Let's talk about Beer, man!

[vchizzle]

The more I drink here: http://aleasylum.com/ the less I like everything else. I love their new bar/brewery. Even other beers I've liked a lot in the past just have been tasting inferior lately. Bedlam is my current favorite. Food is pretty decent too on their limited menu. I've been drinking their ales a long time, but just recently started going to their brewery. I need an endorsement or something

 

[Julio]

Itaipava (Pilsen): To drink lots of it and fast. Like in a barbecue for example. And I mean LOTS of it.
Heineken (Lager): To drink slowly, at night, with my wife...

 

[frankb56]

Anything but Coor's Light...no offense to our Colorado brethren, but I'd rather sip warm urine. I guess that's because I love Stout Beers....gimme a Guinness Draught any day or time. It's the milkshake of beers.

 

[sergiodeblanc]

Has anybody tried the Newcastle Bombshell yet? http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/342/93802 Always been a big fan of Newcastle.

 

[RichardJ]

Hmmm.... Well this comes from the 'Old Country', many happy hours (mostly a blur) spend drinking Newcastle Brown Ale - aka Newcy Brown - goes down a treat but has a rather 'windy' effect the next day! I wonder if this is the rarer Newcastle Amber Ale, much nicer and less 'incendiary'.

Happy days!

 

[Bill SAS 513]

Where to begin...after cutting the grass, I love lime beers...when visiting R&R HoF, found out about LaBatts light with lime...perfect after yard work .tough to find around here though. English raves...Boddingtons, Old Speckled Hen, Hobgoblin, and another I was turned on to in UK, (although not English) Stella, which has taken off around here lately. Love it with a shot of lime juice, which makes my wife cringe...there goes my man card, huh?!?!

 

[John Beef]

Anything but Coor's Light...no offense to our Colorado brethren, but I'd rather sip warm urine. I guess that's because I love Stout Beers....gimme a Guinness Draught any day or time. It's the milkshake of beers.

Coors isn't really a Colorado company any more, in fact they're not even domestic ( owned by SAB, headquartered in London). Neither is Budweiser (InBev headquartered in Belgium).

 

[Danerada]

Had some of this a few days ago. The label says for best taste to drink from a glass. I tried from the bottle and from a glass and I preferred the bottle.

 

[sergiodeblanc]

aka Newcy Brown

Added to the vernacular!

Love it with a shot of lime juice, which makes my wife cringe...there goes my man card, huh?!?!

Whatever! I love lime in beer, I don't care if it makes me a fruitcake... Instantly turns a Bud light into a Corona!

 

[frankb56]

Had some Newcastle last night with my poker buddies.....good stuff.

 

[Em7]

Added to the vernacular!



Whatever! I love lime in beer, I don't care if it makes me a fruitcake... Instantly turns a Bud light into a Corona!

The practice of putting a slice of lime in a bottle of Corona came about because the beer is shipped in clear bottles; therefore, it's susceptible to being light-struck. Lime juice kills the “skunky” aroma/taste that occurs when the isomerized alpha acids from the hops are exposed to light. Most of the beer that is packaged in green bottles has also been light-struck by time that it is purchased (Heineken is so notorious for being light-struck by the time that it is purchased that most Americans believe that it is part of the beer's flavor/aroma profile). Brewers that want to prevent their beer from being light-struck package it in brown bottles.

 

[Hopeful Sinner]

A friend turned me on to Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout and it is superb! They also make a porter that I can't wait to try...

 

[RichardJ]

The practice of putting a slice of lime in a bottle of Corona came about because the beer is shipped in clear bottles; therefore, it's susceptible to being light-struck. Lime juice kills the “skunky” aroma/taste that occurs when the isomerized alpha acids from the hops are exposed to light. Most of the beer that is packaged in green bottles has also been light-struck by time that it is purchased (Heineken is so notorious for being light-struck by the time that it is purchased that most Americans believe that it is part of the beer's flavor/aroma profile). Brewers that want to prevent their beer from being light-struck package it in brown bottles.

No-one likes a smart arse! Interestingly here on the continent in Europe most beers come in green glass, apart from some of the Spanish ones where, given that it is hotter and sunnier, they should know better! Average French beers come in green, the good ones (abbey brewed etc) come in brown.

'Proper' beer from the 'old country' only comes in brown bottles. Myth also says it has to be warm and flat but I don't go quite that far!

 

[RichardJ]

A friend turned me on to Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout and it is superb! They also make a porter that I can't wait to try...

Ooh, now good porters are a thing to behold (can you get anything from the London brewers, Fullers or Youngs?) if you really want to go hardcore look up 'Winter Warmers'.

 

[Shawn@PRS]

The Pumpkin Ale's are starting to arrive now. Southern Tier Pumpking is most excellent.

 

[Em7]

No-one likes a smart arse! Interestingly here on the continent in Europe most beers come in green glass, apart from some of the Spanish ones where, given that it is hotter and sunnier, they should know better! Average French beers come in green, the good ones (abbey brewed etc) come in brown.

