We really had frigid cold for awhile. We didn't get much above 0 degrees F for several days.
I tried a bike ride on Saturday. It was too cold for a bike ride.
On Sunday, I brewed. It was actually too cold to brew. Or at least it was too cold to chill the wort using water from my outside faucet.
Oh well ... it turned out ok anyway.
It being winter, it was time to brew my 2024 Winter Seasonal Saison ...
I started on Saturday by making a yeast starter from the 3711 Yeast I harvested from 2023 Falling Leaves Saison (Batch 344).
I would have started the mash on Saturday night, but as you know if you read my last post, the Beer Model and I attended a Denver Pioneers Hockey Game on Saturday. I really didn't feel like setting up the water when we got home.
I did wake up very early Sunday morning, though and got the mash going. Then, I went back to bed, so I sort of did the overnight mash.
I woke up again at around 7am and started warming up the mash to get to boiling temperature.
It always take awhile for my 120 volt Anvil Foundry to heat up to boiling from mash temperature, but with the frigid cold, it seemed to take even longer.
I got to boiling around 8:20 AM.
Pre-boil gravity and volume was pretty close to plan and the boil went well.
One interesting thing I did with this brew, is that I used "spent hops" from dry hop of the batch Shoddy IPA (Batch 343).
I got this idea from an episode on of the THE BRÜ LAB podcast. Episode 097 | Re-using Spent Hops In The Brew Kettle w/ Dean Hauser.
I thought this was worth a try, and this was the batch I finally decided to do it.
This seems to have worked out well, but I guess we'll have to see how the beer turns out.
And ... because of the frigid cold ... I didn't want to turn on my outdoor faucet to chill the wort.
I moved the hot wort into my Anvil Brew Bucket and let the wort cool in the cold air. (like I ended up doing in Humdinger of a Hootenanny (Batch 345)).
I think I'm going to be brewing something I think I'll want to ferment in the Anvil Brew Bucket soon, so I transferred to a plastic fermenter once the wort was a little cooler.
I hope this doesn't increase the hop bitterness in the finished beer. I don't think it will, but we'll have to see.
It took several hours of cooling before I was comfortable pitching the yeast, but it didn't take long at all for the yeast to get going once pitched.
The beer was rocking hard the next day.
I'm planning on kegging by this weekend, and probably drinking shortly after that.
As always, stay tuned on the regular SheppyBrew Channels to see what is happening with beer and other things: SheppyBrew's Facebook Page; Sheppy's Twitter Feed; SheppyBrew's Instagram Page; and SheppyBrew's Website.
Go Pioneers!
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