ionia ales

Posted by Brendan at March 17th, 2008

So, I still haven’t posted very much stuff.

Brewed my first BeerQuest(atEmpyrean) beer, an IPA.  It’s all done fermenting.  Originally chilled to too low of a temp, I pitched more yeast after 24hrs of lag time, bythe next day it was ROCKIN’!

I found some bark in the back of the beer truck.  And helped a local florist unload some hollowed out tree trunks with the forklift.  It was a wacky day.   Irish Red at Lazlo’s is great, but one of my new favorites is the BetterWorld Wheat  a wit sans corriander.

Posted by Brendan at February 17th, 2008

Yep,

I just joined, this. 

THAT’S ALL FOR NOW.

Posted by Brendan at February 16th, 2008

I can’t wait for more of this…

ipa fall o7 
It’s been a while since I’ve been able to brew.  Or had mulitple batches going.  Here’s the plans.

I need to brew:

Some IPAs.

Strong Golden

Maybe a Wit?

A stout for St. Patricks day?  - i haven’t actually done that yet.

Sour beers!  - so that might be a turbid mash day.

I’d like to get some pure cultures, but I know much of my gear is infected, so maybe I see what’s left of my house cultures.

There’s much need for organization of equipment/keeping funky gear away from clean equipment.   Not that I am worried of a airborne transfer, but I don’t want to accidentally grab a bucket or hose that might ruin a “clean” IPA or other beer.

Not too long ago I had a “bomber” of Left Hand’s Warrior IPA.

Also, relatively new to the Lincoln Market, as of the holliday season.  Decent beer, this bottle was beginning to show the effects of oxidization.  ie, Tinny hop flavor.

Rogue’s Monk Madness was an interesting take on an abbey style.

But it was Rogue through and through.  Dark fruit notes and some alcohol.  An example of great brewing and knowledge of malts, hops and their house yeast.

Posted by Brendan at February 16th, 2008

My favorite style.

Rocky Mountian IPA - Ft. Collins Brewery.

Great floral nose.  Amber color.   Good bitterness balances the caramel notes.   Hop bitterness fades and flavor remains.   Very good beer.   No real flaws. However, After it warmed I got similar hop notes as the Cold Hop from Boudler Beer, which I really dislike.

Lakefront’s IPA was the second of the two “new to lincoln” IPAs.  I enjoyed it.  It was a good version of a standard IPA.  Nothing was heavy handed.   I’d buy a 6pk.

I’ll get some photos up soon.

Posted by Brendan at January 18th, 2008

I suck.  I admit it.  I haven’t posted for what a Month?  Jeez!

Good beers have been had.  Photos have been taken.  But no posts.

Let me explain. 

Working at a brewery hasn’t killed my love for beer or my love for talking about beer. (ask justin who was back for the hollidays and he maybe heard two sentences from my NOT about beer, and I am sorry I never really got to hear what the hell he is up to.)  But, I do not seem to have the motivation to write posts like I should.   Here’s a recap.

 I really hurt my back in mid december.  I was lifting a keg. (go figure!) It wasn’t a normal beer delivery and I did the damage while lifting the keg into a van.  OUCH! Then I had to deliver the damn beer.   The pain was sharp and terrible.  I have never felt anything like it.   A day later I went to a chiropracter and he’s been a big help.  I think things are better but the more difficult the work days the more it hurts.   About two weeks after I injured myself I had a string of days where I was running the bottler.  This was good since I needed to learn how to work the machine (which is like a glorified AK bottler with bells and whistles) and my injury got me of the delivery routes long enough to learn the in’s and out’s of the microbrewery staple  - THE MAHEEN!

So in the homebrewing world of mine, I haven’t been brewing.  Not enough time, and it’s been cold.   The beer brewed with ChrisJ has turned out awesomely! Very Crisp and delicious.  And a few of my sour beers are getting better and better.  Sidenote- I might be getting the peasure of donating a few bottles to the UNL eastcampus microbiology dept for a lab where they will “plate” out the beer in petri dishes to see what the heck is in there.   In the real world they’d be searching out “wort spoilage organisms” - and there are many in my beers.   Multiple strains of Brettanomyces, Lactobacillus, maybe some others.  When I hear back about that I will deffinitely post about that!

