Ingredients:

• 9.5 Maris Otter pale malt
• 1 pound wheat malt
• 1 pound chocolate malt
• 1/2 pound flaked oats
• 1/2 pound caramel or crystal malt (80 L)
• 1/2 pound black patent malt (500 L)
• 1 ounce Chinook hops (60 min)
• 1/2 ounce Canadian Goldings hops (15 min)
• 1/2 ounce Canadian Goldings hops (5 min)
• Nottingham Ale Yeast or Wyeast 1728 Scottish Ale

Ferment in the primary for three weeks at 60-70 degrees.

For the secondary fermenter (three weeks):

• 1 pint of bourbon (I bought Jim Beam.)
• 2 ounces oak cubes

I suspect the bourbon will have to mellow out a bit. Probably aging this beer a couple months will improve its flavor.

Dark beer by nicholasjon, on Flickr.

Last year I made the Classic American Pilsner for one of our clubs and they liked it so much they asked for another keg of it for this year. I think I will change it up a bit though and make them the Pants-Optional Pilsner if they will agree to it. The latter was a little more crisp and clean, with a definite but light maltiness and just a little bitterness. To me it was the perfect springtime beer.

Last time I made this brew I had a three-week window in which to complete it. It was good, but the leftover beer was even better a couple weeks later. This time I am allotting about six weeks for it to fully ferment and age. There is no reason to rush a good pilsner and I expect that should make it just about perfect.

What brews do you have in your spring lineup?

Larvik Bødker Pilsner by Bernt Rostad, on Flickr.

First of all, determine that your fermentation is really stuck and not just slow. My friend Rob has an interesting thing happening at his place. His yeast are apparently shy as a new cat or something because he never sees any bubbling in his air lock but his specific gravity readings are just fine and the beer tastes great. In his case, he simply has no visual indication of fermentation but it is happening. It could be that he does not have a perfectly sealed fermenter. I do not know what is going on with his system, but it is working, even if it is not perfect.

Obviously, the first step is to check your specific gravity readings. If they are too high and you have waited a week or so, your fermentation is likely stuck. I have never had my friend Rob’s problem, but I have had a delayed fermentation, where the yeast are apparently shocked or something, and the bubbling does not start for a few days. That is okay, as long as it fully ferments, but keep in mind that you should wait a week before determining that your fermentation is honestly stuck, since the bulk of the fermentation happens in the first week.

Here are some tings I have advised in the past to try to restart a stuck fermentation:

• Pick up the plastic primary fermenter by the handle and rotate your wrist to disturb the sediment on the bottom. This can revive some of the yeast that is under a layer of trub and get them interested in working again.
• Mix the beer thoroughly with a sanitized spoon or paddle to stir up the yeast at the bottom and get more oxygen into the wort.
• Make sure your temperature control is working. Yeast do not like large fluctuations in temperature. Also make sure that your fermenter is within the allowable temperature range for the yeast you are using.
• If these tricks do not start your fermentation, try adding another yeast packet or yeast starter. It could be that you got some old or bad yeast, or perhaps that the wort was too hot when you added the yeast and they died from shock.

Remember not to freak out if you get a stuck fermentation. There is nothing that cannot be fixed when it comes to brewing, as long as you are careful to avoid infection. Do you have a special trick you use when you have a stuck fermentation?

Fermentation by Jason Pratt, on Flickr.

It's not pretty, I admit, but it works just fine.

The auto siphon removes the need to put your lips on a hose, thus keeping your germs and beasties out of your beer. Honestly, I do not worry about such things because I figure people have been doing it this way for a long time and I have never had a batch of beer get infected. I have a clamp toward the end of the hose that allows me to pinch it shut. I do this, dip the tip of the hose in sanitizer, and proceed to transfer the beer. No fuss, not much muss. Whatever muss is.

I needed a new racking cane and took a friend to see the Maryland Homebrew store. He kept saying, "Get an auto siphon racking cane," so I figured I would try it. I was not impressed. This might just be because I am old and stuck in my ways, but I already have a system I use for racking. It is simple and there are no moving parts.

