The Joy of Homebrewing

Ah Spring is coming here at 690. It’s currently snowing outside but spring will soon be here. The birds are singing, the grass is turning green and the brewers at New Holland are cleaning out the kegerator and pacing out the horseshoe pits in the snow. With the kegerator up and running we have been doing a lot of homebrewing on the pilot system. What could make someone who brews all day want to stay after and fire up a five gallon batch. Well for one, we get to brew all the crazy shit that a group of thirsty brewers can think up. Most planning consists of “Let’s make something big”, “No let’s see how much hops we can put in”, “It should be dark” and “how about something light and refreshing for summer”. After a round of laughter and wiping our eyes at the thought of making something light and refreshing we fire the system up. With the different types of yeast we have going now we can brew almost anything we can think of. Our last project was making fifteen gallons of beer and splitting it into three five gallon batches with different yeast in each batch. We even spiked some with some sour stuff from our friend Frank. The joys of homebrewing for me is getting a better understanding of the effect of each of the different type of yeasts and grain we use, learning how to formulate recipes and lets not forget the joy of being able to drink a beer I’ve made without having to pay for it. Yes spring is coming and soon the tulips will be out. I’d better get to homebrewing. Maybe I’ll brew a porter or a hoppy pale ale. A stout sounds pretty good too, I think I’ll go fire up the system.