Flashbacks from 2005
Cherry Stout
Brewer’s Assistant firing up the burner in preparation for our “Bummer Porter”.
Batch #27 “Coming of Age” Pale Ale
Keggle Heat Shield
At 125,000BTUs the Bayou Burner started to melt our keggle thermometer. I found this scrap metal out by the shed and Chef Thommy formed it haphazardly into …this:
Return of the Grill Pie
Chef Tommy made 3 out-of-season, yet delicious, GCBC grill pies for batch 27. Here he is cooking up his ‘Meat Lovers’ while gulping down our RDP (Ril Dil Pils).
The Surplus
7 ales, 1 lager (not pictured). GCBC is stocking up for the spring riding season. More cycling = less brewing.
Brew Session Notes
- Utilized “First Wort Hopping” technique once again (1oz Goldings, 1oz Columbus)
- Discovered the secret to optimizing our sparge arm’s rotation
- Thommy was beat down by “The Champion” (once again) in Wii Sports Ping-Pong
- New Wii Game: Deer Drive (like Big Buck Hunter, but not as much fun)
- Our first pilsner “RDP” (dedicated to the infallible Jay Brown @ Hoffman Audi) proved to be a real gulper. Goes great will grill pie. The remaining keg must be saved until the warmer months.
- Propane does not flow well when it’s cold. Pro Tip: Submerge it in cold water.
Batch #26 Brew Notes
- Utilized “First Wort Hopping” (FWH) technique with 1oz of US Goldings & Willamette
- First batch using our new 125,000 BTU “Bayou Burner”. Hot enough to melt the keggle thermometer.
- Krampus (NW) kicked and will be replaced by the first keg of RDP (Ril Dil Pils).
- For inspiration we sampled Brewdog’s “Atlantic IPA”. At $30/12oz bottle, it’s one of the most expensive beers in existence.
- Brewmaster’s asst Zac cooked up some cedar plank haddock with grilled asparagus (he has a thing for bottom feeders).
- The brew session was technically proficient (to make up for recent mistakes), but an ounce of Goldings somehow failed to make it into the kettle.
- Everything is frozen. We had to rig the wort chiller to the kitchen faucet using an entire roll of electrical tape and 60ft of tangled garden hose.
- Measured OG was surprisingly low — 1.051 vs an expected 1.060. Not yet sure what happened.
Forgotten Techniques
“The process is called First Wort Hopping (FWH), and it refers to the practice of adding hops to the brew kettle, into which sparged runnings are collected, at the beginning of sparging. The idea is that the hops soak in the collecting wort (which usually runs out of the lauter tun at temperatures ranging from 60 to 70C depending on one’s setup) for the duration of the sparge, and the volatile hop constituents undergo very complicated reactions, producing a complexity of hop bitterness and aroma that is obtainable no other way.”
http://www.brewery.org/library/1stwort.html
Our 26th batch, Transatlantic IPA, will utilize this technique.
