September Blogging

September broke this blog's page view record, previously set in August which was previously set in July which was previously set in June which was previously set in May. In fact it has been since May of 2011 that I've been on a record breaking streak.

Do you want to know what posts have been most viewed over the last 30 days? Sure you do. Here we go ....

Bicycle Built for 7

This past Saturday, the Colorado Shepards drove up to Fort Collins Colorado.

We decided to check out "Swetsville Zoo". Bill Swets is a retired farmer who has a talent for welding and metal fabrication. Over the years, he was created hundreds of sculptures out of scrap metal. It is really amazing.

The most amazing thing to me is that admission is free. There is a little donation box, in which we made a deposit, but this is completely voluntary.

Brewing Boo Berry Wheat

Recently, I asked my blog readers "What should I #HomeBrew Next?". I did an online poll allowing anyone to vote as many times as they wanted.

Here are the results:

• 2 votes for Black IPA (someone entered it in the Other choice of the poll)
• 5 votes for Ale to the Chief: Honey Porter 
• 12 votes for Eric The Awful 
• 15 votes for Boo Berry Wheat

The Beer Model was pretty happy about the winner. To be honest, I was sort of rooting for Eric The Awful , but I can always brew that next. Actually, I am just glad I got so many votes on the poll.

Shrek and beer

I was looking through this blog's stats the other day. In the "Search Keywords" section for the day. One of the search entries was "шрек и пиво".

According to Google Translate, "шрек и пиво" is Russian for "Shrek and beer". Personally, when I google "Shrek and beer" or "шрек и пиво", I don't come across my blog. Apparently some Russian did, though. Of course, I don't know what search engine was used.

It is interesting to me, though, that someone out there came across my blog while looking for Shrek and beer. I wonder if he or she found what they wanted on my blog or if they just looked real quick, decided they were really looking for something else and then went on the the next search result. I'll never know.

What should I #HomeBrew Next?

I can't decide what to brew next. From time to time, when I have come across such dilemmas, I've called for votes on facebook and twitter to help me decide. Usually I get pretty good feedback, and am able to decide from the votes what to brew. This time I thought I would post an "official" on-line poll like I did in Help Me pick my #IPADay Beer.

So, here we go ... vote as early and often as you would like. If you don't like what I put in the poll, tell me what style you think I should brew in the "Other" choice.

All-Grain Version of the White House Honey Porter

In White House #HomeBrew Recipes, I told you that the White House had emailed me two beer recipes. Of course, they were extract recipes, and if I am going to brew one or both, I need all-grain versions.

I have not seen any all-grain versions of the recipes posted on the inter-webs, yet. So, I decided to go ahead and convert them. Of the two, I am more likely to brew the Honey Porter, so I started with that one. Chances are, I'll convert the other one soon.

You can look at the details of the recipe at Ale to the Chief: Honey Porter.

My #SourBeerDay

I would say that there are 3 kinds of people when it comes to sour beers. You love them or you hate them or you have not tried them.

Most people are in that "have not tried them" category. My wife is in the "hate them" category.

I am in the "love them" category.

As I mentioned last week, Saturday was #SourBeerDay. I really thought I was going to use the "holiday" as an excuse to stop by Crooked Stave's taproom and try a couple of Chad's beers. I never got around to it. Actually, I didn't even drink a sour beer and #SourBeerDay.

But what did I do?

What is #CraftBeer?

We have certainly established that I am a Beer Geek ... Beer Snob ... Craft Beer Fan ... Beer Whatever-you-want-to-call-me.

I like beer. Specifically, I enjoy Craft Beer.

I use the term "Craft Beer" all the time. For the most part, I have a clear picture what I mean when I use the term, but in some cases there is a little bit of technical gray area that bothers me a bit.

What exactly is "Craft Beer".

2012 Q3 SheppyBrew Stats

Can you believe we are into September already? I don't know about you, but for me, the summer has just flown by.

Since another quarter has ended here at the SheppyBrew Brewery, it is time again for me to share some more of my brewing stats (see SheppyBrew 2009 Stats, 1st Quarter Stats, 2nd Quarter Stats, 3rd Quarter Stats, SheppyBrew 2010 Stats, 1st Quarter Brewing Stats, 2nd Quarter Brew Stats, SheppyBrew Stats Q3 2011, 2011 SheppyBrew Stats, 2012 Q1 SheppyBrew Stats, 2012 Q2 SheppyBrew Stats).

