The Little Kingdom

OK so the last few months the updates have been few and far between. Well, that's because not too much has actually been going on! With school bearing down, and my recent pseudo-addiction (OK, full fledged...) to beer trading, I've been spending more of my cold hard cash on this. But, in my eyes, the more beer you try and sample as a home brewer, the more you learn and the more ideas you have to add to your next batch. One of the ideas for an upcoming batch would have to be the re-make of Man, but this time a 4gallon batch, with a 1gallon mix of God into the carboy, with a host of champagne, High Gravity, Scottish and Brett yeasts contributing to the final mess. It's going to be funky. And quite possibly one of those most interesting, complex beers you'll ever have. So once this all gets up and running, I'm sure we'll have a host of new batches to report on. The Bleeding Hop Bucket has yet to be bottled, but I am certain the time is almost near! Actually, it's been nearly 3 months since brewing, with around 45 days of dry-hopping taking place. Which means, yep, it's ready. We'll bottle that within a week.

Keep checkin back and the updates will roll, I promise!

The Reprise

So looking through some old posts, I came across my "Top 5 beers" and got a slight chuckle. That is, not because the choices aren't great ones, it's simply interesting to see where I've gone as far as beer in the last number of months. For instance, last year around this time I was excited to hear about the new, upcoming "Miller Chill," gearing up to hit shelves, and was ecstatic to find it on vacation last June. Although I'll probably pick up a few bottles to have on the beach again this year, my taste buds have been on a roller coaster ride ever since my first Chill moment.

In the spirit of great beer, here is a newly fashioned list of one mans palatial favorites:
And although I have them numbered, that really means nothing. A good beer in the right context can potentially beat out any of these for top-runners.

5. Minneapolis Town Hall Brewery Masala Mama IPA: Had the pleasure of tasting this delicious IPA at both Dark Lord Day as well as the Cincinnati BA get together at the Catskellar a week and change ago. Just a great overall brew, with nice spice and citrus notes, great session brew to enjoy.


4. Founders Kentucky Breakfast Stout: What can I say? It took WAY too damn long to get my hands on this brew. WAY too long. But it was worth the wait - thanks to Adam and a fellow BA trader, I got my hands on 5 of these. I'm a sucker for a Coffee Stout/Porter these days. This one is top notch; each wave is complementary to each other and is incredibly drinkable for the 10% ABV.

3. Brasserie Dieu Du Ciel Peche Mortel: Another lucky pickup. These came around in Cincinnati just this past week, and with a little heads up, I was able to get more than my fair share. I enjoyed my first whole Peche Mortel after having just a sip at Dark Lord Day this past Thursday while watching Lost. As I noted then, this brew seems like it may have some amazing cellaring power. Rich coffee, toffee, chocolate and sour notes over what could be considered a bed of Motor Oil. Pick this up if you see it out. Now.


2. Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron: Incredibly complex and fulfilling, the Palo Santo Marron was my #1 until last night (see below...). Another thick pourer, the PSM delivers waves of rich, spicy chocolate, vanilla, palo santo wood, and alcohol. A sipper at 12%, and well worth the $15/4pk price tag. It's got a bite though, and should age incredibly well... I'll be saving quite a number of these to try in a few years.

1. Midnight Sun Imperial Chocolate Pumpkin Porter: Thanks to our pal Frank in Anchorage, I was able to get a couple of these (have yet to try the Oak Aged version...) sent 4000 miles onto my porch. Shared this with Emma, Tim and Jenny, and each taster found this to be a fantastic beer. Incredibly well-balanced, full of rich rich chocolate, with a great complementary pumpkin "tart" that finishes off the end of the taste. I can't wait to drink the next one, and really wish these came around the Cincinnati region more. Top Notch brew. If you see this, get it. No matter what level of beer drinker you are, there is no way you will be dissapointed in this one. And if you are, for some reason... I'll finish that glass for you ;)


This list is pretty reflective of my current appetite, but with summer around the corner, I am on a hunt to track down more and more IPA's and Belgians. It will be interesting to revisit this category in a few months and see how my tastes have changed, or "matured"


Honorable mentions go to: Three Floyds Alpha King Pale Ale, Stone IPA, DaveDave Spiced Chai Milk Stout, Fullers Vintage 2006, Dark Horse Double Crooked Tree IPA, and Christian Moerlein OTR. I guess I am getting back into those IPA's after all....

