October 1999

[Greenblood]

Minutes of the September Meeting

Cleanup Crew: Chuck Epp

Treasurer's Report: No treasurer, no report.

Members in attendance: Jennifer, Derek, Xan, Rob, Chuck, Dale, Andrew, Pete, Ellen, Barry, Rich, Ken

Guests: Stephanie and Bill Payne

Maria, a friend of Xan's, visited us at the September meeting. She is planning on filming a documentary on brewing beer for a class and would like to soak up as much knowledge as she can. She would also like volunteers that will let her film as they brew. She expects to film next spring, so keep a watch for more details.

Old Business
Brewing Techniques is out of business. sniff sniff

Library donations: equalling discount on membership - table for one more meeting. We kind of need the librarian to be in attendance for the vote.

Concern is that we don't want to become a garage-sale dumping ground.

Suggestions - We could count any book that the AHA sells (in-print version) or say that it is subject to librarian's approval.

New Business
Christmas Party: We need to start discussing at Oct. meeting. Start thinking about brewing Christmas/holiday beers now! See recipes.

It was also pointed out that this is a good time to start ciders.

Homebrew list for Thursday, Aug. 12, 1999

Rob: ESB

Pete: Pale Ale and a Hefeweizen

Bill & Stephanie Payne: Purist Pale Ale and Tr?egs ESB from the Appalachian Brewing Co. in Harrisburg, PA.

Thanks to all who brought beer to share!

Meeting Adjourned.


Commercial Tasting: Pale Ales
The second Going Blind tasting.

We tasted four pale ales and were told that at least one of those was an import. It turned out that three were area brews; one was an import. Nobody had much success identifying them correctly, but we had a lot of fun trying. Here are the results:

Favorite brew:
Boulevard was the overwhelming favorite with eight votes. Pyramid and Bass each received one vote.

Find the Import:
Four people guessed that Pyramid was an import; three people guessed that Flying Monkey was an import, and three people correctly guessed that Bass was an import.

A matter of style:
Eight people said they thought Boulevard was closest to style; one person thought that Flying Monkey was closest to style; both Pyramid and Bass received no votes for conforming to style.

Here are some of the guesses people wrote down for each of the brews:

Pyramid: Sam Smith (2) and Boulevard
Flying Monkey: Fullers, Oasis, Boddingtons, Boulder
Boulevard: Oasis, Sierra Nevada
Bass: Spanish Peaks, Black Dog, Fullers London Pride, Bass

Ellen Jensen
Secretary

Shocktoberfest Update
An update on the Shocktoberfest: A first prize of a $20 gift certificate will be given out to the best costume of the evening, as voted by party guests in attendance. Start planning your costume now.
Saturday, Oct. 30
7 p.m.
Ecumenical Christian Ministries
Wear costumes
Bring German-style (preferably) beer and food


Holiday Beer Recipes
Irish Christmas Stout

Source: Cats Meow 3 - Johnny Yen (juanyen@tezcat.com), r.c.b., 11/3/95

Here's a holiday stout I did that turned out beautifully. Make the appropriate substitutions with what you have. Note: The ginger will seem like too much at first- there's a quarter pound of it in there! But it mellows a lot as it ages, and blends with the other spices. 8 weeks is recommended, but it is already quite good at 4 weeks. I added nutmeg to the mix, too. Also, be very careful with simmering the honey. It boils over very easily. Use a double boiler if you have one, or improvise; put one pan in another, bottom one filled with water. Or substitue the brown sugar you already have. Cheers!

Ingredients:

4 pounds, Mountmellick Irish Stout Extract
3 pounds, Munton and Fison Amber DME
1/2 pound (2 cups) Crystal Malt (60 Lovibond)
1/4 pound (1 cup) Black Patent Malt
1 ounce Bullion hops (bittering)
1/2 ounce Hallertau hops (finishing)
1 pound Clover honey
12 inches Cinnamon sticks or 6 teaspoons ground cinnamon
4 ounces Ginger root, freshly peeled and grated
2 teaspoons of Allspice
1 teaspoon Cloves
4 grated rinds from medium size oranges
1 package WYeast #1084 Irish Stout Yeast

Procedure:

Simmer honey and spices in covered pot for 45 minutes. Add cracked grains to 2 gallons cold water and bring to a boil. As soon as boiling starts, remove grains with a strainer. Add malt extracts and bittering hops and boil for 55 minutes. Add finishing hops and boil for 5 more minutes. Remove from heat. Stir in honey and spice mixture and cool. Strain into fermenter containing 3 gallons cold (previously boiled) water and pitch yeast (when cool). After vigorous primary fermentation subsides, rack into secondary. Bottle with 7 ounces corn sugar or 1-1/4 cups DME when fermentation completes.

Puppy's Surprise Spiced Wheat Ale

Source: Cats Meow 3 - Bryan Maloney, bjm10@cornell.edu, r.c.b., 2/18/96

This is inspired by a commercial brew, "Blue Moon Ale," which claims to be "Belgian" but tasted more like a spiced Weizen. Since the original claimed to be "Belgian" in inspiration, I'm planning to use "Belgian" malts. However, with all the wheat and the oats, will the pale malt have enough enzymatic activity? Should I switch to klages or even to 6-row?

I specified "sweet orange peel" for this recipe mostly from warnings I read against a "Sunkist taste" from ordinary orange peel. Is it really that big a difference? I've heard of sweet orange (mediterranean) peel in baking, so I'm not confused about what this ingredient is. I've never compared "eating" peel to "sweet" peel in cooking, so I don't have direct experience with how big a difference there really is.

