I Make Beer

I Make Beer.

I'm 'making' beer at this very moment.

It's still carbonating. I have to wait some more.

It will take a few more weeks.

Should be ready for Spring Break. (Hooty-hoo!)

I Make Beer.

I wait.

All Bottled Up

I bottled my beer today. The event was well thought out, planned out and orchestrated to the tiniest detail. (Almost.)

It has been more than a couple of weeks since I started my brewing, so I was getting more than antsy to get this stuff bottled. The only thing that was keeping that from happening was - BOTTLES. I knew I'd need them. I knew it from the very beginning. What do you drink beer out of? Bottles. I had purchased a few small 12 oz. bottles several weeks ago, because they were kinda cute, but this wasn't going to be near enough for the two gallons of ale beckoning the fruition of my labor. I thought about stealing the now empty 1 quart bottles from my husband's beer making kit, but those bottles seemed so...ordinary. And plastic. And too large. Hardly worthy of my inaugural beer. Not fancy enough for the "Taste of the Blues". Oh no, I needed something MORE.

So, I set back off to the local supply store. Lucky for me, I live within about a mile from one of the very few beer/wine supply stores in our fair city. I knew as soon as I laid eyes on the bottling section which bottles were coming home with me. There they were, those glorious Amber colored, 16 oz., swing-top bottles. The neck is rather bulbous. Perfect! I gathered up a case of these (after careful calculation as to how many I'd need) and headed home. I had two gallons of brew. That's 256 oz. My case of 16 oz. bottles would take up 192 oz. That leaves 64 oz. I'd get to use those cute 12 oz. bottles so nothing goes to waste. Of course, this was all meticulously calculated previously. Along with the cute 12 oz. bottles, I had also purchased a nifty capping gadget. (I've been a lover of gadgetry since I was a mere tot.) As long as you have a legitimate reason for gadgetry, it's always appropriate to purchase said gadgetry without otherwise having to justify the expense.

Now that I had enough bottles, I returned to my handy and entirely thorough instructions from the Mr. Beer kit. This is Step 3 - Bottling & Carbonating. It said my beer was ready to be bottled when the liquid in my keg was relatively clear and no longer cloudy. As it turns out, my beer still seemed cloudy to me. I wasn't dissuaded from my task. I reasoned that since I had pulverized a bunch of blueberries and added honey, that this concoction couldn't help but be somewhat cloudy. I pressed on. I followed the steps to sanitize everything. Can't be too careful in this step. (I read something about exploding bottles if you don't follow this step correctly.)

Before my beer making days, I never really gave much thought to carbonation. I mean, I understand that soft drinks are carbonated and that's what makes them bubbly, but I never considered that beer was also carbonated. It makes perfect sense, of course, but I just never gave it any thought before. (If you're reading this out of order, you may not know that I was not previously a beer drinker until I became a beer brewer.) So, this fermented brew that was sitting in my keg needed some carbonation. This happens by putting sugar in the bottles before adding the liquid. Just regular old white granulated sugar. Mr. Beer thought of everything, so he assumed some people (like me) might not be satisfied with the pre-packaged plastic bottles that came with his kit. He gave sugar measurements for all different sizes of bottles - 3/4 tsp. for my cute little 12 oz. bottles and 1 tsp. for the awesome 16 oz. swing-top bottles. I filled each bottle with the appropriate amount of sugar and brew and capped them off. I placed all the bottles out of direct sunlight as directed. It is night-time, so there's no sun at all. But, being that I plan ahead...I made sure that when the sun does come back out, that it will not shine directly on those bottles.

My husband is a big fan of my blog, and he was trying to assist me in my endeavor (bless his heart). He thought I should write something about what I'll do now that my beer is bottled. What else can I do? I'll wait.

Brew Fest Results

Well, I am embarrassed about my delay in posting the results of the over-hyped beer fest event. Even in my embarrassment, I will continue.

The invitation I created (see post dated Feb. 1, 2010) was, well...how do you say? Pretentious. I enlarged it poster-sized and had it mounted to hang on my den wall. The poster enlarging and mounting dude was quite interested in the event. I believe he was fishing for an invitation. That is, until he learned of the true nature of the event. All the same, he was impressed with the poster. (I think he secretly had printed one for himself to keep.)

