Saturday

Don't Call Me Pale Ale
6# LME
.75# Crystal 40L
.25# Honey Malt 25L
2 oz Goldings
Wyeast London Ale

Standard boil on the grains and extract, added 1 oz of the hops at 60 mins, .5 oz at 22 minutes, and .5 oz while the wort chilled.

I also made this:



















The candle holder, not the table or everything else. Now, if it would quit raining, I could make more candle holders and use them!

Revolutionary Red

A NW red ale...

6# Light LME
.5# Organic Caramunich II
.5# Caramel Munich
.25# Organic Roasted Barley
.25# Cara Red
.25# Flaked Red Wheat
1 oz Amarillo (60 min)
.5 oz Willamette (15 min)
.5 oz Cascade (5 min)
1 oz Cascade (dry hop in secondary)
Wyeast Irish Ale

OG - 1.61

Ah Yes, the '60s

Just started reading Nixonland on my Amazon-brand e-reader (Kindle). The book opens with some stirring scenes from LBJ as he goes about creating the Great Society. For a second there, you remember that there were politicians who really seemed to care about helping people, not just winning elections.

I was reminded of this while reading Bobo's latest. Mostly because of this:

The welfare policies of the 1960s gave people money without asking for work and personal responsibility in return, and these had to be replaced. The welfare reforms of the 1990s involved big and intrusive government, but they did the job because they were in line with American values, linking effort to reward.

And I, of course, starting thinking about how if linking effort to reward is America's #1 value, how come we always focus with the poor and not on the inheriting rich? Maybe we can take all their money and they can know the morality of working for a change.

Anyway, just as I was working myself up, I came across this sentence:

The geniuses flock to finance, not industry.

And I was reminded that no one can possibly take David Brooks seriously.

Perfectly Pedestrian Oatmeal Stout

8# LME
.75# GW Crystal
.5# British Chocolate
.33# Roasted Barley
.33# Black Malt
2 oz Willamette
.5 oz Cascade
Wyeast Irish Ale 1084

Steeped grains at 155-175°F for 30 minutes. Boiled wort for 20 minutes before adding .5 oz Willamette hops. Added the rest of the Willamette hops after 15 minutes. Boiled for 45 more minutes for a total of 80 minutes. Added the Cascade hops when I killed the boil and moved the wort to cool in an ice bath.

OG of 1.070 @ 60°F

Notes: Not happy with the preliminary color. It is definitely brown. I should have ignored the guy in the homebrew store and added more black malt. Only added .5 oz hops at 20 minute mark as an error. Thought I'd put half the package in, but obviously had not. Got wort to too low of a temp in the ice bath, now have to wait for it to come up before I pitch the yeast. Forgetting to mark the carboy before I brewed was a mistake, now I have no idea how many gallons I am brewing.

This is my first brew in about 10 years, so I am sure there are things I am missing. This is will be the first time I won't be putting my beer in a secondary. Plan on going 4 weeks in the primary and bottling. Whether or not one needs to use a secondary fermentor seems to be a matter of great controversy, but may lack of secondary compels me to side with the primary-only crowd.

Wish me luck. Will keep you posted.