On The Map!

After a few exhausting last few days, we have recovered (almost...) from Dark Lord Day (amazing), and just received a BA beermail from Warren, a fellow BA we met and shared a few homebrews with at DLD, who told us that the Brickstone Brewery in Bourbonaise, IL is interested in brewing some DaveDave! I don't really know what this entails, but big congrats to Batch 11, which is apparently the *chosen* brew. Once I can dig up the recipe and hop-schedule, hopefully they'll go through with it and we'll have our very first professionally brewed DaveDave on the map! We'll keep everyone posted as to the status of this... very cool stuff indeed!

In case you were wondering...

...there is indeed a wiki for brewers. tatafornow...

www.brewwiki.com

Spiced Chai Milk Stout

The official tasting has yet to take place, but a few bottles have been opened in the last few weeks and the response is pretty outstanding - this is a hell of a brew. in the earlier tests, the lactose was nigh unrecognizable and i was begining to wonder if this thing would actually come out like a milk stout at all. however, as the carbonation began to bubble, the head showed just what this milk stout is all about. I have honestly never had a creamier, thicker head in my life on a beer. This is a definite re-make batch for sure.

hell yeah baby, the davedave is back.

Our Ancestors Were Carazyyyy

Hit this link: Ancient Fermented Chocolate Drink.

So apparently some old timers (very old...) were making some fermented drink using the pulp from the root of the cacao plant quite some time ago. Ahead of the curve, huh?

So then with all the talk of brewing some spring ales, perhaps there is a way to create a full, rich, earthy (and i do stress the earthy) chocolate spring/summer brew? I'll do some research, but in memory of those pioneers before us, I'd like to go completely sans-hop and use some regional MesoAmerican plants/roots as bittering units. Could be interesting...

Also: What about the possibility of fermenting in a large pottery jar? Or, boiling broken pieces of an authentic clay pot and dropping them in the primary for that extra authentic hit of style... Juices flowing... ;)

Any thoughts?

Samuel Adams Recall

Just got this message in the ol'd email:

"As a loyal supporter and fan of our beer, we wanted to get in touch with you about an announcement that we made yesterday. We have announced a cautious, voluntary product recall of some bottles of Samuel Adams. While there is no problem with our beer, we believe a small proportion of bottles from our outside glass supplier could contain some small bits of glass.

The bottles we've identified as being possibly affected are from one glass plant of the five that we get our bottles from. The issue affects less than 25% of our bottled beer and of that amount, we believe far less than 1% of the bottles we're recalling are actually affected. We have no reports of any injury from our drinkers related to this issue. But because the safety of our drinkers is of paramount concern to us, we are being cautious and issuing the recall for all bottles from this glass plant.

But not to worry, this doesn't mean that you have to stop drinking Samuel Adams! All draft beer is perfectly fine and most of our bottled beer is not in these possibly affected bottles. It's easy to spot the bottles we're recalling: they are all embossed to say "N35" at the base of the bottle below the label (see photo on web site). We are working with our wholesalers and retailers to ensure that the affected bottles are removed from stores quickly.

We wanted to be sure that our loyal Sam fans are aware of the problem and know that we are doing everything we can to address this situation quickly. We are disappointed that because of these bottles supplied to us, we didn't live up to your expectations as a loyal Sam Adams drinker. We believe that we are taking all the right steps to ensure that the bottled Samuel Adams beer out there meets our quality standards and your expectations. If you have any questions about the recall, we created a special web site and a toll-free number 1-888-674-5159 to answer your questions.

As always, we appreciate your support.

Cheers,
Andrew & Bert"


You know what I say? Man Up and drink your damn beer. The glass will probably make you stronger. Wuss.

Calories Per Beer, Lager's List

I find it some kind of funny when I look at the websites that the DaveDave visitors are referred from (hit the Counter Statistics at the bottom right of the mini-buzz column). The two that we get the most are, "Lagers List," which takes you here or, "Calories Per Beer," which takes you here. Click on those. Anything interesting? Well, the Lagers List is actually a pretty decent post... It points you in the direction of Beer Advocate and gives you pretty much all of the necessary list of lagers around the US - not bad overall.