We had an equally impressive beer tasting station set up. With all the pomp and circumstance that you would expect from our otherwise overdone event. There was indeed home-crafted breads, sausage, jerky and roasted peanuts as promised on the invitation. (In my haste to get all the last minute things done, I inadvertently left out the home-made apple butter. Sorry Margaret!) There were skull-endowed home brewing t-shirts, cute little beer themed buttons a-plenty and beer mug Mardi Gras beads adorning our guests. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for rising to the occasion. (If you could see me now, you'd see me wiping sentimental tears from my cheek with the palm of my hand.)

Except for a few amateurish blunders on the part of the hostess (yes, me) in the judging and tasting part of the event, I believe the event was a success. Next time, at the upcoming Summer Classic, I will have ironed out the judging and setup wrinkles for much more thorough and accurate results. I will also endeavor to start the judging early enough in the evening to ensure that the judges are not too inebriated to know whether they were drinking beer or kool-aid.

The Judges pick for best beer - based on appearance, aroma, taste and after-taste - was my husband. Whew! (We were able to sleep harmoniously that night.) His entry was the B&B Haus Pale Ale. The People's Choice award - based on nothing in particular really - went to the Cumberland Pale Ale. The Marrowbone Bitters did receive the highly coveted and much appreciated green "Participant" ribbon. The judges pick received the First-Place black beer mug trophy inscribed with event particulars, a blue First-Place ribbon and commemorative beer-mug endowed Mardi Gras beads. While the trophy will be retained by the winner, the beads are to be passed to each successive winner at future contests. They are quite lovely and were donated by Beer Fest guests.

I have to say that after side-by-side comparison tasting, I actually found the Cumberland Pale Ale to be my favorite. It tasted very similar to my husband's beer, but it did have just a bit more flavor.

By popular demand, at the Summer Classic (date to be determined later), we will be opening the competition to other home brewers. Once the date is set, we'll be offering up details, admission fees, criteria, etc. It promises to be more bigger, more outlandish and in true keeping with "Our Ways". Until then - I'm brewing.

P.S. I tasted my brew this morning. Progressing well.

Waiting.....

I am brewing. Which really just means I'm waiting.

I've been repeating the words over and over in my head..."I make beer, I make beer". Don't know why, but I guess it's because - I make beer.

The First Batch - Where To Begin?

I began my beer-making venture yesterday. I chose to jump in and do a really "girly" beer. (I am a girl after all.) I also decided on a name for the beer label under which all my soon-to-be-famous beers will reside. I named my beer label "House of Brews". My first beer will be a pale ale beer with a fruity concoction of blueberries and honey. It's name is "A Taste of the Blues". I'm sure I'll be designing my label soon, but first things first. The beer.

Since this is my first official batch, I'm following the directions from my "Mr. Beer" home brewing kit. This is the same kit that I bought for my brothers and husband that ignited this new found passion. I found a recipe that I'm adapting. This seems like a very easy way to jump into home brewing with very limited knowledge of the brewing techniques. Okay, with absolutely NO KNOWLEDGE of brewing whatsoever. My husband has already made his first batch (that he will be debuting this weekend at the Beer Fest) and it tasted pretty good (as beers go). I wanted to do this totally without help from him, so I proceeded while he was at work. It happened to be a snow-day here in Nashville yesterday, so I think the beer-brewing gods are on my side.

I opened the instructions. Placed all my beer making essentials nearby and began. The directions seemed very straight forward. I quickly read through them. I think a 5 year old could do this. What's the big dang deal?

Step 1: Sanitizing. Evidently this is an extremely important step in the beer making process. (So far, so good. No trip up yet.) It said that I "MUST SANITIZE ALL EQUIPMENT THAT COMES IN CONTACT WITH MY BEER". Yep, it said it just like that. In all caps and underlined. So this must be super extremely important. It went on to explain how to do the sanitizing with the included sanitizing powder. It went so far as to explain that I should do part of these steps over my sink so I wouldn't make a mess. How thoughtful. Being the perfectionist and overachiever that I am, I love very detailed instructions. I don't like there to be any question about methodology, to ensure a perfect outcome. So far, I'm under the impression a woman must have written these instructions.

