Old Oklahoma Power Plant Gets New Life

The Old Sand Springs Power Plant is now getting turned into a Micro-Brewery! Spring Loaded Brewery
Old Power PlantOld Power Plant

Discovery's New TV Show, Brew Masters

On November 21 2010, the season premier of Brew Masters series premiere, Host Sam Calagione, head of Dogfish Head, takes fans around the world looking for the right ingredients and recipes. His book, "Extreme Brewing" teaches you to not fear taking a chance on something different. I highly recommend the book and look forward to the show!

A random Hello!

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology thanks for stopping by! I have always wanted to visit Hong Kong, a fascinating place! I hope you found what you were looking for on my blog, if not, and you want to fly me over to Hong Kong,  I'll be happy to meet with you!

Some International Home Brewing

Looking at all the countries that I get readers from can kinda be daunting when you think about where I am. If you read this and "your not from around here", I'm in Springfield Missouri. Basically, if you threw a dart at the middle of a map of the United States, you'd get pretty close. And thinking that I now have readers in Canada, UK, Germany, Poland, Russia, Denmark, Hong Kong, Italy, and Singapore, it feels amazing. Let me say Hello, and thank you all for stopping by! I would love to here brewing stories or just talk beer with all of you! Leave me a message, send me an email, you can even snail mail me! I have a big world map and would love to put up a pin where your at! Tell me your local brewing laws, what your favorite beer is, or just say HI.  Keep drinking good beer out there!

Keeton

The two meads decorated for Christmas! Don't worry, I used LED lights so they wouldn't transfer heat! They may get more lights as it goes, they may get a whole new shelf and decorating....

The Brew Is Brewed

My Winter Snowman Ale is Brewed and fermenting as we speak. Mainly Light and Amber malt was used along with some Chocolate and Belgium grains. I steeped the grains for about 15 minutes longer than the recipe called for. It boiled for an hour, Irish Moss was added at 15 Min left and Spices (Cinnamon, allspice, and ginger) were added at 5 Min left.  Original Gravity was 1.080 on the dot and 24 hours after pitching the yeast, I can barley keep the trap full. It's blown twice tonight. I'm going to to let it run dry and give it a week after racked with some new sugar just to kick it a little and then bottle it. On Monday I'll have all the brew numbers plugged into my iBrewMaster App and be able to post all the specs on the brew.   I'll update this as I work the brew.

I also racked both Mead brews and the Cider. Both Meads were given another 1.5 pounds of clover honey  and the 3 gallons of cider got half a pound of brown sugar. All three are chirping along and loving the now sugar.

Brew Update

I've moved to a new brewery and haven't had time to post anything new in a few weeks, but I'm back! The Root Beer that I put together was only about 2.5* but the cider I made was 4 out of 5! I have two different 5 gallon batches of mead going and a newer batch of cider with a new recipe to go with it. I have used the same yeast starter for all the batches of mead and cider I've started now.
 
Tomorrow, all three get racked, honey, and or brown sugar gets added, lees get pitched (thrown away) not pitched like new pitched... hahaha I made a brewers joke.... and I'll make a trip to the Home Brewery to pick a great winter brew recipe to start the next couple days...

And at the end of the day I'll have some new pics to post of my pets!

 The Hard Cider is bottled and ready for a little in bottle fermentation. It needs a little time to mature but I'm really happy with the flavor. It has the tartness of a Granny Smith and the sweetness of a Jonathan! I'm carbonating it for a few days then in the fridge it goes. Once it's ready it won't last long, I'd be smart to start another batch tomorrow if I have times.

My first shot at a Hard Root Beer, bottled, and ready to do some carbonation! It tastes pretty good but I'll have to report back once it's cold and sparkly!

20 Liter Oak Barrel for Aging Wine or Beer

I'm thinking about going with a 5 gallon cask for aging my Black Cherry Mead. It'll only be 2 weeks old tomorrow so I'll keep it in the carboy for at least another 2 weeks. Then I'm thinking I'm going to transfer it into this Gibbs Brothers Cooperage 5 gallon toasted keg. I plan on aging it at least 9-12 months and this is the best price from a cooperage. $138.00 and it's made locally! They will also drill for a wooden faucet if you so desire and you can also choose toasted or charred. If anyone has a thought or opinion on cask aging a mead, please email of comment!RTS Home Accents 5510-001100-5600 50-Gallon Rain Water Collection Barrel With Brass Spigot - Wood Grain

KC Renfest KC MO

We ran up to KC to the Ren-Fest last Sunday. It was fun but their sure could have one built closer than 3 hours. The fest had all that you might expect from the fair. After working at some fairs out in California, I'm use to  being a part of the fair and not just watching.  Maybe the brewers guild could have a booth up there some year and I'd feel back at home:) great Chaucer's Mead and some fun parties afterwords....

This is the label I've been playing with for my mead that won't be done for another six moths. If you like mead this is what you have to look forward too. A lot of playing on the computer and waiting and wishing it was done. Patients is a virtue!

New Toys for Brewers!

for $8.99 I just started playing with the new iBrewMaster iPad Edition 1.4. I haven't played with all the toys on it yet but From what I have found so far is it's a 4 out of 5 stars in my book. if you have an iPad and you brew, you'll enjoy parts of this program, or at least 9 bucks worth of it. I'll post pics later once I can show how it figures out all your calculations.

Current Projects

       I have three different things going on right now. I have a Mead, a Cider, and a Root-Beer all in different stages right now. I know some brewers out there are probably laughing right now, these are not the most technically difficult recipes out there. Actually they're all pretty easy! Realistically, all brewing is pretty easy. There's just a few more steps in some recipes. Mead, as far as ingredients go, has to be about the simplest of all. It's honey, water, and yeast. But if made correctly, can be compared to a fine wine. The downfall of mead, or one of it's beauties, is that in needs ti age for a long time, some even a year. I am buying a 5 gallon charred cask from Gibbs Brothers Cooperage to age my black cherry mead. I'll let you know how it goes, as it goes...
     I love a hard cider around this time of the year, so I decided to make some of that too. It's now been fermenting for about 9 days and will probably be bottled around this weekend. All me readings say it'll be around 6% and hopefully have a hint of cinnamon and clove if it comes out the way I want.
     And my last child currently is a hard root beer. Made from a root beer extract, sugar and yeast.. and water.
The only reason I'm making it is because I always wanted to make a hard root beer. I was at the brewing store, found the extract, and while I had all the equipment out and clean, through it together too.

   

Welcome!

I'm hoping that I'll be able to provide some answers and information on here about brewing and fermentation that I learned the hard way down a long road. Simple little things like placing your fermentation traps in zip lock bags after you clean and dry them to keep dust out of them in between brews. Feel free to ask me anything about brewing, I won't guarantee I know it but I can find the answer!



Happy Brewing,
Keeton