My first homebrew batch, Code: Frankenstein

My in-laws bought me a Maestro Homebrew Beer Equipment Kit for Christmas, and the ingredients for my first homebrew batch.  I've promised a write up of this, and it's long overdue, so here goes!

First, here's the equipment I used:














 Muntons Malt Extract, Dry, Amber , 3-Pound Bags (Pack of 2)

6-quart stockpot for the boil

B-Brite cleanser


Though the link shows two 3-lb bags of dry malt extract, I only used one 2-lb bag.

First off, all the books I've read are very clear on the importance of cleanliness - which makes total sense.  If you're going to be producing what is ultimately a living product, and letting it sit at room temperature in your home for several weeks before drinking it, you certainly don't want it infected by any bacterial nasties.  Everything that touches the brew (particularly after the boil) has to be sanitised - the cleanser B-Brite was included with my kit, and it seemed to work well.  However, it turns out this wasn't actually a sanitiser, and in order to properly sterilise your equipment you need to use a product like Iodophor Sanitizer for Brewing or Wine Making or Star-San.  This wasn't included with my homebrewing kit. 

I started off with a boil - mixing about a gallon of water with the can of liquid malt extract and the dried extract.  When you first add the ingredients, the mixture kind of foams up violently and you have to keep moving it away from the heat until it calms down.  Eventually it settled into a steady boil, and looked like this.

At this point my tiny kitchen smelled absolutely amazing - wort has this incredible and unique aroma which is really hard to describe.  It's a bit like oatmeal, or a rich fruitcake - makes sense when you consider it's made of basically the same stuff.

After boiling the wort for about 45 minutes, it was ready to go.  I'd added some cold water to my fermenting bucket, so I poured the mixture on top and topped up to the 5-gallon mark.  Then I sprinkled the yeast (which came with the liquid extract), let it sit on top of the bucket for 10 minutes, then stirred it in and firmly sealed the lid, adding an airlock.

About 2 weeks later I bottled it into 6 growlers and 12 500ml flipper bottles, mixing in the corn sugar to carbonate it, then very, very patiently waited until it had conditioned and aged perfectly...well, alright, maybe I had a couple of glasses before it was ready - patience may be a virtue but it's not a skill I've yet mastered.

Sadly I don't have pictures of the final product, but I can describe it as a dark, almost black ale with a medium body - it wasn't a stout by any means.  ABV was approximately 5-6% - I forgot to take an OG reading so I couldn't tell for certain.  It wasn't aggressively bitter, but had a pleasant caramel hint in the aftertaste which was extremely satisfying.  As it was my first experience of bottle-conditioning, I under-filled several bottles which resulted in insufficient carbonation and zero head, but the growlers turned out better as they had a 'fill to here' line that was pretty foolproof.  Overall, I was impressed by my handiwork - it goes to show that even beginners can make fine homebrews that compare very favourably with commercially prepared beers and ales.

Homebrew batch # 2 - a Belgian ale named The Muscles from Brussels - is due for bottling tomorrow and I'll have a write-up in a few weeks, once it's ready to drink.

The ugly side of the beer world

I'm a little late on this one, but I just read about this story.  Essentially, Anthony Bourdain claimed on his Twitter account that Big Beer (I'm guessing he means the massive-swill-peddling-conglomerate-excuse-for-a-beer-company Anheuser-Busch, but I might be wrong) effectively shut down the promising Discovery Channel series Brew Masters.  If this has even an ounce of truth to it, it's shameful.  In his press statement, Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head is staying positive about the whole affair but he nonetheless said '...now more than ever – support your small, truly-indie breweries!' 

For an interesting take on the battle between Big Beer and the craft breweries, take a look at Anat Baron's documentary Beer Wars.  Among others, it features Calagione and Dogfish Head, contrasting their business and brewing methods with the 'macrobrewers' like Anheuser-Busch.  Miller and Coors come off surprisingly easy in the documentary, but it's still a fascinating look into the political aspects of the resurgence of craft brewing.

Hogan's Hideaway Custom Brews

I like Rochester in the spring.  The evenings are lighter, the weather is just starting to turn, and all the greenery is slowly returning to the city.  Walking around in this weather, you feel like a weight's been lifted off of you and you can finally enjoy the natural beauty around you without fear of freezing to death.  The local farms are gearing up to sell their wares (I recommend signing up for a local CSA if you want to support Upstate NY's farming industry and get delicious fruit and veg throughout the summer), and the world feels like it's coming alive again.  It's wonderful. 

