Bottling Hoptoberfest

So, I've mentioned that I bribed the people I work with in an attempt to get them to donate to the 2nd Wind Fund. It worked, so I had to brew up more Stouticus American Stout (darn!). I also brewed up a beer that I called Hoptoberfest , which is a Vienna Lager with much more late addition Hallertauer and Crystal hops than you would traditionally get in a Vienna Lager. You could almost call it a love-child between my 15 Year Anniversary Amber Ale and my Rocktoberfest Lager. It was designed with lots of Munich and Vienna malts, fermented with lager yeast at (mostly) lager temperatures, but hopped like the 15 year. Sounds absolutely yummy ... doesn't it? The sample I had certainly tasted like it would be good.

Beer Motivation

A few weeks ago, I started posting "Friday Humor" on my favorite online forum.  It started with the wildly popular post "Visual Explanation of Women" and continued for a few weeks in that same sort of theme.

The past two weeks, I skipped the Friday Humor and replaced them with "2011 #GABF Session 1" and the also-wildly-popular "Sexist Beer Labels"

Surprisingly, apparently a couple of my virtual friends made comments that make me think they miss the little Friday Humor feature of the blog.

I've stolen and posted funny motivational posters before on this blog. They amuse me.

SheppyBrew Stats Q3 2011

I just realized that it is now the 4th quarter of 2011 and that I have not done my quarterly posting of the quarter's SheppyBrew brewing statistics. (see SheppyBrew 2009 Stats, 1st Quarter Stats, 2nd Quarter Stats, 3rd Quarter Stats, SheppyBrew 2010 Stats, 1st Quarter Brewing Stats, 2nd Quarter Brew Stats)

For what it is worth, the 3rd Quarter Stats post from last year are the 9th most popular post all-time on this blog. I know you don't really care, but let's be honest, you've probably already lost interest and won't read the rest of this blog post anyway.

More Beer Labels

So, I got some feedback on my article "Sexist Beer Labels" that I thought I would share.

Some of my virtual friends from the Mr. Beer forum added in the following artwork:

Drinking Ellie's Brown Ale

While grilling some brats Saturday evening, I drank my third beer from the 5280 Seasonal Six Pack. Avery Brewing Company's Ellie's Brown Ale pours deep dark brown with a nice tan head. I do not know if I may have just been in the right mood for a brown ale, but I thought this beer was absolutely fantastic.

Back to the mash tun

Saturday, I took the wife and kids on a field trip to The Brew Hut to get ingredients for the 2011 version of SheppyBrew's X-Mas Ale. I brewed it up on Sunday.

The kids really like the Dry Dock

Of course, my big fermenter was full of Stouticus American Stout, so I got up early and bottled up Stouticus. This time, I mixed sugar and the beer in a corny keg and used my Beer Gun to bottle it up. It seems to have gone smoother this way, but that may have just been the fun of a new process. One decent advantage of using the keg is that it is easier to get every bit of beer out of the keg than it is out of a bottling bucket.

Brecken

Remember that not-too-long-ago I mentioned that I have hundreds of sister-in-laws? Well, with hundreds of aunts, that means my kids have thousands of cousins *.

Yesterday my wife and I got one more niece and the boys got another cousin.

The newest child is named Brecken ... I'm sure named after Breckenridge Brewery **. I think that is the coolest name I've heard in quite awhile.

Note: this is not a recent photo of Brecken.

I am a guy, so I don't remember any of the important stats other than everyone is doing fine. Congratulations to Carrie and Dave and Brecken!




* Actual numbers are not quite as high as described in this blog.
** Saying that "Brecken" is short for "Breckenridge Brewery" is speculation on my part. It is also most likely not true.

Sexist Beer Labels

Speaking of sexist ...I have mentioned before (see Beer Ads) that I am a fan of the BMC beer television commercials. They amuse me. Even the ones (maybe even especially the ones) that offend feminist beer geeks by objectifying women. Again, I am not proud of it, but it is the way it is. These sorts of commercials don't make me want to buy their product, but that is another story.

The BMC breweries may have the lead in great T.V. commercials, but craft breweries dominate in bottle labels. Here are just some of the wonderfully sexist labels out there. These are not even the most chauvinisticly offensive ones. I've never bought any of these beers (I did have samples of Lagunitas A Little Sumpin' Sumpin' Ale and Stumptown Tart Strawberry Ale at GABF ... both very good), but if I saw one of these in my liquor store, I would at least consider buying it for the clever labels.

Drinking Psychotically

You may recall that not too long ago I brewed a beer that I called "Psychotically Dark and Bitter IDA" (see Psycho Dark and Bitter on this blog). It was a beer that I brewed to use up some Mr. Beer ingredients. (see the recipe at SheppyBrew.com).

This weekend, I poured myself a couple of bottles.

Regardless whether you call this a black IPA, a Cascadian dark, American style black or India Dark Ale, SheppyBrew's Psychotically Dark and Bitter Ale is wonderfully dark and hoppy and pleasant to drink.

2011 #GABF Final? Thoughts

What a weekend!

If you've never been to the GABF, I won't be able to properly explain it to you, so I won't even try.

A couple of  "notes to self"...

471 Double IPA

So, remember last week, I mentioned the 5280 Magazine seasonal six pack? Sunday (yes, the day after GABF), I decided to use my new grill and while doing so I tried my second beer of the 6 pack. This beer was Breckenridge Brewery's 471 double IPA. 471 IPA is one of BB's small batch series. It is a year-round beer, but as a small batch beer, it is also in limited edition. I do not think I've ever had this one, although it is possible that at some point I've sucked one down at some point at the Breckenridge Brew Pub. It is a 9.2% ABV beer with 70 IBU's.

The aroma is full of wonderful American citrus hops, although I do detect a bit of an English ale feel to the finishing hops. The beer does use Fuggles hops and I don't know if the English feel is a function of the fuggles or the grain bill or a combination of the two. The malt does smell rich and full. Very nice.

