Colorado Kitchen Brew

Samuel Smith Taddy Porter is one of my favorite beers in the whole-wide-world. Famed beer writer Michael Jackson even coined it “One of the world’s five best beers.” It was one of my gateway beers back in the early 90s and has stuck with me ever since. Although I'll be hard pressed to truly duplicate Taddy Porter, it never hurts to try. After some extensive internet research, I've formulated this recipe using entirely English malts and hops, plus a yeast strain that's supposedly the one used by Samuel Smith. The finished beer should be nutty, roasty and slightly sweet, with a mild bitterness. Here's the plan for five gallons: Grains: 7 lbs Maris Otter 1 lb English Brown 1 lb English Medium Crystal 12 oz English Chocolate Hops: 1 oz Fuggles (6.0% a.a.): 60 min 1 oz Fuggles (6.0% a.a.): 7 min Yeast: Wyeast 1469 - West Yorkshire Mash Schedule: Saccharification Rest: 151F for 60min Mashout: 168F for 15 minutes Original Gravity: 1.048 Estimated Fin...

The tools you will need. I realize it's been a couple of months since I posted actual brewing advice. Today that all changes with another installment on yeast culturing. Back in June, I wrote a blog on a Simple Yeast Culturing technique that allows you to reuse yeast from previous batches of beer. The simple method I presented required that you re-pitch the yeast within a month or so of cultivating it. But what happens if you wait longer to reuse? Well, you have to do a little extra work to bring the yeast out of hibernation. Rousing older yeast isn't terribly complicated. Before pitching your hibernating yeast into a new batch of beer, you have to get it going the day before with a starter made from fresh, sterile wort. Here's a rundown of the procedure: Yeast joins the fresh Wort. Mix 1/4-1/3 cup of DME (Dry Malt Extract) with 2 cups of water. Boil the mixture for 10-15 minutes to sterilize. Cool the fresh wort to 70F. Pour the wort into a sterilized c...

Believe it or not, Oktoberfest is just around the corner. This year, the festivities in Munich start September 22nd. In beer brewing terms, it means I better get a Fest beer going. This time around, I'm going to be experimenting a bit. As I've posted before, I can't lager. However, I've been using a Kölsch yeast for pseudo-lagers to great effect . To see if I get a little more of the lager experience, I've cleared out enough space in my fridge to cold-condition half of the beer for four weeks after bottling. The rest will have to make due conditioning in a basement. I have no idea if there will be all that much difference between the two, but experimentation is what makes homebrewing fun, right?  You'll also notice a new base-malt in the mix. Colorado Malting Company is only a few hours away from me, so I've decided to start buying local and will be using their malts as much as possible. Grains: 5 lbs Colorado Pilsner 4 lbs Munich 8 oz Cara Pils ...

My first attempt at one of these didn't exactly turn out as I expected. For round two , I was determined to get it right. The recipe for the beer was a complete departure from my first brew. I even went so far as to special order Weyermann Dark Wheat for the grain-bill. Time to pop open a bottle and see how things turned out. Things look promising enough out of the bottle. Because of the intended vigorous carbonation, it takes a careful pour to keep the head under control as the beer enters the glass. A quick swirl of the bottle before the final few ounces are poured rouses the yeast and creates the distinct cloudiness of traditional German wheat beers. The beer's chocolate hue is dead-on and the generous head stays as a thick blanket of foam the whole way down the glass. So, what about the aroma and taste? Well, I think I got pretty close to what I was aiming for. Over-ripe banana that borders on bubblegum makes up the first whiff of the nose. Clove is there too, plus ...

My Bohemian Kölsch has reached maturity and is ready to pour. The final numbers yielded a 1.008 Final Gravity and a light 4.9% ABV. The ABV is actually a touch higher than my target. But as I've stated before , Qbrew regularly predicts higher Final Gravities than what I end up with. In the future, I'll be compensating for that discrepancy in my recipes. As you can see from the photo, the beer pours a bright gold, with a dense white head. Clarity is about as good as you're going to get from an unfiltered, bottle-conditioned beer. The head slowly falls to a thin blanket of foam and leaves a healthy amount of lace in its wake. My goal of melding a Kölsch with a Bohemian Pils seems to have worked. The big picture is a beer that's crisp and refreshing. The nose is dominated by pepper, lemon and fresh cut grass. The beer isn't a lager, so there is a touch of fruitiness from the yeast as well. In the mouth, a light honey sweetness gets things going. Bitterness come...

The Pre-Prohibition American Lager (a.k.a. Classic American Pilsner ) is making a comeback. Long before the days of empty and tasteless mass produced beers, American breweries were producing some interesting brews. Although corn is now used as a cheap adjunct that lightens a beer's body and flavor, it was originally brewed with out of necessity. This is because the six-row barley native to America is harder to work with than European two-row. Unlike two-row, six-row barley is too high in protein to make stable beer. Using 20-30% Corn in the mash dilutes the protein and solves the stability problem.  I've mostly stuck to the Pre-Prohibition plan. The addition of a little CarPils should aid body and head retention, but everything else is where it should be. Most of the hops are the Cluster variety used in many early 20th century American beers. Several articles I stumbled across recommended using Noble hop varieties for finishing and flavor. Following form, I threw in some...