The past and the future

As I sit here on a chilly Thursday Manawatu evening, its been a big week in ManawaBrew world.

I've looked into a domain name for the site - figured its easier to market than hey, check out blah.blogspot.co.nz, had a chat with a guy about a logo as well and I have had some chats with the lads about a place in town that could be interested in some home brew tastings. More on that when I actually pull finger and have that chat, watch this space though!

 

I also finished reading a book by Micheal Donaldson called Beer Nation: The Art and Heart of Kiwi Beer. Very hard book to put down, highly recommended to anyone in New Zealand, or overseas for that matter that wants to know the history of beer and brewing scene in New Zealand.

 

A couple of things I found really interesting, Speights as we know it, used to be dry hopped. Yes, dry hopped beer way back when Jesus was a Cowboy. Something I never knew. Could explain why the father in law never liked Tui! I guess I may have known that should I have done the tour all those years ago I was there, instead of the chocolate factory.

 

Another thing I found interesting is why, now, I understand why there is such flavour (sic) in "New Zealand Draught" beer (Tui, Export Gold, DB, Lion Red), a secret ingredient.....sugar. Plain old sugar. Now it might not come as a suprise to some, but it makes sense to me now why on the label for Macs Gold you see 'all malt lager'.

 

The 6'oclock swill gets a good mention and I agree with what Micheal is saying. I maybe a part of the generation of young (sic) males who are still entwined in the mindset of the 6 o'clock swill and I'll admit I probably have passed it onto young males coming through my local rugby club, but its New Zealand right? It's how we roll. Well, once you've read the book, you might understand why it is that way, can we change it though?

 

So, go buy the book, buy the beer that Epic also brewed for it, Message in a Bottle IPA and let us know your thoughts. Pretty sure we tried the beer at Beervana as well, although the Epic stand was towards the end of the night so can't quite recall...

Captains log...

Its been a while since my last post - life has certainly got in the way.

I went over to Masterton for a weekend away with Steph. On the way we stopped in at the Tui Brewery. I've been on the tour before, but its a little hazy on what exactly happend - was for Brian's stag do.  

 

A couple of things:

 

Eating a hop pellet = a free beer. I did this last time I was there, except the hops were fresh, this time they were a little on the brown side and very stale, hopefully they don't chuck them in the beer!

 

DB - seriously consider getting the Brewers Reserve out into the public, not just an onsite beer. I think you'd be surpised how well it would sell. Its probably the hoppiest beer from DB and for me, its a pretty good beer. 

 

To Kava or not to Kava?

I was having a conversation with my boss at work about the Pohutakawa Cerveza and he asked me about kava. I've tried it, I liked it, its not illegal in New Zealand, so a kava beer?

 

The taste of Kava is pretty strong and dirty/muddy, so I think you'd need a pretty strong malt backbone to hide the earthy notes, or throw a truckload of hops at it.

 

A quick Google and I found some stuff. A Porter recipe over on HBT, I'll wait and see how that turns out before I progress, if I do. It's got me interested though. 

 

Next Brews

I've made the decison to re brew the American and I'm going to call it a KPA, or a Kiwi Pale Ale. While its not an offical style, home brewing is all about experimentation...

 

And in between now and brew day (13th October) I'll try and get the Pohutakawa Cerveza done.

 

So some questions for you, my loyal followers:

1. Would you drink a kava beer?

2. Would you drink a Pohutakawa Cerveza (think Corona with a slight salty aftertaste)

A President, a porter and some port

Well, if you're into brewing and you're following anything like this blog at all, you'll know that Mr President, Barack Obama brews beer.

 

Rumour has it that the Pres brought a home brew kit and like most of us caught the bug. Unlike most of us who continue to brew, he's got his staff to brew and they use White House Honey.

 

Full article can be found on the White House Blog.

