Sunday, August 17, 2008

The air is just right right for.......brewing....drinking too

Yesterday was a good day. The weather was great, mid 80s, little breeze, with a few clouds passing by. The dog had just gotten her haircut in the morning. Makes for a pretty good day to brew. We staked the dog out in the yard while I set up the brew kettle and equiment. On the way home Friday, I had stopped by Kirk's Brew and perused his selection with my recipe for the Goose Island Nut Brown Ale clone in my hand. He did have a kit all ready put together for a brown ale, and after running the numbers, his kit was going to be about $10 less expensive than what I had in my hand. So I decided to go with his kit, and substituted a vial of White Labs California Ale yeast for the dried packet that was included in the box.

Everything went really smoothly as far as the brewing process went. The kit called for a 45 minute boil with 1.5oz fuggles, adding 0.5 oz cascade for the last minute. I tightened the connections on the wort chiller that came apart last time and SOAKED Marcie and this time things worked great. We took the 2+ gallon concentrate down to 110F in a couple of minutes while it was sitting in an ice water bath and added it to 3 gallons of water in the fermentation vessel. It was still at about 79F after that, so the carboy was immersed in the same bath and eventually cooled down to 74F with periods of agitation out of the bath. No hot spots in that carboy. Marcie added the yeast and we headed out for the evening, hoping to see bubbles when we got home.

NO BUBBLES!?!?!! None were seen after we returned from the evening festivities, as well as none before I left for church this morning. I was a bit worried, but the did show up after church. But back to last night......

We dined with coach Bo Pelini at Macaroni Grill. Well not with him, but he was there. Then we were off Sun Valley Lanes to use some free bowling coupons we had won at the Saltdogs game. We both had a fun time, and then decided to continue the night downtown. After stopping at the Brass Rail to see Kory, where he bought us a stiff drink, we then headed to Voda for a martini. One turned into more than one, and both Marcie and I saw people from our past, and they were partying together. SMALL WORLD!!! After they sat down at our booth, there were 2 more martinis for Marcie, and 3 more manhattans for me. The tab got a little high priced, but we did have fun. I was feeling allright for church (had to sing), however I cannot say the same for my better half.

And all was better when I got home to the sight of bubbles on the top of a dark carboy. Oh yeah, and the Cubs just completed a 5-1 road trip and hold a 5.5 game lead on the Brewers.

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