Captain Serious Pilsner (Batch 333)

As you probably know if you follow this blog at all, the Chicago Blackhawks are my favorite professional sports team.

And ... my favorite recent player has to be Captain Jonathan Toews (Captain Serious)

The Blackhawks really have not been a good team for several years now, and Toews has had health issues.

This past year, the team decided that Jonny would not be coming back to the team as they are concentrating on bringing on young (cheap) players to go all-in on their rebuilding process.

While, I don't disagree with the decision, the separation makes me sad. 

But, in honor of "Captain Serious" I decided to brew a beer named after him.

Captain Serious Pilsner

I've been somewhat obsessed with the somewhat new style "Italian Pilsner". It isn't an official BJCP style, but I've come across it quite a bit lately.

It is one of the styles I always have to try when I come across it.

Essentially, as far as I can tell, an "Italian Pilsner" is basically a German Pilsner that is dry-hopped.

I actually didn't realize it at the time I designed the recipe, but my Schreck Gartenzwerg Pilsner is an Italian Pilsner.

But, anyway ... the Captain Serious Pilsner has a simple recipe. 

The malt bill is 100% German Pilsner Malt. It uses Talus hops ... mostly because I have a bunch of them that I need to use in something.

I thought it was a great opportunity to give Pressure Fermentation another try.

Anyway ... originally I thought this would be a Big Brew Day brew, but I killed a keg and thought I needed to get my beer inventory up, so I brewed this past Sunday.

Unlike my usual practice, I didn't prepare anything the night before, I got started fairly late on Sunday. I was mashed-in a little before 6am.

I let the mash go through church, so it was still a long mash. I was draining around 9:30am.

The pre-boil gravity was a little high, so I diluted just a bit. 

The boil was as planned.

I chilled to just below 60 degrees and pumped into the fermenter.

I had the yeast pitched by noon. I attached hop bags into the inside of the top of the fermenter with sous vide magnets (like I did for my latest batch of Melting Stream Spring Saison).

Then, of course, I went for a bike ride.

Fermentation was going strong by the end of the day Monday.

As I am typing this, I've let the dry hop bags drop. I expect to keg before the end of this week.

Keep an eye on the usual spots for update on this beer.

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Go Nuggets!