One of my favorite annual events, beer-related or not, is back at Overlook Park again through Sunday, June 30th. Check out the North American Organic Brewers Festival for some relaxed mood, some music and food, and of course, an exciting lineup of organic beers.
Author: Andy
Oregon State Microbe: saccharomyces cerevisiae
On an already incredibly celebratory day, this bit of brewing related news comes from my turf. Oregon officially recognizes brewer’s yeast, saccharomyces cerevisiae, as the state microbe. That’s right, we’re the first state to officially designate a state microbe.
Really though, besides Aspergillus oryzae, what other microbe does as much to contribute to our culture and economy? Way to go, humble heroes!
Danzig Baltic Porter
Yesterday, as rain poured down outside the open garage, a Baltic porter was born. A few friends joined to get a refresher in partial mash brewing (extract plus steeping grains). We started the morning with a quick recipe, a trip to Homebrew Exchange (which is open Sundays thankyouverymuch), and got the water heating. I had to do some reading again to remind myself how to do an extract batch, but the savings in setup, time, and cleanup were a nice change of pace. To mix things up, and to get beer a little sooner, we decided to split the beer in two carboys and pitch one with british ale yeast and the other with California lager yeast (2 packs on a recommendation from the shopkeeper). Brew day was easy, and the extra hands around meant that cleanup (and carrying the 6+ gallons for beer to the basement) was much easier.
Anyway, here’s the recipe:
Grains:
- 23 lbs light malt extract
- 1.25 lbs chocolate malt
- 1 lbs Munich
- 1 lbs Vienna
- 1 lbs Crystal 60L
- 1 lbs Crystal 80L
- 0.5 lbs black patent
Hops
- 3oz Palisades @ 60min
- 3.5 oz Glacier @ 10min
Other
- British Ale Yeast
- California Lager Yeast x2
- Irish Moss
OG came in at 1.087. Get to work yeast!
An Idiot Move
In a “life imitates art” display of use of the Idiot trademark, Coronado Brewing Company is suing Elysian for Elysian’s use of Idiot in their Sauvin IPA. I’m on the verge of heading to San Diego for work and had collected a list of breweries to try while I’m down there. Coronado’s legal exercise just made that list a little shorter.
BrewBalls
Once you stop chuckling, you realize this is a really great idea.
Avocado Leaf Pale Ale
I was recently given a homebrew from a coworker. Not an entirely unique thing, but when she said it was brewed with avocado leaves, I was intrigued. It’s a partial-mash beer. The carbonation is great, the beer is a nice hazy pale, and the aroma is predominantly malt but with an earthy sweetness that I’m not familiar with. The taste is great – I’m actually surprised by the beer – for an extract beer it’s very clean and there’s not too much sweetness or anything. It’s really good – and there’s just something different about it that is intriguing. I’ve never had avocado leaves in anything so I have nothing to compare it to.
There’s not much hop to it, but I understand why. The leaves apparently came from a friend in Hawaii, and were steeped and added to the wort. It’s definitely a recipe worth brewing again.
Imperial BIPA
Today’s brew went from normal to Imperial when the hot liquor tank ran out of hot water. I was shooting for an IPA with a nice biscuit flavor. Thus BIPA. All told, the OG was 1.078 and I managed to pull off a full 10 gallons.
Grain
- 18 lbs 2-row
- 6 lbs Pilsner
- 1 lbs Munich
- 1 lbs Biscuit
Hops
- 3 oz Simcoe @ 60min
- 1 oz Newport @ 60min
- 2 oz Simcoe @ 20 min
- 2 oz Simcoe @ 10min
- 1 oz Amarillo @ 7min
- 1.5 oz Simcoe @ 5min
- 1 oz Simcoe in keg
Other
- 1 packet of Safale S05 in 1.5L starter
- 1 smack pack Wyeast NW ale yeast
- blend the two at inoculation
I debated whether to have two separate batches with a unique yeast, but given the initial gravity, I opted to mix and pitch to make sure both beers got a running start.
Oak-aged Bourbon Porter kegged
After 3 months sitting on bourbon soaked and toasted oak chips, I’ve kegged the remaining robust porter. It smells great and the sample I had while racking the beer suggests that it’s going to be a doozy. Stay tuned.
Banquet draft tower – for all your office party needs
I built this banquet tap tower for Michelle’s office christmas party in December. It’s a simple block of CVG Douglas fir with a hole straight-thru for a beer spigot and a partial groove in the bottom that allows it to be attached to a desktop with a C-clap. It started out as a part of a jockey-box, but after reading a fair amount, I decided that for the purposes of a party (or a wedding), the 5-gallon kegs usually get finished before they can cool down, and having the keg under the desk in a bucket of ice would be cheaper and less foamy than trying to get a jockey box dialed in.
Anyway, it worked well, looked nice, and was fun to make with some scrap I had laying around. I re-sawed some of the CVG fir to glue to the sides so that it would be CVG all the way around. It seemed a shame to have only 2 pretty sides. I didn’t finish it – and I probably should given the wet nature of beer – but unfinished fir just looks so lovely. Personally, I like it better with the short tap-handle. Next step will be to make a matching handle.
Dr. De’s Special Bitter – A PCC 50th Anniversary Tribute Beer
McMenamins is tapping a special beer this Wednesday, February 1st, brewed in honor of my employer’s 50th Anniversary. The beer, Dr. De’s Special Bitter (get it … DeSB), was brewed in honor of Dr. Amo DeBernardis, the person who founded and directed Portland Community College through it’s formative years. Oddly enough, Dr. Bernardis was a student at Kennedy School (a proper student, not like us), so it’s somewhat fitting that McMenamins be doing the brew.
This is pretty cool news and I can assure you that I’ll be stopping by Chapel Pub to sample the honorary beer on Wednesday. I hear it’ll be available at the nearest pub to each of the 4 main campuses – Chapel, Mall 205, Rock Creek Tavern, and John Barleycorns.