But the Calories Per Beer one, is quite comical. Especially when you consider that we claim to have made a brew with 859 calories per beer (Beer Tools software said so...), and I'm 100% sure that folks just want to know how many calories is in their beer. Not their DaveDave (although they have been flying off the shelf lately), but just their regular ol' drinkin beer. Do you want my opinion? Don't worry about the calories, jerkwads. It's beer. Enjoy it or go home.

Also - funny that our Bells 8000 Review was at one point listed higher on the Google search than the link to the actual Bells 8000 website on the official Bells Brewery website as well as on top of Beer Advocates link. Weird. I'm sure it's not like that now, but odd that that would happen anyhow.

Peace ya'll - gone skiing for a long weekend. Catch you back here on Sunday.

The Bleeding Hop Bucket Will Probably Kill You

I'm one big stupid idiot. Just completely irresponsible in every way possible.

I moved the Bleeding Hop Bucket to secondary today, and pitched a WYeast 1084 Irish Ale I had chilling out, just for the hell of it (OK, not really for the hell of it...), and dry hopped with 11 oz of mixed leaf hops that have been hanging out in the fridge for a while.

So here's the deal. This beer has FORTY-FIVE OUNCES of hops in it. That's it. I'm going to OD on hops. Who's with me??

I am officially making a new qualification for brews; that being, the Triple IPA. Why the hell not? Sure, we could go with Imperial, but nah.

Fuck it, dude, let's go for the Triple.


(Pics up soon)

Guinness Stout Brownies

Our friend Jeff at Wort's Going On Here just added a post about Guinness cupcakes, and I thought I would share with you a Guinness-based desert that I recently had the pleasure of making and of course, enjoying:

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 6 tablespoons unsalted room temperature butter, cut into cubes
• 8 ounces dark bittersweet chocolate, chopped
• 3/4 cup white chocolate chips
• 4 large eggs, at room temperature
• 1 cup superfine or granulated sugar
• 1-1/4 cups (10 ounces) Guinness Extra Stout beer (see Note below) - I used a DaveDave Chocolate Raspberry Porter instead
  
• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1/8 cup (about) confectioners' sugar for dusting

PREPARATION:

- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line a 9 x 13-inch baking pan with nonstick foil.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, and salt until evenly combined. Set aside.
- Melt butter, bittersweet chocolate, and white chocolate chips in a double-boiler over very low heat, stirring constantly until melted. Remove from heat.
- In a large mixing bowl, beat eggs and sugar on high speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add melted chocolate mixture, beating until combined.
- Beat reserved flour mixture into melted chocolate mixture. Whisk in Guinness stout beer. The batter will seem a bit thin. Drop semisweet chocolate chips evenly on top of batter (some will sink in).
- Pour into prepared baking pan. Bake 25 to 30 minutes on center rack in the oven, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out almost clean.
- Let brownies cool, uncovered, to room temperature. Dust with confectioners' sugar before serving.
- Note: The beer should be at room temperature. This recipe uses a little less than a standard 12-ounce bottle of beer. Do not include foam in the measurement. Either spoon off the foam or let it rest until the foam subsides.

I made these for a party later in the week, so I froze them for a few days and let them thaw in the fridge the day of - they were awesome. INcredibly rich, though - you'll need a fresh brew to help finish them off, of course. The DaveDave Chocolate Raspberry Porter went great with the recipe. The raspberry flavor just squeaked through in the end, but added a very nice touch to the brownies. Also - be liberal with the chocolate; what's just a bit more going to hurt??


Check out the original recipe page here

Best Place On The Web In 2007

Hey guys, the crew over at DaveDave Breweries voted our blog the "Best Place On The Web In 2007"! Congrats to everyone for a great year! Here's to an even better 2008!

Here's a link to the article.

Bottle Bottle Bottle

54 Spiced Orange Witbiers bottled as of last Wednesday, March5. We'll keep you posted.

UPDATE: Bockfest Parade (NOT) CANCELLED

I just received this email:

"The Bockfest parade for Friday Afternoon has been CANCELLED. All other Bockfest activities are still going on as scheduled, so you can still get your Bock beer if you need it. The Bockfest
organizers are working with the city of Cincinnati to reschedule the parade for Sunday. I will send out more information when it becomes available.