'Proper' beer from the 'old country' only comes in brown bottles. Myth also says it has to be warm and flat but I don't go quite that far!

I am not trying to be a smart aleck. I was a hardcore yeast bank maintaining, hop growing, all-grain amateur brewer for almost a decade (I was planning to attend the Siebel Institute and turn "pro" before I met my wife). My wife was amazed when she discovered how deeply I was involved in the hobby. She could not get over the fact that I had built a small all-grain brewery and a small yeast lab in my house.

To the best of my knowledge, I was the first amateur brewer in the United States to successfully plate a complete Ringwood culture. I plated it from a hydrometer sample taken from one of the open fermenters at the old Wild Goose Brewery in Cambridge, Maryland. Ringwood is a multi-strain ale yeast. I transferred single colonies from the plate that I used for single-cell isolation to multiple agar slants and grew these colonies into one-liter cultures. I mixed the different cultures and ran test batches until I had identified the individual strains. Most homebrewers only manage to get the top flocculating strain, which results in a high terminal gravity or a stuck fermentation if used by itself (this strain in pure culture form is diacetyl city). Most homebrewers usually fail to get the high-attenuation strain that is responsible for chewing through the wort.

I went from homebrewing beer to homebrewing amps when I started to run out of thirsty friends (I needed a creative technical hobby). Homebrewing was a great hobby, but I have never been a big drinker, so I had to rely on my friends and family to make it possible for me to be able to brew a fraction of my yearly legal quota. I quit the hobby altogether after my kids were born because all-grain brewing is time intensive.

My favorite yeast strain was strain #679 from the National Collection of Yeast Cultures (NCYC) in the UK. NCYC #679 is a lager yeast strain from a Bratislavan brewery. NCYC #679 was a trip to rehydrate, grow, and plate because I had never had to deal with a glass ampoule before I received this yeast culture from the NCYC; however, it produced beautiful, well-attenuated lagers.

I know that most craft beer lovers prefer ales, but continental lager brewing is an art form because lager fermentation requires refrigeration and precise temperature control. I especially loved brewing pre-prohibition-style American lager, which is a radically different beer than what the three megabrewers currently produce. Yuengling Traditional Lager is basically a pre-prohibition-style American lager. Almost all American lager had as much flavor as Yuengling Traditional Lager before prohibition. The beer that the American megas produce today is the product of World War II. The megabrewers lightened the taste of beer to make it more palatable to women. Rice was used in place of corn, and the rest is history. Corn, when used properly in a domestic 6-row malted barley grist, produces a beautiful, tasty, and chill-proof beer.


Anyway, here's one my last all-grain ale recipes:

Fall Pale Ale

Grist (crushed using a roller mill)

• 9 lbs of pale ale malted barley
• 1 lb of Munich malted barley
• 1 lb. of dark crystal malted barley

Mash

• Single infusion, 90 minutes @ 150F

Liquor (a.k.a. water)

• 4 gallons of filtered 172F water (mash-in liquor)
• 5 gallons of filtered 180F water (sparge liquor)

Hops

• 3oz whole Goldings 4.3% alpha acid (60 minutes)
• 1oz whole Goldings 4.3% alpha acid (0 minutes)

Note: The total boil time is 60 minutes after the hot break. The first addition of hops is added immediately after the hot break. The bitterness from this hop addition is felt in the back of the mouth. The final hop addition is added when heat is removed from the kettle. The wort must be chilled quickly to preserve the aroma and taste of the final hop addition.

Yeast

• 32oz starter of the Charles Wells yeast culture (any decent British ale yeast will do)

 

[gush]

I have gotten away from the heavier beers. My top of the list favorite WAS petes strawberry blonde until that brewery was bought out and that beer was discontinued. DANG!!!!!!!!

Blue moon is my go to beer when we go out for dinner. The shocktop stuff is ok too but we where at Morgan street brewery in St. Louis over the 4th and they have a wheat beer that's very good.

Every once in a while I will pick up a 6 pack of miller high life, reminds me of growing up as a teen.

 

[RichardJ]

