Yes, that's right. Its time to do some real lagering. The Oktoberfest had been slumming it in my ghetto refrigerator, but now you see it in some deluxe accommodations, a used chest freezer that I picked up yesterday...



And when it's out of the carboys and into kegs, it will look like this...

I ran out of cornys to put in there, this freezer is huge! With the temperature controller from OlyBrew, it's holding steady at 45F

I keep meaning to write about the Oktoberfest I brewed up last weekend.. Well, everything went flawlessly, except for the broken pump! I snapped the threads off the head of one of my march 809's. Surprisingly, I still made 79% efficiency after loosing about 1/2 gallon during runoff.



After all that, I hit 1.053 og, with this recipe:

10# Vienna
9# Munich
1# Caramunich 60

3oz Hallertauer 60 min
1oz Hallertauer 20 min

Munich Lager @ 52f

I just transfered to secondary yesterday, the beer was at 1.015.... can't wait for September...

Brewed an easy drinkin' summer ale on Friday.

14 lbs Marris Otter
4 lbs Belgian Pale
2 lbs red wheat (unmalted)
2 lbs barley (unmalted)

Mash Schedule:
20 minutes @ 120
30 minutes heating/recirculating
60 minutes @ 148

Hop Schedule
60 minutes Chinook (1oz, 13% AA)
15 minutes Amarillo( 2oz, 10% AA)
5 minutes Chinook (1oz, 13% AA), Cascade (3 oz, 3% AA)

OG measured out at 1.054, which put me at about 80% efficiency (If I have my potential extract right).

Two Wyeast 1056 smack packs later, I have what appears to be a happy beer!

I had the pleasure of visiting the Abita Brewpub in Abita Springs, LA last week. This place is about an hour outside of New Orleans, on the wrong side of an inland sea (also known as Lake Pontchartrain.)

The food was classic pub fare with a Louisiana twist. I had the po-boy loaded with deep fired gulf shrimp and oysters. It was amazing.

The beer was even better.

Purple Haze, a lightly flavored raspberry ale
Rye, a light amber colored, slightly spicy rye beer
Bock, malty, kinda toasty. My friend from Baton Rouge bought a growler of this.
Altbier, a little less malty, maybe a little more toasty than the bock. I settled on this for my pint.

All of the beers were very "clean" tasting. No house flavors here, they take good care of the equipment in this pub. All around good times...

Seems like the thing to do, recapping a year in brewing. Well, In looking at the two other brewers on this site, I realize my bookkeeping, note-taking, and overall "scientific method" seem to be, well... Lacking. So rather than a detailed recap, how about a resolution? My brewers resolution for Oh-Eight: Keep track of my stats. There it is, I said it. With that in the open, lets look at what I managed to find for Ought Seven.

The first of the year is a little fuzzy, but as I recall, there were at least 3 beers before the notes I have catch up to reality. There was a 5 gallon test batch of HavreWeizen (which was a mistake, 5 gallons all-grain takes the same time and effort that 10 gallons). A batch of the Up Town Bremerton Blond (a recipe with unmalted barley direct from a friends Montana farm). And the Club started a Bourbon Barrel Beer project, I brewed 10 gallons for that...

And then some notes begin to take over...

6/2/07 Bourbon Barrel Barley Wine - An english style barley wine for the club barrel! This was the first batch of a 30 gallon day.

6/2/07 HavreWeizen - This is a Hefeweizen made with 55% Un-malted hard red wheat, grown on my father-in-laws wheat farm near Havre, MT. The OG on this one, like most of my Ought-Seven beers, came in low. It made for a very easy drinking summer beer.

6/2/07 Up Town Bremerton Blond - This one got put on hold. Brewing 3 all-grain batches is tricky. NYC Brewing eventually brewed this beer under contract.

7/20/07 Bourbon Barrel Belgian - That club barrel has consumed another 10 gallon batch! As of this writing, it still rests there.

10/8/07 45-Minute IPA - A Dogfish Head replica gone awry. Due to a low o.g. and a miscalculation, this would be calamity turned out great!

12/28/07 Cabin Fever - Belgian Grand Cru, loosely based on Snoqualmie Falls Spring Fever. Still in secondary. o.g. 1.072

Overall, not too bad of a year I suppose. I don't remember being thirsty...