HomeBrew Wednesday # 1

Happy Home Brew Wednesday  

 

This will be my first home brew Wednesday blog post. Today I will talk about what I have been doing in the brewing world and some of my up grades in my home brew equipment.  

 

 

Back on January 10 one of my local breweries (Draft Line)  had an event called Brew and Chew.  As the Head brewer said " we will BREW some home brew and  CHEW on some brewing facts. There was around twenty homebrewers on hand. All brewing our own 5 to 10 gallon batches. I brewed a Pale Ale with all Nelson Sauvin hops and cultivated Wyeast 1272 from my last brew of ESB.  What a great brew day.

 

(in the center) Jamie McMillan , Draft Line Brewing head brewer
-Photo courtesy of Kellie Evans

 



A great angle of brewery with me in the middle with the hat on
-Photo courtesy of Kellie Evans-

Wort Chilling with an awesome immersion chiller.
-Photo courtesy of Kellie Evans-





Yeast starter cultivated from my ESB batch. (Wyeast 1272)
-Photo courtesy of Kellie Evans-

 

 

From the Brew and Chew I picked up a few techniques to bring my Brewing up to the next level. Up until that day I had only batch sparged, but from some of the other home brewers I was able to get some ideas on how to build a fly sparge system, which I used on my next brewday.

Diagrams for my fly sparge system

My Fly sparge system in action.

 

Brew today, See you Tomorrow. 

 



Contest Winning Brew / Double Axe Nano Brewery

Good Afternoon my fellow craft brew drinkers. I am working my way to the nano brewery level.  In my last post I brewed an End Of Summer Citra IPA. I entered that beer in a home brew competition at my local home brew shop, which I won third place.  Coming in behind second place an Oktoberfest and first place a Baltic Porter.

Here are some pictures from my last brew day. I brewed a Pumpkin ESB. 

Brew Today , See you Tomorrow

Snow day Beer

I heard the snow was coming to my town. Everyone was going out to buy milk and bread , I went out to get a local NC beer. Here are some pictures of what I bought.  HighLand brewing company's  Kashmir English India Pale Ale.

Recent Beers

Some of the recent beers I drank this week.

Down the Rabbit-Hole We Go

                 Oh my ears and whiskers! The White Rabbit.

Today I visited a brewery right in my home town, White Rabbit Brewery. 

White Rabbit Brewing Company

219 Fish Drive

Angier, NC 27501

(919) 527-2739 (BREW)

They invited me over to help them brew and they would pay me too! Pay me in Beer! That's like taking a kid to a candy store and letting them try all the candy.

'Who are you?' said the Caterpillar.


White Rabbit Brewing Company is a brewery that bases all their beers on the book "Alice's Adventures In Wonderland." . All their beers names come from the book, like: Tea Party Porter, Dunkin Dormouse Octoberfest, Cheshires Pumpkin Ale, Jabberwocky Tripel, and Drink Me Cream Ale just to name a few.
 

“Begin at the beginning," the King said, very gravely, "and go on till you come to the end: then stop.”  Lewis Carroll

I had a chance to talk with Owner and Brewmaster Kenneth Ostraco while I drank one of their Tea Party Porters, Which was amazing.  It being a Vanilla Bourbon Porter, It was strong on vanilla and bourbon flavor in the best way possible. But to focus on the quote above, Kenneth told me the brewery's story from the beginning to where he is looking to go with it in the future. He started off like most all other Masterbrewers, As a home brewer. White Rabbit has a nice size space with a tap house in the front and the brew house in the back.  The tap house has eight beers on tap at any given time and the brew houses air is full of malt and hops about twice a week.  Kenneth went on to tell me he is right where he wants to be. He has a good clientele and a list of clients waiting for beer. From our conversation, it appears that Kenneth didn't want his brewery to be like fire works, shoot to the top and fizzle out. " I want to take small steps and stick to my grassroots" said Kenneth.  He had told me he has had some big offers to help him go full size and become a full size brewery.  He went on to say "I do not want to jump into the deep end and have someone hand me two cinder blocks and see how long I can tread water".

   

 





I'm late / I'm late / For a very important date. / No time to say "Hello, Goodbye". / I'm late, I'm late, I'm late. The White Rabbit


Time to start Brewing.  We brewed three barrels of beer. Gryphon’s California Common, Rabbit's Nutbrown Ale and Pale in the Park.  Good times hanging out with Kenneth from White Rabbit and Adam from Homesteaders Brew Supply.

Brew today, See you tomorrow

Summer time , No its still winter

Took my love Turtle Mama out for her Birthday, We went to Natty Greenes Brewery in Raleigh.

If

If you are in the mood for good food and a good beer go to Natty Greenes at 505 Jones st Raleigh NC.