Strawbeery Fields forever

I've got beer on the brain. Strawbeery fields to be precise.
I can't wait to get another batch brewing once summer madness is over...yummers.

But I want some now...:(

Teaser

Artwork ("Skeleton Choir") is by the amazing Misty Michelle Bensen.
I love her work, and hope she approves...

Countdown to berry madness

In approximately 5 hours I can finally have a taste of my delicious looking strawberry ale. It is time :)

I can't wait. I remembered to put some in the fridge before bed last night so it'll be all ready after supper.

Dad gave me a pewter mug engraved with my name when I graduated from university. Think I'll drink it out of that!

oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy .....

I love the smell of biru in the morning...smells like victory!

(Sing with me to the tune of "I am Evil Homer")

I'm the queen of biru!
I'm the queen of biru!

Yes - finally the strawberry nectar that I've been brewing for the last while has been bottled. Last night I did the final racking off leaving the scunge behind and with the help of my biru minions (aka J and Magnus) it was primed and bottled.
I now have 37 500 mL bottles of beer. Squeeee!
I did lose about 2 litres during the brewing from the crazy yeast blowoff and about 1.5 each time I racked due to all the strawberry sludgy stuff I had to leave behind. Then there was the bottle or two worth I spilled down the front of myself trying to lift the pail full of beer up onto the kitchen counter by myself before bottling... (he heh - I smelled grrrrrrrrrrrreat!). In the end, I was left with a nicely cleared, pleasantly red coloured beer. There was part of a bottle left at the end and we shared the warm, uncarbonated dregs between us as a bit of a taste test - not too bad if I do say so. It is a mild flavour, but good. A few weeks of aging should carbonate it up and fill out the flavour a bit.
I can't wait to try some...
Now I have to finish up the labels...and then get geared up for my plan for my week off next week - paint my whole living room and hallway, ceiling and all. But, when I'm done THAT I can celebrate with a glass of my very own brew.

The White Minstrel brewery has successfully bottled their first batch! :)
Kewl.

Beer update

I'm probably the only one interested about this, but I'm happy to say that my beer is now racked into the secondary fermentor - a glass carboy with a bubbler valve on top full of vodka, wrapped in light protectant (posh description of taped up garbage bags :) ) to keep the skunkiness light reactions away from my precious precious brew. The krausen had fallen, and there was about 2 inches of berry sludge in the bottom of the primary fermenter that I left behind, all gungy strawberry bits and yeast. I lost a bit of beer, but I think the beer is better without it. I added some pectic enzyme powder to the carboy before I put the lock on so perhaps that will help clear the beer up a bit. If not I'll boil a bit of water and dissolve some more in and add it in a few days...we'll see. It takes a while for beer to clear up and it will take probably about 10 days before I can bottle it.
It smelled amazing...
I pulled the brilliant act of sterilising the carboy by filling it full of bleach water in the kitchen and then realising I couldn't lift it to empty it...so I had to siphon out some of the (delicious and flavourful) bleach water before I could rinse it and use it. Magnus managed to not mock me too much while I figured that out. J was working luckily, so the mocking was kept to a minimum. :)
I just wish I could find the jar so I could use the whatchamajig to read the specific gravity of it. I need to be sure it's done fermenting before I bottle it...I forgot to find it before I racked the beer...so no intermediate reading either. The scientist in me is wigging about that, but it'll be OK.
I heard it bubble this morning before I left...and grinned ear to ear. It's pathetic I know, but I really love making beer.
It makes me grin on the inside.
It's like baking or cooking an elaborate meal. You get the fun of making it and then get to enjoy it at the end.
Nice.

Beer on the brain

Well...Ze foaming has finally calmed down as of this morning- no more explosive bursts of foam out the sides of the tub under the lid or through the tube...it's odd the reduction...the krausen is down below the top of the pail now. At least I don't have to watch for explosions anymore, and don't need to keep rinsing seeds out of the blowoff tube :) Another day or so and I think I can rack it to the carbuoy. I feel as though I should take the lid off to wash all the crud and seeds from around the rim of it, but I don't know if mucking with it would give more chance of contamination that just leaving it alone for another day...being a labrat with crazy sterilization training for bacterial and cell culture work, it seems so...crude.
Must...not...meddle...GAH!

Hope it tastes good...:)

It's alive! ALIVE!

Well...the beer is DEFINITELY brewing.
It's so krauseny it's freaking me out actually.
They said if you add fruit to the beer it really foams...well it's true. It's foaming like nothing I've ever seen before. It's in a brewing pail with about 5 inches clearance, but it's actually bubbling over the top, so I put on a brewing lid, with a stopper and small tube that feeds into a bucket...and it's bubbing awayvigorously. I've never grown yeast this well even in the lab! It's bubbling out the sides occasionally too, but I can't just let it bubble all over the place or it'll be contaminated. This way it's relatively contained and it won't blow up, as it has ways to vent. I keep checking the hose occasionally to make sure it's not gummed up with seeds...I'm thinking this was not quite the way to do it. Next time I'll try adding the fruit *after* racking...less messy. It keeps foaming out the top when I rinse the hose...no worries about the yeast taking this time :)
The top floor of the house smells like fruity beer and bleach...not so great, but it should die down in a few days and then I can rack it into the carbuoy. We're relaxing to the sounds of bubbling...it's odd.
I just did my 5 K fun run today, and after a victory breakfast at my favorite local diner (taters....) I must go be a bit domestic. My friend Magnus of The Shining Path is moving here today...he's going to go to the University in the fall and is staying with us until he finds a place. It'll be good to see him. I should go make the place a bit less beery and tidy for when he gets here...

Berry Brewin'

Today...as I write this I am making strawberry beer.
FINALLY.
I've been trying to for ages and the combination of laziness and life have kept me from it. I've had the stuff to do it for ages, and today and finally getting to it. I have 4 L pureed frozen strawberries (5 500g bags) that I'm adding to the boiled wort, to pasteurize them, along with some pectic enzyme and the yeast...and hope to have a nice light lager with a strawberry flavour very soon. Currently the house smells like berries.
Yum.
In a week I'll rack it and hopefully in no more than 10 more days bottle the red tasty goodness. Then I must be patient...hopefully in July sometime there will be a tasting...gotta get back to the brewing in the lab...er...kitchen.