Despite having an action packed weekend, I managed to sequester a couple of hours Saturday morning to brew. I experienced a near tragedy while preparing ingredients. Several months ago I stocked up on hops and had been storing them in the freezer. For a period of time I had so many hops in our freezer that it looked like we were peddlin' weed. In preparing ingredients during the boil I realized the hops I had planned to use on Saturday were completely spoiled and they smelled like rotten cheese. Fortunately other hops in the freezer had kept pretty well and I was able to substitute some whole hop cascades for the centennial pellets that went bad. I decided on brewing an everyday stout to have on tap around the house. My aim was Sierra Nevada's Stout. Just to mix it up in addition to black patent malt and roasted barley I steeped a 1/2 pound of Franco Belges kiln coffee malt. Its supposed to accentuate the coffee flavors you frequently taste in a stout.
As you can see in the picture above, we are already bubbling away. In fact, Meg and I got back from a long afternoon/evening of babysitting for some friends on Saturday and the fermentation had taken off and had practically exploded through the airlock. I caused quite a mess.
Keep it bubblin',
HolzBrew
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