3218

Remember when I thought getting over 1000 page views for a month on this blog was a big deal? It was not that long ago that I reported May broke my page view record. Since then, every month has broken that record.

The page view total for September was 3218. I know that real bloggers probably think that is nothing, but for my little blog, that is a really big number.

2011 #GABF Session 3

Since the Saturday afternoon session is for Brewing Association and American Home-Brew Association members only, their was no "members only" line to get in quickly. It really helps put into perspective how great having access to the quick line was for the other sessions. We got there about 11:50 or so and had to walk almost all the way around the huge Denver Convention Center to get in line. Luckily, once the line gets moving, it is quick. Still, it is much nicer to do the short line.

2011 #GABF Session 2

Did I mention how much I love having access to the members only line? Well, I do. It might be worth the cost of admission to the AHA just because of that little perk.

Friday night I was lucky enough to be accompanied by the hottest brew babe in Denver (quite likely the hottest brew babe in the world). She had to drop off the kids and traffic sucked we didn't meet up at the light rail station until around 5:30 pm. When we got there around 6-ish or so, the general admission line was still extremely long, but we got to walk right in. It is cool how fast the general admission line moves, but walking right in is better.

2011 #GABF Session 1

Ok, so the members only line RULES!! The festival started at 5:30. I was in and had my cup collected by 5:35. As planned, I got to New Glarus early but they did not Belgium Red. Tried their Raspberry Tart instead. It was Ok. I also tried their Blacktop IPA which was fantastic. I thought it was probably my favorite beer of the night.

Pre-event #GABF Post

Ok ... it must be GABF time. My blog is seeing lots of traffic today and almost all of it is looking at GABF related content.

I think I'm ready for tonight. The GABF posted their Beers at the Festival page today. I did a quick cross-reference against my Thursday night #GABF plan. Quite a few of the beers I want to try are not going to be at the festival, but that isn't too disappointing. I'll get over it. Tonight is mostly about reconnaissance anyway. I have to be at work tomorrow, so I'll take it real easy tonight anyway.

Droid and beer

I have had severe phone envy of my wife since she got her Droid 2. But my Verizon "new every two" just came up I just got a new Droid 3. This is just a test email from the new phone as practice for the blog entries I will be making from GABF over the next few days.

The picture is of Victory brewing company's HopDevil IPA. The SheppyBrew Beer Model purchased a six pack for me while she and her mom were on their shopping weekend. Not bad at all.

Not a great photo, but ok for a blog test.

Now I really wish the GABF made a droid app instead of an iPhone app.!

Oh well, we will see how it goes.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless Phone

Thursday night #GABF plan

A couple weeks ago (it is hard to believe it has already been almost two weeks) after the GABF map came out, I started to discuss My #GABF Game Plan. I think I am ready to finalize my plan for the Thursday night session of GABF.

Flashback India Brown Ale

Here it is ... #GABF week. Aren't you excited?

5280 Magazine recently came out with a seasonal six pack. Back in March I mentioned their Colorado Best Beers, and I guess that was such a success that they followed up with a seasonal six pack. I grabbed mine a few weeks ago.

Thankyou Stouticus

You may remember that Stouticus came about because the COO of the company I work for asked me to make a beer. I ended up sharing the first batch with everyone in the company.

When the SheppyBrew beer model signed us up for the 2nd wind fund again this year, I sent out an email at work offering everyone who donated some more Stouticus. A few people took me up on the offer by donating. Today, I brewed the "Thank you" batch of Stouticus.

The recipe changed just a bit from last time. You can see the recipe on the Stouticus page on the SheppyBrew site. It is a quite a bit higher in alcohol and is not nearly as afraid of the stout roast. It also uses some flaked barely (first time I've used flaked barely).

Making cookies

My wife left us again this weekend. Her mom is visiting and they went on a "shopping weekend". Personally I have a hard time thinking of something that sounds like worse torture than a "shopping weekend". I suppose a "shopping week" or "shopping month" would be worse, but not much else. I watched a movie last night that was close, but that only lasted 2 hours give or take.

So, what did the boys want to do with the women away?

They wanted to bake cookies.

Visual Explanation of Women III

As I mentioned in Visual Explanation of Women, my sister-in-law forwarded me an email. Here is another thing that was in it.

NOTE: To get the full effect of the animated image, you have to click on it to link to the actual big picture. 

Have you ever wondered how a woman's brain works?
 Well....it's finally explained here in one, easy-to-understand illustration:

Every one of those little blue balls is a thought about something
 That needs to be done, a decision or a problem that needs to be solved.

 A man has only 2 balls and they take up all his thoughts.

Green Flash West Coast IPA

Green Flash Brewing Company is one of millions of craft breweries located in and around San Diego, CA (millions might be a slight exaggeration). Their West Coast IPA is listed as tied for #48 on my 2011 Best Beer in America poll. I saw it in my liquor store last time I was there (the same time I picked up Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron).

West Coast IPA has an ABV of 7.3% and claims 95 IBUs. On the "Our Beers" page of the Green Flash website, it says:

A menagerie of hops is layered throughout the brewing process: Simcoe for unique fruitiness and grapefruit zest, Columbus for strong hop pungency, Centennial for pine and citrus notes and Cascade for floral aroma. A multi-dimensional hop experience.

Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron

Last time I was in my liquor store, I grabbed a 4-pack of Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron. This was listed as tied for #34 on the 2011 Best Beer in America poll. Of course Dogfish Head will be at GABF, but I stayed away from that huge line last year, and expect I'll stay away again this year.

Just as a little editorial interjection. I will never understand why Sam Calagione's show, Brew Masters, was not more popular on the discovery channel. Their most fatal flaw was probably that it was a show that I liked. Whenever I decide I like a show enough to DVR every episode ... that is when the show is probably in trouble. Maybe, this is a topic for another time.

