2024 Learn to Homebrew Day

If you read Roll-a-Style 14 ... 16A. Sweet Stout, you know that Learn to Homebrew Day was the first Saturday in November.

I had plans to get together for a brew day with my buddies Du and Doc.

My turn to host has been overdue, and the Beer Model and I decided that we would go ahead and have Learn to Homebrew Day at our "brewery".

We also invited some non-brewers over to "Learn" on Learn to Homebrew Day. These people were also available to help us eat BBQ and drink beer.

I was a little more ambitious than I probably should have been, planning to brew two batches of beer, smoke a pork butt, and make some chicken wings.

Roll-a-Style 14 ... 16A. Sweet Stout

Learn to Homebrew Day is coming up on the first Saturday of November. At this point, I'm planning on getting together with my brewing buddies Du and Doc, but I'm not sure if this will be a travel brew day or if I'll end up hosting.

Anyway ... I was recently thinking about what I'd brew, and came across a recipe in Beer Smith that I developed at some point.

Pack o' Hooligans Stout is actually a 16A Sweet Stout. At some point I must have gone to my Roll-a-Style list and "rolled" 14 on an online 20-sided die ... 

 

Golly Jeepers Wild Mango Ale (Batch 346)

If you read Roll-a-Style 13 ... Wild Specialty Beer, you know that Saturday was Learn to Homebrew Day, and that I brewed Golly Jeepers Wild Mango Ale.

My friend "Doc" wanted to host another brew day, so I headed over to his "brewery".

Generally, when I "Travel Brew", I like to start my mash at home and let it convert during the drive over. Then, when I arrive I can just transfer to a boil kettle and therefore have a head-start.

I do this in my old-style gott cooler / propane burner system.

But, my friend "Du" also was heading over, and he asked to use a propane burner and boil kettle.

Roll-a-Style 13 ... Wild Specialty Beer

I brewed Humdinger of a Hootenanny (Batch 345) the weekend before Learn to Homebrew Day. I obviously had to have something to brew on the first Saturday of November (today if you're reading this the day it publishes)

About the time I discovered that I Lied about the 2021 BCJP Categories ... I came across some Wildbrew Philly Sour yeast in my favorite local homebrew shop.

That yeast has been sitting in my fridge since then, and I always had expected I'd use it to brew a Category 28. American Wild Ale with it.

I decided that Learn to Homebrew Day would be the day. It was on my Roll-a-Style list ... so ...

I pretended to roll the Online 20 sided die and pretended that I rolled ... 13

13 corresponds to 28C. Wild Specialty Beer, a pretty wide-open style.

An American Wild Ale with fruit, herbs, spices, or other Specialty-Type Ingredients.

I decided to go with a simple base beer with mango fruit. The "Wild" character would come from the Wildbrew Philly Sour yeast.

My recipe is 

2022 Learn to Homebrew Day

This past Saturday was the AHA's Learn to Homebrew day.

You might remember this from previous years, but my homebrewing friends "Doc" and "Du" and I try to get together a few times a year to brew together.

Learn to Homebrew Day and Big Brew Day are always great excuses to get together.

The AHA always posts a recipe for these national brewing days. The one they posted for Saturday was LTHD22 Hoppy Amber Ale.

While I don't ever actually use the AHA's recipes, their Hoppy Amber Ale, inspired me to come up with a recipe for a Hoppy Red Ale (aka Red IPA). 

Back in the day, I was a great fan of this style. Remember such classic beers as Quarter Life Crisis and Pompously Illegitimate Red Ale.

Learn to Homebrew Day: Dudocs English Mild (301)

This past Saturday was the AHA's Learn to Homebrew Day.

This year, my friend "Doc" decided he wanted to host a brew day, so I packed up my equipment and traveled to his brewery.

The recipe that I designed for this brew day, was Dudocs English Mild.

It is a pretty simple English Mild recipe fermented with Lallemand Voss Kveik Ale Yeast.

It should be an easy drinking flavorful dark, malty session beer. I'm looking forward to trying it out.

