Saturday, January 30, 2010

Wychwood Brewery

As I was strolling through Wegman's I walked through their beer display as I always do, I just can't seem to help myself. It is set up in the last two aisles of the store and even if I have no other items to get from that end of the store, I always seem to end up in those two aisles. Even as I walk towards thoses aisles I can feel myself being filled with anticipation, what will I find this time? Will it be something new that no one I know has tried and I can be the pioneer to taste it first? and so on and so forth.

When I finally get to the beer display I find myself lost in thought and as I stand there and look like a monkey doing a math problem, people make there selections and squeeze past me. I find that I like to look at the labels and the artwork first, is it eyecatching? does it look interesting or hokey/gimmicky?, then after finding a few good labels I pull a bottle out of the six pack and read the description that some marketing guru dreamed up. Does it sound interesting and draw me in or can I read through the bullshit and see that the flowery over the top jargon is just trying to hide an average non-descript beer. After all of that, if I still am intrigued I'll buy a bottle or a six pack and bring it back home to give it a shot.

Which brings me to Wynchwood Brewery. I ended up buying two 500 ml bottles of their beer and these are my impressions.


First I thought that the labels were pretty original as well as the brew names. Although I think goblins are a little hokey, (Sorry Captain Insano and all of you other Syfy freaks), the labels were well drawn and very creative. Also, when I read the back of the bottles for a description, the write up was written by the head brewer, Jeremy Moss. I give them big props for that. I like when I can see what the brewer thinks about the beer and describes it in his own words. One other interesting note, that I didn't see when I bought them was that Wychwood is from "across the pond" and brewed in Oxfordshire, England.

Fiddler's Elbow
  
Fiddler's Elbow was very refreshing and very light. Its color was a little darker than I had expected, but the beer was still very light. It had aromas of earth and wood from the Styrian hops. It was smooth and lacked a little complexity until it finishes with a strong citrus and hop flavor. Overall, it was an ok beer, it would go great with a back yard bbq where you wanted a light refreshing beer that wouldn't fill you up. I would probably purchase it again for that type of occasion or if I wanted to break in a group of domestic (a.k.a Budsweiser, Miller, etc) drinkers to the craft beer scene.

Hobgoblin-Dark English Ale
Now Hobgoblin was a good beer. It was dark in color, with reddish highlights through out it. It had clean fruity aroma that may have been figs, I'm not real sure, my palate needs a little more work. It was full bodied with notes of chocolate that wasn't overpowering. There were hints of toffee as well and the some bitterness from the darker malts. It had a nice clean finish that left you wanting another sip. Overall, it was a well balanced full beer, it had enough malt and bitterness to carry the hops but neither of them whacked you in the face. I would definitely buy this again.

Based on my tastings, I would definitely buy the Hobgoblin again and put it in my rotation as a regular beer that I drink. As for Fiddler's Elbow, it was good, but I wouldn't run out to buy more unless I had the situations I stated above in its review.

Grab a pint and Enjoy!!
Naps

Sunday, January 17, 2010

La Goudale Beer Review

It has been a stressful few weeks for me. The winery I work at is being consolidated with another winery and before the merger there were going to be 4 winemakers and 2 assistant winemaker, which would of included me. Although there is a ton of work it is hard for the company to jusitfy paying the salaries of that many winemakers and needed to cut one position. So obviously with me being an assistant winemaker I was pretty nervous and it has been a nerve racking couple of months. But luckliy one of the winemakers opted for early retirement and my position was safe.

So with that stress relieved I decided to reward myself with a good beer to unwind and toast my good fortune with, which brings me to La Goudale:



It is a Blonde Ale from France and I found it at Wegman's for $9.99 for the 750 ml. I liked the artwork on the label with the hop flowers and the interesting font. I couldn't tell you what the label said as most of it was in French, all I could make out was the type of beer it was.



