I just got done bottling yet another batch of beer. This is my second batch in two weeks. Luckily I will have a lull in my brewing and bottling after my orange beer gets bottled in a couple weeks. It is also only 2.5 gallons of beer instead of 5. I would really like to keg but I think I have finally gotten my bottling day process down to where it takes as little time as possible.

Today I sanitized in my dishwasher for the first time. I ran 50 bottles on the sanitize cycle with heated dry. I used no soap and I have vinegar in my jet dry dispenser. I also have been bottling right at the bucket with my bottling wand attached to the spigot with just a couple inches of tubing. I really like this because it less moving of the bottles. I just put all the bottles in the dishwasher, and once the cycles done I put them on the counter where I fill, cap, clean, label, and box the batch. I used to sanitize at the table and move them to the floor and fill with a wand on a six foot hose. I would fill and cap on the floor then move the batch to the table to label and box up.

Here is a new product I saw at my Homebrew shop. They are called Brew Balls.

Its basically balls with different density rates and they fall into the brew as the alcohol goes up. It would eliminate the need for taking constant hydro readings and wasting beer. I would think you would still want to do OG and FG readings. By the way these were 25 bucks at my LHBS. A little steep for me. It's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist.

No hop beer in the fermenter.

I brewed my no hop beer yesterday. My recipe for a 2.5 gallon batch was just 1/4 lb of carapils steeped for twenty minutes in about a gallon of water, a 3.3 lb can of Breiss pilsen light LME, and a pack of Safale US-05 yeast. I will add the zest com an orange or two in about a week. I had krausen this morning so things are off to a good start. My OG was 1.045.

I just finished bottling my Caribou Slobber. It is an American Brown Ale. I had a heck of a time with this bottling for some reason. As I was sanitizing bottles I found one that was cleaned and put away, but wasn't really clean. It had a nasty ring of mold at the bottom of the bottle. Apparently I drank the beer and then didn't rinse it and put it away. YUCK! I tossed the bottle as I seem to have more than enough lately.

I also tried a new way of filling the bottles. I generally I attach a 4 foot hose the spigot and put a bottling wand on the other end. Today I cut about 2 inches of tubing and attached that to the spigot and the bottling wand to the other end. So I could stand at the bucket and fill basically right from the spigot. It took me a few minutes to get the tubing right and everything to fit. But in the end I really like being right at the bucket. It made getting the last bit of beer out of the bucket easier, I just had to tip the bucket forward and fill the bottle.

The next issue I had was the FG of the beer. I had an original gravity of 1.050 and a what I thought was a high FG of 1.020. I was going for somewhere under 1.015, or at least that is what I am used to. But according the Danstar website the Windsor yeast produces a high final gravity. So I was at least more comfortable with the fact that this beer full fermented. But the downside is that I only have 3.91% ABV.

The taste test was fantastic. It also had a great color. I can hardly wait to try a bottle or two of this in a week or 10 days.

Removing labels from used bottles

I save myself a lot of money by using used bottles for my home brew. I either buy a 12 pk of bottles that comes with free beer inside or collect bottles from friends to clean and use these to bottle my home brew. If I buy commercial beer for bottles I make sure they are pop tops and not twist offs. I tend to lean toward Sam Adams and Sierra Nevada, because the beer is good, the bottles are pop offs and the labels seem to fall off. Here is what you will need to successfully remove labels from bottles.

Bucket-5gallon is about the perfect size. I got mine from Lowes for about 3 bucks. You do this in the sink as well or any other vessel that will hold water.

Oxy Clean Free- "Free" is important so you don't get any dyes or scents.

Vegetable peeler-You may want to use an old one or buy your wife a new one. This is pretty hard on the peeler.

Empty bottles with labels attached

My process begins with getting the water as hot as possible and start filling my bucket. When you get the bucket filled a bit throw about 2 tablespoon of Oxyclean Free in the bucket and mix or swirl the water to dissolve the powder.

Fill the bucket with about 4 gallons or so of hot water. Then throw your bottles in. It may be easier to fill the bucket with the bottles if the bottles are filled with water first so they will sink. Then just wait for 15-30 minutes. The time isn't exact but don't let them sit too long, I have found that if you use to much Oxyclean Free or allow the bottles to sit for to long then they will get a gritty film on the outside that is hard to remove. If you do get the grit then soak the bottles in Starsan.

After they sit for what you determine to be long enough for the labels to be soaked through then you can start removing them. You may find that some of the labels have floated off the bottle. This is particularly true with Sam Adams and Sierra Nevada bottles. Reach in a grab a bottle and scrap the label and glue from the bottle with the vegetable peeler, dunk back into the Oxyclean to remove the scrapings. Then make sure you rinse your bottles with fresh water after the labels are removed. Now your ready to either sanitize and bottle or let them dry and store until your ready to use them.

I thought I would just start this blog with some rambling about what Ive got going on in the brewing world. The beer I have ready to drink is getting fewer and fewer everyday, and soon I will be out. I have a 5 gallon batch of Phat Tyre in the bottles that will be ready to drink in about 4 weeks. The picture above is the very first pour of that beer. To tell the truth I have had three from that batch already but they really aren't ready to drink but they are darn tasty at less than two weeks in the bottle.

In the fermenter I have 5 gallons of Caribou Slobber which is an American Brown Ale. I am really looking forward to this because I love brown ales and I love the american versions of most styles, as they are generally hoppier than the standard version of the style. I also have a 5 gallon batch of Sierra Madre Pale Ale in the fermenter, this is an American Pale Ale. This style is less hoppy than I normally like but I was looking for something different that would also be a good summer beer.

Coming up I would like to do a hopless beer. Again I was looking for something different and this definantly will be. I just hope that I can stick to my guns and do this completely hop free. Its really tough for me to think this will turn out good without the hops but I actually got the idea for this from someone else and tweaked it a little by adding the carapils. The original brewer says it pretty tasty and you get some of the bitterness from the orange peel.

Ingredients

Amount	Item	Type	% or IBU
3.30 lb	LME Pilsen Light (Briess) (2.3 SRM)	Extract	92.96 %
0.25 lb	Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM)	Grain	7.04 %
1.00 items	Orange Zest (Secondary 1.0 weeks)	Misc
1 Pkgs	SafAle American Ale (DCL Yeast #S-05)	Yeast-Ale