As usual, I started the mash at home and let the amylase enzyme do their thing while I was driving.

This way, when I got to Doc's I just had to drain the wort into the kettle and start heating to boil.

Learn to Homebrew Day: X-Mas Ale 2020 (272)

Saturday was the AHA's Learn to Homebrew Day. The SheppyBrew Beer Model and I have made it tradition to brew together on that day every year.

Of course we both know how to homebrew, but Saturday was the first opportunity for the Beer Model to brew with the Anvil Foundry I recently purchased (see Bud Lite Lime (271) on the Anvil Foundry).

There are two main reasons that the idea of electric brewing was extremely attractive to me.

First: most of the electric units I know about allow the ability to set a timer to start heating water. This means you can get your water all ready the night before and have the strike water to temperature when you get up in the morning.

That way, you can start the mash process immediately when you get up. 

Both times I've used the Anvil Foundry, I've taken advantage of this feature, although when brewing with the Beer Model, we get started so late, it wasn't as big a deal for me.

Learning to Brew Dearg Irish Red (batch 243)

So ... Saturday was Learn to Homebrew Day.

We used this as an excuse to get a brew day done together with a couple of my Home-brewer friends.

At the same time, we invited a bunch of non-homebrewers over to watch and hang out. Sort of like Big Brew Day back in May.

This time, the Brew Day was at my friend "Du"'s brewery.

Less people showed up to this brew day than BBD, but the brewers sure had a lot of fun.

During the Big Brew Day back in May, my friend "Doc" brewed an extract batch. And, I decided that I would do the same thing this time.

I figure that if I'm doing an extract batch, there is less pressure to remember equipment (since there is less equipment for extract than for all-grain.

It also makes the brew day take less time and therefore make the chance of forgetting something in the process less likely.

Most importantly, it means I had less clean-up after the brew day.

So ... I created a quick little extract Irish Red Recipe:

Dearg Irish Red

Learning to Homebrew

So ... Saturday, November 3 was the AHA's Learn to Homebrew Day.

My homebrewing friend, "Doc" invited me to his house to brew. You may remember that earlier in the year, I went to house for Big Brew Day (see Cinco de Bealtaine Irish Stout).

In addition to the two experienced homebrewers, there were a couple of people there to watch us, and a new homebrewer doing his first "real" homebrew batch.

Again, I packed up my brewing equipment and brought it "on the road". Again, it is a little awkward for me to do this.

I need a checklist.

But I was able to get enough of the stuff to Doc's house that I wasn't missing anything. The only thing I had to borrow from him was his wort chiller.

Where'd My ManGo Wheat

So ... last Saturday was the AHA's Learn to Homebrew Day, and I used that as an excuse to get the SheppyBrew Beer Model to join me for a brew day.

I try to get The Beer Model to brew at least once a year for legal reasons.

... sort of ...

You see, Colorado (like most states) allows the adult head-of-household to brew 100 gallons of beer per year.

I basically brew 100 gallons of beer per year.

However, sometimes I go a little over.

The law also allows a second adult in the household to brew 100 gallons of beer per year.

As young as she looks, the SheppyBrew Beer Model legally qualifies as an adult in our household.

So, by having her brew ... I figure the SheppyBrew Home Brewery is allowed 200 gallons of beer per year.

Fall Back ... Brew a Morlock Porter

Until about mid-week I was not planning on brewing today. Between it being the end of Daylight Savings time (giving me an extra brewing hour) and there being no Bears or Broncos football games, I thought it was just too opportune a day not to do it, though. Plus, yesterday was the AHA's Learn to Homebrew Day. I can't not brew on the weekend of Learn to Homebrew Day, can I?

Of course I can't.

So, I quickly put together a porter recipe. As many of you know, one of my 2013 goals was to round out my brewing experience, by making sure I had brewed at least one all-grain batch of all 23 BJCP beer categories (see SheppyBrew Styles). At the beginning of the year, I had brewed just over half, so brewing 11 was not that big of an undertaking. All I had left as of this morning was Category 12 Porter and Category 19 Strong Ale.

Now, I only have the Strong Ale left.