Anyway... back to the regularly scheduled blog post ...

#SexistPig but not Proud Of It

The other day, I was hitting old "you might also like" links in my blog. I am probably way too Sheppy-Centric, but I do that from time to time. This blog has been around a long time and lots of the posts I had completely forgotten about. Sometimes I find something interesting or amusing. It is really fun to look through my old blog posts. It interests me much more than it probably does you, but try it sometime and let me know if you find anything interesting. (i.e., leave comments please)

One of the posts I came across was 7th Commandment. I thought it was incredibly amusing. LOL, ROFL, LMAO, perhaps not quite ROFLMAO but hilarious non-the-less. Go ahead, read it. Man, I crack myself up sometimes.

Ommegang Three Philosophers

Right after the 2011 Best Beer in America poll came out, I stopped by my local liquor store to see if I could find a beer to check off my list. I came across a bottle of Ommegang Three Philosophers, and grabbed it.

It has been sitting in my fridge since then.

Belgium beers are a bit tough for me to evaluate. I am slowly but surely developing an appreciation for the funk derived from most Belgium yeasts, but that flavor and aroma really has to be restrained for me to like a beer. To be honest, if I can detect any flavor that is obviously yeast-driven, I automatically like the beer less than something with a cleaner yeast profile. That is why SheppyBrew's Buckwheat BPA doesn't really use a Belgium yeast, and I ferment it pretty cool. Yes, I should probably stop calling it a Belgium Pale Ale.

Visual Explanation of Women II

As I mentioned in Visual Explanation of Women, my sister-in-law forwarded me an email. Here are another couple of things that were in it.

By the way ... according to my blogger stats, Visual Explanation of Women was wildly popular. I had a huge "page view" day the date that I posted it, and it is currently already #5 on the all-time viewed list. That was sort of unexpected.

Anyway ... here are a couple more. These are not as good as the first ones.

#GABF Big Friendly Guide

In the category of  "ask and you shall receive" ... I got an email from my Contact Me form today in response to my blog post "My #GABF Game Plan".

Honestly, I was a bit bummed out that GABF spent the time and effort to develop an iPhone app. I love the concept. I just don't have an iPhone. Not only don't I have an iPhone, but I will never purchase an iPhone. My wife has an Android phone, so it would be better for me if they developed an Android app. But, personally, I think it would make much more sense to develop part of their website with this sort of functionality so EVERY smart phone could take advantage of the data they are making available for iPhone users.

My #GABF Game Plan

Over the weekend, I saw that the GABF Map has been posted. This means I can start designing my plan-of-attack for the festival. There are over 450 breweries and over 2000 beers. Obviously, I cannot try every one. I have my list of beer to attempt to sample. I know which breweries are going to be there but not which beers each brewery will serve. There are a few breweries I know for sure I want to hit in addition to my list. My buddy Diane from Mr. Beer told me to be on the lookout for "killer chile beer". I will, of course, be continually seeking sour beers as I wander.

Of course, the game plan needs to be flexible, but here are some elements I am pretty sure of (in no particular order):

Brewing more Rocktoberfest

I brewed up my Rocktoberfest lager this weekend. Yes, it is a bit late to save the Rockies season. I'm certainly not going to be able to drink it while watching them in the playoffs this year. It is also not going to be ready for any traditional Oktoberfest time period. Luckily, I still have some left from last time I brewed it, which was back in January. I had a bottle the other night and it was totally fantastic. Come to think of it, maybe I'm making this batch for NEXT year. On second thought, I can drink an Oktoberfest beer in the winter. Don't worry, it will be fine.

Beer Gun

I've done 7 blog posts in GABF month, and only one of them has been about beer or brewing. Shameful. Anyone coming from the Complete List of Beer Blogs will wonder why the hell this is listed as a beer blog. I guess Root Beer and Pretzels mentions BYO magazine. Does that count?

But don't worry, beer lovers. Today's entry does have to do with beer.

I used my Blichman Beer Gun for the first time yesterday. The beer gun is SheppyBrew's newest toy. In case you do not know, the beer gun is designed to transfer kegged beer to bottles. I probably should have tried a less-expensive home-made method, but I decided to treat myself to this extravagance. Since I have never bottled from a keg before, I cannot comment on advantages over other methods. But the beer gun is pretty slick.

Visual Explanation of Women

By the way, please don't forget ... I need donations for the 2nd Wind Fund of Metro Denver (see 2nd Wind Fund of Metro Denver (2011) )  I think we have a respectable number of donations, but nothing close to what we got each of the last two years.

Anyway ...

My Sister-In-Law (one of the hundreds that I have) forwarded my an email titled "Women As Explained by Engineers". I don't usually forward this sort of thing along, but I thought it was humorous enough to at least share a couple of the things in there. There are a couple more that I may share at a later date.

2nd Wind Fund of Metro Denver (2011)

Yes, we (the Colorado Shepard Family) are trying to help raise money again for the 2nd Wind Fund of Metro Denver. If you are my facebook friend, you might have already seen me post our fund-raising page. I also personally messaged some of you. At the time I am typing this into the computer, a couple generous people have donated and I have had several more let me know that they will donate.

The mission of Second Wind Fund of Metro Denver (SWFMD) is to decrease the incidence of teen suicide by removing financial and social barriers to treatment for at-risk youth. Personally, I cannot think of anything more tragic than kids committing suicide. This year is 2nd Wind's 10th anniversary of their fund-raising festival / run / walk. If you are a Denver-area resident, it is worth coming and checking out at the Jefferson County fairgrounds on Sunday, September 18th.

If you are not participating, PLEASE consider dropping by our fund-raising page and making a donation.

http://www.runningguru.com/RunWithMe.asp?mID=Shepard2963

Last year, the family raised $1,275.
The year before, we raised $1,100.
It would obviously be nice to beat those numbers this year. If you can help out, please do.

