It could be the title of a Hardy Boys Mystery, or perhaps an Encyclopedia Brown story, if any of them were old enough to drink. Scooby Doo could be involved too, if a beer-colored ghost was somehow implicated.
Or maybe an episode of CSI Miami. I can picture it now. An intricate pattern of beer splatter covering the walls and ceiling. Detectives take photos, collect evidence, and interview neighbors. Ballistics experts are called in to determine the velocity of the beer spray, thus determining the force required to propel the beer skyward.
Also, there’s a dead body found in the dishwasher. This is network TV, after all.
But no, the real story of the exploding beer bucket is not any kind of mystery. It happened to me this past weekend. The cause was less a mystery, and more me being an idiot.
Allow me to explain - if I can unstick my sock from the beer-crusted floor in order to make it back to the computer.
Okay, I’m back. So as you may know, I consider myself an amateur beer brewer – a homebrewer, if you will. I’ve made beer several times, and it’s always turned out better than I’ve expected. It was as if I couldn’t ruin a batch, even if I tried.
That streak of not ruining beer ended on Saturday.
First things first. I took my package of Wyeast liquid yeast out of the fridge before mixing together the grains, malt, hops, etc., per usual. I smacked the inner nutrient pouch in order to give the little yeasties a little something to snack on. The idea is, the yeast start to eat the nutrients, producing some carbon dioxide and causing the yeast packet to swell. That way, you know the yeast is good to go – ready to get all up in that barley soup and start a party.
So the packet didn’t swell. I left it out for hours. Nuthin. But I had already begun to boil grains and the malt and the hops and the brown sugar – which I had previously caramelized. This was going to be the Cadillac of homebrews. But the yeast decided to stay asleep. Or to die. It’s sort of hard to know.
So instead of wasting an entire 5 gallon batch of barley malt, hops, sweat, caramelized brown sugar, blood, chocolate malt, and tears, I decided to grab the only other yeast I could find – Fleischman’s baker’s yeast. Yeah that’s right. The dry-powdered crap you use to make dinner rolls. Or rye bread, or pumpernickel, or whatever.
Apparently, and according to the internet so it must be true, baker’s yeast is bred to produce a lot of carbon dioxide, but not a lot of alcohol. So that’s pretty goddamn terrible for beer. Also, it supposedly imparts so odd flavors to the brew. Furthermore, you don’t use it to make beer because it makes the shit explode. Keep in mind I added two packets. Not one. But two.
And explode it did.
I had sealed the fermentation bucket as usual, and left for a casual dinner soiree in Fort Greene. That was around 8pm. By 1:30 pm, I received a call from Jaimi who had returned to our apartment earlier after seeing a movie with her friends. I was then informed that the lid of the bucket had exploded. And worse yet, it had woken her up. There was no way she was going to help clean up the mess now.
Thank God she hadn’t been sleeping on the fermenting bucket.
When I got home about 45 minutes later, the devastation I encountered was complete. A thick layer of beer foam, or “krausen” lay on the floor surrounding the bucket. The lid of the fermenter was thrown to the ground, coated on both sides with the sticky brew. Splatters and splashes ran up the wall to a height of 6 or 7 feet, and ran along the floor in a radius of several meters. Charred helicopter wreckage smoldered in the distance, near the TV. Half of a burned-out Humvee lay upended just past the sofa.
Anyway, it was a pretty big mess. And I was pretty pissed at myself for trying to freestyle homebrew with bread yeast.
All of that being said, I did reseal the bucket, and will wait to see if this stuff actually becomes some sort of drinkable beer in a week or two.
Moral of the story: don’t use baker’s yeast to make beer. Unless you want to construct a WMD
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Monday, October 19, 2009
The Case of the Mysterious Exploding Beer Bucket
Monday, May 18, 2009
BeerLab
Much like NASA’s Skylab paved the way for the Space Shuttle, and man’s inevitable mission to Mars, so too does my foray into the magical – and experimental – world of beer-making pave the way for fantastic beer-related journeys to the edges of the known brewing solar system.
Or something like that.
Yesterday, for the first time, I decided to brew a beer not from a specific recipe. It’s an amalgamation of various internet sources, my own wild imagination, and a fledgling knowledge of the most basic brewing techniques.
