The omnibus worked for me so I might see if doing it this way will help me be a bit more regular in my blogging.
When I brew it tends to be a solitary exercise with me pottering around in the garage and kitchen. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy it, but when you think about some of the best beer drinking you have ever done it is invariably a social experience with your good friends. So I was quick to say yes when my friend Ian (who has been in this blog before) invited me around to his place to help him brew some beer. He has more experience in full mash brewing than I do so I was keen to learn a thing or two. By the time I arrived mid-morning Ian already had his mash well underway and was busy measuring out hops in the kitchen. They were Riwaka hops. Ian was playing with a recipe that he had already brewed five or six times. In the past he had used a variety of hops but this time was going Riwaka all the way. He had it all set out in a nice clear pocket folder with details of the hops and ingredients he had used each time. He even had batch numbers. What a pro! We made our way outside where Ian had all his brewing equipment set up at the bottom of his garden. We were joined by our friend Ricky and Ian's brother in law and we proceeded to hang out, every now and then lending a bit of a hand but generally not adding much more value than company. It was good to see how they do stuff, particularly, with the sparging where the water volumes were all worked out in advance to get the right volume at the end instead of my haphazard keep adding water until I can't be bothered any more. We also got to sample some of a previous brew, which was very tasty. Hopefully the camaraderie will make the next brew spectacular.
I also had a few tries of my previous APA too. It was tasting nicely balanced having reached its stride about the middle of the month, unfortunately after that things went downhill. Every bottle I opened would start to froth up and slowly froth its way out for a long time making the bottle undrinkable. A bit of Internet research suggests it could be a number of things from overcarbonation, too much sediment or even an infection. Pretty disappointing. A suggested way to deal with this is to make sure the beer is very cold. It has been pretty darn hot for Wellington so that may be getting things going so I need to make sure I have the bottles in the fridge for at least a week to settle things down. I will try that and see how it works.
On a slightly different note I listen to a lot of podcasts about all sorts of stuff. This month I started listening to the Beer Diary Podcast by Phil Cook and George Langlands. Now it is pretty old, starting in 2011, but it is a really interesting time capsule of what the Wellington beer scene was like when it was first burgeoning. Looking back and seeing how things have grown and fledgling breweries are now major players is pretty cool. Definitely worth a listen.
Beers I have had this month include Behemoth In Ya Face, Epic No Agenda and the delightfully named Behemoth Celia Wade Brown Ale. Check out what I drink on Untappd.
