Pure oxygen (and better beers?)
Monday night marked the first opportunity for us to try our Oxynator, a pure oxygen system to aerate the wort (in lieu of shaking, which can get pretty graphic). Besides the ability to avoid humping your carboys, theoretically this should give us better attenuation (conversion of the sugars from the grains into CO2 and alcohol), resulting in better beers. We’ll keep you updated on how effective this pure oxygen system actually is, but we thought you might want to see it in action.
We also used a yeast starter on this bad boy for the first time in a long time. Needless to say, if this beer doesn’t come out with amazing attenuation, Jeff will probably wet himself. And not the good kind of “wet yourself” either.
This is how we aerate
The “shake vigorously” method is well known to most homebrewers. Unfortunately, homebrewers comprise the minority in society. Society finds ways to make fun of us, even if it is because we “make love” to carboys full of brew. Whatever.
Out-ninja’d by the big boys?
Many of you have heard of our Roundhouse Pale Ale, our humble homage to all of the great American ninjas. You may not yet have heard of “Guinness” or “Harp,” but these “Irish” brews are now infiltrating our culture, and even threatening the same ninjas that define us. Thanks to The Barley Blog for the heads up. We need to neutralize this threat. I’m thinking we’ll dispatch some cowboys or vikings or something.
Our newest ale needs a name… perhaps the Ole Prospector?
We brewed a California Common Ale last week and have been scratching our heads trying to come up with a name. We’ve got a few potentials, but definitely want some feedback before committing. The front-runner right now is Ole Prospector, followed by The Commoner. Ole Prospector, obviously, is a derivative of the California gold rush. Leave a comment and let us know what you think. If you need further information, you can take a look at our inspiration, a la Will Ferrell:
This is how we brew it
Last night we made another 10 gallon batch of our world-famous Swashchuckler IPA. If you’re curious to see how our brewing process works, take a gander at the following video. This is how we “sparge,” soaking the grains with hot water to extract the fermentable sugars before boiling them in that big stainless steel pot. You might see Joel pretending to pee in the grains. Pay no mind. He’s an idiot.
Joel eradicates beer from the world
Remember that time when we had that sanitation problem with our beer? Yeah, that was fun. Joel found himself dealing with the remnants of said problem on Monday. Take a look at the video and you’ll know why we had to pour it out. It was either that or serve it to our enemies… revenge is a bottle best served cold (and volatile).
Bryan Adams helps us brew better beer
It’s true. We listen to his greatest hits album every week (The Best of Me). Unfortunately even Bryan Adams couldn’t save us from a stuck sparge. Watch this video to see more… Also, Peter totally hits on me. And Jeff goes to town on that hose. WARNING: It’s boring, but only 45 seconds long.
Don’t worry, we hope to be posting much more interesting (and much less intimate) videos in the future.