I’ll be lucky if it tastes as good as monkey piss – or some similar highly ammoniated yellow liquid. Of course, no matter what, it will be more refreshing than monkey piss – being that it’ll be served ice cold, rather than at or around monkey body temperature.
Anyway, I ordered a few pounds of various specialty grains (chocolate malt, oat malt, something else that looks like oat malt but I forget what it is) added some high-quality cocoa, some standard barley malt extract – and boiled it all together in a big ol’ pot with some hops and a whole lotta love. I’m going to add a bit of cranberry extract at bottling time – if this batch makes it that far – to create something truly of The Mill, by The Mill, and for The Mill.
The Mill’s Cranberry Oatmeal Chocolate Nasty and/or Tasty Stout.
Truly, I may have to drink all 50 bottles of the stuff myself.
I don’t really know if the proportions are correct. I’m not sure how strong it might end up being, or how long it will take to ferment. All I know is that the little yeasties are currently gorging themselves upon all the sugars I boiled up, producing a nice stream of bubbles out of the fermenter’s airlock.
It will be about a month before this stuff can even be considered ready for consumption. I think it will be either bitter as all get out – from adding WAY too much unsweetened cocoa – or not taste too terribly awful. There’s a 0.5% chance that it will actually be pretty good.
As I’ve always said, I’ll try anything once. And in that same spirit, my BeerLab is now officially open for business. What should I brew next?
Snickers Fruity Pebbles Porter?
Mutton Mint Chocolate Stout?
Cilantro Pumpkin Pie East River Water Ale?
I think each of those could really dazzle the taste buds. Look for it being drunk out of a jam jar, at a street corner near you.
Monday, May 04, 2009
Breakfast in a Glass
I finished bottling my second batch of beer yesterday - a super-hoppy ale. Everything went smoothly – more so than the first try – and I’m pretty optimistic that this round will taste better as well. Of course, the omnipresent, latent fear of the bottles exploding in my cabinet still exists.
But I don’t think I’ll ever get over that. You see, if you bottle too early and the beer’s still fermenting, then the pressure in the bottles can grow so great, that you get a big fucking mess of broken glass and beer everywhere. At least, that’s the scientific explanation.
So now it’s on to planning my next brew. Now that I’m getting the hang of it – an assuming the bottles don’t explode – I’d like to try something a bit more complicated. Smoked Salmon Lager? Saag Paneer India Pale Ale? Pepperoni Parmesan Porter?
These are all great ideas. And would no doubt be delicious – even when sipped off floor through bits of broken bottle glass. But what about something a little more practical, and a little more revolutionary. A real category-buster, if you will.
The Breakfast Beer.
Fruity Pebbles Summer Ale. Bacon and Egg Brown Ale. Brown Sugar Cinnamon Oatmeal Stout. The list goes on and on. But the key ingredient that connects all of these delicious brews would be caffeine. Instead of your morning coffee, you could drink a few of these beers. In fact, they would truly be breakfast in a glass.
“Wake up your lazy ass. Have a breakfast in a glass.”
“When you’re too tired to chew, grab The Mill’s breakfast brew.”
“You’re an alcoholic, I fear. So start your day with breakfast beer.”
And so on and so forth. As you can see, the marketing initiative wouldn’t be a problem. Just add a catchy jingle to those rhymes – and James Earl Jones reading them - and you have yourself a great radio commercial. It’s practically guaranteed to sweep the nation.
Note: if you drive to work, you should limit yourself to three breakfast beers. But if you take the train, or carpool, then there’s no need to limit your intake. And so breakfast beer also encourages the use of mass transit, which limits the burning of fossil fuels, prevents global warming, and saves the world.
“Breakfast Beer: Saving the world one sweet sip at a time.”
Sunday, April 05, 2009
Brewed and Bottled, Cooled and Consumed
My homebrew is ready. It’s official. And although several of you came up with some damn fine names for my first real homemade beer (one of many, to be sure) I don’t know if this first batch is really deserving of any of the imaginative and thought-provoking names that you presented to me in your comments. Some of my favorites included "Hydrocorti-beer," "Von Hayes Dazed Ale," and "Beerded Lady." Those will definitely be used in the future.
Let’s just call this one “The Mill’s Made-From-a-Kit Homebrewed Reddish Ale-like Beverage.”