We will be making a decision regarding the Bockfest Homebrew competition tomorrow morning based on road conditions and advisories."

Look for updates on the Bockfest website or check back here for the latest info throughout the weekend with the timely weather upon us, folks.


EDIT: the parade is NOT cancelled, just the float portion of it. An updated email as follows:

"I misunderstood the scope of the Bockfest Parade cancellation that I sent out earlier. The official information can be found here. Due to the snow emergency, the City of Cincinnati cancelled the float portion of the parade where we walk down the streets. Everything else is still on. We will kick off the weekend at Arnold's at 6PM, and walk up to Bockfest Hall for the blessing of the beer. All the bars are still open and ready to keep you warm with some delicious bock beer and sausage.

If you are an adventurous Monk or Wench, then let's meet down at Arnolds. Bring your coconuts if you've got them, and I'll bring the head beating boards."


So there you have it. See everyone out and about this weekend ;)

Craft Beer Sales Up... Again!

In the previous post, I briefly mentioned the idea of Cincinnatians getting more and more into craft beers. Maybe it's just a hunch, maybe it's because I'm noticing it more and more as I get older, maybe it's because I'm getting older, or maybe it's because I've been making my friends only drink good beer. Whatever the case, the rest of the nation seems to be following the trend, and it looks like the trend is on the rise.

According to an article in the St. Louis business journal, craft beer sale were up 16% in 2007! An interesting fact to note is that although craft brewing sales only make up for about 4% production and 6% sales in the US, out of 1,449 breweries in the United States, 1,406 of them are considered craft breweries! Incredible. That means that only around 3% of the breweries in the US control over 94% of the sales! Can you believe it!?

However, although it doesn't seem like much, the craft beer market did grow 12% in 2006, and with the 16% increase in 2007, we also saw an increase from 7.1 million barrels to 8 million barrels sold, which means a 900,000 barrel increase at 31 gallons a barrel - roughly 279,000,000 beers (figuring a modest 10 beers per gallon). Yes you read that right, Two Hundred Seventy Nine MILLION more beers in 2007! That's a hell of a lot of beer. Here's a link to the article:

Craft Beer Sales Up 16% in 2007

Keep up the good work, folks ;)

Cincinnati's Bockfest 2008!

From the Bockfest website:

"Bockfest 2008 is here! Cincinnati is the home to the world's oldest Bock festival, but many Cincinnatians are unaware of this tradition. If you are one of the unfortunate who have never attended a Bockfest (or who have but can't really remember that weekend) here's a quick primer. In the 1800s, Cincinnati was one of America's most prolific brewing cities. Cincinnatians drank more beer per capita than any city in the country, and Over-the-Rhine was at one point home to more than 50 breweries. A tradition developed among the breweries to release all of their bock beer on the same day. Bock beer is a rich, complex, robust lager that marks the end of the Winter brewing season and the beginning of Spring."


Our friend Bryon of the Cincinnati Beer Company (http://www.cincybeerco.com) is very involved in this years event, and also sent us this information about this years Prohibition Resistance Tour:

"Prohibition Resistance Tour 2008
This is a great opportunity to learn about such an integral part of Cincinnati history, and it is truly one of the most fun weekends of the year. What better way to support your city and Over-the-Rhine, while experiencing some of the untapped potential that could be unlocked by the streetcar?

On March 8-9, 2008, during the 16th annual Bockfest, you are invited to travel back to Nineteenth Century Cincinnati and explore the city's rich brewing heritage, both above and below ground. The Brewery District, in conjunction with Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal and the John Hauck House Museum, will be presenting the Prohibition Resistance Tour.
Each tour will start at Museum Center, where the tour will include an admission voucher to the Cincinnati History Museum's Beer, Breweries and Barons: A History of Cincinnati's Brewing Industry exhibit. Greg Hardman, the CEO of Christian Moerlein Brewing Company, will give a presentation on the amazing story of how Christian Moerlein left his native Germany and started one of the biggest breweries in the country, a story that mirrors the history of Cincinnati. The bus tour will include many of the remaining historic brewery buildings in Cincinnati, including the John Hauck Dayton Street Brewery, the Clyffside Brewery, the Jackson Brewery, and the Christian Moerlein Brewery. We will explore the life of another of Cincinnati's great brewers at the John Hauck House Museum, where this restored mansion on Cincinnati's original "Millionaire's Row" contains original antiques, furnishings and brewing memorabilia. Our final stop is at the Kauffmann Brewery on Vine Street, where we will journey through the sub-basements and tunnels of the brewery, spaces unused since Prohibition and never before opened to the public.

