A Very Beery Christmas

It was a very Beery Christmas at our house. I received a lot of beer- and brewing-related gifts: a gift card to Midwest Homebrew, enough to pay for the ingredients for the next iteration of my Gimp Biscuit ESB; carboy covers complete with “Shh.  I am Fermenting” embroidery; carboy draining and storage racks; a membership in the American Homebrewers Association, complete with a subscription to their monthly magazine Zymergy; a Christmas Story pint glass; a rare Belgian made with “wild” yeast.  Thanks to wife Olivia, mother Marsha, brother Matt, and inlaws Don and Carolyn for supporting my addiction, er, hobby. Continue reading

Mash Paddle

The Oatmeal Stout brew also gave me a chance to try out my new maple mash paddle, which was a birthday gift from my in-laws (thanks again to Don and Carolyn).  It worked much better than the long-handled plastic spoon I’ve been using, with less stress on my wrist and much less incidents of dough-balls and hot spots.  I highly recommend!

Equipment and Supplies Order

Did a little Black Friday shopping from home (er, in-laws home).  Finally pulled together an order for two brews and a bunch of equipment I’ve been coveting.  Here’s my shopping list:

  • ingredients for my Ghostly Juror Oatmeal Stout recipe
  • ingredients for my IPA, with tentative name of Hoppy Gnome
  • a Barley Crusher grain mill
  • tubing and hardware for racking and aerating chilled wort out of the kettle into the fermenter
  • a digital thermometer (finally!)