Pints: Tasting the British-ish ESB

The time has come to finally taste the kind of British ESB I made  Well, that's a lie, I tasted it several times prior to this.  But now, it is finally worth mentioning.  Not to say it is amazing, but I would happily drink it now and would be comfortable serving it to other people.  I kegged it ten days after brew day.  It wasn't terrible by any stretch, but it had a slightly buttery or butterscotch flavor and it had an almost salty taste.  That has since gone away.  I suck at describing beer, but here goes.

The head is probably the most disappointing thing about it.  It falls away quickly and leaves little lacing.  Not really a big deal though.  The color turned out about right as far as I'm concerned as well.  It will slowly clear up in the keg.  As for aroma, it has a slightly malty smell with obvious caramel.  Not much hop smell that I can detect, but maybe something faintly herbal or floral.  The flavor is pretty good I think, fairly light and refreshing, with some residual sweetness.  It tastes a little bit like Newcastle Brown Ale.  The bitterness is softer than I thought it would be, and the hops contribution leans more towards a light floral or herbal flavor (maybe some lavender?).  There is a bit of tartness from the carbonation that lingers on the tongue.  You can taste a bit of caramel and maybe a bready note as well. 

Overall, I think its good enough to try brewing again, though not exactly the same way though.  I will probably use less Burton salts next time and maybe add an extra ounce of EKG or maybe fuggles hops.  I think the malt bill was pretty good, though I may try using a darker crystal malt next time.

On a side note...I was at the Flying Saucer Draught Emporium in Nashville early this week.  They had Stone Farking Wheaton w00tstout on tap, so I got to try the genuine article to compare it to the kit I made.  Didn't take detailed notes, but it was very tasty.

Pints: A Full Keezer Again

After a horrible month or two of having to go out and buy beer like a savage, I finally have my keezer fully stocked with delicious liquid refreshment. 

The ESB-ish thing I made the other week was just connected to gas tonight.  I am following the Brülosophy Quick Carb schedule for it, which I have had respectable results with in the past.  Didn't take any pictures of it...not much to see at this point in any case.

I have another 2.5 gallon keg with a batch of Danger Dave's Dragon Blood wine.  I will be doing a post about it soon, but I gotta say how impressed I am with it, at least with the color. 

Crystal clear, with a gorgeous ruby red color.  Flavor wise it isn't bad, I dare say its even relatively good.  A little tart for my tastes, and a bit of harshness.  I pulled off 6 clear swing top bottles worth for various reasons; mostly for gifts.  It's much better than my first attempt at wine from about a year ago though.  That batch was basically cloudy prison hooch that tasted like cloyingly sweet, fruity rubbing alcohol and threatened to explode in the bottle.  What a change proper temperature control, yeast nutrient, aeration, blah, blah, blah can make!

My final keg is my 5 gallon one...filled with W00tStout.  A 13% ABV monster of a beer.  I've been dying to try this one since I poured it into the fermentors (had to split the batch) in February.  Finally, it nears completion.  I've tasted a bit of it cold but flat as it's carbing up (which is taking a while...).  Very complex, but its a little hard to drink.  Given how thick it is, it might not have attenuated fully.  I'll do a full review and write up of the process once it is ready. 

One last picture: my keezer/fermentation chamber in keezer mode.

It's a tight fit, but it works well.

Bites: Slow Cooked Pork Loin

So for the 5th of July, I made a slow cooked, smoked pork loin.  Frankly, it was awesome.  The flavor, the texture, the smokiness, it was just spot on.  Below is the approximate recipe; I didn't really...measure...anything, but it's pretty close.

• 2 Lb pork loin
• 1 tsp (?) of seasoned salt
• 1/2 tsp of chipotle chili powder
• 1 tsp of garlic powder (or the fresh equivalent)
• 2 Tbsp or so of soy sauce
• 1 Tbsp or so of brown sugar

Again, none of those amounts are precise, so just tweak it to taste.  Prep the pork loin by spearing it in a few places with a knife.  Then put all of the ingredients together in a ziplock freezer bag and let it sit in the fridge overnight. 

The next day, you could probably throw it on a smoker and cook it nice and slow.  I'm sure it would turn out great.  But what I think made this one turn out so good was cooking it most of the way with my ANOVA sous vide cooker.  I dialed it in to 140F and cooked the bag of pork loin and seasonings for about 4.5 hours. 

It gets a little buoyant as it cooks...had to weight it down.