Q3 started out a bit slow. In fact, after my last beer in Q2 (Summer Lovin' American Wheat), I did not brew again until the first weekend in August with Ello Poppet Czech Pilsner. As I mentioned in Ello Poppet and Root Beer, I really had to squeeze that brew day in.

So, all my 3rd Quarter brewing was done in August. I got 3 batches done (Ello Poppet, Rocktoberfest Lager, and Laser Salt Sandy Blonde Ale). This brings my 2012 total to 15 so far. Last year, I did 23 batches. There is no way I am going to do 8 batches this quarter to match last year.

#SourBeerDay is September 8th

I love sour beers. One of my #GABF goals every year is to try every sour I come across. As I've mentioned before, I plan on making a sour beer sometime in the "near" future.

I have just learned that September 8th is #SourBeerDay.

It is, obviously, like #IPADay and #StoutDay, only instead of celebrating IPAs and Stouts, this twitter holiday celebrates sour beers of all sorts.

The first sour beer I ever had was a happy accident. My first GABF, I came to the New Belgium booth very early in the night. In fact, I had only had one sample up until that point. I walked up, pointed to a random keg labeled "Eric's Ale", and asked for "some of that". Had I asked what "Eric's Ale" was, I don't know if I would have tried it, since I had never experienced a sour ale before.

But, I loved it. I absolutely loved it. I am bummed out that I have never found it since then. Since then, I have made it my mission at every GABF I have been to (this year will be my third) to try as many sours as possible.

2012 Duck Race Pictures

The Colorado Shepards attended the Breckenridge Duck Races again this year.

We are now officially on a winning streak. Connor's duck came in 28th in the Kids' Duck Dash and came away with a gift certificate to one of Breckenridge's fine establishments (in your face, Tweedle Beetles).

Here are some pictures:

White House #HomeBrew Recipes

I got an email from the White House yesterday. Yes, I am that big of a deal.

The reason I got this email, actually, is that I signed on online petition asking that the White House release its home-brew recipes to the public. You can see it at whitehouse.gov: "Release the recipe for the Honey Ale home brewed at the White House".

The petition was started on August 18th and as I type this, it has 12,240 signatures. Originally, the petition said it would need more than that (24,000?) signatures to "pass", but I guess the white house didn't see any reason not to share the recipes. They are not huge government secrets, and there was certainly interest out there.

I don't know if I will make either of the 2 recipes. Generally speaking, I don't use recipes from other people. Part of the fun of home-brewing is creating my own recipes. I may or may not make an exception here. The White House did make a special effort to email me.

If I do make them, at the very least, I will convert them to all-grain. Of course, I'll have to substitute some Colorado honey for the White House Honey.

Anyway, I think it is cool that the White House is home-brewing, and I think they made the right decision to share the recipes.

August 2012 Blogging

Around 10AM on the 30th, August broke this blog's page view record, previously set in July which was previously set in June which was previously set in May. In fact it has been since May of 2011 that I've been on a record breaking streak.

I suppose if you read this blog regularly enough to remember month to month, you're probably sick of hearing about it. At this point, I feel I have to report on this every month at least until the streak stops. I am sure it will eventually, but this month, you'll have to either ignore this post or suffer through it.

Bonus ... for the first time this year, I beat Mrs. Bluefield in our unofficial number-of-posts contest (not that it is a competition)..

Do you want to know what posts have been most viewed over the last 30 days? If so ....

Brewing Laser Salt Again

"So, Sheppy, what's with the Laser Salt?", asked one of my more loyal readers in a comment of Killing the Glutens. I didn't answer at that time. But, here you go:

The question has to do with SheppyBrew's Laser Salt Sandy Blonde Ale. "Laser Salt" refers to the  Great Sand Dunes National Park. The term "Laser Salt" is an inside joke between the SheppyBrew Beer Model, myself, and a couple of old friends.

The summer that we first moved to Colorado, we decided to head down to the Sand Dunes to camp. Just before we went, a couple of friends came to visit us from Illinois. While talking, my wife told the couple that we were "going blazer camping in the sand". Of course, what this meant was that we were taking the Chevy Blazer that we owned at the time and camping by the Great Sand Dunes. At the time, most of the camping we did was backpacking. Blazer camping just meant we were camping close the car as opposed to backpacking.

