Beer Cellar

The beer collection has been expanding lately. This is the time of year the LCBO releases a lot of interesting beers, many of them only available once a year. I counted 79 bottles at present and 44 different styles. Some of the bigger beers will be aged for a while, others will be savored until they come available again and the lighter beers will be consumed fresh.

The collection is not finished for the year though. I am still waiting on La Trappe Quadrupel Ale, St. Bernardus Abt 12 and Meantime Coffee Porter. It also can't hurt to get a few more Orval!

Photos and a spreadsheet that list everything to follow:

Step 5: Filtering & Bottling the Wine Kit

Here is the final step of the six week process to make the KenRidge New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc wine kit. Above is a photo of the wine after clarifying for 16 days and after it was transferred off the sediment. It was pretty much crystal clear at this point.

I decided to filter the wine even though it looked really clear. It was cheap to rent so I figured why not. After it was done I think it did make a big difference in the finished product. It was pretty easy to run the machine. Just add filter pads, rinse it out, put the sucking hose in the carboy, the draining hose in the bottling bucket and turn it on.

With the wine crystal clear I siphoned it into sterilized bottles. I then sterilized the corks and corked the bottles with a rented floor corker.

After all this time, here is the finished product. Twenty Eight bottles of Sauvignon Blanc. The labels came with the kit but the shrink caps did not. It is tasting very good at the moment but I think it will be even better after sitting in the bottles for a couple months.

Step 3 & 4; Degas, Stabilize and Clarify the Wine Kit

The gravity sample above shows the wine has completed fermentation. This means it is time to degas the KenRidge New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc wine kit. The degassing is done to remove excess carbon dioxide so the wine can clarify properly.

I degassed with this tool that goes on a drill. It does a good job and is very quick. The degassing can also be done with a spoon or by shaking the carboy.

First thing for step 3 was to transfer the wine off the sediment to a new carboy. Then add Potassium Metabisulphite to the wine and degas. The photo above shows the wine after degassing, it produces alot of foam. Now the wine has to sit for two days before clarifying.

Step 4 consists of adding a packet of Potassium Sorbate and a packet of ISOKLEER to clarify the wine. After that you simply stir it well and let is sit for 16 days to clarify.

Here is a sample taken just before adding the clarifying agent. The wine is quite clear already but it does show some hazing in the carboy.

Step 2, Racking the Wine Kit

Last Friday I racked the KenRidge New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc wine kit into a glass carboy. Primary fermentation went well during the first 10 days and it almost fermented to dryness in that time. The photo above shows the wine before I transferred it. Smells really good so far!

This is a photo of the lees left in the bottom of the fermenter after racking. It was pretty thick stuff.

Here it is in the secondary fermenter. It is still very cloud but it will settle out over the next two weeks. Then in the third step I will degas the wine and add a fining agent to further clarify the wine.

I took a gravity sample to test the sugar levels. It came in at 0.995 which means the yeast are just about done consuming all the sugar. It should lower a little bit more by the next sampling. I then let the sample settle out in the fridge for a taste test. It was excellent, a little yeast at the moment but there definitely is a nice tasting wine in there.

KenRidge Showcase, New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc Kit

Tonight I started my first batch of home brewed wine. I am using a premium wine kit from KenRidge and it is suppose to simulate a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. This kit produces 23L or 30 bottles of wine and takes 6 weeks to brew. The kit cost $90 which works out to $3 bucks a bottle.

Above is the contents of the kit. It includes everything you need asides from brewing equipment, water and bottles/corks. Items included are:

• Good instructions with note sections
  
• 16L of grape juice concentrate
• Bentonite, 15g (clay that is used to nourish the yeast and clarify the wine)
• LALVIN K1-V1116 yeast, 5g
• Potassium Sulphite, 4.5g (used to stop oxidization and stabilize the wine for storage)
  
• Potassium Sorbate, 6g (used to stop yeast growth, my wine will be dry so I will not use it)
  
• ISOKLEER (used as a fining agent to clear the wine)
• Printed wine labels
  

Starting with sterilized equipment I proceed to do the first steps of brewing the wine. The 16L of grape must was added to the bucket. Then the bag was rinsed out into the bucket and it was topped up to 23L with filtered water. With that done I stirred in the Bentonite and then gave everything a through mixing. The yeast was then sprinkled on top, the lid was put on and I inserted an airlock into the lid. Now it goes in a warm spot until the next step in 10 days. The first step took about 15 minutes.

Before sealing up the bucket I took a gravity sample, This tests the sugar level. This is done for a couple reasons, it is used to calculate the alcohol content when the wine is finished and it also tells you when fermentation is complete. The reading came out at 1.098 which is right on target. This wine will ferment out to approx. 13%.

Here is the wine all buttoned up, It will ferment in this food grade bucket for the first 10 days. Buckets are the best fermentors to use in primary fermentation because they are easy to mix in and they are simple to clean out afterwords. The next step will be to transfer the wine into a glass carboy for the secondary fermentation. Look for a post on the next step around Nov 6th.