I intend to pre-boil my water, dropping the calcium to around 55ppm and carbonate to 40ppm. While I don't do this for my dark ales, I think it will be necessary for this.

Ingredients:

3 lb. Belgian pale malt
5 lb. Belgian wheat malt
2 lb. rolled oats
3 HBUs Styrian Golding hops (60 minute boil)
1.5 HBUs Styr. Golding hops (30 minute boil)
0.5 oz Kent Golding hops (finish)
0.5 oz sweet orange peel (30 minute boil)
0.25 oz sweet orange peel (10 minute boil)
0.75 oz crushed coriander (finish)
Wyeast Weihenstephen (#3068)
0.5c corn sugar
gypsum or calcium carbonate

Procedure:

Boil oats in 3 gallons water until gelatinized. Replace lost volume with cold water and adjust temperature to 125F (52C). Add malts. Stir slowly until grist is completely mixed into water. Measure pH and adjust to 5.3 with gypsum.

Heat to 130F if temperature has fallen too low and rest at this temperature 45 minutes, stirring every 15 and boosting temperature as needed.

Boost temperature to 150F and rest 2 hours, stirring every 15 minutes and heating to 150F every 30 minutes.

Sparge with 4 gallons water, pH 5.7, 170F.

Boil 30 minutes and add first hop aliquot. Boil another 30 minutes and add the second and add the first aliquot of orange peel (pre-soak peel in water if dried). Boil another 20 minutes and add second aliquot of orange peel. Add finishing spices at end of boil and sit 15 minutes on stove, flame off.

Chill to 50F and rack into secondary. Sit overnight and rack wort off trub in the morning. Wort pH should be between 5.0 and 5.3 at pitching. Pitch yeast.

Rack to carboy when primary fermentation is done and add isinglas. Settle 4-5 days.

Great American Beer Festival
The GABF is being held, Oct. 7-9. There are three public sessions from 5:30-10 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday at Currigan Hall in downtown Denver.

Awards are handed out Saturday afternoon at a session open only to American Hombrewers Association members, brewers and press. 400 breweries represented, 1,700 beers.

The History

The first festival was held in June of 1982 in Boulder, CO, and 20 breweries brought 35 different beers. The Professional Panel Blind Tasting began in 1987. Until then, there was a Consumer Preference Poll (popularity contest). The Consumer Preference Poll continued through 1989. There were 120 beers in 1987, and medals were handed out in 12 categories.

The 10th festival attracted 175 breweries and 550 beers in 1991.The festival moved to Currigan Hall in 1993. More than 1,000 beers (1,240) were available for the first time in 1994.

What's New

The festival will honor top breweries and brewers for the first time.

Results from the Professional Panel Blind Tasting (PPBT), where beers are judged in 54 categories, will be used to determine a "Brewery of the Year" and "Brewer of the Year" in five categories. The awards will be given out on the basis of annual beer production with awards going to:

Brewpubs producing 1 to 1,200 barrels per year
Brewpubs producing 1,200 plus barrels per year
Microbreweries producing up to 15,000 barrels per year
Regional breweries producing 15,001 to 500,000 barrels per year
Large breweries producing 500,001 barrels per year.

Each award will be decided on a point system, with each gold medal being worth three points, silver two and bronze one.

Beer News
From BEERWeek

Fire Destroys Hops Warehouse
SEPT 24, 1999

A fire gutted a Yakima, WA, hops warehouse Thursday, destroying 6,500 bales of hops valued at $2 million. Spontaneous combustion, always a danger with tightly-packed hops bales, is suspected as the cause of the fire at the John I. Haas facility.

When firefighters first arrived at the warehouse, flames were shooting out of the metal roof. The fire generated temperatures estimated at 1,000 degrees, warping beams in the warehouse and melting the metal siding. More than 40 firefighters poured an estimated 100,000 gallons onto the fire, stopping it from spreading to the other 17 buildings on the property.

The smell of burned hops hung over north Yakima on Thursday as firefighters monitored the remains to make sure nothing reigned. No Haas employees or firefighters were injured in the blaze. Haas process about 120,000 bales of hops annual, most coming from nearby Yakima Valley farms.

Czech Breweries on the Block
SEPT 27, 1999

A heated bidding war looms for the two leading brewers - including the prestigious Pilsner Urquell - in the Czech Republic when Japanese bank Nomura puts them up for sale.

Although there are no official suitors yet, among the names mentioned are Bass, Scottish & Newcastle, South African Breweries, Anheuser-Busch, and Heineken.

Pilsner Urquell is the last beer with Pilsener on the label to still be made in the Czech town of that name. It has been brewed there since 1842 and is the biggest-selling beer in the country and a top-selling import in many countries. Radegast, the second brewer for sale, is the No. 2 brewer in the republic.

The auction will be via sealed bids starting on October 4.

Oktoberfest Visitors Set Records
OCT 3, 1999

This year's visitors to the original Oktoberfest in Munich set a record for beer consumed at the world's largest Oktoberfest. The 6.5 million visitors drank 5.8 million liters (almost 1.3 million gallons) of beer during the 16-day run, surpassing the record of 5.6 million liters set in 1997. Unusually warm weather during the first week of the festival boosted beer consumption. A dubious record was set when officials totaled the number of two-liter mugs stolen - finding that 168,000 were swiped during the festival, compared to 140,000 in 1998.


Discount Days at Bacchus & Barleycorn
LBG members receive a 10% discount from Bacchus & Barleycorn, October 4-9 . Please show membership card or bring newsletter. Bacchus & Barleycorn is located at 6633 Nieman Rd. in Shawnee (913-962-2501).