True Confessions

Submitted by drew on Wed, 05/22/2013 - 10:00

A few years back in Zymurgy (March/April 2011, to be precise - go, go handy Zymurgy Index), I wrote about making your brewery organized and neat and welcoming of brewery activities. (Got a lot of "Man, my wife just saw this and I have to clean up the brewery now. Thanks!" emails for that one.) Well, it's time for true confessions time - my brewery is a disaster area right now. You know how it goes. Stuff accumulates.

Brewing Again!

Submitted by denny on Mon, 05/20/2013 - 11:32

My job has a very unstructured schedule. Sometimes it's a day of work here and there, sometimes it's 2 weeks straight followed by a week or 2 off. I'm heading into a 10 day stretch of no work and looking forward to getting my brew on for the first time in a while! I'm planning on getting in at least 2 batches of relatively low alcohol, but (hopefully) flavorful beers. Both will be experiments because I haven't brewed either recipe before. One will be a low alcohol Belgian style beer, made with W3787 Westmalle yeast and some beautiful Hallertauer pellets I picked up.

We Need I.G.O.R.s

Submitted by drew on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 04:00

One of the things that Denny and I have been talking about behind y'alls back is some of the elements of the book. Listening to you kind folks it's definitely clear that we need some help with researching and experimenting to handle some of your thoughts. So here's our announcment - we're in need of some good I.G.O.R.s. The dots mean that it's an acronym! (Let's face it there's a shockingly large percentage of homebrewers who seem addicted to funny bacronyms. I'm looking at all the Q.U.A.F.F.s, M.A.L.T.S., S.A.A.Z, S.O.D.S., C.A.R.B.O.Y. of the brewing world.

A Day in the Life of a Writer

Submitted by denny on Wed, 05/15/2013 - 11:05

think think think think write research research think think think get up walk around pet the cat play ball with the dog think think think write research go to work wish you had a beer

Sounds exotic, huh?

So, today I'm thinking about what types of suggestions for experiments to include in the book. The posts you've been making help a lot in knowing what you're interested in. That's a hint!

Experimental Brew

Submitted by denny on Tue, 05/14/2013 - 14:06

You can learn something even with an unsuccessful experiment....

We've Been Remiss!

Submitted by drew on Tue, 05/14/2013 - 08:41

I feel like we've been remiss here. We totally forgot to mention that homebrewing will finally be legal in all 50 states! It's taken a few years, but once Mississippi's law goes into effect in July, you can no longer consider yourself a wanton criminal in these here states. So congratulations to Mississippi (signed in March) and Alabama (signed last week) and to the fleet of homebrewers who've worked for multiple years to finally get the hobby fully legalized.

Preconception and Perception

Submitted by denny on Fri, 05/10/2013 - 17:26

One of my biggest points in evaluating your experiments is knowing how to not fool yourself by letting what you think you know interfere with what you're trying to find out. Listening to an old podcast of America's Test Kitchen on my drive home last night, I learned about wine tastings conducted by Frederic Brochet. In a nutshell, in one tasting he served 2 glasses of the same white wine, only one was dyed red. Tasters proceeded to describe definite differences between the wines.

A Brief Glimpse into Experimental Brewing

Submitted by drew on Thu, 05/09/2013 - 08:08

Southern California Homebrewer's Festival

Submitted by drew on Tue, 05/07/2013 - 23:12

This year's edition of the Southern California Homebrewer's Festival featured 39 home brew clubs and a massive ton of beer. I saw everything I think you can make there from American Light Lagers to rip roaring super stupefying meads. Had some great beers like a brilliant Watermelon Sour where you could taste the rind. I never could find it again, so if you know who was pouring a watermelon sour beer at the SCHF, please let me know! ([email protected]).

Thanks!

Submitted by denny on Tue, 05/07/2013 - 08:26

Rather than thank everyone individually for every post in the forums, I wanted to just give everybody an overall thanks for your contributions. We're off to a great start and we've got a long way to go, but every post is valuable to us and hopefully it will be to other homebrewers.

Big Brew

Submitted by denny on Sun, 05/05/2013 - 11:36

Well, I hosted a Big Brew for the 14th time yesterday. 5 brewers, about a dozen drinkers. No strange ingredients used, unless you count all the crap that blew into kettles due to the high wind. every year, on the day after Big Brew as I clean up, I always seem to feel more than a year older since the last one!

Forum - fixed, I think

Submitted by drew on Sat, 05/04/2013 - 00:19

My apologies - earlier when we launched, it seems that someone *cough* me *cough* forgot to give users the ability to make a forum post. It should be fixed now! Fire away.

SCHF Bound and Time to Find Wacky Ideas

Submitted by drew on Sat, 05/04/2013 - 00:17

Hey everyone, so I'm sitting here I just packed up for tomorrow's Southern California Homebrew Festival at beautiful Lake Casitas, CA near Ojai. 1800 homebrew enthusiasts will gather around the lake looking to sample beers from nearly 30 different clubs. Each club has it's own little booth and lots of fun pouring strange things. If you think I'm not researching like a mad man at this fest, you don't know me so well!

Announcing Experimental Brewing - The Book

Submitted by Administrator on Thu, 05/02/2013 - 08:42

Coming in 2014 from Drew Beechum and Denny Conn is Experimental Brewing, a book about how to play with your beer. We'll be blogging the harrowing journey of two men, sitting in front of laptops pulling our hair. Actually, strike that, what we really want is your feedback. We've both spent an inordinate time online answering questions, reading other people's experiences and generally thinking way too much about homebrewing.