 

Recipes:

 

White House Honey Porter

Ingredients

• 2 (3.3 lb) cans light unhopped malt extract
• 3/4 lb Munich Malt (cracked)
• 1 lb crystal 20 malt (cracked)
• 6 oz black malt (cracked)
• 3 oz chocolate malt (cracked)
• 1 lb White House Honey
• 10 HBUs bittering hops
• 1/2 oz Hallertaur Aroma hops
• 1 pkg Nottingham dry yeast

 

White House Honey Ale

Ingredients

• 2 (3.3 lb) cans light malt extract
• 1 lb light dried malt extract
• 12 oz crushed amber crystal malt
• 8 oz Biscuit Malt
• 1 lb White House Honey
• 1 1/2 oz Kent Goldings Hop Pellets
• 1 1/2 oz Fuggles Hop pellets
• 2 tsp gypsum
• 1 pkg Windsor dry ale yeast

Pretty standard beers really. I have had some conversations with some people about the porter and instead of using White House Honey, throwing in some Manuka Honey. I've toyed with the idea of honey before and still might go ahead with it.

 

Also thought about a Mexican Cerveza with some Pohutakawa Honey hoping some of the saltiness from the Pohutakawa comes through. Might do a small batch and see what it comes out like, it'll be a cheap extract kit:

 

Pohutakawa Cerveza

• 1.5kg Mangrove Jack's Mexican Cerveza LME hopped kit
• 1.5kg Coopers Light LME
• 1kg Pohutakawa Honey
• Saflager S-23 Yeast 

Not sure if I'd follow a "normal" extract brew, or if I'll do a full boil and throw some more hops in there. I'll put some thought into it. Maybe even some speciality grains as well, can't hurt. Although, I guess what hops does one put into a Cerveza? Saaz baby, all the way!! Might be out of style, but then again that's the joy of brewing right?

 

Port Porter/Stout

I got offered a bottle of Port, which I gracefully agreed to grab, which brings me to my next brew. A port based porter. Now it might sound odd, it might sound funny to some, but if you imagine a strong porter, let it ferment then throw it into in a barrel that has been used to store port, then cellar it for about 6 months...If you like port and if you like Porter, then it'd be a beer for you, or in this case me.

 

A couple of points to note:.

1. I don't have a barrel
2. The barrels I have found are pretty expensive ($NZ220 for a 5L)
3. Will it be worth it?

I'm keen to have a goo and to be fair, should this little hobby become something more serious, I'll have a 5L Oak Barrel to play with - who wouldn't want it right? Experimentation anyone?

 

I'll sleep on it, dream about it and hopefully save some money to actually do it! Pledge Me account time maybe?

Bubble Tea......?

Need another name, bubble tea it is not!

 

After mowing the lawns and fluffing around the house, I figured I deserved a taste. Cleverly I put a bottle in the fridge before I started doing anything this moring!

 

On a nice warm Manawatu day, watching Canterbury vs North Harbour in the ITM Cup, I popped a bottle. Sorry - no pics this time, I'll make sure I've got one for next time.

 

No carbonation. I'm not to worried for a couple of reasons:

1. You'll remember that I had some issues with bottling. This bottle was the bottle i was bottling when it happened, the bottle was pretty much full to the brim, so there wasn't any headroom for anything - silly me should have tipped some out.

2. Its only been a week since I bottled. Simillarly with the JD SMaSH it eventually took 3 weeks to carbonate. So I'll leave this one - again another reason to bottle with 500ml bottles, not really wasting that much beer.

 

Onto the beast itself....

Taste - very malty, the chocolate malt comes into its own now and its pretty good, decent roast there. Hops are not there really, might've needed more? Yeah, more, definately needs more HOPS! There is a slight hop after taste, similar actually to the I.R.A I brewed for my birthday. Not a bad taste.

 

Aroma - all but nothing there, there is a malt nose, not sure if it the buscuit or the chocolate malt thats doing it, but its surprinsingly pleasent. I'll lleave the rest of the notes for when it's carbonated, something tells me it might be different.

 

Look - Dark brown with a red hue. Obviously no lacing or head to speak of since its not carbonated.

 

Finally manged to get some Star San as well. Pretty stoked. I'll be honest, I was being lazy in not getting any, but after seeing the stuff in action on the Brewhemoth Brew Day I thought, bugger it, I'm getting some! Pretty cheap and should last me a long time!

 

Keep an eye out for more tasting notes!

