SheppyBrew's PBR

Remember in SheppyBrew 2018 Year-End Brewing Stats, I mentioned that I wanted to brew more new recipes in 2019?

Remember in SheppyBrew 2018 Year-End Brewing Stats, I mentioned that I wanted to brew more lagers in 2019?

So ... last weekend I brewed a beer that was both a new recipe and a lager.

Bam!

At first, I thought I was going to brew a Standard American Lager (BJCP Category 1B). This category call for using corn as an ingredient. I've brewed Popcorn Beers in the past, and I thought it would be fun to add popcorn to this one too.

For some reason, I thought it would be funny to make a beer name for which P.B.R. could be an acronym.

Popcorn was a great start for the "P".

It took me awhile, but eventually, it hit me that "Popcorn. Barley. Rye" would work for "P.B.R".

I already had Popcorn and Barley as part of the recipe. It certainly isn't difficult to add some Rye.

Voila ... I had the malt bill for my new lager.

Z is for Zuni Street Brewing Company

Z. I'm finally to Z. Hooray for me.

Yes, I am finally down to the last letter in my A to Z Denver Breweries series.

I bet for awhile there you probably never thought I'd get here.

Well, way back in February of 2015, I composed a list of Denver Breweries that I had never visited. I was embarrassed by the large number of breweries I had never been to, and decided to try to make an effort to get to more.

It struck me that most of the letters of the alphabet were covered by the beginning letters of the brewery names. I thought a fun way to get through a bunch of un-visited breweries was to start with A and work my way through Z.

If you follow this blog, you likely caught that I hit "Y" just a little while ago.

Now I'm at Z.

Z is for Zuni Street Brewing Company

X-Mas Ale Vertical Tasting

You may have gathered from Sheppy's Blog: X-Mas Ales that I brew a different X-Mas Ale every year.

I started this back in 2009, and have continued every year up to and including 2018.

I'm certain I'll brew a new X-Mas Ale recipe in 2019 as well.

Back when I first started and for several years thereafter, I bottled extra bottles that I let sit in the beer fridge for several years. The idea was to be able to perform vertical tastings of the various years.

Now that I keg everything, I have not been great at putting aside beers, but I still have quite a few left from 2011 through 2015.

Y is for Yak and Yeti Restaurant and Brewpub

Big Y little y. What begins with Y? Yak and Yeti Restaurant and Brewpub. Y. Y. Y.

Yes. I am finally down to the second to last letter in my A to Z Denver Breweries series.

What the hell am I talking about?

Well, way back in February of 2015, I composed a list of Denver Breweries that I had never visited. I was embarrassed by the large number of breweries I had never been to, and decided to try to make an effort to get to more.

It struck me that most of the letters of the alphabet were covered by the beginning letters of the brewery names. I thought a fun way to get through a bunch of un-visited breweries was to start with A and work my way through Z.

I started with A is for Alpine Dog Brewing Company

By the end of 2015, I had worked my way through G is for Great Frontier Brewing

I made great progress in 2016, getting to T is for TRVE Brewing Company before 2017 began.

2017 brought U is for Ursula Brewery, V is for Vine Street Pub and Brewery, and W is for Wits End Brewing Company.

Then I got lazy for over a year.

SheppyBrew 2018 Year-End Brewing Stats

The 2018 is over.

As you may know, the Brewery likes to post quarterly updates on how much we have brewed. You can see all these updates (including the one you are reading right now) by following this link: Sheppy's Blog: Brew Stats.

The forth quarter was light. We only brewed 3 beers.

• X-Mas Ale 2018
• Buckwheat's Belgium Pale Ale
• Resilience IPA Clone(ish)

Those 3 batches totaled 16 gallons of beer, bringing my 2018 total to 18 batches and 93 gallons brewed. Hooray ... I'm a legal homebrewer this year!

2018 X-Mas Ale

2019 Arctic Vortex Winter Saison

Here it is. Winter again.

Among other things, winter means that it is time to brew Arctic Vortex Winter Saison.

Yum!

As you probably know if you follow SheppyBrew Brewery, we brew at least 4 saisons every year.

Winter Spring Summer Autumn.

I call them my Seasonal Saison series of beers.

The Arctic Vortex Winter Saison happens to be a black saison, because winter is generally dark ... and it would be boring to make all my saisons look the same.

This weekend, I brewed this year's Arctic Vortex Winter Saison.

Christmas Ribeye Roast

As I mentioned in Double Smoked Ham, I had a couple of Christmas dinners to make this year. The first was the Sunday before Christmas with some family. I cooked that ham on my smoker.

The second was our family Christmas dinner. This one was a 6 lb Ribeye Roast that our local super market had on sale for Christmas.

I had never made a Ribeye Roast before this year. It really isn't difficult at all.

Pretty simple, really.

The night before, I trimmed a bit of the hard fat on the roast and applied Montreal Steak Seasoning over the whole thing. I let it sit in the fridge overnight.

Around 10 the next morning, I started up the smoker with charcoal and hickory chunks. I put the roast on the smoker in a roasting pan around 10:40.

Double Smoked Ham

Happy New Year!

Recently, we had a couple of Christmas Dinners that had to be prepared.

We had some family over to the house on the 23rd, and decided to do a Christmas dinner for them.

The kids wanted a ham.

We decided to cook it on the smoker. I had never done a ham before, and it provided extra oven space for other things.

To make things easier, we decided that I might as well just do a pre-cooked spiral cut ham.

As luck would have it, I had come across a recipe ... How To Smoke A Honeybaked Ham.