Recent content by jefferym09

I brewed an Irish red, Smithwicks clone, but i had to sub a decent amount of ingredients out because my LHBS was lacking what i needed. its only been 4 days, but My OG was 1.048 and its down to 1.011 already. the taste is very... well not good, hard to explain. bitter, unpleasently so. Not very...

thanks for the info, i just compared the probe temp to my brewing thermometer and the probe temperature gradually just keeps going up, like a degree every 30 seconds. so i guess i will just replace the probe. hopefully that does the trick. Thanks again

i use a Johnson temperature controller for a ceramic heat bulb to warm my wort during the winter. i keep the bulb and wort in a freezer thats acts solely as a fermentation chamber (the freezer does not work, so all i have is a heat source in a sealed container basically.) on my current beer...

1028 London Wyeast, OG was 1.060. temp is around 66 right now although i just bumped it up to about 70. ive done tihs batch once before and i came out great by keeping the temp at 65...

ha nice. well its fermenting, just slow as hell. im assuming it wont attenuate well. so once it stops and i take a reading and it if it hasn't attenuated down, would pitching more yeast then finish it off? or is that still a waste of money?

i woke up this morning to see that it has now started to ferment. 1/2 inch Krausen, bubbling every few seconds, but im still worried. If its already going, would pitching another yeast make any difference?

long story put short, used yeast that wasnt healthy, its been 2 days since i pitched it and it hasnt done a thing (it was close to expiration) was gonna pitch another one tonight, but the shop didnt have anymore of that yeast and the only substitute they had was expired as well. i'll have to get...

got a new devlopment, i got one of those ceramic light bulbs and it does the job well, maybe too well. the johnson controlled thats plugged into my freezer cant keep up with how hot the bulb is getting it. i can hear the freezer kick on when it gets too hot, but it only runs for like 2 seconds...

looks cool, i only need the freezer to be about 10 degrees hotter, do you think that bulb would be overkill? i dont want my johnson controller to work too hard cuz i know it takes like 3/4 of the actual freezer life away

does a dual stage controller have two outlets? one for a heating source and another for the freezer?

bought a big chest freezer and a johnson temperature controller, but of course now its getting cold out and my garage isnt warm enough to keep the interior of the freezer above 57 degrees. the johnson controller has a setting, which i already switched, for heating instead of cooling. but im...

i rarely do extract batches, but since my friend wanted me to teach him how to brew, i though an extract would be easiest to teach. and of course the brew he wanted to do was Midas Touch. the recipe I got showed an OG of 1.086. but after we were done on brew day our OG was 1.070 ish. Just...

how do you prepare the cinnamon and nutmeg? grinding or crushed?

brewing a pumpkin ale today. i have nutmeg, cinnamon, alspice, and vanilla bean. all the spices are in thier whole form, not ground (figured i would want to take them out at some point and ground spices would just "dissolve" into the beer) anyway all i can do is crush them as fine as i can with...

i'll try to answer as many of these as i can. mash temps were all between 152-154 for 1 hr. boil time one hour, AG, I cooled it down on day 2 when i saw it was at 71 and fermenting very rapidly, aerated with Oxygen stone, pitched 1 pkg nottingham dry rehydrated at 65 degrees wort temp, primary...