Bubble Tea?

Time to bottle the Bubble Tea Mild. First, a final "gravity" test. Still at 1.020 and well, it'd be rude not to have a taste right?

Still tasting good! Still has that initial sweet hit then a slight roast from the chocolate malt (which is a new flavour) and the final taste bud sensation, HOPS!

 

So there it is, in all her glory, brown, not fizzy yet and for now, rather tasty. Not the yeast still in suspension (white specks).

 

I got the kistchen ready for bottleing, gave it a nice clean and hunted through my bottles to get as many 500ml bottles as I could. I'm liking the smaller bottles, more so for tasting. I grabbed some bombers (650ml) bottles that I had from Stoke and the usualt 750ml suspects from those other breweries.

 

I did have a slight mishap when I was bottling though, didn't waste much and I have one 500ml bottle that might not be so good...

I was filling a 500ml bottle, and the end of the bottling wand come off in the bottle! So I had beer splasing all over the floor and then end of my wand in a bottle. I managed to turn the tap off on the fermenter and after about 10mins of mucking arojund, go the end out of the bottle. Resantitised and carried on. Am I worried? not really. Should I be? Probably...

Had a chat with Brian about some upcoming brews. He's keen to do a vanilla porter and I think I'll have a go at a black IPA. Have you brewed or tried either a Vanilla Porter, or a Black IPA? Leave us a comment below.

Wednesday Brewskies



Well, its hump day and I felt like a beer. All I had in the fridge was some left over brewskies from our brew day a couple of weeks ago.

Sitting amongst the beers are a couple of bottle of the JD SMaSH. I thought I would give it another go, see how its changed.

Into a 2012 Beervana glass it went.

Aroma: Its got a slight nose of the Jack Daniels and when I say slight I mean slight. There is more vanilla in the nose, but apart from that its pretty bland.

Look: Its very golden, compared to how it looked when I was bottling it, its done very well, ver clear, very bright. Its got almost a golden hue to it, from the chips and Jack Daniels I'd say. No head to speak of, it disappears quickly, not to worried since it was a single malt beer.

Taste: Well, it has mellowed in the last two weeks in the fridge. The Jack Daniels is not as harsh as it was, in fact its become very drinkable. Its got a beer taste now, before it was like having a shot of Jack. Now, now its a beer. Now it has mellowed just enough. You still get the heat from the Jack, but its hard to explain, you just want MOAR!

I think I'll still cellar some, if not most of it. Its coming into summer and this certainly is no summer beer. I don't think I'd want to smash back one of these after mowing the lawn! Its more of a tuck up next to the fire sort of beers. Very warming.

Still thinking about my next brew. I got some ideas from Beervana, but I dunno. Not sure I want to spend money on experimental beers, but I guess thats all I've really been doing since I started brewing right?

I have put some thought into the American again, such a good beer and truth be told, most of it went at my birthday so I never got to really give a good go. Only real downside is the cost of the hops, they cost $20 per 100g here in NZ and I need at least 300g. I guess I could make a 10L batch though, scale everything down...? Needs more thought and more beer!!

Bubble Tea Mild Ale

Bubble Tea Mild chillin'

Its been just over a week since the Brewhemoth Brew Day and my failed attempt at a porter. Never fear though, I have decided it will now become an American Mild Ale. Its an American because it has more hops than an English version of the same style of beer. In staying with the name of the original, Bubble Tea Porter, I've now named it, Bubble Tea Mild.

Its currently siting at roughly 5.2% abv, which to me is a sessionable beer. The gravity samples I've tasted have been pretty good, hoppy nose, sweet front, hop bitter back and a velvet mouth feel. I guess the lactose and malto-dextrine have done their job.

Plan is to bottle on Saturday since I now have Saturdays back post rugby season, although the ITM Cup is staring this week and the All Blacks are playing Saturday night, maybe Sunday for bottling day. All going well in the bottle, in two weeks time, we'll have a taste.a

Side note - I have also decide the JD SMaSH is going to cellar over the summer and I'll see how it goes in the winter. I'm not sure if I'll keep it in the house or in the garage over summer, I think the house, since it'll be cooler.