The big problem I had with the auto siphon is that using it requires you to insert the thing into your beer and then pull the center tube out to draw an amount of beer into the device, then push the center tube back in to start the flow. All this pushing and pulling causes the device to move in the beer and possibly stir up the stuff that had settled to the bottom. This does not sit well with me at all. I am not sure what it says about me that I had trouble using a simple hand-pump auto siphon, but there it is. You may have good luck with it. I have talked to people who love them and people who hate them, so at least I know I am not alone with my hatred.

On the other hand, if you don't like starting the flow of your beer the way you might steal gas from your sleeping neighbors, this is a fine tool to use.

Siphoning the the wort into the primary fermenter by Wandering Eyre.

But Andy, remember that if this brew is gone, I still have some of that weird sour stout extract you gave me. Yeah, I never got around to draining that keg. I expect it is good and aged by now, and hopefully a little less funky. At any rate, I will have a brew for you to enjoy when you are ready for some down time.

This style is sometimes known as milk stout because the slight sweetness comes from the addition of lactose into the boil. Lactose is a non-fermentable sugar, so it simply imparts a slight touch of sweet creaminess instead of turning into alcohol. Probably the most widely known example of this style is Samuel Adams Cream Stout. RateBeer has a good list of what they consider the best in this style.

Here is the recipe:

Grain:
8 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter (3.0 SRM)
8 oz Carafa III (525.0 SRM)
8 oz Chocolate Malt (450.0 SRM)
8 oz Oatmeal

Hops:
1.00 oz Willamette – 60 minutes

Adjuncts:
1 lbs Milk Sugar (Lactose) – Boil 60 minutes

Yeast:
1.0 pkg NB NeoBrittania (Wyeast #1945) or other standard ale yeast, such as Danstar Nottingham Ale Yeast

Gulf Islands Brewery Salty Isle Stout by Ianiv & Arieanna.

Amendment I
Brewers shall make no infringement respecting the use of hops, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of adjuncts, or of the yeast; or the right of the drinkers peaceably to partake, and to petition the brewer for a recipe of ingredients.

Amendment II
Well sterile equipment, being necessary to the purity of a homebrew, the right of the brewers to keep and bear sanitizing chemicals, shall not be infringed.

Amendment III
No drinker shall, in time of consuming homebrew play Quarters in any house, without the consent of the brewer, nor during time at a bar, but in a manner using only cheap domestic beer.

Amendment IV
The right of Homebrewers to be sure that drinkers in their houses, to avoid unreasonable effort in cleaning, shall rinse used bottles free of yeast residue, and if a drinker leaves a bottle unrinsed, upon probable cause, supported by Oath or witness affirmation, and leaving a particularly difficult amount of residue in place, that drinker shall wash all bottles prior to the bottling of the next batch.

Amendment V
No Homebrewer shall be held to answer for skunked, or otherwise fouled beer, unless on the presentment of debris floating in the beer, except in cases arising from overcarbonation, or incomplete fermentation, when actual consumption may cause a public danger; nor shall any drinker be put in jeopardy of consuming two bottles from the same batch of skunked beer; nor shall the homebrewer be compelled by any offended drinker to drink his own skunked beer, deprived of ingredients, recipes, or equipment, without the consensus of the majority of beer drinkers that the brewer must be stopped; nor shall private property be taken for public restroom use, without just intoxication.

Amendment VI
In all new recipe presentations, the homebrewer shall enjoy the right to speedy and unbiased feedback, by an impartial jury of drinkers in a manner in which the brew was intended to be consumed, based on the beer style which shall have been previously ascertained by the homebrewer, and to be informed of the hoppiness and mouth feel; to be confronted with criticism against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining people who like his beer, and to have the assistance of his spouse for his defence.

Amendment VII
In brews of high specific gravity, where the alcohol by volume content shall exceed twelve percent, the right to use plastic cups shall be preserved so no fine glasses shall be broken, and no drunken incident shall be otherwise recounted to any spouse, according to the rules of common intoxication.

Amendment VIII
Common Ale yeast shall not be required when cold fermentation is imposed, nor dual or unusual fermentation be inflicted upon porters.

Amendment IX
The general consensus of a homebrew by drinkers, that a beer is a stout, shall not be construed to deny or disparage the homebrewer the right of claiming his beer is actually a pale ale.