I am not trying to be a smart aleck. I was a hardcore yeast bank maintaining, hop growing, all-grain amateur brewer for almost a decade (I was planning to attend the Siebel Institute and turn "pro" before I met my wife). My wife was amazed when she discovered how deeply I was involved in the hobby. She could not get over the fact that I had built a small all-grain brewery and a small yeast lab in my house.To the best of my knowledge, I was the first amateur brewer in the United States to successfully plate a complete Ringwood culture. I plated it from a hydrometer sample taken from one of the open fermenters at the old Wild Goose Brewery in Cambridge, Maryland. Ringwood is a multi-strain ale yeast. I transferred single colonies from the plate that I used for single-cell isolation to multiple agar slants and grew these colonies into one-liter cultures. I mixed the different cultures and ran test batches until I had identified the individual strains. Most homebrewers only manage to get the top flocculating strain, which results in a high terminal gravity or a stuck fermentation if used by itself (this strain in pure culture form is diacetyl city). Most homebrewers usually fail to get the high-attenuation strain that is responsible for chewing through the wort. I went from homebrewing beer to homebrewing amps when I started to run out of thirsty friends (I needed a creative technical hobby). Homebrewing was a great hobby, but I have never been a big drinker, so I had to rely on my friends and family to make it possible for me to be able to brew a fraction of my yearly legal quota. I quit the hobby altogether after my kids were born because all-grain brewing is time intensive.My favorite yeast strain was strain #679 from the National Collection of Yeast Cultures (NCYC) in the UK. NCYC #679 is a lager yeast strain from a Bratislavan brewery. NCYC #679 was a trip to rehydrate, grow, and plate because I had never had to deal with a glass ampoule before I received this yeast culture from the NCYC; however, it produced beautiful, well-attenuated lagers. I know that most craft beer lovers prefer ales, but continental lager brewing is an art form because lager fermentation requires refrigeration and precise temperature control. I especially loved brewing pre-prohibition-style American lager, which is a radically different beer than what the three megabrewers currently produce. Yuengling Traditional Lager is basically a pre-prohibition-style American lager. Almost all American lager had as much flavor as Yuengling Traditional Lager before prohibition. The beer that the American megas produce today is the product of World War II. The megabrewers lightened the taste of beer to make it more palatable to women. Rice was used in place of corn, and the rest is history. Corn, when used properly in a domestic 6-row malted barley grist, produces a beautiful, tasty, and chill-proof beer. Anyway, here's one my last all-grain ale recipes:Fall Pale AleGrist (crushed using a roller mill)

• 9 lbs of pale ale malted barley
• 1 lb of Munich malted barley
• 1 lb. of dark crystal malted barley

Mash

• Single infusion, 90 minutes @ 150F

Liquor (a.k.a. water)

• 4 gallons of filtered 172F water (mash-in liquor)
• 5 gallons of filtered 180F water (sparge liquor)

Hops

• 3oz whole Goldings 4.3% alpha acid (60 minutes)
• 1oz whole Goldings 4.3% alpha acid (0 minutes)

Note: The total boil time is 60 minutes after the hot break. The first addition of hops is added immediately after the hot break. The bitterness from this hop addition is felt in the back of the mouth. The final hop addition is added when heat is removed from the kettle. The wort must be chilled quickly to preserve the aroma and taste of the final hop addition.Yeast

• 32oz starter of the Charles Wells yeast culture (any decent British ale yeast will do)

Hey man, it's just my English sense of humor! It was said with love and respect for someone who does indeed know their beers. Sorry if you were offended, really wasn't the intention.

 

[Em7]

I wasn't offended by your remarks. The science of brewing beer and studying beer history used to be two of my passions.

Speaking of American mega beer, that stuff is incredibly difficult to produce. Most amateur brewers prefer to make heavier and hoppier styles of beer because they mask poor brewing technique and poor biological quality control (stout is a favorite amongst beginning amateur brewers because roasted barley covers a host of cardinal brewing sins). The truly amazing thing is that the megas brew and ferment at high gravity (often 20 degrees Plato) and dilute the finish product in order to maximize brewery throughput. Anyone who has ever attempted to ferment a 20-degree-plus Plato (1.080+) lager wort knows how difficult it is to keep esters and diacetyl (and other ketones) low. A 20-degree wort is equivalent to that of a Belgian Tripel. The brewmasters at Bud/Miller/Coors are some of the best in the world. To be able to do what the megas do with the level of consistency that they do it requires an army of highly-trained biochemists, biochemical engineers, and microbiologists.

 

[RichardJ]

I wasn't offended by your remarks. The science of brewing beer and studying beer history used to be two of my passions.

Speaking of American mega beer, that stuff is incredibly difficult to produce. Most amateur brewers prefer to make heavier and hoppier styles of beer because they mask poor brewing technique and poor biological quality control (stout is a favorite amongst beginning amateur brewers because roasted barley covers a host of cardinal brewing sins). The truly amazing thing is that the megas brew and ferment at high gravity (often 20 degrees Plato) and dilute the finish product in order to maximize brewery throughput. Anyone who has ever attempted to ferment a 20-degree-plus Plato (1.080+) lager wort knows how difficult it is to keep esters and diacetyl (and other ketones) low. A 20-degree wort is equivalent to that of a Belgian Tripel. The brewmasters at Bud/Miller/Coors are some of the best in the world. To be able to do what the megas do with the level of consistency that they do it requires an army of highly-trained biochemists, biochemical engineers, and microbiologists.

Cool, just checking as sometimes things are misconstrued in 'translation' across the ocean.

If you ever see Pelforth Ambre well worth a glass or few.