Hello All! For all of you who don’t know me, I’m the unsung hero of the Campfire here…ok maybe not. Annnyhow, just thought that this was an interesting article on desserts using beers. So drink, read, and be merry! Throw in your own ideas, or if you’ve actually tasted any of these brew baked goodies let us know!
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/mar/25/food/la-fo-beerdesserts-20100325
Christmas is coming.
I recall a quote that inspired me throughout my adolescence. “You may run like Mays, but you hit like shit.” Lou Brock, Major League.
Mr. Lou Brock made it abruptly known to Willie Mays Hayes that just because he did one thing well did not make up for what he did not do so well. I appreciate the honesty used by Lou. I understand his reasoning and why he had to approach Willie the way he did. What I learned from this is that no matter how good you may think you are at something, if you are honest enough with yourself, you can always seek improvement.
I’m trying to redo the site a bit, make it easier to navigate. If things look screwy, be patient, I’m trying to figure all this stuff out. Thanks.
Today the Chocolate Raspberry Stout has moved into it’s new home, into a third carboy for tertiary. The primary purpose of this was to remove the beer from the raspberries and get it off whatever trub was in there. I took a hydrometer reading and also had a tasting. The beer was much better than when we moved it into secondary, the bitterness was way down. Also, the raspberries added a great sweetness, while also adding wonderfully mild yet noticeable raspberry flavor. The gravity reading wasn’t what we were hoping for, it only dropped to 1.020 from 1.021, but that’s OK, It should still be great.
Our brewing career began with a kit from Beer and Wine Hobby (kudos to them for being awesome with their service so far). It was an amber ale that came with all the equipment. It came out decent, we made some mistakes. In the end it tasted like beer. A tip for all newcomers to homebrewing: When using a plastic fermentation bucket, apply the airlock to the lid before placing the lid on the bucket. The grommet easily falls in your beer if you push too hard, then you have to have Bujer sanitize his arm and stick it in wort to fish it out.
Our second batch was using a Coopers IPA kit. The extract comes pre-hopped so all you have to do is boil. Not difficult at all. Here’s another tip: When using the IPA kit, don’t use 2 cans. Use 1 can of the IPA, 1 can light malt extract. 2 cans make for extremely bitter beer. After about 4 months we still have 1 bottle left, it might have mellowed out by now.
Our third batch was our own recipe for an India Pale Ale. We believe it came out fairly awesome, good balance between hops and malt. We were quite pleased with it, so we don’t have any tips.
The next batch was a Belgian Witbier. Great flavor, balance, too dark. Definitely the best one and most popular to date according to all of our friends. A tip: When using White Labs WLP400 yeast, keep the temperature between 75-85 degrees when fermenting. Our yeast went dormant in the basement because the temperature was 65-68 degrees. Took an extra week or two to finish fermenting.
Stick around for our current beer that was started yesterday…
Thank you for visiting the blog of the Campfire Brewery. We are made up of four friends; Greg, Clubby, Bujer, and Dave, who decided earlier this year to start making our own beer. Not quite sure why, but we did, and now we’re hooked. Right now we are still using extracts, but soon we will be venturing into all grain territory. Stay tuned for more posts on beers we are making, drinking, talking about, and other random crap.
