XMas Ales and Ribeye Roast

For various reasons, the "SheppyBrew Christmas Dinner" was on the 23rd this year.

If you've been following along for awhile, you may have figured out that one of my favorite things to make on holidays is Ribeye Roast.

I only really get it when there are holiday sales for them at our local grocery stores. This often happens around Christmas, and I picked up one on sale this year to make.

Another thing you probably know if you've been following this blog for awhile is that every year (since I started brewing way back in 2009) I brew an "X-Mas Ale".

Back when I bottled most of my beers, I always saved 6 or so bottles to do vertical tastings in future years. Now that I keg, I have pretty much gotten away from that, but I still have some older "X-Mas Ale" bottles in my fridge.

Random SheppyBrew Recipes

After typing up SheppyBrew's Most Brewed Beers, I got to thinking ... "what am I going to do with my Roll-a-Style list once my 'Bench' has been emptied?"

Ok ... not something I have to worry about for a long time (and really ... why would I worry about it at all?) ... but in only 8 Roll-a-Style brews, my "Bench" will be empty.

As a computer geek, here is what I came up with: 

I made a change to SheppyBrew.com where my recipe page will randomly pick a previously brewed beer when the id=random.

IE ... 

http://www.sheppybrew.com/recipes/recipe.aspx?id=random

Butt and Biking

If you look at this blog, you'll see that I smoked Port Butt quite often.

Out of all the meat I BBQ, I have probably posted more about Port Butt than anything else ... although I suspect that I've actually cooked chicken thighs more on my various grills.

My kids are home on Christmas break from their colleges, so with more mouths to feed, I thought I'd make a big piece of meat this past weekend.

Port Butt is what I ended up making. 

One of the nice things about Port Butt is that it is something that doesn't require constant attention to make.

I tend to use a modified snake method, which if set up correctly means that I can just let the kettle cook for several hours.

SheppyBrew's Most Brewed Beers

Last week (from when I am typing this ... not when it was posted), there were technical issues with SheppyBrew.com where the web server could not connect to it's database.

I was a bit annoyed that my hosting company needed me to point out the problem, and that it took them several hours to fix it after I pointed it out.

But, in the grand scheme of things ... it's a first world problem.

For some reason ... once the issue was fixed, and I was looking through the database I decided to figure out what beers I've brewed the most.

I went down a rabbit-hole of sql queries and since I had gone through that effort ... I thought I might as well share what I found.

F is for Fiction Beer Company Chapter Two

It seems likes it's been quite awhile since we've done anything with our A to Z Breweries Series of Posts.

I posted E is for El Rancho Colorado over a month ago, which isn't THAT long ago, but for whatever reason, it seemed like longer ago than I guess it was.

Anyway ... this past weekend, the SheppyBrew Beer Model and I decided to hit another brewery for lunch.

Time for an "F" brewery.

Once we eliminate the "F" breweries we've been to already (see A to Z Denver Breweries Round 4) ...

I thought there was one obvious choice on the Colorado Brewery Map & List.

F is for Fiction Beer Company Chapter Two

Decemberfest Lager (Batch 348)

December already? Where did 2023 go?

Seems like I just submitted the first 2023 post recently.

I suppose I'm just getting old enough that time flies by faster and faster.

Anyway ... 

I brewed my 23rd batch of beer of the year Sunday. I believe this will be my last batch of beer for the year.

It was the 348th batch of beer I've ever brewed.

I have brewed this beer (with minor recipe modifications) 3 times now.

It is a nice December Seasonal lager.

Decemberfest Lager

2023 Update on the 2021 BJCP Goal

If you follow this blog, you know I've renewed my old BJCP Goal.

Through a series of blog posts, I've discovered / acknowledged that I had not brewed whole categories in the 2021 Style Guidelines (see BJCP 2021 Style Guidelines, I lied, and 2021 BCJP Styles to Brew).

At some point, I decided to not only try to get every category covered, but work through all the styles (at least the ones that I'm interested in drinking)

I even came up with a "Roll-a-Style" concept to give me help deciding which style to brew.

After X-Mas Ale 2023 (Batch 347), I've now brewed at least one style in every BJCP Category. And ... I'm not planning on adding any more new styles before the end of the year.

X-Mas Ale 2023 (Batch 347)

Every year since I started homebrewing (way back in 2009), I've brewed an X-Mas Ale to have around the holidays.

They have all been similar base beers ... a malty winter warmer ... with various flavorings.

I've done everything from Almond Vanilla Cinnamon Cloves (2009) to just the base beer (2015).

I've used Smoked malt, Peppermint, Peanut Butter, Cherry Pomegranate, and other flavorings.

If you're interested, there are links to every single recipe on X-Mas Ales 2009 - 2023.

Towards the beginning of 2023, I realized that I had not brewed beers in every category of the 2021 BJCP Guidelines (see Sheppy's Blog: I lied), and I thought that Category 33 - Wood Beer would make a good X-Mas Ale.

X-Mas Ale 2023

Roll-a-Style 18 ... Wood Aged Beer

Well ... on Roll-a-Style 13 ... Wild Specialty Beer, I had 33A. Wood-Aged Beer on my "Roll-a-Style" list even though I knew for quite some time that my 2023 X-Mas Ale was going to satisfy that style.

So, I suppose this is another beer style where I am pretending to roll. For this one, I am pretending to use the online 20-sided dice to roll 18 ...