Go to www.bockfest.com for more details and to purchase tickets."


With what seems like a great weekend of beer history, beer discussions, Cincinnati brewing history and of course, beer drinking ;) , Bockfest has been generating a whole lot more publicity this year. It's hard to tell exactly why, but my gut instinct (and optimistic nature) would hopefully point to the fact that folks around the area are slowly, but surely getting back into the world of craft beers, and moving away from the stray-alley-cat-beat-up-a-skunk beers. Only time will tell, but I can definitely smell something great on the horizon for Cincinnati (and it's not the skunk).

Also, there will be shuttles running not only for the tour, but all around the area all weekend long to make sure folks stay safe, as well - check out bockfest.com for more details.

Spiced Chai Rice Extract Milk Stout

To Honor a Fool, when Caspito comes to town this coming week/end, we are making a brew unlike any seen before! The next addition to the Davedave lineup will be a Spiced Chai Rice Extract Tea Beer, currently unnamed. I have done some researching and a small bit of looking around the internet and have decided on the following as a starting batch:


1/4 lb. chocolate extract
4 lbs. rice extract syrup
2 lbs. honey
2 lb. dry wheat malt extract
1 lb. dry x-lite malt extract
1 c dark brown sugar
1.5 oz. summit (60 min)
1 oz. golding (15 min)
1 oz. cascade (3 min)
1 package star anise
1 package cardamom seed
2 T freshly chopped ginger
5-6 cinnamon sticks
a good handshakes worth of peppercorn twists
15-20 cloves
darjeeling tea base
1 or 2 packages lactose


most of the spices will be brewed with the tea up front and then the rest of the boiling process will go as usual for a brew of this kind. the question is, when do we put everything in the brew, what do we add at primary, what kinds of yeast should we use (WYeast Labs Yeast List) should we substitute in any other hops? I have heard that adding a few bay leaves to the beginning of the tea brewing adds a nice flavor.

thoughts?

beer brewview

i know i havent rapped at ya'll in a bit o' time, but here it comes, albeit brief and off topic:

just found this new beaut:
"hopnotic illusion" by the Blue Point Brewing Company out of Long Island. (Notice the smooth creamy head lifting itself up about an inch from the top of the glass. mmm.) this is one IPA that i can definitely get behind. My first thought was "HOP, HOPS!" and my final was "oh, yeah, this feels great."

tasty, running at about %6.2 per volume and not all that expensive.

in other news, my not far off visit to the homeland of davedave shall render quite the project as ve and i attempt our first tea inspired brewsky. keep notice, loves.

sex coffee beer

just in case you didn't feel like reading the entire previous blog, we set a new davedave record - and quite possibly a world record - this weekend by bottling 62 man.2.

more beer than your mom can handle

a couple of quick updates on some brews that have been created in the past few weeks here at davedave. first, we had a double brew day in the end of january - man.2 and the spicy orange witbier. after three weeks of hard work, man.2 was bottled and set aside for conditioning this past sunday, the 17th with a record setting 62 bottles capped. we also took an immediate post-primary taste of man, and it is to the best knowledge of this brewery that the finished brew will be even better than the original - which was pretty damn good in itself. man.2 will be ready to drink around the first week of march, and will continue to age well long after that.

the spicy orange witbier is currently still in the primary stage, and may be moved to secondary this week with more spices added and then let sit for a few more weeks.

