Beer Bits 2

So why do I have to go to work? :-( Ahhhh well I guess I'll read all about it when I get home over a pint of homebrew.

LINK :: Visit The Brew Dudes for the action.

The Brew Dudes have laid down the gauntlet for Fermentation Friday this month. On the 25th we can all jump from site to site soaking in the advice of home brewers who have been there done that. Here is my contribution.
What a great topic. I think most home brewers could go on for hours. Though, if my experience tells me one thing it would have to be, "Brew it your way." Sure there are things you just shouldn't do, but, it really is all about learning. Everybody learns in a different way. You're first step might be to read a book or perhaps watch somebody brew. Maybe you'll follow the directions that came with a kit. These days you can even watch a DVD or a video on YouTube. Oh yeah there's also podcasts to listen to. I suppose you could even persuade somebody to help you via a Skype video conference or go old school internet and look for a newsgroup about brewing. Ok...a forum if you like more recent tech. Hey, my grandfather did it in a crock in the basement. How sanitary was that? Many people have been brewing for thousands of years. I hear it used to be a common chore in many households. It ain't rocket science. So get to it. There's more than one way to start brewing. Remember my one piece of advice. Do you're own thing. Why? Because you are your own brewer. Nothing should stand in the way of your first mistake. After all this mistake could be what will likely teach you to make great beer time and time again.

This month's theme?
Get started early and send you contributions to The Brew Dudes!

Well I'm happy to report that the Kolsch was a success. I went with ten gallons and came back with one. The Yuengling 16 gal keg was hit a little lighter. Not sure, but, I think about ten gallons are still left. :-)

Tomorrow is the community party where I get to share my homebrew. I kegged the second keg last night with the help of my brother in law and its cold conditioning in the fridge right now. How did it turn out? Well I'm happy to say this Kolsch is something I'm pretty proud of so far. Definately the lightest tasting and looking beer I've ever made. Seems pretty clean not too dry. I drank it next to a Victory Hop Devil so I don't have accurate tasting notes yet. The real test will be tomorrow. Will a bunch of people drink this beer or Yuengling Lager? Should be interesting.

My wife and I are also providing the music selection (via iPod not actually playing). I hope they like that too. Otherwise I'm never going to live it down ;-)

By now you know I love writing this blog and teaching people how to brew. I've written hundreds of posts about the topic here and elsewhere. So, if you like Beer Bits 2 and what I do here feel free to hit the donate button over there on the right. See you tomorrow.

When I heard my brother-in-law was getting ready to homebrew for the first time I couldn't stop offering to help. Seriously, he's probably wondering how to stop me from talking about it ;-) Well after a few conversations we landed on brewing at my house while his family is visiting. What better way to show somebody the ins and outs than to have them help you brew.

Homebrewing used to be a very private thing for me. I just wasn't very confident about my process and the results. Why would I share them with somebody if I wasn't a master? They might see I was doing it all wrong. Well, all I needed was somebody to ask me. Enter Jeremy a friend from work. As I've mention before in my online bloggings he was the reason I started brewing again. You know looking back on things he could be considered the catalyst for me to start homebrewing and blogging :-) Hmmm....anyway back to the story, he said that he was thinking of learning to brew. I of course shared with him that I knew how to do it and would be happy to help him learn. Before long we were buying supplies at the now defunct Brew By You and boiling up our first wort. We brewed a few beers together at my house with my equipment and then with his and soon he was off brewing on his own. In fact his wife is getting ready to brew her first batch soon. In fact I think they might be over to help us out too.

So, if you know how to brew, consider sharing your skill with somebody. You might not be perfect, but, who cares. You might even learn a thing or two. Some say, "The best way to learn something is to teach it." Sounds counter intuitive, doesn't it? Once you've taught something you'll understand. Get out there and teach somebody to brew!

Here's what's going on...

I'll be demonstrating the finer aspects (what does that mean?) of homebrewing to my brother-in-law sometime over the next week. Another friend and his wife might come over as a precursor to her first foray into brewing. She's shooting high for that first batch, pomegranate wheat.

Getting ready for the community party this weekend. I'll be sharing homebrew with these folks for the first time. Should be a good time if we get good weather.

The AB & Inbev thing is getting some big press. I don't really care all that much. I thought HopTalk had a funny post about it. If anything I think it will help Americans understand that we really do live in a global economy now. Even their American Beer is affected. Hey, maybe I do care. Maybe we should be listing to Jack. There's opportunity to be had.

Also, the Firefly Lights (aka Little Belgian Bastard Ale) is almost gone. There's just a bit of root beer left for some root beer floats. I'm sure the kids will appreciate that.

Brew Dudes decrees the topic to be...


Thanks John. Great topic!

Note: Sorry about the bad links. All fixed now. Thanks Andy for the help.

Charlie Papazian is making some great points on his blog. If you've ever thought about how to explain Good Beer, you might want to check this out. Here are links to the posts in his "What is Good Beer?" series (so far).

While giving us his take on good beer he enlists our help as beer enthusiasts. Here is a quote from his most recent post.

He is absolutely right. I found myself doing this on the 4th of July more than once. I'm usually trying not to talk somebody's ear off about beer or homebrew, but, they just keep asking questions. They want to know more. I would venture to say that as homebrewers we have a distinct advantage. We aren't presenting some kind of fancy high falutin' expensive beer. We're sharing a homebrew!