It’s not bad. And it certainly tastes like beer. Additionally, after drinking one, I suffered no hallucinations, stomach cramps, nosebleeds, or cancerous lesions. So whatever I brewed, it looks and tastes like beer, and isn’t toxic to humans. I think there may even be some alcohol in there.
These are all positives. And for a first attempt, I’m pretty proud of myself. But I do have a couple complaints. Of course, I have no one to blame but myself. One thing’s for sure – any complaints about my beer will result in myself offering me a free beer.
Anyway, the beer is a little too carbonated – maybe the bubbles are too big or something? It’s just a bit too fizzy, like seltzer. Second, there’s a slightly perceptible alkaline aftertaste. It’s like licking an almost dead 9-volt battery – but just with the tip of your tongue. Very mild, but I’ve noticed it in two bottles that I’ve sampled.
Could it be from the local water supply? The steel kettle? Not enough love added to the brew? Who knows. As long as it’s not too noticeable, and not too poisonous – whatever the hell it’s coming from.
My next brew is going to be an India Pale Ale - loaded with hops and more hops and extra hops on top of that. The hops bitterness should mask any off flavors of batteries benzene, or whatever else might happen to fall into the fermenter before bottling.
In any case, I’m excited to continue developing my brewing knowledge and techniques. At worst, I brew mediocre beer that’s still costs me half the price of any store-bought brands. At best, I make some very tasty brews to share with friends and family – making me a beer hero to them all.
Monday, March 30, 2009
The Right Name for My Beer - Will It Taste Better?
So the beer is bottled. It wasn't a pretty operation, and I'm now anxiously awaiting the first exploding bottle.
My bottle-explosion paranoia is probably unfounded, as I checked to see if the beer was finished fermenting several times before bottling. The only problem is, I don't really know what I'm doing. Let's just cross our fingers and hope for no explosions, or only minor explosions.
As the beer ages for about 2 more weeks - turning ever more delicious minute by minute - the task becomes figuring out a name for my inaugural brew. My matriculation into homebrewing. My preliminary entry into the cold, frothy fold of beer making.
It's worthwhile to keep in mind that this first attempt may very well not taste very good. Personally, in the deepest, darkest recesses of my beer-soaked heart, I believe that people will be pleaseantly surprised when they taste it. Reactions will be, "Oh my. This isn't awful," and, "Aw hell, Mill, this actually tastes like beer. I could drink ten of these for breakfast," and perhaps, "I expected much, much worse. This is marginally drinkable, and doesn't seem to be poisoning me."
Any of those responses would be perfectly fine, as far as I'm concerned. But the real test, and the real challenge, is coming up with the perfect name for my brew. A cool-sounding name, that elicits strong emotions in the drinker could potentially make the beer taste much, much better. Or at the very least, make the drinker feel better about themselves - depending upon the individual, this is a monumental task.
So for the moment, I'm moving on from brewing, and into psychology. Here are a few ideas, ranging from standard and unimaginative, to elaborate and trademark infringement-y:
Mill Genuine Draft
Mill High Life
Mill Lite
The Mill's Master of Your Own Domain Brew
The Mill's Jewish Red Ale
The Mill's Quit Complaining, Keep Drinking Ale
The Mill's Zero Trans Fat Ale
The Mill's Barack Obama Presidential Beer
Kim Jong-il's Ballistic Missile Brew
Please let me know if you have any ideas, comments, or questions. If you come up with a good name, you'll get a free bottle of beer - pending federal, state, and local regulations. Must be 21 years old to legally drink beer. Beer cannot be shipped to PO boxes, or in regular envelopes - I've tried it before and it doesn't work.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
The Mill's Microbrewery is Open for Business
My homebrew kit arrived this past week – in a giant ass box filled with 20 cubic meters of Styrofoam peanuts. This was a birthday gift from Jaimi. I love it, but I’m not sure she realizes what she’s gotten herself into. Instead of 4 or 5 little beers in the fridge, there’s going to be gallons of beer taking up space in the kitchen. Or the closet. Or the even the bathtub. It all depends on how well things go.
From here on out, our apartment is officially a craft brewery – registered, licensed, and fully bonded in the state of New York. Actually, I’m not selling the stuff – and it remains to be seen whether or not the first few batches will be drinkable. Or technically, even qualify as “beer.” So let’s leave the state of New York out of it for now.
