NorwayMartin
Member
- Joined
- Feb 11, 2015
- Messages
- 8
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Greetings from a German who has moved north, i.e. the polar circle, Norwegian department.
For quite a while I've been curious about brewing beer. The past year or so I've embarked on trying many different (craft) beers; was a great experience. On Christmas I got myself a Cooper starter kit and two weeks later, I could bottle my first own Wheat Beer (and after a few weeks in the bottle, I must say that it tastes more than decent. Am very happy for a first timer.) Love making the labels, too!
For my second beer, I wanted to step up the game, and tried a Trappist inspired recipe which besides the extract also used some hop grains (awesome flavour!) liquid yeast (it's alive!) and some cracked grain (awesome flavour). Was even more fun, as I felt that it was more my beer rather than just mixing pre-made stuff. I had also built myself a stir plate, which I kept improving. In the current version it comes with proper speed control (thanks, eBay!) and internal lighting - looks cool to see the yeast turning at night with bottom lighting. But I digress.
I learned about yeast harvesting, so I wanted to try that. Also, since I hadn't used all the raw material that I got for my previous beer, I wanted to use those (also: when living this far north, it takes about a week to get hold of more specialized stuff, and I am an impatient soul). So currently I have in my FV a nuclear version of the previous brew, with more malt, some dextrose, much more hops (also tried adding it at different times). Been fermenting actively for 2 days, as of yesterday it has quieted down. The taste is very promising, much more characterful than the previous beer. Heading towards 6.2% abv. Since I loved the smell of the used grains, I tried using those for baking bread - turned out to be a huge success! Very moist, tasty dark, dark bread, that is very complimentary with cheese.
My next project is to build myself a BrewPi and have proper temperature control. Ordered also 3 standard books on home brewing. At some point I'm pretty sure that I'll try all grain brewing.
So, bottom line (tl;dr: ) love this new hobby, love building electronics, love trying out things and of course learning. Will probably pester you all with questions and ideas.
1st Beer (drinking it now): Weissbier 1, 4.5% wheatbeer
2nd Beer (in the bottles now, can have first taste in about a week): Trapped in Belgium, 6% Belgian blonde
3rd Beer (fermenting now): Nuclear Strangelove, approx 6.2% altered Belgian blonde
For quite a while I've been curious about brewing beer. The past year or so I've embarked on trying many different (craft) beers; was a great experience. On Christmas I got myself a Cooper starter kit and two weeks later, I could bottle my first own Wheat Beer (and after a few weeks in the bottle, I must say that it tastes more than decent. Am very happy for a first timer.) Love making the labels, too!
For my second beer, I wanted to step up the game, and tried a Trappist inspired recipe which besides the extract also used some hop grains (awesome flavour!) liquid yeast (it's alive!) and some cracked grain (awesome flavour). Was even more fun, as I felt that it was more my beer rather than just mixing pre-made stuff. I had also built myself a stir plate, which I kept improving. In the current version it comes with proper speed control (thanks, eBay!) and internal lighting - looks cool to see the yeast turning at night with bottom lighting. But I digress.
I learned about yeast harvesting, so I wanted to try that. Also, since I hadn't used all the raw material that I got for my previous beer, I wanted to use those (also: when living this far north, it takes about a week to get hold of more specialized stuff, and I am an impatient soul). So currently I have in my FV a nuclear version of the previous brew, with more malt, some dextrose, much more hops (also tried adding it at different times). Been fermenting actively for 2 days, as of yesterday it has quieted down. The taste is very promising, much more characterful than the previous beer. Heading towards 6.2% abv. Since I loved the smell of the used grains, I tried using those for baking bread - turned out to be a huge success! Very moist, tasty dark, dark bread, that is very complimentary with cheese.
My next project is to build myself a BrewPi and have proper temperature control. Ordered also 3 standard books on home brewing. At some point I'm pretty sure that I'll try all grain brewing.
So, bottom line (tl;dr: ) love this new hobby, love building electronics, love trying out things and of course learning. Will probably pester you all with questions and ideas.
1st Beer (drinking it now): Weissbier 1, 4.5% wheatbeer
2nd Beer (in the bottles now, can have first taste in about a week): Trapped in Belgium, 6% Belgian blonde
3rd Beer (fermenting now): Nuclear Strangelove, approx 6.2% altered Belgian blonde