Pictures from the 2011 Breckenridge Duck Races

If you've been following around in the recent developments on the whole Tweedle Beetle saga. (especially my last blog entry) , you know that the Colorado Shepards attended the The Summit Foundation 24th Annual Great Rubber Duck Races.

You also know that this year (for the first time EVER) we overcame the cheating efforts of the Tweedle Beetles and WON! Yes, it was only 12th place, but that was good enough to make the list of winners and get a prize.

IN YOUR FACES, Tweedle Beetles!

Here are some pictures from Race Day:

Tweedle Beetles Return Part III

So, if you've been following along with  Tweedle Beetles Return Part I and Tweedle Beetles Return Part II. you may be asking yourself "Why is Sheppy so sure that the Tweedle Beetles are involved with this mess?" If you haven't been following along, go back and read Part I and Part II.

#StoutDay is November 3rd

Hmmm... remember I told you about the social media "International #IPADay" on this blog (August 4th)? Apparently, the powers that be decided that it was such a huge success that they would go ahead and follow it up with International #StoutDay on November 3rd. I'm not sure how they defined success, but I suspect it has to do with the number of #IPADay hash tags you could see on twitter that day (http://twitter.com/#!/search/%23ipaday).

Tweedle Beetles Return Part II

picture from geocaching.com (of all places)

I know you have all been waiting with great anticipation for the exciting conclusion to Tweedle Beetles Return Part I. Ok, you probably don't care that much, but it is my blog, and this is what I'm posting today, so deal with it. If you need to catch up, go ahead and read part I. Go ahead, part II will still be here when you are done.

So, I have all these emails coming into my sheppybrew inbox. There were not so many that it was unmanageable. It was just annoying. So, what did I do? I decided to program a CAPTCHA challenge into adding comments to my site.

Root Beer and Pretzels

We have had the 2nd part of a Mr. Root Beer kit for quite some time without a whole lot of interest from the kids about making it. In fact, I think the last time we did make root beer, I think was back in June of 2009.

But, for some reason, recently Tyler has been asking to make root beer, and this past Sunday, he and I finally did.

The Tweedle Beetles Return Part I

picture from geocaching.com (of all places)

I finally figured it out! Those sneaky little Tweedle Beetles are back! Well, I don't suppose they ever really left, but they have been quiet for quite some time. For whatever reason, they have decided to passive-aggressively attack me over the past several days. Sadly, it took me over a week to discover the identity of the attackers. Damn Tweedle Beetles!

Psycho Dark and Bitter

I brewed another batch of beer last night. I call this recipe Psychotically Dark and Bitter IDA (follow the link to see the recipe). It is another batch of beer designed to use up Mr. Beer ingredients that were given to me (ie free!) last year at GABF.

Of course, India Dark Ale (IDA) is what I like to call the Black IPA / Cascadian Dark Ale / American-Style India Black Ale / whatever-else-people-call-it. I just hate the Cascadian Dark Ale name simply because it implies that is a regional beer style exclusively created in and for the Pacific Northwest. I like (and have used) the name "Black IPA", but calling a beer "Black" and "Pale Ale" just seems too oxymoronish. I like "American-Style India Black Ale", but it seems a bit long for the name of a style. Here are some of the articles in this blog in which I have mentioned the style: "Black IPA / IDA", "Cascadian Dark Ale", "Stone Soup IDA".

Fermentedly Challenged and other misc blog stuff

Dave, the author of "Fermentedly Challenged" has commented on my blog a fair amount recently. I appreciate it enough that I feel that I should point out his blog to my other readers. I am not sure doing so will help his blog traffic. Probably not, but I don't think it can hurt either.

"Fermentedly Challenged" is a relatively new addition to the "Blogs I Read" section on the right side of my blog. He is a great source for Colorado-related news. In fact, he gives Colorado Beer News just about every day. That is one of my favorite parts of "Fermentedly Challenged". It is a great place to get Colorado-centric beer information.

Buckwheat BPA Brew Day

So, I brewed Buckwheat's BPA today. I got started before church by printing out the brew sheet from Beer Smith. Then, I heated up 8 gallons of water and put it in my 10 gallon cooler. I let it sit in there until I got home from church.

2011 #GABF Attending Breweries

Image from GABF Site

I just noticed that GABF has posted the attending breweries (Breweries at the Festival). I think this is a recent posting, but I just may have missed it up until now. I am not sure this is a final list. It might not be, but I don't think the final list would be much different than this one.

Of course, I have mentioned the GABF on this blog quite a bit: http://blog.ericshepard.com/search/label/GABF .

Part of the reason that this list is interesting to me is that I will be attending the festival and will use it to try to find beers on the Zymurgy Best Beers in America list that I don't get a chance to try elsewhere.

Here are the beers on the list that I have not had (or at least I don't know for sure that I've had):

Brewing Wetta Blonde with Mr. Beer

Until tonight, I have not brewed a Mr. Beer batch of beer in awhile. According to my records, I brewed "Eric's Red" on 12/21/2010 (see Brewing Eric's Red). I kept telling myself that I'm going to brew something with the HME's / UME's that I got Peter after GABF, but I just have not done it (until tonight).

Looking through ingredients in stock at the SheppyBrew nano-brewery, I had some Mr. Beer Classic American Blonde Ale HME and some Mr. Beer Pale Export UME. I also had some East Kent Goldings hops, some SafeAle American Ale (US05), and some honey. It just so happens that those ingredients are all I need to make my Wetta Blonde Ale. So, I decided to brew up some Wetta Blonde.

Just the Boys Camping

For most of the summer the boys have been saying that they wanted to go "just the boys" camping (this means without Mom ... in case you were not able to figure that out). This weekend was finally the time we did it. We decided to go to Buffalo Creek Campground, which was the place Tyler and I did our first "Just me and My Dad" trip. It isn't the greatest campground in the world, but it takes reservations and it certainly is not the worst place either.