Home Grown Hops

Early this year I decided to order some hop rhizomes from Left Fields Hops. This has to be done in Feb/March because they sell out fast. Once the snow left my order arrived and I planted Cascade, Nugget & Goldings. They are growing up the side of the house which I will show below:

Here we have two hop bines growing, Goldings on the left and Cascade on the right. They are growing up string. The string is tied to a stake in the ground and then fastened to a hook under the eaves of the house.

This hop bine is Nugget which is a good general purpose bittering hop. It is growing up 3 long bamboo canes that I bolted together. This method didn't work the greatest so I will use just string next year.

The photo above shows how the hops start flowering, This is called a burr. Basically the sticks eventually turn brown and the hop forms.

Here are a couple shots of fully formed Cascade hops. The cascade is putting out an excellent crop for the first year. These hops are just about ready to pick. I've read they are ready when they turn light green, feel dry to the touch and the end is slightly browning. They will also change from having a grassy smell to a nice hop smell.

The other hops are doing well also but producing a little slower. The nugget has many burrs currently so it will produce a nice harvest of bittering hops later this season. The Goldings is not producing much in its first year. Maybe just enough for a 3 gallons batch of English Ale I hope.

Blanche De Chambly Bottled

Above is a shot of the Blanche De Chambly clone taken during primary fermentation. Being a wheat beer I was expecting much more krausen but it did bubble more then usually.

OG was 1.052 and FG came in at 1.010. So this brew finished up with an ABV of about 5.5%.

Here it is all bottled up. There was enough to fill 32 500ml (17 oz) bottles. I was short about 8 bottles, I guess the beer fairies took their share. This was bottled about 10 days ago. It should be pretty much carbonated now. I'll following up with a photo of it in a glass once I crack the first one open.

Look for an update on the hops I am growing next....

Blanche de Chambly Brew Day

A few days ago I brewed the Blanche de Chambly clone, the recipe can be found here. It went well and being a partial mash it only took a few hours to do. Here are some photos I took along the way:

Here is the wort after a 10min boil and after the only hop addition. It was boiled for an addition 30mins after that. The white foam is hot break which occurs after the wort has come to a full boil.

After the boil I tossed in the coriander, ginger & bitter orange peel and let it steep for 10mins. The pot then went into an ice bath to cool to pitching temperature of 24c(75f).

With the wort cooled I took a gravity sample to test the sugar levels. It came out at 1.052, with the recipe projecting 1.049 it was within range.

Here it is after pitching the yeast. I separated it between two carboys because I have read wheat beers can have a large krausen which would make it prone to blow offs. In the end it was unnecessary as the krausen only came up about an inch. Better safe then sorry I guess. At first the beer seemed quite dark for a witbier. It has since lightened up after settling out.

Up next I will show photos of the primary fermentation and racking the beer into a secondary carboy.

Blanche de Chambly Clone

After a bit of a brewing hiatus I am at it again. This time I am trying out a clone recipe for Blanche de Chambly. It is a belgian witbier and will be an excellent summer brew. Here is the recipe that is provided by byo.com:

Blanche de Chambly clone

5 Gallon, partial mash

OG 1049

Grain Bill:
3 lbs. Belgian pilsner malt
0.5 lb. flaked wheat
0.5 lb. flaked oats
3 lbs. unhopped wheat dry malt extract
1 oz. Saaz hop pellets, for 40 min.
0.5 oz. cracked coriander seed
0.25 oz. dried bitter orange peel
0.125 oz. grated dried ginger
recultured Blanche de Chambly yeast (or Wyeast 3944 or 3942)
7/8 cup corn sugar for priming

Directions:
Mash pilsner malt, flaked wheat, and flaked oats in 2 gals. of water at 150̊ F for 60 minutes. Sparge with 10 qts. water at 168̊ F. To kettle add extract. Boil 10 minutes. Add hop pellets and boil another 30 minutes. Reduce heat to simmer, steep (in a fine mesh bag or muslin hop bag) coriander, orange peel, and ginger for 10 minutes. If desired, other spices could be added, such as cumin, cardamom, black pepper, and paradise seeds. Remove from heat and chill, removing spice bag. Top off in fermenter to 5.25 gals. and cool to 75̊ F. Pitch yeast. Ferment for eight to 10 days at 65̊ F or so. Rack to secondary and condition for three weeks at 60̊ F. Prime with corn sugar, bottle, and age four weeks.

Above is a photo of all the fermentables. In the large bags there is 3lbs of pilsner malt & 3lbs of wheat dry malt extract. In front there is 1/2lb flaked oats on the left & on the right is 1/2lb of torrified wheat that I substituted for flaked wheat. In the middle is the yeast I used, it is safbrew wb-06. It is a dry yeast for use with wheat beers. Ultimately I should have used the true belgian yeast but I cheaped out.