Firestone Double Jack

Last Sunday (a week from yesterday), after I got done brewing my Rocktoberfest Lager, I decided to have a beer. For quite some time, there has been a bottle of Double Jack in my beer fridge and it called out to me. I decided it was finally time to pop it open.

You may remember that back in late June, I blogged about Union Jack. Double Jack tastes a bunch like Union Jack. It is 9.5% ABV, but does not taste like it at all. It is a bit dangerous that way. I am amazed how well this captures all the hop and malt flavors and aroma as Union Jack with much more alcohol.

Dogfish Head Indian Brown Ale

A few days after I closed out my quest to try the beers on Zymurgy's 2011 Best Beers in America list, I found Dogfish Head's Indian Brown Ale in my local liquor store. Indian Brown Ale was tied for 34th on the list. Even though I had already moved on to the 2012 list (which did not include Indian Brown), I decided to grab the six pack and blog about it.

It is my blog. I can do this if I want.

Dogfish Head's Indian Brown Ale is a year-round beer. The Dogfish Head website calls it "a cross between a Scotch Ale, an India Pale Ale and an American Brown". It is meant to be a magic blend of hoppy and malty. Its IBU are listed at 50 and its ABV is 7.2%.

If you are familiar with my beer preferences, you can probably imagine that I was really excited to try this beer. I love well hopped beers with more complex malt characters than the typical American IPA. 

Hoppy Press: #HomeBrew meets #Art

About two months ago I got an email from the Contact Me form on this blog.

It was from Greg who was (is) starting a new website called Hoppy Press. Hoppy Press is dedicated to Homebrewing Art. Apparently they have amazing artists/printers lined up to showcase on the website and sell their work.

Greg told me:

"We're dedicated to making quality stuff just like homebrewers. We were tired of thin cheap glossy prints and want to make something that was frame-worthy but still captured the spirit of homebrewing."

I thought this is a cool idea and I told him I would be willing to post his website on this blog. He was not quite ready, yet, since they had not gotten their first print.

A few days ago, I got another email letting me know that their official launch would be today. They have one print for sale. It looks nice. Check it out. I'll let you decide if you want to spend the money, but even if you don't purchase this print, sign up for their newsletter and keep an eye with whatever else they put out.

They also have a twitter feed @HoppyPress if you would like to follow them that way.

Here is their link again:

Hoppy Press

Brewing Rocktoberfest 2012

This weekend, I brewed my Rocktoberfest Lager. It is hard to believe that this is my 4th time brewing it as a lager. Time sure does fly. This is actually the closest that I've brewed it to the right time for it to be ready for an Oktoberfest-style celebration.

The beer was meant to be a pleasant malty fall beer to drink during the baseball playoffs, preferably watching the Rockies. Unfortunately, like last year, the Rockies are no where close to making the playoffs. It is ok, though, I can also drink it watching football or just sitting on my patio on a cool autumn day. Heck, I can drink it on a hot summer day if need be.

Another CYBI Arrogant Bastard

If you read this blog, you probably know that I am a fan of Stone's Arrogant Bastard. My admiration of this beer is not just about it being a fantastic beer. I love the attitude behind the beer. I absolutely love that Stone keeps everything secret about how they make this beer.

I am really fascinated by the Brewing Network's attempts to clone this beer despite Stone's refusal to give any information on this beer.

Well, the BN guys tried again at this year's NHC. I am running behind (again) in my podcasts, so those of you who listen to CYBI probably are already up to speed on this. If you have not already, though, download the episode (Can You Brew It: Arrogant Bastard 4).

Mitch Steele came on again. He (true to form) was not very helpful, but he was extremely nice about it.

#CraftBeer Snobs

I have been accused of being a Beer Snob, and it is not a point which I argue. If I have a choice between an inexpensive or even free mass-produced American Light Lager and a more expensive flavorful craft beer, I will almost always choose to spend the money.

I try not to be condescending about it, but I don't always succeed in that attempt.

I cannot help it. I prefer to drink beers with more flavor, and if that makes me a snob ... I am a snob. As a craft beer drinker, being a "beer snob" is somewhat a badge of honor.

But one thing about me as a craft beer drinker ... compared to your typical BMC beer fan ... If you offer me a beer I have not had before, telling me it is good / unique / wonderful / interesting, I will always try it. ALWAYS. I won't care what color it is. I won't care what style you tell me it is. I won't care what character you tell me you find in it ... I will try that beer. I will try it and thank you. If I don't like it, I will tell you specifically what I don't like about it along with what I do like about it.