It poured real nice and had rich amber color. I was a little surprised by the color, I thought it was a little dark for a blonde, but what the hell it could have been a dirty blonde. At least I couldn't see her roots, that's all I'm saying, but anyway. It had nice aroma, I picked out a slight citrus aroma, maybe lime peel and I also got a green aroma, almost like wet hops, but overall it was very appealing.



Just a shot of the head, it was very full and rocky and tended to stay for a long while, it didn't just shrink away into the night. Very nice! After admiring the head, because I love head that has staying power lol I took my first sip. It was very true to the style, it was light on the palate but had a creamy almost velvety mouthfeel. It had tastes of honey and some light hints of malt. It was well balanced and was a very well rounded combination of malt and hops.




Overall, this was a great beer and worth the money. As you can tell from the above picture none of it went to waste, and it was good to the last drop. I would recommend it to anyone and if you do grab a bottle, feel free to let me know what you think about it. Enjoy!!

Saturday, January 9, 2010

You put the beer in the coconut and throw the can away! Well, not really....

Well, my Bock has been happily fermenting for 7 days in the primary fermenter at approx. 57 F and today was the day to transfer it to a glass carboy and start the 4 week lagering process. So I pulled out a the carboy and sanitized it with hot water and a little chlorine. After letting it sit for about a half hour, I triple rinsed with hot water so the glass was warm to the touch. I find that if you transfer your fermenter into a warm carboy and aerate it as you are doing it, it reinvigorates the yeast and you get a better finish to the fermentation. That brings me to this little gadget:



That little piece of plastic works wonders for aerating the fermenter as it is being transferred. As the beer runs down the tubing and through the piece above, it hits the point, which displaces the stream and introduces air into the beer. Also the resulting spray also aerates the beer as it splashes. I really love using it and it was super cheap. So here is the transferring process:





So the beer was all transferred and then was inspected by my Head Brewmaster:





After Ava's approval and her awarding me a medal for in her words "Best Team Beer", I placed the beer in what I am calling my lagering cellar and will now anxiously wait for the next 3-4 weeks before I can bottle it up. So now I just sit back and wait while enjoying a cold one of someone else's and wait. I hope I can hold out that long.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Brew Day has arrived

I received two gift certificates for Christmas to Northernbrewer.com and I couldn't wait to use them, so I hopped onto the website the day after Christmas and ordered all of my supplies. I have made a bunch of different beers over the years and would consider myself an intermediate brewer, but in all of the beers I have brewed I have never brewed a lager. This is mainly because I didn't have the capacity to lager the beer. The lagering phase of the fermentatiion basically is fermentating and holding the beer at a lower temperature, somewhere between 40 - 45 F degrees for 1 - 4 weeks and sometimes longer until the fermentation is complete. However, with our new house, I have a very small basement and a crawl space. I have taken the temperature of the crawl space this winter and it seems to hold at a constant temperature of about 42 F, which is perfect for me.

Now with all of the peices in place I could finally attempt to brew up a lager. I checked around in a few books I had and decided to make a Bock, then if this beer turns out good I may try a Dopple or Triplebock but we'll see. The box of ingredients showed up New Year's Eve, but would have to wait until the festivities and the recuperation was complete before it could be opened and turned into that delicious mild brown Bock. So today was the day to open it up and start that magical transformation. Here is what was laid before me:


These are the things that will be turned into the beer that will be drank, good or bad, it will not go to waste.






















With my malt, yeast, and hops all in order I was ready to begin, so I filled my brew kettle with about 3 gallons of water and began heating it. I was aiming for 175 F, so I had time to get some other things prepared. I knew I was going to steep about 3 lbs of grains in the kettle so I needed a good way to do this. I know some brewers just add the grains to the water and let them sink/float and steep them that way, but doing it this way leads to awkwardly trying to transfer 3 gallons of 175 F water through a strainer to get the grains out before you can bring the wort to a boil and add the malt extracts. So I came up with a cheap and easier way to accomplish this, I buy a $0.59 muslin bag and add the grains to that and tie a knot in the end. Then steep the grains and when you are down, just use tongs to pull the bag out and throw it away.