Another taste of Cider (without the breast flashing)

Had another bottle of my homemade hard cider tonight. Check out "Simple Hard Cider", "Bottled Cider", and "Cider Drinking and Breast Flashing" as a reminder about the cider.

I think it is better than it was. It probably needed that little bit of age. I even had this bottle warm. I think it would be even better cold. I went ahead and put the rest of the bottles in the fridge so that next time I try it, it will be nice and cold. I'm not sure how long this will last, but I'll try to report back as it is in the bottle longer.

Little Lion Man

When I work too late into the night, I have a hard time getting to sleep.

It doesn't really help to be at the computer after. At this point, I really should be sleeping.

I do really like this song ... I wish the beer model could play it on the guitar. I suppose it probably is not nearly as good with one musician, though.

click to show lyrics

Weep for yourself, my man,
You'll never be what is in your heart
Weep Little Lion Man,
You're not as brave as you were at the start
Rate yourself and rake yourself,
Take all the courage you have left
Wasted on fixing all the problems
That you made in your own head

But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn't I, my dear?
Didn't I, my...

Tremble for yourself, my man,
You know that you have seen this all before
Tremble Little Lion Man,
You'll never settle any of your scores
Your grace is wasted in your face,
Your boldness stands alone among the wreck
Now learn from your mother or else spend your days Biting your own neck

But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn't I, my dear? (x2)

Didn't I, my dear?

Ahhhhh......

But it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn't I, my dear? (x2)

Didn't I, my dear?

SNB Brewing Blog

SNB Brewing

Recently, I discovered that another one of my Mr. Beer forum virtual brewing buddies has a blog. Actually, I didn't so much discover it. He told me about it.

I like it when my virtual brewing friends have web-sites or blogs because when they keep them up to date, I can see what they are up to. I don't pay attention to the forums as much as I used to and even when I did, I missed a majority of what was going on. I do pay attention to various blogs, though. If you are on the "blogs I read" section of my blog, I read all your posts within a day or two (usually) of the time the rss feed updates the information over there. I have several other blogs that I follow through rss feeds and catch most of what goes on in those blogs.

Hot Chelle Rae

click to show song

It’s been a really really messed up week Seven days of torture, seven days of bitter And my girlfriend went and cheated on me She’s a California dime but it’s time for me to quit her
La la la, whatever, la la la, it doesn’t matter, la la la, oh well, la la la
We’re going at it tonight tonight There’s a party on the rooftop top of the world Tonight tonight and were dancing on the edge of the Hollywood sign I don’t know if I’ll make it but watch how good I’ll fake it Its all right, all right, tonight, tonight
I woke up with a strange tattoo Not sure how I got it, not a dollar in my pocket
And it kinda looks just like you Mixed with Zach Galifianakis
La la la, whatever, la la la, it doesn’t matter, la la la, oh well, la la la
We’re going at it tonight tonight There’s a party on the rooftop top of the world Tonight tonight and were dancing on the edge of the Hollywood sign I don’t know if I’ll make it but watch how good I’ll fake it Its all right, all right, tonight, tonight
You got me singing like Woah, come on, ohh, it doesn’t matter, woah, everybody now, ohh
Just don’t stop let’s keep the beat pumpin’ Keep the beat up, lets drop the beat down It’s my party dance if I want to We can get crazy let it all out
Just don’t stop let’s keep the beat pumpin’ Keep the beat up, lets drop the beat down It’s my party dance if I want to We can get crazy let it all out
Its you and me and were runnin this town And its me and you and were shakin the ground And ain’t nobody gonna tell us to go cause this is our show
Everybody Woah, come on, ohh, all you animals Woah, let me hear you now, ohh
Tonight tonight there’s a party on the rooftop top of the world Tonight tonight and were dancing on the edge of the Hollywood sign I don’t know if I’ll make it but watch how good I’ll fake it Its all right, all right, tonight, tonight Its all right, all right, tonight, tonight Yeah its all right, all right, tonight, tonight
Just singing like Woah, come on, ohh, all you party people Woah, all you singletons, ohh, even the white kids
Just don’t stop lets keep the beat pumpin’ Keep the beat up, lets drop the beat down Its my party dance if I want to We can get crazy let it all out
Just don’t stop lets keep the beat pumpin’ Keep the beat up, lets drop the beat down Its my party dance if I want to We can get crazy let it all out

Guitar Lady Goofy Kid

Well, believe it or not, there are a couple more videos to post from the Laser Camping in the Salt trip.

I still have not told you why I call it "Laser Camping in the Salt". Does anyone want to take a guess? Do you? Do you?

You could win fabulous prizes if you come up with the best (one that entertains me the most) answer. Double points if it is the right answer too.

Videos from Laser Camping in the Salt

As promised, here are some videos from our "Laser Camping in the Salt" trip.

Laser Camping in the Salt

We went to the Great Sand Dunes National Park last weekend. It is only about 4.5 hours south west of us, but the Colorado Shepards have not been there since the summer after we first moved to Colorado. Of course that was before we had kids, so the youngest members of our family have never been.

I should apologize (especially for those of you with dial-up internet connections) for the number of pictures here. It was hard to cut down the selection (although this is not even close to all of the ones we have).

Hoppy #IPADay and @IntlBeerDay

Almost a month ago The Beer Wench announced that August 4 is "International #IPADay". It is designed to be a social media phenomenon to promote the popularity of craft beer. The hash tag is a twitter-specific thing, and when the announcement went out, I noticed quite a bit of reaction at http://twitter.com/#!/search/%23ipaday . Most of it was positive. Some of it was negative. Some of it was almost make-personal-attacks-at-Ashley-kind-of-negative. I suppose that is a function of twitter. Can't please everyone I guess. The very next day, the Wench made another post about the event to answer questions she apparently got (mostly from twitter, I'm sure).

