Jensen Haus Home Brewing

After much contemplation about a desire to brew more than once batch at once, I stared longingly at my Bottling Bucket and cursed it for being a Bottling Bucket, not a Primary Fermenter. It then occured to me that the only thing keeping my Primary from becoming a Bottling Bucket (and vice versa) was an extra lid, airlock and spigot. But, could I use a bucket with a spigot in it as a Primary? After some research it seemed that I was not alone. I quick ordered up a lid, spigot and airlock and pulled out the cordless drill and the 1in boring bit. Now I have two bottling buckets that can be used as Primaries. Its actually highly useful. If I rack the beer from the spigot , it leaves the trub on the bottom of the bucket as the spigot is mounted about an inch from the bottom. Now that I had two primary fermenters, I, of course, needed another secondary fermenter. I picked up a 6.5 and a 5 gallon carboy for $40 from a former homebrewer here in town. He threw in 48 cap bottles for free so it was a pretty good deal. Now I have a dearth of brew equipment.

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.

Jessica, the Brew Mistress of Jensen Haus, and I brewed up the Irish Red Ale Kit we’d ordered from Midwest. The Boil and subsequent pitching of yeast went just fine. However, there was a HUGE lag from pitching the yeast to the fermentation beginning. We pitched this batch at about midnight Friday night and it just started bubbling this morning. My assumption is that it started some time late last night. That puts it right at the far reaches of the three day window. Maybe I was spoiled by the sub-24hr start time on the Copper Ale but this one freaked me out. I opted for the liquid White Labs yeast for this one just like I did on the Copper Ale. I do have a packet of Munton’s on hand just in case though. If this batch wouldn’t have started fermenting by tonight, I was going to pitch that in to the fermenter just in case I had a batch of White Labs or the temp was too high. Unless something changes, I shouldn’t need to resort to such a drastic measure.

The funny part is that because Jessica was “in charge” of this batch, she’s been checking on the fermenter all the time. I think she’s worried that she did something wrong and that it wouldn’t ferment. For both our sakes, I hope all is well with this Irish Red. I’m almost out of Copper Ale so I need to get this batch rollin’. Next up is an Oatmeal Stout. Without the Holiday Spices this time around. (Just for you Craig and JB.)

Well I have survived BockFest in New Ulm, MN. What an awesome time. I’m amazed at how little stupidity there was at an event like this. Its clear this event attracts the non-stupid drinkers. Clearly, I need to talk to my Father-in-Law about some deer skins and antlers. Check out the Flickr Gallery here.

Officially opened a bottle of the Copper Ale tonight. I had strategically put a single bottle in the fridge before I left for work yesterday so I could let it chill all day. Other than the inevitable chill haze, this stuff is awesome. I’m struggling to find a good comparison in a commercial brew but it reminds me of Sam Adams Winter Ale but not as dark. The closest comparison I’ve thought of would be an Oktoberfest. As the single bottle was successful, I put the whole batch in the fridge to halt the priming.  It should have close to 36hrs to settle the yeast and chill haze out. This should be an excellent drinking this stuff while waiting in line for Bockfest on Saturday morning. Hopefully I can keep myself from drinking all of it before I got to visit my parents in March. That’s the best part of Home Brewing. When you have a successful batch and you can share it with other people and get to say, “I made this.” Check out my Flickr Gallery of the Copper Ale here.

I saw a 6er of this in amongst the packs of Sierra Nevada selection at Hyvee this last weekend and I was highly intrigued. I really like a good grapefruity IPA and I’ve been on a quest to find one that has a similar flavor to Granite City’s Duke of Wellington IPA. Sierra Nevada has answered my prayers and it sounds like they are making this a permanent addition to their line up. This is an incredibly good beer and you’d never know it was a 7.2% brew. Fantastic “grapefruity” hoppyness that makes or breaks an IPA for me. Not a heavy brew as evidenced by my drinking of 4 bottles. I’ve been evangelizing this brew to my friends who I know like a good IPA and it appears that the distribution is a little spotty around the area. Sunday was the first time I’ve seen this stuff in the store. It should be more widely available in the near future. (so I hope anyway)

• Press Release
• Reviews

With Bockfest fast approaching, and the Copper Ale still “priming”, I wanted to test it to see how it was doing. So this last Saturday night, I put a bottle of it out on the deck to chill for two hours and popped the bottle. It obviously needs a few more days to finishing building the final carbonation levels but it tastes fantastic. It would benefit heavily from being cold aged for a solid 48hrs to get the chill haze to settle out.  Its surprisingly clear at room temperature however. Irish Moss is a miracle product I tells ya. Its a very triumphant moment after the huge failure that was my Holiday stout. Alton Brown was right. Sanitization is the key. The trick I used this time around was to run all the equipment I could possibly fit in my dishwasher through a full cycle. That way the equipment is heated above the magical 170 Degree mark for a considerable length of time. I also put about a tablespoon of powered sanitizer in the soap launcher in my dishwasher. I do need to come up with some way to get my 5gal Carboy in to my dishwasher and get it to be stable. Right now it won’t stand up straight. I’d also like to find or make a drying rack for for my 1L bottles. The standard bottle racks from places like Midwest don’t support a 1L bottle and I really don’t like storing the bottles and my carboy right side up.

My most recent batch of brew is in the bottle and should be ready for a sample in about a week or so. Ideally, I’d like to have it ready to go for BockFest. I’d love to take along a few bottles/growlers of it to give to some friends to sample. I brewed this batch of Copper from a kit I’d ordered from Midwest Brewing Supplies. Midwest is where I ordered my original brewing kit and brew pot from and they’ve been amazing. Great customer service, fast shipping and excellent products.

I’d like to personally welcome you to my shiny new website. I’m a rookie (my 4th batch has just been bottled) Home Brewer and to feed my other hobby of being a nerd, a website such as this seemed like a fantastic idea. So there you have it. If you are a fellow brewer, check back once I’ve got some photos up and running.