More updates this weekend.  I’ve got to move some kegs.

Posted by Brendan at December 7th, 2007

Ok, this is the first of two posts about Shawn’s IPA.  This is the cooler/warming up bottle, I will follow with the room/cellar temp bottle.
hazy light orange color.

Well attenuated and quite carbonated.

I enjoy this beer because it is dry and crisp which causes me to take another sip and before long, there isn’t much left but some lacing on my pint glass.

As for the hops, they play a strong role but it’s not out of control.  A wonderful and almost downplayed malty-ness is at the center of this well bittered beer. At a lower temperature the hops seem to change character between floral and citrus but there are fruity aromas floating around as well.

The beer dances on my tongue and feels prickly.  and i am going to take another sip right ….   now.

Thanks Shawn.

Posted by Brendan at December 7th, 2007

Ok.  Hard Work Week,  Good Beer Week.

Starts off with Chimay Gift pack.  Small Bottles of each - Red, White and Blue.

Also, Great Divide’s Fresh Hop and Hibernation Ale, Orval, Flying Dog’s Double Dog Pale.   Hooray Beer.

Hibernation was a surprise with it’s intense dark crystal/special b type malt and big dry hopping.   Great at about room temp,  After I dozed off for a bit.

Orval was missing something, and I have had some of this bottling before, but it was out of the Chimay Glass…  so, that might expain something.

I hope to get some more posts going again.

Happy onset of winter!

Brendan/ioniaales

Posted by Brendan at November 22nd, 2007

GREAT beer-  affordable at the Yia Yia’s  at 6bucks.

Super fresh hop aroma.  Wonderful lacing on the pint glass.

Amber in color but not too sweet with the caramel malts.

Very delicious.   I think better than the FreshHOP by Great Divide… Which I also enjoyed.

Posted by Brendan at November 8th, 2007

Sierra Nevada’s Celebration Ale has made an Early ARRIVAL here in lincoln.  Maybe 3+ weeks before I remember seeing it last year.

I am on my first 6er.   Very tasty… and similar to last years.  a touch of caramel.. red hue.. and plenty of hops.

Maybe a more extensive review in the next few days.

Posted by Brendan at October 24th, 2007

Phew.

Dang.

Dang-tired.

So the Fremont Lazlo’s closed  (how about those comments?!) Also, Today was the Omaha location’s delivery day, so they ordered their two week alotment.  My day started at 5:18am when I got up to take a leak.  Walking down the stairs I thought, “hmm, it’s got to be getting close to 5am” - which was what I had set the alarm for.   Ooops! already 18 minutes behind schedule.  The plan was to meet Jeremiah at 6am to load the Third Stone Brown that I kegged on tueday. This was along the line of 40 15.5 gallon kegs and 30 5 gallon kegs.   That had to be taken out to the warehouse and inventoried.  And this is where the day got interesting.  Omaha has their order, and I was also going to Fremont to pull their inventory, so the trick was to set aside all the untapped kegs from Fremont, and try to fill the Omaha order.  Luckily most of that was figured out thanks to excel spreadsheets.   Also, I picked up the empty kegs, and had to rearange the load in the truck so I could get at Omaha’s beer.   Ohh, the big PAIN? Case beer with out the brown carboard case “flat” so I had several cases of beer in six packs just floating around.  I tried, successfully to lock them in with the empty kegs and the 2-wheeler.  By 11am I was heading to Omaha, and that delivery wasn’t too bad but it’s good sized.  Around 25 kegs of beer tides them over for the two weeks.   I managed to pawn off the case beer as well.   Lincoln bound  at 1 or 1:15pm and I stopped at the warehouse to pick up keg beer for some company party, grabbed a few other things and dropped off other full kegs from Fremont that Omaha didn’t need.  Onto the interstate by 3:30pm.  Unloaded the truck, washed down 50 kegs, filed paper work and nearly fell on my face after clocking out at just before 6pm.