SheppyBrew Zazzle Store

Quite some time ago, I noticed a that the Bearded Brewer (Bearded Brewing Blog listed in the "Blogs I Follow" section at the right of this page) had a link to his very own "Zazzle Shop". Basically, Zazzle allows you to create all kinds of customized products. You can upload pictures to place on all kinds of things to brand them however you want. You can order straight from Zazzle. Even cooler, you can show your custom products on your own online-store. Zazzle takes care of everything and will give you a royalty on anything bought through your store. At the time, I thought it was really cool. I thought I might like to have SheppyBrew products available in something similar.

Then, I forgot about it for awhile. But, recently, I've been playing around with creating SheppyBrew branded products on Zazzle. Then a couple of days ago, I made my own Zazzle Shop at http://www.zazzle.com/sheppybrew to share these products. Now, I am finally sharing the shop with the world.

Record Smecord

Remember I told you that May was going to break this blog's "page views" record for any month? (see Record Breaking if you need to refresh your memory)

Well, May did break the record. It blew away the previous record 1383 to 1008. That 1008 page view record had held since September of last year.

As it turns out, June blew away May's record 1950 to 1383. July might break June's record. It will be close, but even if not, it blew away May as well. July's page view count is already at 1832 with a few days left to go. I'm wondering if the blog is starting a new trend or if the page views will return to the level of a couple of months ago. I guess we'll have to see.

This picture is not related to the topic of this post. I just felt it needed some picture.

In May, I had Cider Drinking and Breast Flashing to thank for increased views. I cannot attribute any one blog post in June or July for any increase in traffic, although people liked looking at my Fermentation Video in June. Readers also seemed pretty interested that I Got my G.A.B.F. Tickets and that I'm Moving on to 2011 Best Beers List. Women and Beer came on pretty strong at the end of July. Also, for whatever reason, our trip to Geneva Park Campground last August got quite a bit of interest lately. I still don't get very many comments, although I have gotten a few more than usual over the past few days.

Anyway, I'm sure no one cares, but I don't really have anything that exciting to share with you at the moment.

Phat & Tyred Brew day

Seems like forever since I've brewed beer, but today I brewed up a batch of my world famous Phat & Tyred Amber Ale. This is my first 5 gallon batch of the P&T beer. It is also the first time I've tried my modified BIAB process.

My modified BIAB process is basically using a nylon bag inside a 10 gallon gott cooler. I used no sparge, and I got all my boil volume from the mash itself.

Grains ready for the strike water

Beer Smith gave me a strike water volume of almost 8 gallons at a temperature of 161F. Just in case you were wondering, 8 gallons of water is pretty heavy. 8 gallons of hot water is probably pretty dangerous, so if you are going to copy this process, you might want to be careful. I wasn't, but I'm not that bright. Plus, I lead a Semi Charmed Kind of Life, so I won't get hurt. You might.

Women and Beer

Remember back in March of 2010 I mentioned that I had been surprised to find two women working in my local home brew shop (LHBS)? If not, feel free to review at  "My LHBS's".

Now-a-days, I see a lot more women in the LHBS's. Not only do my two main shops employ women, but I see more that seem to be there shopping for brewing ingredients rather than just tagging along with their husbands or boyfriends. Heck, even the Beer Model has brewed a couple of batches of beer, so I see at least one female home-brewer every day.

I would also say that women make up a decent percentage of craft "Beer Geeks". I think of the beer bloggers that I follow, at least half are women. And I think that a higher percentage of women who say they are beer drinkers tend to drink craft beer than do men who say they are beer drinkers.

From 26 Highly Suggestive Beer Ads

And yet, BMC (Bud/Miller/Coors) breweries continue to act as if women don't drink beer. Worse, they act like women CANNOT like beer. Remember my blog post "Beer Ads"? I commented on sexist beer ads and how I'm not sure they actually sell beer like they should. I made this observation after reading an article in which "The Beer Wench" had been complaining about the sexist nature of beer advertisements from large breweries. Personally, as a male chauvinist pig, I have no problem with the sexist nature of the beer ads. I just don't think they are effective at selling beer. I can understand that female consumers might not be too happy about these ads. The Wench is not the only beer blogger I've seen make the same point. Unfortunately, I didn't save the links to any of the other articles. Trust me, though, most women beer geeks don't appreciate seeing sexist beer ads.

Helpful #HomeBrew Thieves

My wife's family visited this past weekend.

They came in last Thursday night and then we spent the weekend (Friday thru Monday) up in Breckenridge.

I wanted them to help me reduce my SheppyBrew inventory, and they did. Boy did they help.

I started them off with some Summer Lovin' American Wheat in hopes that they would help me kill that keg so that I could have an empty one (see below for why it was important to have an empty keg). After awhile Thursday night, though, they wanted to try some other beers, and of course I let them.

Tracy's dad seemed to really enjoy both the Gringo Cerveza Cream Ale and the Gringo Cerveza Jalapeño Cream Ale. He is certainly not a craft-beer drinker, and I was not surprised at all that the Cream Ale would be his favorite. I am a bit surprised that he like the Jalapeño beer, though.

The newest brother-in-law tried a bunch of different kinds. The one he seemed to like the most was 15 Year Anniversary Amber Ale. He told me that ambers are his favorite. I suppose he probably would have been a fan of Phat & Tyred Amber Ale, but I didn't have any to offer him.

The older brother-in-law (older than the newer b-i-l ... not older than I am) also tried a bunch. He was a real big fan of the Fox Sox Knox Rye Pale Ale and the TommyHawk APA. He especially enjoyed the dry-hopped version of the TommyHawk, which was my favorite of the evening. I thought both those beers were tasting particularly delicious that night as well.

Tracy's youngest sister is pregnant, so didn't have much. She did have a few sips here and there and made some very complimentary comments.

The middle sister isn't much of a beer fan but did seem to like Summer Lovin' American Wheat and Buckwheat's Belgium Pale Ale.

I brought the rest of the keg up to Breckenridge. It emptied early Friday afternoon. This makes me very happy.