surprisingly, god is NOT FINISHED. can you believe it? after around two months of aging with whiskey soaked oak chips, the gravity readings on god were not low enough. in fact, they were still higher than most original gravities of beers that i've brewed. over a month ago we did a partial reboil of god, added more and more malt and hops, created a "starter" carboy (approx 1 gallon) into which we pitched another round of the super high gravity yeast, and then after 4-5 days, added the rest of the remaining batch. that was 3 weeks ago, and it's still going strong. the carboy has been bubbling at around 8 sec. apart consistently for the past week and hasn't slowed. so maybe we'll see god sometime by 2009...

the chocolate raspberry porter has been bottled for around 16 days now and is getting pretty good. i realize now that it was a mistake to add the additional semi and bittersweet chocolate to the boil, and should have relied on the chocolate malts to bring in the chocolate flavor. this is definitely a correction necessary for the future. the raspberry flavor has rounded out and is lost a little in the beer - hopefully a few more weeks and the flavors may re-emerge

also, emma and i attended the stone brewery beer tasting at jungle jims last friday and were able to come away with 6 boxes of the bottles used at the event. since we've only got around 30 left on the shelf, this couldn't have come at a better time. now the capacity is back up, to around 150 beers worth, which works well considering the three brews that are currently in primary: as mentioned, the spicy orange witbier, god, and BLEEDING HOP BUCKET.


THAT'S RIGHT - WE NAMED A BEER, 'BLEEDING HOP BUCKET.' As i've mentioned in the past, we've been looking for an IPA to knock us on our asses for some time. we want something that will make us bleed hops when we drink it. we've attempted before, with The Hop, and Batch 11, but neither of those will compete with what we've done over the weekend. Bleeding Hop Bucket (what i would like to call a TRIPLE, or rather - imperial...) IPA was brewed with not 5, not 10, not 15, not even 20, 25 or 30 ounces of hops. we used 33, that's right THIRTY THREE OUNCES of hops in one 5-gallon batch. on top of that, there are 7 ounces of fresh hop leaves on reserve waiting to be dry-hopped in secondary come a few weeks from now. this was one of the most intense brews ever attempted by davedave, and it was a valiant success. look for more updates on this brew in the future.


dave

Bottle Bottle Bottle

52 Walnut Irish Reds on the wall...!

In My Fridge

Founders Centennial IPA
Sam Adams Cream Stout
Sam Adams Double Bock
Sam Adams Boston Lager
Fuller's Vintage Ale
Spaten Optimator
Sierra Nevada Harvest Ale
Great Lakes Eliot Ness
Bells Batch 8000
Bells Demolition
Bells Matilda
Delirium Tremens

What's in your fridge?

Oh My

44 Chocolate Raspberry Porters on the wall

Creating History One Dave At A Time

yesterday not only did i make history completely rocking guitar hero, but davedave brew saw its very first simultaneous double batch brew with the help of Mr. Josh Wiseman and of course, some good deep conversation. the two brews that made it to the double batch saturday were Man.2 and a Spicy Orange Witbier.

The Man re-make retained many elements of the original but with a few notable changes. there was no brewed coffee used in the boiling water. the bitterness of the coffee in the first batch was more than likely due to using this technique. next, we used a few more pounds (total) of coffee, black patent, caramel 120 and caramalt grains. hopefully this will give the beer a more rich and full element that Man.1 could have used. Another significant change is in switching from White Labs Irish Ale Yeast to WYeast 1084 Irish Ale Yeast. I've had some great results using the WYeast, so we'll see just how this all rounds out. The batch smelled amazing and should be a fantastic one when it's finished. Should be ready to drink around the 20th of Feb., along with the Chocolate Raspberry Porter, Batch 11, God, the Walnut Irish Red and of course, the Spicy Orange Witbier:

I won't lie I've never been a fan of the witbier. not at all. Bells Batch 8000 has somehow pulled me into the style and given me a new perspective on the style. So what the hell, we've never done a wheat beer, why not give it a shot. We added loads of honey, wheat malt, orange peel, coriander, grains of paradise and toasted oats to the batch, and topped it off with a WYeast Belgian Wit Yeast. Also added was a very very minimal amount of chocolate malt, which added a bit of color to the batch and should give a very nice chocolate note to the taste. we'll see how this batch goes and keep the updates going as things progress.

also: Batch 11 was sampled yet again. It's not there yet, but this brew is going to be unreal. absolutely fucking phenomenal. We'll keep you posted.

