Brew years resolutions?

[fury_tea]

What have you got planned for the new year?

New techniques? Would you like to try out some new beer styles? Equipment? Brewing space upgrades? New ingredients you want to try?

Here's my list:
1. I got a new keg (2 more actually), a spunding valve and a floating diptube for Xmas so I'm going to try a pressure ferment and zero oxygen transfer in kegs.
2. Kettle souring
3. Harvesting a wild yeast
4. Using liquid yeast, saving yeasts and building starters, and finally putting together the stir plate I bought the bits for last year (if I can even find them)
5. Brewing some kombucha (maybe an alcoholic one and maybe using kombucha to sour a beer?)

Let's hear some of yours!

 

[lupinehorror]

1. a second PB.
that's about it. thrilling, i know.

 

[Tanglefoot]

Hope to start brewing partial mash and with a bit of experience on to full grain.
Realised I've already got a Baby Belling cooker with gas rings so looking to treat myself to a nice stainless steel pan.

Also mean to drink a little less so am toying with the idea of drinking only what I brew myself and cutting out the shop bought bottles and cans.
Of course first I must selflessly finish what I have left in the fridge !

 

[Leon103]

My only one is to try and not buy so much beer. This year I have made a conscious effort to support breweries and my local bottle shop. But that as meant not drinking as much of my own. I have a few brews lined up so need to drink my own to turnaround the kegs quicker.

 

[Obadiah Boondoggle]

What have you got planned for the new year?

New techniques? Would you like to try out some new beer styles? Equipment? Brewing space upgrades? New ingredients you want to try?

Here's my list:
1. I got a new keg (2 more actually), a spunding valve and a floating diptube for Xmas so I'm going to try a pressure ferment and zero oxygen transfer in kegs.
2. Kettle souring
3. Harvesting a wild yeast
4. Using liquid yeast, saving yeasts and building starters, and finally putting together the stir plate I bought the bits for last year (if I can even find them)
5. Brewing some kombucha (maybe an alcoholic one and maybe using kombucha to sour a beer?)

Let's hear some of yours!

Harvesting a wild yeast? Sounds interesting - how?

 

[lupinehorror]

 

[fury_tea]

Harvesting a wild yeast? Sounds interesting - how?

https://bootlegbiology.com/diy/capturing-yeast/
I saw it in this article: DIYeast: Capturing Yeast

 

[Clint]

Crack on with the Tribute clone. Make more bitter. Make a lager for the summer. Wheat beers. Wheat beer with fruit.
Kegs...I'm not friends with my plastic PB's..look into getting a kegerator sorted if only for just a couple of cornies.

 

[DavidHatton]

Brew stronger beers, would like to always have a wee heavy or a 7% dark ale on tap, McEwans champion or a bottled Adnams Broadside style.
Also brew a tripel.

 

[RichardM]

I have never brewed an Irish Red, Scottish anything or an imperial stout, so they are all on my list for this year.
Not new, but I made a Barley Wine a few years ago that was very popular so I want to do another one of them. If I do it soon it should be ready for next Christmas.

 

[dave_77]

I currently brew every 2 weeks and aim for 16l batches, seems like a good amount to share and drink so a keg becomes free. I like brewing Belgian Pale and American Amber so I thinking of brewing a 26l batch of these beers but then take 10l to ferment or hop differently. I ued Brett for the first time and I could use this to experiment more with Brett whilst keeping the kegs full of my favourites.

Also wanted to brew an Altbier- I have just ordered the ingredients so it will happen in the next few months.

 

[Michael Burnley]

1. Start to design my own recipes rather than doing clones or other people's recipes
2. Enter these on this forums competition
3. Start to get my head around various mash techniques such as 'decoction'
4. Understand water chemistry better, I feel I know the basics but I know there is more to learn about it
5. Settle on a few 'house regulars', not sure this will work because I'm definitely someone who messes with things!

Happy New Year everybody, stay safe in 2021

Things will get better

Mick

 

[Horners]

1. Clean up after myself on brewday, not a week later.

2. Brew a big stout.

3. Have one last tilt at a Belgian and if I don't like it draw a line under Belgians once and for all.

4. Perfect my Camden Pale clone. Less simcoe more citra on next iteration.

5. Make a lager starting with Ashbeck to see if this produces better results.

6. Finally bother to wander into the aquarium shop less than half a mile away and ask him if he sells RO water.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

I might buy a couple more corny kegs. At the moment I have six kegs and six taps so that means every time I keg a beer one of those taps is effectively sitting unused while the beer conditions. Having one or two more kegs will allow me to condition the beer “off-line”.

One thing I should do is organise my ingredients and my spares better. At the moment everything is just put in a few boxes so I have to rummage through everything in a box for whatever I want.

I do have a couple of jobs to finish on my brew-shed. The refit from this year is pretty complete but I left a couple of jobs in order to start brewing again. Those jobs are associated with cooling the brew-shed so weren’t needed in winter but will need to be in place by Spring.

I also need a little bit of self-discipline when it comes to record keeping. At the moment all my recipes are a few notes on my phone, that’s it. I effectively have no records and actually look back at my own entries on this forum when I want to refer back!

We’ll see how I get on but I may have to refer back to this post to remind me what I’d planned to do!

 

[fury_tea]

I also need a little bit of self-discipline when it comes to record keeping. At the moment all my recipes are a few notes on my phone, that’s it. I effectively have no records and actually look back at my own entries on this forum when I want to refer back!

Yes this is a good one. I pay for BeerSmith but I only really use it as a guide. I went to look at one of my porter recipes yesterday and I'd modified it into a stout recipe and saved over it without changing the name. Had to look through messages to a friend because I remembered I'd sent it to him!

 

[Cwrw666]

Going to attempt my first lager - Czech Pilsner.
Already got the soft water, yeast is on it's way. Just need to order the Saaz and the pilsner malt. Not too hard at the moment (or for the next few months) to find a room in the house somewhere around 12c!

 

[Pavalijo]

1. Get ahead of the game (brew a larger stock), be patient and leave to properly develop before drinking (my last 2 bottles of Razorback were fantastic. The first 38 were good but not great);
2. Resist the temptation to brew just the best of the kits I brewed in my first year back to brewing after 30 years (Festival NZ Pilsner and Razorback, MJ Pink Grapefruit and Pres Sierra APA) - there seem to be so many good kits out there;
3. Try different styles. My future son in law gave me a chocolate stout from all grain. Normally I would have turned up my nose but it was great.
4. Get into all grain. My kids bought me a day brewing course and I’m going with FSIL when safe - will start after that.
5. Continue to share my home brew with friends - for me that is the biggest joy of this hobby!

 

[chthon]

Actually, first clean up my dry yeasts. I still have too many sachets. And I have found out that harvesting and using yeast from beers I like (actually only the Trappists Westmalle, Rochefort and Chimay, and St.-Bernardus) is not that difficult. So I will probably in the future use many more of these in my brews, and only use dry yeast for weizen, English beers, bock and saison.

Working further on my 4 hour brew day: make sure that everything is set up in the days before, mash, filter, boil, cool and rest in the boiling kettle and do the first part of my fermentation in the boiling kettle. I have already tested this for quite a few brews and my beers are still tasty after a year.

 

[Appleyard]

Nothing to do with brewing (which resolution is: "brew more!"), but plenty to do with drinking.

"Appleyard, don't drink and post".

 

[RockTKaz]

• Get brew timings right so I don’t have weeks without any beer!
• build a draft system (keezer or kegerator not sure yet)
• enter some forum comps for feedback