After unpacking the aforementioned giant-ass box, I surveyed the inventory. Jaimi had ordered the complete beginner’s brewing package from Midwest Supplies. Supposedly, it comes with EVERYTHING I’ll need to brew and enjoy 5 gallons of delicious beer, right out of the box. Of course, not everything is actually included. You provide the tap water that actually comprises 99% of the beer, and the mouth and stomach to consume the beer once it’s ready. None of this is included in the box. False advertising? We’re talking to some lawyers about it.
Anyway, everything else you need is actually included. The beer bottles and caps, the fermentation chamber (big plastic bucket), the bottling bucket (another big plastic bucket), the ingredients kit, instructional DVD, hydrometer, sanitizer, etc., etc. I chose to make the Irish Red Ale for my trial run. I hope that it’s a forgiving style of beer for the novice homebrewer.
So yesterday, I studied up on the included “Beginner’s Guide to Homebrewing” and watched the instructional DVD. Production quality was fairly low, but the presentation of techniques, and the fine gentleman providing instruction were both top notch. In no time, I had a kettle on the stove, and a nylon bag of crushed barley steeping in the hot water. It was like making tea – if you were to make it 2 gallons at a time. With barley.
So far so good.
Next, it was time to boil the malt extract and hops in the “barley tea.” This takes about an hour, and requires careful monitoring to avoid boil-overs. Or so I was warned. I don’t think it was ever close to a boil-over. But I was so frightened by the instructional DVD’s warnings, that I essentially stared at the bubbling brown liquid the entire time. Better safe than sorry.
After that, it’s time to cool the mixture, or “wort” as it’s known in the beer biz. You see, I can use words like “wort” now because I’m a member of a very exclusive club – those who want to save money and avoid taxes on alcoholic beverages by making their own at home, and who often pretend like what they’ve made is good enough to drink when in reality it should be fed to livestock or burned for fuel.
So I’m cooling the hot wort in a sink full of ice water. And I’m stirring with a sanitized spoon every 15 minutes. And we’re going to be late for our dinner reservations and a show. But if I skip a step, or carelessly add the yeast before the temperature is below 100 degrees, then all of this terrible trouble would be for naught. So I insist upon waiting a few more minutes – the yeast has to rehydrate in order to activate, goddamnit!!
In the end, the wort is cool, the yeast is happy, and the bucket of near-beer is shoved into the corner where it will remain for the next 2 weeks.
For any ATF officers reading this, that sign "cold beer sold here" is simply a novelty sign made in China. I do not sell beer. Yet.20 hours later, I can see bubbles in the airlock. And so I’m happy to report that the little yeasties appear to be eating up the sugary solution and converting it into magical alcohol – in a process known as fermentation, for those of you who didn’t make it through grade school.
Bottling the stuff will probably be a huge pain in the ass. But the first stage wasn’t too bad. If this stuff is even remotely drinkable – no stomach cramps, vomiting, and only mild hallucinations - then I’ll be pretty happy with the experience.
Of course, there will be more updates to follow.
Monday, March 09, 2009
Hurtling Towards Homebrewing
As I mentioned before, Jaimi planned to get me a homebrew kit for my birthday. What a brilliant gift. I’ll soon have so much beer around the apartment, that I’ll be forced to pour it over my breakfast cereal, and bathe in it from time to time just to make sure the golden nectar doesn’t go to waste
Maybe you thought my fiancée would have second thoughts about this gift. How could it REALLY be a good idea to establish a nano-brewery in our kitchen? I don’t know. But that question is moot, because the beer-making equipment is already on its way. No turning back now. I’ll attempt my first homebrew this upcoming weekend – or at least that’ the plan.
Partly in preparation for my budding homebrew hobby, my good buddy Greg and I went the Philly Craft Beer Festival at the Philadelphia Navy Yards this past Saturday. We knew there would be a lot of breweries we’d never heard of, and we hoped to find some hidden gems.
There were some old familiars there, such as Blue Point, Stone Brewing, and Magic Hat. But out of the 50 breweries at the festival, I’d say at least half of them were previously unknown to us. Suffice it to say, I didn’t bring a notepad.
I remember Cricket Hill Brewery because I thought it was bad name for a beermaker – someone might mistakenly assume that they make pale ale infused with crushed cricket corpses. And there was Gritty’s Brewery, whose banner read, “Show us Your Gritty’s!” And Straub Beer, whose product was kinda bad, but they gave out free bottle openers – pretty much the only free swag we got all evening.