Behind The Scenes

Yes, the posts have been few and far between as of late. but just because the updates aren't piling up doesn't mean that the davedave brewery isn't working full capacity. in fact, this evening we are planning on expanding to a five, possibly six fermenter operation, with the hopeful addition of another brew pot to expand our brewing capabilities to two at a time. this of course means more efficiency, which then translates into more and more brews for everyone to enjoy. this weekend we may see two, possibly 3-4 more brews, depending on if we can locate funds for our increased capacity. at least one brew session will take place, and that will be the man.2. obviously not a forerunner in the vote category, but it may be necessary if we plan on having a few ready by feb. 14, the extreme beer festival. after man would be the spicy witbier, which has been changed to an orange spice, with notes of clove, jasmine, vanilla, corriander and grains of paradise. should be an excellent batch in itself. after that, the ruling is still up in the air, but we'll keep you posted as to what's chosen next.

also, in celbration of lost's 9 month hiatus from the air, thursday will be the official birth date of batch 11, which should be just about ready for its actual initial tasting.

last night we added a bottle of port to the raspberry chocolate porter and are letting it mix in for a day or so, which means there will be a bottling session more that likely before sunday. when that happens, we'll put the pieces of god that we've viciously torn apart and recombine them in what can essentially be called its fourth fermentation period, which shouldn't last more than a few days before bottling takes place.

the walnut irish red is coming along very well, and should be ready to bottle within 10 days.

so in theory, by next weekend, we could have SIX new brews in the primary. yes, SIX brand spanking new davedaves for all to enjoy. dear god this is getting exciting. oh yes, davedave is on the climb.

we'll see you at the top

another week, another brew

all brewed and carboyed is the DaveDave Walnut Irish Red Ale, which featured a brewing session by myself, william, and our own irish red, mr. patrick meier. this is one that will more than likely go down in the books of davedave as yet another batch of fantastic brew. we used a basic amber ale foundation, but added caramel and toasted malts, cinnamon, and our own baked vanilla soaked walnuts to the secondary. naturally we also used an irish ale yeast, wyeast 1084. as for the usual progression, 2 weeks primary, 2 weeks bottling, looks like we'll be enjoying our reds about a month shy of st. pattys, although the added month wait will help them age nicely and should bring these guys closer to full maturation. look for some to turn up at a small gathering around here in the near future.

in other news, we've bottled 53 Batch Elevens, which when sampled straight from the carboy, were absolutely fantastic. initial tastes were quite hoppy, but not as bleed-for-weeks blinding as we had hoped. fear not; a bit of patience and bottle conditioning (plus coldness and carbonation) will allow more of the bitter hop flavors to pull out. regardless, the brew will be pretty damn fabulous - they will be ready for drinking around valentines day.

and FINALLY, God will be ready to bottle in about a week. that's right. you'll all be able to try the infamous 22% beer that we've been talking about for the last 3 months. but while we were talking, god was in its secondary fermentation, aging with whiskey soaked oak chips, which have had quite an impact on the brew. yesterday, we pulled about a half gallon of god, added 3 lbs more dark malt and reboiled. essentially - if you were worried - we boiled off the alcohol in that half gallon but, considering 3 lbs per 1/2 gallon makes 30 lbs per 5 gal, which is more concentrated than when we initially brewed, we're actually upping the ABV in the long run. what we've done here is taken the reboil, carboyed it, and then added another unit of the super high gravity yeast, which will create a "starter" of yeast which we will then add to God, which should help ferment those fussy, remaining sugars that have evaded the grips of the previous, normal, "lazy man" yeast that we are now substituting with steroid HGH superhero yeast. the stater pitch will take place on or around wednesday, with bottling more than likely happening next monday or tuesday.


finally, we've fruited the beer. the Border Jumper beer, it has been found, goes perfect with a slice of lemon. lime would more than likely suffice as well, but initial taste tests have found that a lemon rimmed and squeezed BJ is just fantastic. adding some lemon flavors to the brew could be a good idea for a remake session.



so now we've realized two questions:

1) what name shall we give the Walnut Irish Red Ale?
2) what are some of your favorite combinations of beer + (something that goes into your beer: ie. lime, salt, lsd, etc.)?