I let youngest sister take some beer home to one of my virtual beer friends. Hopefully next time I see her, she will be able to obtain some of his for me to try.

The SheppyBrew inventory is much lower than it was before the in-laws came to visit. In fact, it is lower than it has been in a long time. This is good in that I now can brew again. Sadly, we wiped out 15 Year Anniversary Amber Ale and Fox Sox Knox Rye Pale Ale. I'll certainly have to brew those again.

Can't wait to work on my pipeline again.

So, why did I want to have an empty keg? The last beer I made and kegged was Quarter Life Crisis Hoppy Red Ale. I dry hop this beer, and this time I decided to try dry hopping without using any kind of hop sack. Then, I didn't cold-crash and probably was not as careful as I should be to leave behind the bottom hop matter when I transferred from the carboy into the corny. Anyway, I ended up with enough hop matter in the keg that my poppet valve on the beer-out side was clogged up and the keg did not dispense beer.

The only thing I could think of to rectify the situation was to move the QLC into another keg, but at the time, my only other keg was full of Summer Lovin' Wheat. I would have bought another keg, but at the moment, used corny kegs are pretty expensive, plus I knew that the Beer Model's family was coming and that they have been known to consume a fair amount of beer when with me.

Tonight, I sanitized the empty keg and siphoned beer from the full keg to the empty one. I left a couple of liters of the QLC behind just to try to keep as much of the hop matter out of the new keg. I didn't waste it, though, I transferred some of that into a pint glass and the rest into a growler. I drank the pint glass and the growler is still in my fridge.

The new keg of QLC has been pressurized and is in the keggerator. I just poured myself about 10oz, and it does flow. It also tastes very good.

I guess the SheppyBrew Brew Master will consider this a learning experience. I'll be using hop sacks for dry-hopping and/or making sure I cold crash and/or be careful transferring dry-hopped beers into kegs. All's well that ends well, but I don't want to make this same mistake again.

Next brew day for SheppyBrew:  Phat & Tyred Amber Ale.

Belgo @NewBelgium

You can see over on the left side of this blog in my "Blogs I Read" section that I follow the New Belgium Brewery blog.

Today they posted "A sneak peek at something new and exciting... " Apparently, New Belgium Brewery is going to start brewing its Belgo IPA as part of its "Explorer Series", which basically means it will be available all the time instead of as part of its experimental / small batch "Lips of Faith" series of beers.

This interested me because Belgo India Pale Ale is a beer I blogged about back in November. (see http://blog.ericshepard.com/2010/11/belgo-india-pale-ale.html).

I liked the beer, but I think part of its appeal to me was that it was a limited edition type beer. For the most part, if I want a hoppy IPA, I am not really in the mood for the Belgium funk. If I feel like the Belgium funk, I'm not really looking for the citrusy hops of an American IPA. If I am purchasing an experimenting or limited edition beer, I am looking for something different than usual, so I am fine with that sort of conflicting flavor profiles. But, if it something I can buy at any time, I'm not sure that I will.

I guess we'll see. I wonder if it will come out in cans.

Anyway, I thought this was an interesting development, and so I thought I'd share it with those of you who don't follow the New Belgium blog. Of course chances are no one but me find it interesting.

World Famous Phat and Tyred

I sort of jokingly refer to my "world famous" Phat and Tyred Amber Ale. It is one of my favorite SheppyBrews. Not only does it taste wonderful, but it was also my first completely non-Mr. Beer recipe. It was my first partial mash. It was one of my first all-grain beers. It is one of the beers that I've brewed over and over again, and tweaked the recipe just about every time. I've only brewed Buckwheat's Belgium Pale Ale more often.

When I recently shared with my Mr. Beer virtual friends that I had only brewed 3 times last quarter (see 2nd Quarter 2011 Brew Stats), I got a response from one of the guys, "I brewed your Fat Tire Clone 3 times this past quarter if you want to add that to your stats...". (don't believe me? click here)

Also, Phat & Tyred Amber Ale made it to the "The #homebrew Daily" on July 10th. Apparently the guy who does "The #homebrew Daily" follows me on twitter, and his paper.li picked up on my tweet. I am pretty sure this is the first time I've ever made any type of paper.li news paper. Pretty exciting.

So, I guess my Phat and Tyred Amber Ale  is "world famous"! This is at least the third non-Sheppy brewer that has made a version of this beer. There are one or two others who told me they were going to brew it, but who never let me know if they ever actually did. If I know about these people, I'm sure there must be countless more who have or are planning to brew it as well.

It usually gets referred to as my "Fat Tire Clone". Although it did start out as an intended clone, I do not like to call it one now. I've purposely modified the recipe away from being exactly like Fat Tire to more perfectly match my tasting preferences. It is fine if others call it my Fat Tire clone, though. I'm just honored that they recognize it.

Of course, I had intended to brew Phat and Tyred Amber Ale to be my first kegged beer. But as you may recall (Worst brew day ever?). Things got screwed up and I ended up with "Fat and Stoopid" instead. While a very good beer and a wonderful way to start kegging (and a beer that did not last long at all), Fat and Stoopid was certainly not the same as my Phat and Tyred Amber Ale.

And so, I've decided what I'm going to brew next. It is going to be my 7th batch of my world famous Phat and Tyred Amber Ale. I've updated the recipe just a bit, mostly to account for alpha-acid percentages in the willamette and fuggle hops that I have. My recipe is now based on a 5.5 gallon batch instead of 5 gallon.

Washing Yeast for #HomeBrew

I have mentioned before that Billy Broas at BillyBrew.com is one of my favorite beer bloggers. Actually, he probably is my favorite beer blogger. If I were to take beer blogging seriously, his blog would be what I would try to model mine after.

Today, I came across a great post that he did quite awhile ago, and I thought I'd share.

