[Wayne1]

Kevin,

To each their own

Some people may feel that using Bybees on each driver in your speakers is overkill

Serious brewers, like serious audio geeks, can never have too many toys

Go peruse the posts on the homebrew digest www.hbd.org for some of the off the deep end homebrewers who use PLC based controllers for maintaining mash temps and who ferment in stainless steel conical tanks

Having been trained in microbiology, I may know a bit  too much about how easy it is to contaminate beer and how hard it is for yeast to reproduce without contamination.

I am also a Certified Beer Judge, having been among the few to pass the very first Beer Judge Certification test in 1985.

I have judged on local, state, regional, national and international levels.

I take beer and brewing VERY seriously.

There is no doubt that you can make good beer using the methods you have described.

By going into the "overkill" methods I have described you can make world-class beer every time.

As far as Chinook hops, that is also a very personal choice. I do not care for the taste of the very high alpha hops. They are far to "rough" tasting to me. I prefer to use higher quantities of lower alpha hops.

The last recipe for an IPA I made commercially, used 20 kilos of Amarillo hops in six additions throughout a 90 minute boil. After fermentation I also added another 2.75 kilos for dry hopping. This was for 500 gallons.  

[Wayne1]

For those of you who are into all-grain brewing, here is a link to a recipe I shared with the homebrewing community in 1995.

http://brewery.org/brewery/cm3/recs/01_154.html

If you are not up to mashing yet, sub 7 lbs.  light dry malt extract for the Pale malt.

[Rocket]

hello wayne,

i hope you didn't take offence regarding my previous post.  i guess i'm a bit on the slack side and like things to be nice, easy and quick when i'm home brewing my beer.  it still does taste quite good tho.

regards

rod

[MaxCast]

I think you guys handled your selves like a couple of good beer buddies       I for one, would love to try any of your beers.  Hell, maybe Wayne might bring a six to the MAF if he has room    

Have you guys planned your spirits for the super bowl yet?

[Wayne1]

Rod,

No offense taken.

If you are happy with your end product, that is all that matters.

One suggestion I do have is instead of adding sugar to each bottle, you can try batch priming.

This is where you have another vessel, it could be a glass carboy or a polypropylene bucket that has been cleaned AND sanitised before hand. Take the full amount of sugar and a small amount of water and boil it up for 10 minutes. Start to rack the beer into the second container and then add the sugar. VERY carefully and slowly, stir the sugar solution into the beer.

Then you can fill the bottles.

This way you are assured of consistant results as far as carbonation levels go and you will get the beer off of the yeast so there will be less sediment in the bottles.

When you use kits, always use two kits instead of one kit and sugar. Sugar does tend to thin out the flavor, add a bit of an apple-cider taste to it and it gives a nasty hangover. By doubling the malt extract, you will be using maltose instead of sucrose. Maltose is a bit less fermentable so you will have a bigger body and smoother taste. It will cost more, but it will be worth it.

Coopers makes some very fine kits. Before I got into all grain seriously, I did use Coopers kits as the basis for much experimentation.

[KevinW]

Kevin,

To each their own

{snip}

As far as Chinook hops, that is also a very personal choice. I do not care for the taste of the very high alpha hops. They are far to "rough" tasting to me. I prefer to use higher quantities of lower alpha hops.

Hi Wayne,
I'll be the first to admit to lacking refinement in my taste in beer.  The hoppier the beer, the happier I am.  I need lots of flavor to enjoy the taste... similar to required louder music due to damaged hearing.

My best recipe uses 3lbs of frozen mango bits.  Probably breaks every rule in the beer judge handbook, but it adds a very distinctive flavor.

[Rocket]

hello,

i used to know a couple of guys who weren't really bothered by the taste of the beer, they used to drink the sedament at the bottom of the bottle as well.

i usually find if you leave the beer for a couple of months it really tastes better.  it is a bit green and not quite ready to drinking after a month.

i just tried one of the new coopers range "canadian blonde" it is from there export range and i think it tastes great.

anyway happy brewing.

regards

rod