Jensen Haus Home Brewing

I had to dump out the full keg of Honey Steam last night. It tasted horrible. I know, *sniff* a sad moment indeed. It was the last batch I made with my old All-Grain rig and my (apparently) disastrous water treatment regiment. My old rig didn’t have a proper sparge arm or a false bottom on the mashtun. I had a bazooka screen and a coiled rubber hose on top to whirlpool the sparge water on top of the grains. Because of the lack of procedural repeatability and what is a really shallow grain bed, I was getting extract efficiencies all over the board. Plus, I had been using Sodium Metabisulfate to clear the chloramine from my tap water and I think that I was overloading with Sodium which as leading to some pretty nasty flavors that I’ve detected in a number of my beers. (more…)

After a long winter here in South Dakota that involved feet of snow and some super cold temps, I’ve finally gotten back around to posting here on my site. Lots of things have happened over the last few months in regards to my brewing setup. Among the more important things is my move/upgrade to an All-Grain setup. I’ll be honest, I’m still trying to work out the kinks and learn the ins and outs of my new setup. I have to say though, I love the amount of control and variations I can create with this setup. Many thanks to Clark with Toppling Goliath Brewing in Decorah for letting me watch an All-Grain brewing session. It really demystified the entire process for me. All that said, I’m in a flurry of brewing right now for multiple reasons. Obviously I want a stockpile of brew on hand for the summer. That said, I also am scrambling to produce beer to enter in to the recently announced Granite City “Brew Off”.  On top of all that, I’m also hoping to take a variety of beer with me to Iowa in April when Jessica and I go to visit my parents. I love having friends family etc sample my brew to get general reactions. I was really hoping to give some samples to the aforementioned Clark with TGB but it sounds like he will be out of town at the Craft Brewers Convention in Chicago. Oh well, I’ll just secret shop his tasting room and drop off some bottles. Anywho, back to work. Check back as I hope I really can be diligent with posting and updating stuff here.

With the arrival of Summer, it marks the arrival of the “Summer Beer”. Usually brewed with Wheat and assorted citrus flavors, these beers are awesome for hot weather and compliment a BBQ any time. As a Home Brewer, I love this time of year. Summer Beer is one of the easiest and most satisfying of all the things I’ve done as a home brewer. It doesn’t require a lengthy fermentation, its supposed to be cloudy and lends it self to “session” consumption. You and gaggle of fellow beer geeks can sit on camp chairs in the garage on a summer night and drain a 5 gallon keg (Craig, JB, Chris and I did just such a thing). This is exactly what I was hoping for when I tinkered with an extract kit from Midwest. Its called “Bavarian Wheat” and its a very basic recipe. On its own, this batch was pretty unremarkable but once I got done with it, it was amazing. After fermentation, I reconstituted some Minute Maid Lemonade and combined the beer and lemonade in the keg. After carbonating and settling for a few days, this stuff would give Leines Shandy a run for its money. Going to make another batch of this for Nordic Fest.

I’ve learned a valuable lesson in the beer brewing process. Just because you want to transfer the beer from the primary, and a full week has gone by, it doesn’t mean the beer is ready to transfer. I had a continued fermentation in the Secondary over the last two weeks. So, last night I transferred the batch to another carboy to settle for another week. If I make this beer in future, I will be using my 6.5gal carboy to do the primary fermentation so I can see it to make sure its done. I guess I should have expected this with this recipe. Given the addition of 1lb of candi sugar, I’m sure the yeast had a ton more to munch on. I did sample a glass last night though. Despite being flat, it was a tasty brew.

At the rate we keep getting snow (in frickin’ April!), I should be calling this batch “Snowblower de Saison”. Craig and I brewed up the Lawnmower de Saison kit from Midwest last night. I opted for the White Labs liquid option. (Belgian Wit Ale WLP400). This is, hands down, one of the most involved boils I’ve done. Two kinds of LME, a 1lb package of Candi Sugar, Three Hop additions, Grains of Paradise, Whole Coriander and Bitter Orange Peel. As a note to anyone else who wants to brew this beer. This batch will clog your strainer! With all the hops and the huge pieces of orange peel, I had to stop and start the straining process twice. In future batches, I plan to use a colander and a mesh strainer for this batch so I can filter out the large chunks first. Either that or siphon it from the boil pot in to the fermenter so I can keep all the gunk in the pot. This batch smelled fantastic and it started bubblin’ in the fermenter in about 12hrs. Its batches like this that make me want a kegging set up so I can taste this beer in 3 weeks instead of 5.

I know most of you who home brew have some sort method to label your bottles. I’ve been using plan old masking tap and a sharpie to mark whats in each bottle. I didn’t like the “prohibition” feel that this method gave but I wasn’t exactly thrilled about printing out labels and then soaking them off once the beer had been enjoyed. I decided that a good compromise would be a permanent generic “Jensen Haus” label and the masking tape labels to note what and from when was in the bottles. I found these labels online and they are billed as “permanent”, dishwasher safe and laser printable. I order up a package and found that they print very well in the laser printer and that they are incredibly sticky and that the laser printing does not rub off. Even with a wet finger. I applied these labels to a case of 1L swing-top brown bottles last night. I ran them through the dishwasher this afternoon so I could bottle my batch of Oatmeal Stout and they survived the dishwasher excellently. In fact, during the stout bottling, I overfilled a couple of bottles and the spilled stout wiped right off the labels. So after a successful trial run, I then applied these labels to all my bottles. (they don’t work on the Growlers.) I took some pics and you can check them out on Flickr. (they should be the in “beer/brewing” photostream in the upper right.)

