30 Quarts of Beer (Pt 1)
Well, I sent out the following invitation to a dozen or so people on Thursday:

I posted an article a few days ago entitled "How to brew beer in a
coffee pot." Well, this Sunday I'm going to test out my theory, and
you're all invited. I'll get all of the supplies, including a
cheap-ass coffee maker from Costco or something, hops, wheat, and
whatever else goes into beer, and we'll cook the shit up to see what
the deal is.

Now, what you're coming over for is a fun and creative mess. What
you're NOT coming over for is homemade beer. WTF??? you ask? After
we "brew" the beer in the coffee pot, it has to sit for 5-7 days to
ferment. Therefore, this is a BYOB event since the beer we're making
will not be ready yet, and I pretty much have a full bar if you want
martinis or whatnot.

At this meeting of beer lovers, nay, BIRTHERS, beer birthers, we'll
decide the time and place to get together to savor our culinary
creations (most probably the sunday next).

Sounds like a commitment to me!

Well, Thursday evening we bailed out of our various obligations to head over to Bev Art Brewer & Winemaker Supply, home to the Wild Blossom Meadery & Winery, to purchase all of our hops, malts, and yeasts. There, we met Kazys Ozelis (first name pronounced "Kos"), an awesome dude who was not only patient with our newbishness when it came to the differences between base malts and specialty malts (and 100 other questions), but was thorough in hooking us up with what we needed. He even busted out some of the "Wild Blossom" private reserve, and we all had a drink to him.


Frank, the fearless leader, *really* tries to get his point across


Let's all drink to KJ, because she drinks to us!


And so does Al! We may have a trend here (let's ask Viki!)

Our manifest of ingredients is:
Malts

• 2 lbs of Belgian Pale Ale Malt. This is our base malt. I thought a lighter malt would bring out the flavor better in the specialty malts (we'll see!)


• 1/8 lb Black Patent Malt. Dark. Creamy. Soothing.


• 1/8 lb Belgian Chocolate Malt. How could I not get some Choco Malt?


• 1/8 lb 60-degree Crystal Malt. I have no idea what this is, but I bought it on Kazys' recommendation. He's really nice.


• 1/8 lb Roasted Barley Malt. For extra-creamy goodness.

So the idea here is that we mix in the 1/8 lb specialty malts into a bit of the base malt to kind of "flavor" it. At least that's what the instructions I downloaded from teh intarweb told me to do.

Yeasts

• Danstar Nottingham. A dry yeast, which should bring out a crisper flavor


• Coopers Ale Yeast. Super malty.


• Wine Yeast. As per the instructions, some basic champaign yeast.


• Muntons Dry Ale Yeast. More dry.

Hops

• Hallertauer Hop Pellets.


• Cascade Hop Pellets.

I can honestly say that I forgot any difference between the two.

With the supplies that we have, we have the potential for making any combination of 32 different varieties of beer. And that was the original plan: 30 quarts of beer, each different. But then, pt. 2 happened....
- posted by frank crist @ 9:06 PM