As it was finishing in the pot, I got my grill going.  It's a homemade contraption, made by an old colleague, but it works great.  It acts like its somewhere between a charcoal grill and a smoker.  Cooks faster than a traditional smoker, gives a better smoky flavor than a traditional charcoal grill.  In addition to the charcoal, I threw a tinfoil pouch of cherrywood chips on it too.  As it started smoking, I took the pork loin out of the water bath and put the meat on the smoker.  The bag had the remaining liquid from the pork and seasoning.  I certainly couldn't throw that out.

Mmmm

After a bit the smoker sealed the meat with a nice crust.  Very little juice dripped out of it.  I put a few chicken breasts on as well for later in the week, and a tilapia fillet (which I basically smoked into jerky).  About 45 minutes later, I took the pork off and let it rest for a bit.  Then I cut in and had a bite.

Oh yes, it was good

Oh, it was god damned delightful.  Juicy, smoky, a little spice from the chipotle, and a little sweet from the brown sugar.  Melted in the mouth.  Pouring the juice from the bag onto it made it even better.  It was just awesome.  Had it with corn on the cob as well, a great 4th of July meal, a day late.

Other Stuff

Beer update!  The sort of British ESB type thing I made the other day is progressing nicely.  Visible signs of fermentation have mostly stopped and the gravity readings show that it is about as low as it will go.

Side note!  My wife poured herself a beer (nothing on tap, sadly), only to realize that she grabbed one she didn't like (an IPA).  Now I have to drink a beer tonight...oh damn.

Pints: Vaguely British ESB

So I read a post on a homebrewing forum about East Kent Goldings hops that made this hop variety sound interesting, and more importantly, tasty, in beer.  That, and I don't think you hear about it being used very often in hoppy beers, not that I have a problem with hops like Citra and Simcoe.  So to try it out, I decided to make something like a British "extra special bitter".  I went down to my local homebrew store and bought the following ingredients (links to Amazon products included):

• 4 LBs Maris Otter (double milled)
• .25 LBs Briess Crystal 40L (double milled)
• .25 LBs Briess Crystal 80L (double milled)
• 1 tsp Burton salts (try to find a smaller bag)
• 2 oz of East Kent Goldings hops
• 1 package of Safale S-04

At the homebrew store I ran my grain through the mill twice to get a finer crush.  For my first all grain brew-in-a-bag batch, I had terrible mash efficiency and I was hoping that the double crush would help.


On brew day I used my ANOVA Sous Vide cooker to get about 2.5 gallons of water heated to 151F.   The ANOVA is kind of an expensive way to brew, but it makes holding a steady temperature so easy.  Good for making perfectly cooked meat as well!

Heating the mash water, bag o' grains in the back

On a side note, I really need to get a bigger kettle.  The one pictured is only 4 gallons and I think it limits my brewing efficiency because it doesn't hold enough water to properly do BIAB

I mashed for about 2 hours, and at the end I increased the temperature to 170F and held there for about 15 minutes.  During this the wort progressed from quite light to a lovely dark color.  I stirred it several times and added a bit of extra water (about 5 cups).

Near the start

Near the end

I took out the grain bag and put it over my pot.  Had a grate for cooking pizzas on a grill that works great for this; nice and sturdy so you can press it without bending it.

Getting every last drop of wort

While that was draining, I cleaned the ANOVA's heating element so it wouldn't get sticky.  It's very easy to take apart.

Then I started the boil.  Tossed in 1tsp of the Burtons salts right at the beginning.  One hour, starting when it was visibly boiling.  I added 1oz of the EKG hops with 30 minutes remaining for a bit of bittering and 1oz at 5 minutes remaining to get more of the flavor and aroma.  I put all hops in a fine nylon mesh bag to cut back on gunk in the fermenter.

Mmmm, wort.

Next I started cooling it, which, to say the least, took entirely too long.  At least an hour in fact.  Didn't have enough ice on hand.  But, finally, it was down to a reasonable temperature.  I dumped the wort into my fermenter, re-hydrated my yeast in warm water, pitched the yeast, and aerated the mixture with a whisk for a few minutes.  I filled it with water to 2.5 gallons.  After that, into the fermentation chamber it went.  Temperature was set to 65F.  Starting gravity was 1.052.  If I did the math right, I got about 70% efficiency with my mash.

My fermentation chamber/keezer

It started bubbling after about 6 hours.  I'll post about how it turns out in the coming weeks!

Edit:  A link to the future!  Go directly to the tasting!