Once the temperature was right, I added the grain bag and let it steep for twenty minutes.




After the twenty minutes was up, the bag was removed and the wort was brought to a rapid boil. Once boiling I added the malt extracts, both dry and syrup, and then I added 2 ounces of hops for bittering purposes. For those of you who have never seen hops, they come in many forms, from whole leaf, plugs, and pellets. Many homebrewers use the pelletized kind just for ease of use nd that is what I used. The pelletized hops look like rabbit food.




Now the wort was allowed to boil for 50 minutes, then a second addition of hops was added for aroma this time. The wort continued to boil for another 10 minutes then was removed from heat and chilled down to 75 F. The chilled wort was transferred to the primary fermenter and topped up with 2 gallons of 80 degree water and aerated as the water was added. Once at a little over 5 gallons, the yeast was pitched and added to the fermenter and given a quick stir. The top was placed on the fermenter and an airlock was added and voila you have a batch of beer getting started.

 This will ferment in this primary for 5 days, then will be transferred to a secondary glass fermenter and put in the cellar to finish fermenting for 4 weeks. I will update this beer as I progress through to the final bottle. Enjoy.

Ah, New Year's Eve and the games we play

Well, yesterday was New Year's Eve and we decided to have people over for the festivities. We figured that everyone could come over and hang out, have some fun and if need be crash at our place to be safe. So calls were made and people harassed until they said they would stop by for the fun and once again the Goof Troop was reunited. The first to arrive was Dinker, then he was followed shortly afterwards by Butters and Rhonda, and then a few minutes after that Cpt. Insano and Karen showed up. Now the reason I state this is the party was scheduled to start at 8 pm, but these participants showed up at or before 7:30 which is a rarity because they are never early. That was my first sign that it was going to be a great night. My second sign was Dinker acting up before there was any beer in him. See the evidence below:


Yes, thats a grown man holding a pretty pink build-a-bear unicorn while wearing a Happy New Year tiara and holding what looks to be a magic wand. Also, notice how happy he looks.

But moving on Lauren wanted to have a "Feats of Strength/Challenge/Dare" portion to the evening and for anyone who knows the Goof Troop, you know what that means. So we came up with a few challenges, the Milk Jug, Balance, Ice, and 7 Saltines.

The Milk Jug Challenge: Who can hold a full milk jug in their outstretch arm the longest:

Butters and Rhonda drew this challenge and I would like to note that Rhonda came out victorious and beat Butters.

The other challenges were shortlived and not as much fun as I had hoped they would be so they get little to no mention with the exception of the 7 saltines. The object was to try and eat 7 saltine crackers in 1 minute, in reality it can't be done, its just not possible but we were going to try anyway. We all lost probably because we were all laughing like idiots while trying to do it. The only one that came close was Dinker, he managed to choked down all 7 saltines in a minute thirty seconds.

But on to the exciting part of the evening, the food challenges. Our group has a history of trying to out do one another and that means eating different things sometimes, so with that in mind I went shopping. My finds were 2 cans of "spicy" vienna sausages, 2 cans of potted meat ( a mixture of chicken & beef in the same can), a jar of lamb baby food, a jar of turkey baby food (was supposed to be veal, but I grabbed the wrong jar), 1 can of tamarindo nectar, and 1 can of guacabana nectar. Now when I got home, the labels were removed and each item was labelled with a number and an index card was filled out with the instructions "Eat Item #1" etc and a key was made of what each item was. Now this is where the fun really begins, The following pictures are of the nights food challenges:











As you can see from above, none of the "Items" were that tasty, but they were all washed down with cold frosty beverages. From there the night went on and many card games were played and the rest of the Goof Troop showed up and the night was a pretty great night.




So here's to a Happy, Healthy 2010. Love The Goof Troop.

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