Hop Juice

[Beer-lord]

To make the next brew day better, don't wash your beer covered clothes! Wear them the next brew day and you'll brew an award winning beer.

You wear glasses too? As for pollen, I have a beastly sinus infection that I'm taking antibiotics for but I can't swear it's a true sinus infection but it started when the pollen season started. The better the weather, the worse my nose. Try some local honey. I'm told that helps with nasal congestion.

[Inkleg]

We have bubbles in the blow off jar and the fridge smells of hops.

[BlackDuck]

Awesome. Don't you just love the aroma when it first starts to ferment?

[Kealia]

We have bubbles in the blow off jar and the fridge smells of hops.

'nuff said.

[BlackDuck]

I dropped the rest of the dry hops in today. So that will make the first round of dry hop in the fermentor for 7 days and the second round in for 3 days before the cold crash. The first thing I noticed is that it is starting to clear quite nicely. Compare the two pictures and you can read the numbers on the hydrometer much easier this time. The bitterness is starting to come through more also. It was much more pronounced on the back of the tongue this time. It was hard to tell what the flavor was at this point though...not sure if it's piney dank or more citrusy, but both are there. The gravity was 1.012, which was the same as last time...so the bubbling on the airlock I mentioned last time must have been due to the Co2 being released from the bottom junk. (Thanks Jeff for pointing that out).

Anyway...hops are in, lid back on, and here's the hydro pic!!

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[Beer-lord]

I'm thinking I won't do a secondary with thus even with all the hoppage. I wasn't to see how this SS brew bucket does with all these hops in the clinical bottom. Plus, I don't know if my carbon can hold the amount of beer I gave which I think was a bit more than 6 gallons.
I'll have to let it clear in the keg.

[BlackDuck]

Mine is not going to secondary either, but I do cold crash though. I know that's difficult for you, but by the clarity of mine right now, and if yours is close to mine, the clear in keg process should work just fine.

[Inkleg]

Krausen has reached the lid, gone in the blow off tube and starting to change the color of Star-San in the jar.

More than likely I'll dry hop mine in the keg. I just retrieved my SS dry hopper from the Pliny keg. Yes sorry to say the Pliny keg is no more, but I had to make room for the Juice coming up. Pliny is not really gone. I picked up one of these to try. So I have 2 liters left. It's not cheap, but it works great.
If you just wanted to take some kegged beer with you somewhere this is the way to go.

[Beer-lord]

How do you know how much CO2 to add to the bottle?
I kicked my Pliny this week as well. I'm trying to catch up on some bottle beer I've been sent this weekend while my kegs carb and condition a bit more. I need to make room in the fridge for more beer. Ahhh, the tough, spur of the moment decisions we have to make.

[Inkleg]

You read the back of the packaging the do hickey came with. It says to fill a soda bottle with carbonated beverage of choice, squeeze to air out with the cap on and inject CO2. I hit mine with a quick blast of about 20psi. And I filled it from the bottom up with a bottling wand. I'll go snap a picture of it and post it in the Pliny thread in a few.

Here's something to pass the time with while I'm gone. Managed to score 2 bottles of Founders KBS the other day. It's good to know people in the biz.

[Beer-lord]

Braggart!
Founders has shown up here this month, just never got around to it. Same with Go To. There are just too many beers to try and not enough time.

[Brewbirds]

Okay well I read these posts backwards so I guess no Pliny for me.

Inkleg I hope you will post on how that thing works as JoeC gave me a tap a draft with three liter bottles and I haven't tried to use it yet.

[Beer-lord]

Hey, they stole our name! http://www.leftcoastbrewing.com/beers/hop-juice
Our recipe is better anyway.

[BlackDuck]

Uh-oh...don't let the trademark police in here!!!

[Beer-lord]

Did the first dry hop tonite, in my 6 gallons it totals about just a bit more than 4 1/4 oz of hops. And, while not as clear as Chris', it's going to be ok and it's at at 1.012 and right where Beersmith says it should be.
In 3 more days, I'm going to add 3 more oz of hops. I'm hitting it with 2 oz of cascades and 1 oz of Belma (cuz I need to get rid of some hops).
I know Jeff said he was going to keg hop his so we'll see some varying dry hopped style variations which is a beer-dream for me.
The taste was out of this world good. Almost a slight, pepper taste that I am sure is the Apollo which I've read about. In my previous use of Apollo, only a small amount was used and I can definitely contribute the taste to it. Can't wait for this to finish. It was somewhat dry (corn sugar???) and if it comes out like I think, I'll have to find someplace to compete with it.

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