As the weather was so nice out this afternoon, my wife and I decided to go to Hogan's Hideaway on Park Avenue for a quick drink and a snack.  It's a decent place (though I have to say that the food portions were incredibly meagre for the prices we paid - around $8 for a small plate of nachos, and $2.50 for a cup of fries). The quality was decent enough, but I felt we'd have been better off making our own snacks for cheaper. Maybe I'm being unfair to the place - it's really popular, so we should probably go back for a full meal.

Anyway, this isn't about the food.  It's about the beers they serve - specifically the two custom beers brewed locally by Custom Brewcrafters, who've been featured on this blog before.  There are two brews currently on the menu - Hogan's Pale Ale and Park Avenue Ale.

Let's start with the Pale Ale. It was a light golden colour, with very little head.  Lightly carbonated, with a medium body and mouthfeel.  Wonderful floral hops in the aroma - reminded me of a less aggressive version of CB's Caged Alpha Monkey, which I briefly mentioned in an earlier entry.  A definite hoppy taste, with some malty flavour behind it, but not overpowering.  A good choice for a springtime beer - I can imagine myself sitting on the terrace at Hogan's on a warmer evening enjoying a few of these.  I'm going to give it a 4 out of 5.

The Park Avenue Ale is a dark ale, again with little head.  It had plenty of body, but it was nowhere near a stout.  You could clearly taste the roasted barley in this brew - the flavour profile emphasised the malt and toast over hoppy character, and was very pleasant (if dark ale's your thing).  This was definitely more of a winter brew.  It actually reminded me a lot of my first batch of homebrew, about which I'll soon be publishing my writeup.

In case you're interested, Homebrew Batch #2 is a Belgian Ale currently weighing in at around 7% ABV.  I'm really excited about this one...

Upstate Brewing Co

It's really wonderful to live in Upstate New York.  I've mentioned before things like the weather, the diverse range of activities and culture which are available around here...what's also marvellous to see is a burgeoning microbrewing industry.  In the past few years, Upstate NY has brought us Custom Brewcrafters, Rohrbachs, Southern Tier, Horseheads Brewing, Ellicottville Brewing, Three Heads Brewing (can't find a website, but they're on Facebook), and countless others.  With the wide availability of hops and grain, it's no wonder that Upstate is becoming a mecca for craft beer.

One particularly exciting prospect is Upstate Brewing Company, a new venture based around the Horseheads area.  They're very, very new, and if you follow them on Facebook you'll see all that's involved in starting up a brewery.  Watching a new small business come together is really fun to watch, and I'll be keeping a close eye on these guys as they start a new venture in this lovely part of the world. 

Coming up: some thoughts on my first homebrew batch and a writeup of my second batch!

And like a revived corpse...

..the Upstate Brews guy emerges from the blogosphere's graveyard.


Over the past month or so, I've tried several Upstate wonders, including:

• CB's Jack (a CB Scotch Ale that's been aged in bourbon barrels, giving it a lovely, smokey, whisky-like flavour)

• War of 1812 Amber Ale (brewed by Sacketts Harbor Brewing Company; I've only been able to find this at Scotch & Sirloin and Beers of the World but it's well worth the effort to find it).

• Ithaca Beer Company's CascaZilla (lots of fresh hops in a light ale which reminds me of the springtime)

• CB's Christmas Ale (served way too cold at a sports bar; given the time to acclimatise, it was actually pretty nice, kind of like a Christmassy malt loaf in a glass)

• CB's Caged Alpha Monkey (CB's brand new IPA - I know I've gone on about hating hoppy IPAs on this blog, but the hops were so fresh-tasting in this one that it may have changed my mind.  I think they must have gone light on bittering hops and heavier on the finishing hops).

I've also been busily working on my first batch of homebrew, thanks to my wonderful in-laws (who bought me all the equipment as a Christmas present).  It'll be the subject of my next post, so for now all I'll reveal is that it's a dark ale named Code: Frankenstein.  Appropriate, don't you think, given my recent reanimation?

Custom Brewcrafters Canandaigua Lake Ale

I think I've said before that I appreciate ales which don't rely overmuch on extreme, bitter hopping.  There's a certain class of beer drinker, particularly in this country it seems, that believes that complex, highly hoppy beer is the only craft beer worth drinking.  Any other kind of craft beer is a bit of an anomaly to these people - they don't know what to make of it.  A sweet, malty brew with plenty of fruity or citrus notes?  Well, it's not Bud Light but it's not IPA either, and it's suspiciously easy to drink, so it can't be Good Beer.  Can it?