Here is a shot of the remaining ingredient, all the flavoring additives. Starting clockwise from the back corner, bitter orange peel, saaz hops, coriander seeds & dried ginger. There is an ounce of each so only partial amounts were used except for the hops.

Brew day photos to follow in a day or two.

Hop Grower Dan

This year I am going to try my hand at growing my own hops. I have a bit of a green thumb and have been publishing a vegetable garden blog for three years now so they should be easy enough for me to grow. I have chosen three varieties even through I really only have room for two and they will be grown up strings that are about 20 feet long.

I wanted to grow general purpose hops and I also wanted to select vigorous & disease resistant varieties. Here are the ones I selected and a short description of how I want to use them:

• Nugget - selected for an all purpose bittering hop.
  
• Goldings - selected for ales, stouts & barely wines. Possibly used for lagers as well.
• Cascade - selected for pale ales & IPA's
  

With these varieties I should be able to supply most of my hops needs. Then I would only need to order specific hops if needed. I ordered my rhizomes from Left Fields Hops who are located in British Columbia, Canada. They offer a good selection and at good prices.

Here is what arrived, Short rhizome cuttings. I planted them about 6" deep with a good amount of compost. Once they start growing I will run some string from the ground to the eaves of the house and let them grow. I am guessing this year hop production will be pretty low. Hopefully I get something though.

Vanilla Bourbon Porter Bottle Night

This evening I bottled the porter and it just so happens to be 5 weeks since brew day. It took about an hour to bottle which was much better timing them my last attempt. I have still not got the hang of not spilling all over the kitchen though.

The porter finished off at 1.022 which was higher then I wanted. The original recipe projects a FG of 1.018 so it is pretty close I guess. Alcohol content is around about 6.3% at the moment. The priming sugar & bourbon will raise it a bit more but I have no idea how to calculate that.

After the gravity sample I prepared all the additives in my bottling bucket. First in the bucket was 2oz by weight of sugar dissolved in water for carbonation. I then added 2.5oz of pure vanilla extract & 8oz of bourbon, both by liquid measure. The porter was then raked into the bucket, lightly stirred and then siphoned into bottles.

This 11.5L(3gal) batch produced 15 750ml(25oz) bottles and one glass worth for tasting. It is a deep brown colour and the gelatin fining has made it crystal clear. Taste at the moment is very reminiscent of dark chocolate which must be helped by the vanilla. It is also nicely bitter from the bourbon and dark malts. It is very viscous in the mouth and leaves a creamy after taste. With the high alcohol content it laces on the glass but it does not taste overly boozy. I look forward to trying this porter when it is carbonated and ages in the bottle for about a month.

Vanilla Bourbon Porter Update

Here is the porter on 3 day of fermentation. I have started keeping the carboy in the broom closet. It is in the center of the house and the furnace pipes run under it so it is evenly warm. It also completely excludes light so the sun can not skunk the beer.

One the first day the airlock was slowly active. On day two a krausen formed and the airlock was quite active. On day three it is about the same. I suspect fermentation will slow tomorrow.

This is quite a big beer so I will ferment it for at least 4 weeks, maybe even 6. There also is a lot of sediment from all the grain so I will be racking to a secondary fermenter at the 2-3 week mark. I will also be using gelatin finings in hopes for getting it crystal clear.

Not much interesting will be happening with the porter until I put it in the secondary so I will not update until then. In between I will be doing some posts on beers I have tasted lately.

Vanilla Bourbon Porter Brew Day

I brewed the porter Tuesday night, it took about 6 hours total, what a work out. Here goes a few photos of brew day. If you are looking for the recipe you can find it HERE.

Taken after mashing the grain for 60min. 3gal mash with 9.5lbs of grain.

Taken at the end of the second mash, 30min this time. This was done with 2gal of water, a sparge of sorts I guess.

Taken well bring 5gal of wort to a full boil. Hmm looks good!

Taken at hot break and after the first hop addition. My brew pot is just under 6gal so I was a little worried about boil over. The hops went in slowly and all went well.

Taken at flame out after a 90min boil. The wort was reduced from 5gal to a little over 3gal.

The wort was then cooled and I took a gravity sample. OG on this porter was 1.070, the original recipe projected 1.078. I think my efficiency was not to shabby. I did think about doing a third mash which probably would have brought it up the few points, live and learn.

Coming up next will be a post on its fermentation thus far.

Vanilla Bourbon Porter Malt Grain

I had laid out all the malt's for my porter and thought they looked so good I had to take some photos of it all. Here they go:

5lbs Canadian 2-Row Malt

1lb Brown Malt

1lb Chocolate Malt - 1/2lb was used in the porter

1lb Crystal 77 Malt - chewed on some of this, excellent caramel flavor

2lbs Munich Malt

*I am going to start working on the brew day post tonight and hope to get it up in a day or two