So, I’m not here to offer a full review of the festival. There were indeed a number of obscure craft breweries in attendance. And some of them offered some very good – if not terribly memorable – beers of various flavors and styles. There were even a few homebrewers there, who decided to show off their skills alongside the professional brewers.
I thought this was pretty cool. They weren’t there for the money – they couldn’t have been, because they weren’t selling anything. They were simply there to share their love of beer with thousands of other beer lovers.
It got me to thinking, what kind of unique and amazing beers will I soon be brewing? How will I make the world a better place through better beer? I haven’t learned all of the basics yet – I need the homebrew kit’s instructional DVD in order to get my learn on. But after I’ve made a few basic brews, I plan to graduate to the next level.
Here are a few uniquely flavorful ideas for The Mill’s Craft Nano-brewery. I don’t know if you can even add some of this stuff to beer without killing the yeast and/or creating a potentially poisonous mixture. But that’s what the experimentation process is all about.
Wasabi Mike and Ike Ale:
Classic pale ale infused with Japanese wasabi and shredded Mike and Ike candies.
Cinnamon Raisin Oatmeal Stout:
Truly, a breakfast in a glass.
Twizzler Lager:
This one’s pretty self-explanatory.
Smoky Bacon Brown Ale:
I don't know. Bacon-flavored beer? It could be amazing, or it could be undrinkable. I think this definitely warrants further research.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Homebrew - Preparing for a Lifelong Hobby
I talk about beer a lot. But it’s all talk – with a bit of drinking thrown in for good measure.
At long last, it’s time to put my money where my mouth, throat, stomach, and bladder are. Money will be going where the beer normally goes, so to speak. Especially during these times of economic uncertainty - when one never knows what the value of a dollar will be tomorrow – we must find other sources of stability, and of comfort.
Buy gold. That’s my advice to you. And stock your pantry with Tamiflu, spare ammunition, and plenty of Chunky soup - to prepare for any sort of potential catastrophe, whether it be economic, biological, or otherworldly. Just make sure your ass is covered.
But if you fail to do any of the above, just please heed my final piece of advice. Learn to brew your own beer. In these tough times, it’s as good as liquid gold. And far more digestible. And much less hot. And less shiny. But beer conducts electricity okay. But the similarities really end there.
Anyway, I’ve decided that I’m going to brew my own beer. The beer-making kit will be a birthday present from Jaimi – and it’s one that she’ll very likely regret buying. It’s messy and smelly. The fermenting chambers, and bottles take up a lot of space. And the final product makes people drunk and stupid – when handled irresponsibly. Also, the bottles could explode, the fermenter could burst. The beer could turn out bad, which might cause me to cry.
I don’t think Jaimi would want to see me cry.
So there are a lot of potential dangers associated with beer-making. That’s why I need to prepare carefully, and read all the proper procedures and best practices. For example, you should not dunk your hand into the boiling wort Wait until it cools to room temperature, and at that point also do not dunk your hand into it.
A typical homebrew set-up, which Jaimi doesn't realize will soon be taking up half of our living room. It will also smell really bad, and be potentially explosive.A typical batch makes about 5 gallons of beer, or around two cases of 12 ounce bottles. That’s 48 beers. Be careful not to drink them all at once. That could make you very drunk, and worse, you might be too drunk to remember to turn the lights off before going to sleep – which will waste energy and thus add to our global warming problem.
So yes, brewing your own beer could make sea levels rise, and kill the polar bears. Brew with extreme caution.
But seriously, I’m a little uncomfortable with the concept of brewing up a big mess of beer, only to discover several weeks later that it’s nearly undrinkable. I probably wouldn’t actually cry, but I’m afraid that I’d convince myself that the bad beer WAS actually drinkable, and end up making myself very, very sick after only a dozen or so bottles.
Of course, as I enter the wonderful world of home brewing, I’ll take you along for what promises to be a wild adventure. A smelly, yeasty, malty, hoppy, intoxicating ride. So grab your floating thermometers and hop into my 5 gallon stainless steel brew kettle for a trip to Beerland. When the temperature reaches 200 degrees, it’s time to add the hops – and to get the hell out of the kettle unless you want to be boiled alive.