The recipe I'm using calls for using a blender to puree my fruit, so the directions reminded me to also sanitize the blender before using. Again, who would think of this other than a woman? I'm just sayin'.

So, once everything is sterile enough for a surgeon, it's on to step 2.

Step 2: Brewing. Okay, now we're getting into the fun part. This is the part that evidently brings in to play the creative juices (pun intended) of the brew-master. Since my husband had already done a 'base brew' - meaning he did the recipe straight from the box with no variations - I already knew I had to add my own flair for my first brew. Well, I added someone else's flair to my first brew because I'm using a recipe I found online. Being this is my first brew, and I have no idea what I'm doing, I decided it would be best to try a recipe that someone created. Next time though...

I measured my ingredients with the sanitized utensils. This is the part where you add the booster that came prepackaged with the kit. The package of the booster says it boosts the alcohol and body to the beer. I'm all for that! (Is there enough of this stuff?) This mixture is called the wort. Now who came up with that name, I wonder? Wort. It evokes visions of that hideous growth on the end of a witches nose. I'm told that it's actually pronounced like wert. I feel better about that. After mixing in my deviation from the basic recipe (my blueberries and honey), I added my ingredients into the cute little plastic keg that came with the kit. This specific kit makes 2 gallons of homemade brew. I think that's a respectable amount of beer for an amateur beermeister. I placed my keg in my dining room out of direct sunlight as directed. Now we wait. It has to sit a MINIMUM OF 7 DAYS. (Again, the directions had this all caps and underlined.)

So...what shall I do while I wait? Life goes on I presume. I need to start my real research now and start planning for my next batch. I went online and subscribed to a magazine today..."Brew Your Own". Gotta get up to speed on my new hobby.

I think I'll start designing my label.

Can A White Girl Brew Beer?

Let me start by saying I'm a 40-something woman that lives in Nashville, Tennessee. For Christmas this year (oops - last year), I was compiling a list of gifts that I wanted to get for my siblings. Having six siblings and dozens of nieces and nephews, we generally do not purchase individual gifts for everyone. However, 2009 was a traumatic year for our family. Having suffered a horrible tragedy in the family near the end of summer, I was looking to uplift my spirits through the joy of giving. In the process, I also hoped to lift the spirits of others, too. So, as I was making my list, I wanted to give something to each that was at least somewhat more than an obligatory pair of gloves and somewhat less than a new car. Budget, of course, was a concern. So I set off on my journey through the Internet to find something both economical, worthy and maybe even enjoyable.

I'll cut to the chase. For two of my brothers (and husband), I decided on Home Beer Brewing kits. Needless to say, they were well received. "The Contest" began the next day. It's conception was modest, but immediately started growing. One brother showed up at our house within a few days with a small newspaper publication "Southern Brew News", and I knew this competition was going to spiral into a beer-making frenzy. Anything less, wouldn't be in keeping with our family traditions. ("No Rules, Just Traditions" - but that's a blog for another day.) The ground rules were forming and the date was set for the unveiling / judging to see who would claim the prize.

Being that I am not one to be outdone, I decided (as a joke) to jump into the competition. Let me interject here that I am not a beer drinking person. Never have been. My tastes lie in the more heartiness of a good Southern Bourbon. That being said, I just wanted to throw a kink, if you will, into the mix. So I purchased a pre-mixed and ready to 'brew' bottle of Mexican Cervesa at a local brew supply shop. All I had to do was drop a little yeast pill into the bottle, cap it tightly and wait. (I'm still waiting.)

The competition is this coming Saturday. The beers have been named. (Of course, we'd name them!) And the invitations have been sent. (Okay - I'm sticking them in the mail today.) Who will reign victorious? We will be having two prizes. There will be the official Judges Pick - based on several specific criteria. And then there will be the People's Choice Award - based on nothing other than personal favorite.

I've gotten the beer making fever. How hard can it be? What is a 'hops'? A 'wort'? I don't know. Do I really need to know what these things are? I guess I'll find out, because I'm starting my first REAL batch of beer today.

Can a white girl brew beer? Today begins my journey. I'll be posting my results here, so tune in to find out.