You may have seen me reference on SheppyBrew.com and / or this blog about me harvesting yeast for my home-brews. I've been doing it for some time. People ask me via email, facebook, or online forums from time to time questions about the details behind how I do it. I usually start with urls to a couple of pages that describe the process.

Billy took the explanation to the next level. He did a video about the process. I figured it out from text descriptions on the internet, but it really would have been helpful to have had Billy's video back in June of 2009.

Anyway, Billy did a blog post called "Yeast Washing". The url is http://billybrew.com/yeast-washing . If you are wondering how I harvest yeast, Billy will tell you. Our processes are pretty much identical. This is the link I'm going to give people from now on.



http://billybrew.com/yeast-washing

Arrogant Bastard III

I just listened to CYBI's third Arrogant Bastard clone show (yes, I'm behind on my beer casts). Mitch Steele, Stone's head brewer was there to taste the beer. It was a failed attempt.

Remember I told you (see http://blog.ericshepard.com/2011/04/arrogant-bastard.html) that last time everyone but Tasty called it cloned. They decided to let Mitch and AHA members try the next one at NHC. I thought they had agreed to do that same recipe, but Tasty switched up the recipe a bit. And it was a failure.

I'm so disappointed. I am not really disappointed that it was a failure as I am that Tasty decided to change up the recipe. I was really curious to hear what the brewer thought on a beer that CYBI declared a clone.

So, I'm still considering #2 the recipe.

Here it is again:

OG: 1.066
94.8 IBU
22.5 SRM

90% pale 2 row
10% special B

24g Chinook 85 min
24g Chinook 45 min
24g Chinook 15 min
24g Chinook 0 min

WLP 007 Dry English Ale

148 degrees mash



Again, since I love the description on the back of the bottle:

"This is an aggressive ale. You probably won’t like it. It is quite doubtful that you have the taste or sophistication to be able to appreciate an ale of this quality and depth. We would suggest that you stick to safer and more familiar territory–maybe something with a multi-million dollar ad campaign aimed at convincing you it’s made in a little brewery, or one that implies that their tasteless fizzy yellow beverage will give you more sex appeal. Perhaps you think multi-million dollar ad campaigns make things taste better. Perhaps you’re mouthing your words as you read this. "

2nd Quarter 2011 Brew Stats

The 2nd quarter of 2011 is over, which means it is time to publish another blog post in the continuing series on SheppyBrew's brewing stats (see SheppyBrew 2009 Stats, 1st Quarter Stats, 2nd Quarter Stats, 3rd Quarter Stats, SheppyBrew 2010 Stats, 1st Quarter Brewing Stats).

After the ridiculous amount of beer I brewed in the 1st quarter (just over 32 gallons), this 2nd quarter has been my least busy brewing quarter ever. I only brewed 4 batches, and that is including a double-batch of Gringo Cerveza Cream Ale, where I split the batch into two fermenters and added Jalapeños to one of them. So, in the whole quarter, I've only brewed 3 times. I brewed almost 15 gallons, which is the least amount since I've been keeping track by quarter, but not by too much.

The beers I've done this quarter are:

• Gringo Cerveza Cream Ale
• Gringo Cerveza Jalapeño Cream Ale
• Summer Lovin' American Wheat (blog label Summer Lovin)
• Quarter Life Crisis Hoppy Red Ale (blog label Quarter Life Crisis)

So far in 2011:

• I made 12 batches of beer, which puts me on pace for 24 for the year (33 batches in 2010)
• I have made about 47 gallons of beer, which still puts me on pace for a record-breaking 94 gallons (75 gallons in 2010)
• 6 of the batches were completely new recipes (18 were new in 2010)
• 1 batch was a lager (2 in 2010)
• All the batches were SheppyBrew recipes.
• 1 was a partial mash (9 in 2010)
• The other 11 were all-grain mashes (10 were all-grain in 2010)
• My average cost per 12oz bottle per batch has been $0.52 (I did not really keep this stat for all of 2010, but the average for the 4th quarter was around $0.79).  

Some things of note for the nano-brewery this past quarter:
SheppyBrew now owns 2 kegs, and both Summer Lovin' and Quarter Life Crisis are in my keggerator right now. I obviously like kegging, but I am going to have to continue bottling quite a bit. Corny kegs have really risen in price. Plus, I don't really have room for the number of kegs it would take to have the same kind of variety in my inventory.

I've changed my mash process to be BIAB. As I mentioned in Brew day: Quarter Life Crisis, I am thinking of changing my BIAB process to include a 10 gallon cooler, so that I can do slightly bigger batches. This will also help with cold-weather brewing.

My wife (the SheppyBrew beer model) brewed the Summer Lovin' Wheat with me (see Beer Model Brew Day). I guess that means my brewing month was even less busy as one of those brews, my wife did half the work.

Summer Lovin' American Wheat

 My inventory is still high, but I am not as completely overflowing as I was recently. My wife's family is coming into town this week, so I might get quite a bit of help reducing inventory from them. This will give me an excuse to brew more in the coming months.

Anyway, that was your report on how the SheppyBrew brewery has been going. I know no one cares, but it interests me to look back at these every once and awhile. I am not sure why I have not done this before, but I now have a blog label: Brew Stats to keep all these posts together.

Hula Hooper

Many of you know that the SheppyBrew Beer Model turned 40 over the weekend. One of her gifts was a trip up to the Copper Mountain ski resort for the weekend.

On Saturday, we spent most of our time around the village. We also rode the chair life up the mountain. Copper Mountain's fireworks were Saturday night.

On Sunday, we took our bikes down to Frisco and rode them around Dillon Lake to the Dillon Dam Brewery and then to a playground.

We came home on Monday (the 4th), but not before we went up the chair lift one more time.


Here is a video of the Beer Model hula hooping:

Here are some random photos from the trip:

Over-sized chair

Kids playing checkers

Tiny little snowman

Playground at Copper Mountain

Playground in Dillon

Another kid in over-sized chair

Kids by the fire pit