes, Mendocino, and Kona bottles mostly. Stopped drinking anything with a screw-top. A friend preferred Pacifico bottles for bottling, but again - they are a bastard size with a slightly taller neck.

Whoa that's a classic! I remember when they sold those too - back before the remodel at the brewery. "Back in the day." I just saw a pic of me hanging out of the pass window of my RS (girlie was driving) going down Kuakini leaving the brewery on "too much IPA day" when some friends came visiting back in '05.

Was that ride going through San Carlos and Redwood city? I think I was in the midst of it in my MR2 on Saturday.

So I finished bottling everything tonight, little less than I had hoped but I have around 40 12oz bottles of lilikoi wheat (My Lua.. haha), 40 12oz bottles of Kräcker Kölsch (that's racist!) and 24 22oz bottles of wootbeer v2.0 which is the hoppy pale (Chinook for bittering, 7oz total hops, going for the citrusy punch-to-da-dome). Cooking up a pretty basic blonde ale tomorrow. Everything should be ready in the first week of August.

Got the mini fridge for cold-storage but the 5gal fermenter won't fit. Matt - when you say you gutted your fridge - how far can you go? Do you just tear out the organizer things and such like on the door? This is like the 3ft tall (I think, have to check it again) dorm fridge, twice as tall as the little cube ones, and it has that step in it like you mentioned. Wonder if I can remove the freezer part. I was planning to go by a water place and see if maybe they have a square 5gal bottle I can use for a cold secondary. Otherwise I can only use it for cold bottle conditioning. I really want to get to the point of being able to hold a secondary around 45F for a month. Then I can make a proper Kölsch and if I have the patience (3mos) a lager... Till then I will simply try to brew faster than I drink.

 

I'l try to swing by more beer before I brew to get some of that flaked barley, thanks for the tip!

As far as the fridge goes... I ended up cutting all of the shelving off of the door. I too the whole door panel off first to make sure there wasn't anything behind it that'd be bad to cut. I then put the shelfless frame (although I did keep the top shelf) back on because the rubber gasket didn't seal right without the rigidity of the plastic. I then put my carboy (6 gallon Better Bottle) in front of that step and there is just enough room to close the door. Also, the airlock is maybe an inch or so below the freezer, so I didn't touch that. I have heard though that as long as the coolant lines are at the back of the freezer, you can unscrew it and let it hang down. I've had a bad experience messing with a minifridge freezer though, so I opted to leave it since I didn't need to move it.

 

Had a bad experience... LOL. Whenever I read that phrase it plays slowly in Mos Def's voice. "I haaaad a baaaaad experience." Anyways.. your fridge must be taller as my 5gal better bottle doesn't have a chance w/ the airlock. The freezer looks scary and like it might be what cools the whole thing, so I may not touch it.

BTW do you have a 5gal container for a secondary? Morebeer doesn't recommend new brewers to rack to a secondary, but I have been doing this fine since day 1 - just important to sanitize the hell out of everything. Only issue is at this point air is the enemy, so you don't really want to use the 6gal as at this point you will most likely have betweeen 4.5 and 5gallons of wort and that leaves a lot of air space. The process of racking, pulling the beer off the yeast and sediment after the ferment settles down, and then using a bottling bucket, has significantly changed my beer for the better - it's much clearer without any actual filtering. It seems that beers that are not racked, and bottled from the primary end up with lots more sediment and and overall "yeasty" flavour, but maybe that's just me. Should compare notes after you have done a few. I have been meaning to write up a "beginning brewing tips" thing to go with my pics. One of these days.

 

I don't have a secondary, but I have been reading a lot about using them. I'm not going to worry about it with the light ale, but while the scottish ale is fermenting I'm going to debate it.

 

This thread brings me great sadness... I am fasting from beer until I cut down on fat. I just have a glass of wine every day or so. sighhh