The Oatmeal Stout not only smelled fantastic, it tasted fantastic as well. Can’t see through it and it has a nice roastedness to it as a good hearty stout should. I hope I can hold out two weeks for this batch to carbonate.

When I got home from work tonight, I noticed the Hard Cider had pretty much stopped bubbling and that the Krausen in Oatmeal Stout had fallen. So it was Rackin’ Tuesday at Jensen Haus. (after some damn juicy burgers for dinner)

The Oatmeal Stout was pretty mundane. No issues in the racking. I tasted a sample and it tasted as expected. Nice coffee bite and very smooth. Oh how I hope this turns out this time. This batch was the first time I’ve ever used a carboy as a primary fermenter. Looking over in the kitchen, I dread the cleaning this carboy will need.

Now for the interesting part of the night. I transferred the Cider from the Primary bucket to a carboy through the spigot and took a sample glass. (I really liked transfering via the spigot as opposed to the racking cane.) Other than the previously noted Sulfur aroma, it smelled just like Woodchuck Hard Cider. In the carboy, it looked like five gallons of apple juice. (Jessica said it looked like urine. She has an amazing knack for things like that). After I transferred the cider, I popped the lid of the fermenter and discovered one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen in the Home Brewing process. In the absence of the usual hop and trub in the bottom of the fermenter, the bottom of the Cider fermenter was just yeast. It looked like a combination of honeycomb and a close up view of a Tempurpedic memory foam mattress. Check out this close up photo I took.

After a fine meal of Spaghetti, Craig and JB joined me in brewing a batch of Oatmeal Stout on Saturday. I’m hoping to redeem myself after my last stout was a major disaster. I made two major alterations to my modus operandi for this batch. First, to try and weed out a “house” flavor of bitterness that I noticed in both the Pumpkin Ale and the Copper Ale, I decided to use bottled Spring Water instead of tap water. Besides being neutral and avoiding Chlorine and Fluoride, it also helps avoid any issues with water volume. If you buy 5 gallons of water, its kinda hard to use to much or too little and end up with a wicked powerful batch or a watery batch. Secondly, I made it a point to strain out the hop particles from the boil before the wort went in to the fermenter. I think that’s the major cause of noticeable bitter finish to the Pumpkin Ale and the Copper Ale. I don’t think the Spring Water was a major necessity as the water here in Sioux Falls is pretty decent. However, I strive to control the variables I have direct control over so it makes sense.

This Oatmeal Stout kit from Midwest is really simple. There are no Aroma Hop additions so its a straight forward boil. The Specialty Grains in this kit smell fantastic when they steep. The picture attached to this post is of the Stout in the fermenter. (the fermenter in the background is the Cider Test Batch.) It started bubblin’ inside of 24 hours. I love it when a batch starts fermenting that fast. First of all, if the yeast I add take control right away, the possibility of contamination is minimized. Secondly, its reassuring because it means the yeast were healthy and went to town right away.

The Irish Red has been officially bottled. I tasted it and it seems to be quite good. The time in the Secondary must have been good because this batch is REALLY clear. I’m going to assume a fair amount of chill haze but that always clears after a bit of lagering. I’m hoping this batch is excellent because this is Jessica’s batch. She was responsible for almost the entire batch. If this Irish Red turns out, I think I’ll make the Copper Ale and the Irish Red my standard “house” batches.

A good friend of mine is getting married this summer and when asked if he wanted any home brew for his wedding, he said he wasn’t a big beer fan but if I could produce Hard Cider he would “love me forever”.

I decided to take on this task and it appears, on the surface anyway, to be rather simple. Obviously, this time of year, in my climate, fresh Cider is next to impossible to find in the store. My choices were to either 1. use bottled Cider or 2. fresh press some myself. Given the asinine cost of pressing my own, that option was right out. I bought 5 gallons of Cider from the store. Took a little work to find some Cider that was Pasteurized but didn’t have any preservatives in it. I’m sure some really fresh stuff in the fall would be ideal but I’ll make due with this test batch. I ordered a tube of White Labs English Cider Yeast from Midwest Supplies. Craig and JB (college buddies and purveyors of Nice ‘n Sleazy Home Brewing) came over and we sanitized the fermenter and dumped in the 5 gallons of Cider and pitched in the tube of yeast. It was bubbling in less than 24 hours. (White Labs is right. This yeast produces are really foul sulfur smell. Its supposed to subside after two weeks.) If this turns out, this is a crazy easy way to use my Home Brewing gear that sits idle when I’m not brewing to make a tasty beverage. I’m going to treat it just like a fresh batch of Wort at this point. 5 days in the primary bucket and then two weeks in a Carboy. I’ve read a number of recipes that say Brown Sugar is the best option for priming Cider so I’m going to do that. I’ll post an update when its further along the path drinkability.