Amendment X
The beers not consumed by the homebrewer, nor whose consumption is prohibited by the spouse, are reserved for other homebrewers respectively, or to the people who shall appreciate the effort.

Bottle Cap Flag by -pushkill-.

I ran into a problem making this beer. As you know, I prefer to make a yeast starter from a liquid yeast culture. The Wyeast 2206 packet I bought never inflated, so I could not make a starter in time for brew day. I ended up going out last minute to my local homebrew store to get some Saflager S-23 dry yeast. As I have said before, the main difference between dry and liquid yeast is the variety that you can get in the liquid format. Neither is empirically better, and each has its drawbacks and advantages.

The black color comes from a relatively small amount of dark grain. As you can see from the grain bill, most of the grain in this brew is regular base grain. The color comes entirely from that half pound of Weyerman Carafa III grain, which is about 500° L, while the darkest of the other grains is only upward of 60° L. I did not try shining a light through the finished beer, but it looks as though it will not allow light to pass through. That is some dark stuff!

Grain Bill:

• 4.5 lbs. German Vienna
• 4.5 lbs. German Munich Malt
• 0.5 lbs. Weyermann Caramunich III
• 0.5 lbs. Weyermann Carafa III

Hops:

• 1 oz. German Perle – 60 minutes

Yeast:

• Saflager S-23
• Preferred option: Wyeast 2206 Bavarian Lager

Köhler Schweiß in a glass – close up by Gunnar Þór Hafdal.

I looked closer on the page the recipe was on and noticed that it refers to Singha as a malt liquor, not a beer. I will get into the different definitions of what a malt liquor is in another post. As a quick point, though, most international markets define a malt liquor as an alcoholic drink made with malted barley, and the term is an umbrella, under which lagers and ales are categorized. However, my reaction, though, was typical of most Americans when they see that term: Yuck.

I looked at the recipe and it seems perfectly normal, so I decided to go ahead and list it here. The only thing I would add would be a handful of instant oatmeal. I like my beers to have a good head, and the oatmeal helps that pretty well without adding too much to the taste.

Mash together:

• 9.25 lbs British 2-row pale malt
• 1.5 lbs flaked maize
• 1 lb rice hulls
• 1/2 lb dextrin malt
• 3/4 lb German light crystal malt
• 1/4 lb German Munich malt

Hops:

• 1 oz. Northern Brewer (9% AA) – 90 minutes
• 1/2 oz. German Hallertau Hersbucker – 10 minutes
• 1/2 oz. Czech Saaz – 10 minutes

Other Ingredients:

• 1 tsp. Irish moss – 10 minutes

Yeast:

• Wyeast 2206 Bavarian lager yeast

Ferment at 42-52 degrees for about a week, transfer to a secondary, and bottle or keg after two more weeks. Allow it to age a bit, perhaps another couple weeks.

Quick Thai beer before leaving Bangkok by Steve & Jemma Copley.

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
3/4 cup corn sugar for priming

Directions

In an 12 qt pot, steep the grains in a hop bag in 1 1/2 gallons of sterile water at 155 degrees for half an hour. Remove the grains.
Add the 2 cans of the malt extract and the dried extract and bring to a boil.
For the first flavoring, add the 1 1/2 oz Kent Goldings and 2 tsp of gypsum. Boil for 45 minutes.
For the second flavoring, add the 1 1/2 oz Fuggles hop pellets at the last minute of the boil.
Add the honey and boil for 5 more minutes.
Add 2 gallons chilled sterile water into the primary fermenter and add the hot wort into it. Top with more water to total 5 gallons. There is no need to strain.
Pitch yeast when wort temperature is between 70-80˚. Fill airlock halfway with water.
Ferment at 68-72˚ for about seven days.
Rack to a secondary fermenter after five days and ferment for 14 more days.
To bottle, dissolve the corn sugar into 2 pints of boiling water for 15 minutes. Pour the mixture into an empty bottling bucket. Siphon the beer from the fermenter over it. Distribute priming sugar evenly. Siphon into bottles and cap. Let sit for 2 to 3 weeks at 75˚.

Triumph Brewery’s Honey Blonde by Rhys Asplundh, on Flickr.