What’s Brewing? – 2/14/14 Update

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Credit: Literature and Libations

Credit: Literature and Libations

Here’s a quick update on what’s happening on the homebrew front…

Back in January I went to my first homebrew club meeting with the PUBGuild homebrew club. They meet at the Rapp Brewery on the second Saturday of each month. I missed last month’s meeting, but I’m planning on being there for March. I met lots of great people — all very enthusiastic about homebrewing and the products of their labor. At the end of the meeting we had a tasting session where we sampled homebrews and gave feedback. Some memorable brews included a lavender pale ale, oatmeal stout, and a Belgian quad with peaches. Most all of the brews I sampled were very impressive!

As for the progress on my homebrew, two weekends ago I bottled both the bock (A.K.A. NernBock) and cider I made on 11/2/13. I’m very excited about the bock! It had a great flavor coming out of secondary — a very cleanly fermeted lager with strong notes of coffee and carmel. I’m not, however, feeling the same about the cider….

I tested one of the ciders earlier this week for carbonation and noticed a bit of an off flavor. Likely because I didn’t temperature control this fermentation, as the bock was using all the space in my chest freezer. I’ll investigate more, and I’ll likely know what the off-flavor is in a few weeks.

Also, NernBock Jr. was a complete failure. I didn’t boil the gallon of second-runnings long enough and it had high levels of DMS. I dumped that batch, but hey… it was worth the experiment.

Anyway, my lunch break is over… back to work! Hopefully I’ll have another post to share with you all in just a few weeks.

Cheers, and happy homebrewing!

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