Needless to say, I don't subscribe to this view.  I have the utmost respect for brewers who make IPA, it's a craft which I hope one day I'll be able to emulate in my own small way with my homebrew kit (for which I'm saving my pennies).  However, as I've said before, some of my favourite ales are less bitter, and thus open themselves up to a whole range of other flavour profiles. 

CB's Canandaigua Lake Ale really did the trick for me.  The hops are evident, but used in such a way that the bitterness isn't overpowering; a lemon-citrus flavour pervades it, giving it a fresh springtime quality; and the overall feel was very much like an English Real Ale, which I really enjoyed. 

Aroma - This beer smells of springtime.  Citrus notes blend with a hop aroma which is fresh and not at all bitter. 


Appearance - Light golden colour, it poured with a modest head which dissipated fairly quickly.  This doesn't bother me too much as it's ale, not lager.  I did notice a significant amount of sediment floating around - as I've mentioned a few times before, this is due to bottle-conditioning and isn't anything to worry about.  It's just evidence of the freshness of the beer and a pleasant reminder that you're drinking a hand-made brew.  I'll happily admit to having a nostalgic moment on seeing the sediment; it's been a while since I saw a beer that could so easily be English Real Ale.  I mean that as a real compliment.


Taste - This really is a springtime beer!  I love how the hops are evident, but their character is much less bitter than with most American craft beer.  This is fruity, light, with a great citrus bite as it goes down.  It reminds me somewhat of the Witbiers the Belgians are known for.  Obviously it's rather out of season (as I write, there are at least 6 inches of snow outside, and more is probably on its way), but it can be nice to drink this kind of brew in the cold as a reminder that the thaw will come eventually. 


Mouthfeel - Very little carbonation is evident.  Although you see the sediment in your glass, you really don't feel it while you're drinking.  It's not entirely smooth, though - it does effervesce slightly in your mouth with a delightful lemony quality.


Finish - Definite citrus taste, with a lingering, slight bitterness which is just subtle enough to be pleasant.


I think this beer deserves a 4.5 out of 5 - clever and subtle use of hops created a nice, fresh ale which I'll be drinking plenty more of in the springtime.  And I really appreciated seeing the bottle-conditioning in evidence again.

Custom Brewcrafters English Pale Ale (EPA)

Fresh from my first foray into the world of Custom Brewcrafters beers, I decided to crack open the second variety in my sampler pack.  This one declares itself an 'English-style Pale Ale' - given the fact that I'm a limey myself, I had very high expectations for this one.

As I've explained elsewhere, British ale is a different beast from American beer - it's not carbonated to the same extent, and it has to be pumped from the cask - in fact, if you go to an authentic British pub you'll see the bartender literally 'pulling pints' into your glass.  Ale also tends to be slightly sweet or malty, and in my favourite examples the hops are less prominent, giving way to a whole variety of fruity, spicy or otherwise unusual additions. 

Aroma - Fruit and hop aromas are prominent, but not overpowering like an IPA.  

Appearance - This ale has a deep amber colour, and a cloudy appearance, similarly to my previous encounter with Custom Brewcrafters.  I'm pretty sure now that this is due to bottle-conditioning, a process whereby a little yeast is retained in the bottled product to essentially keep the beer fresh.  As for the head, it was very modest, but it was there - slightly more present than it was with the Scotch Ale.

Taste - A delightful malty hit mellows into a mild hoppy bitterness.  There isn't as much 'oomph' in this beer but that's not a bad thing - a milder or more subtle taste makes for a great session beer, in my view.  These sorts of beers are also usually a better accompaniment to most food, as they won't crowd your palate when you're enjoying that amazing marinara sauce, or swordfish steak, or sushi, or...you get my point. 

Mouthfeel - Like CB's Scotch Ale, very little carbonation is evident.  This is a smooth English-style ale, true to its name. 

Finish - A bitterness lingers, reminding you of the malt in the aroma.  It's not a strong, toasted-barley taste, but a more pleasant, subtle flavour.  Very enjoyable.

I'll give this a 4 out of 5 - it's a very good, solid session beer, which satisfied this Englishman's high standards.  Like I said, I prefer less hopped English ales, which did affect my judgement a bit, but still - I can thoroughly recommend it.