Yoker Belgian Tripel (Batch 385)

As I mentioned in Learning to Homebrew: 2025 X-Mas Ale (Batch 384), I was hoping to get together with at least one of my homebrewing buddies coming up soon.

It turns out that this past weekend, we were able to do this.

The SheppyBrew Beer Model and I packed up our brewing equipment Saturday and headed over to Doc's Brewery for a brew day.

Getting started at Doc's Brewery starts even later than when I brew at home with the Beer Model, but Saturday I still got up fairly early to get things ready for the Travel Brewing.

I put a Chuck Roast on the weber kettle to smoke for a few hours so that I could leave it in the crock pot most of the day.

That way we'd have dinner ready when we got home.

I also made a yeast starter for the yeast I harvested from the Tafel Mystère Belgian Single (Batch 383).

Then, I packed up equipment and ingredients, including starting the mash for the beer we were brewing on Saturday.

Yoker Belgian Tripel

By starting the mash at my house, it means that the conversion is happening while I'm driving and that I'm a little ahead once I actually arrive.

Between all the beers I have to drink at Doc's Brewery and various distractions of socializing, it is best to keep the process as simple and efficient as possible.

So ... once I arrived and unpacked, I drained the mash tun and then did a batch sparge.

The pre-boil gravity was actually fairly close to where I wanted it, which was a pleasant surprised considering how little I do the whole gott-cooler-mash-tun process now.

Also, I no longer have the measuring stick I used to have to measure volume in the kettle. I think my wife threw it out without realizing that I need it.

Anyway, I added a little time to the boil and that was about perfect to get the right gravity.

The Beer Model "helped" by adding boil additions. Of course I had to pull her away from talking to the women-folk to get her to help out in this way.

But, we got everything in there at about the right times.

We got the beer chilled enough and I racked into two 5-gallon PET carboys. 

I actually thought my OG was very low, but I had made the decision to add the sugar to the fermentor later.

I think the beers I had may have helped me forget this fact. But, anyhooo ... as it turned out, the OG was perfect once I added sugar later. (actually the next day as it turned out)

After brewing, a couple of neighbors showed up with beers for us to sample. I'm not sure that was a good idea, because I was pretty much recked for the remainder of the day.

But it was great fun!

When I got home, I dumped the two carboys in one fermenter along with the yeast starter. The fermentation took off quick and was rocking way before bedtime.

I actually did calculations the next morning to verify the amount of sugar and water to add to the fermentor to get to plan. So, I don't really have an official OG "measurement", but of course I trust the math. Waiting until the next morning was a good call.

I expect I'll keg this up the weekend after Thanksgiving. Chances are pretty good that I'll let you know how it turns out either on this blog or on the SheppyBrew website. Most likely both.

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